Assessment 2 Project - Transtutors...large rural town, for a report into the business need or opportunity in computerising some or all of the day to day business of the video store

IT Requirements Specification- Assessment Task 2 LAST UPDATED: March 2015, Version No. 2

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Assessment 2 – Project

Instructions:

Trainer may decide whether this will be an individual or a group assessment.

You need to complete all the tasks successfully to get “Satisfactory” in this assessment.

IT Solutions is a (fictional) software company.

Your tasks in this assessment will be based on a project this company will perform for a video rental store.

Duration:

Trainer will set the duration of the assessment.


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Your tasks:

What's happening at IT Solutions?

You have been employed as a systems analyst by the software company IT Solutions. This company provides software solutions to small businesses that do not have their own information technology personnel. It has a staff of systems analysts, programmers and testers, as well as the necessary support staff.

The company has received a request from John Vandrine, owner of Diamond Video Rentals, a video store in a large rural town, for a report into the business need or opportunity in computerising some or all of the day to day business of the video store with the aim of making it more efficient and providing better customer service.

Moreover the recent releases of cheaper DVD TV Recorders and Media Player devices have led the company to expand from their Melbourne base into the Sydney market, with a new business department in Sydney to establish a foothold in that market.

Congratulations! You have now been assigned to work on the Diamond Video project.

You will be working with Mary Adams (the Project Manager) who will be providing you with advice to assist you in meeting the client’s business needs. Initial meetings have been held with the client and the following is the Initial Project Brief for Diamond Video Rentals and the minutes of an interview conducted by Mary Adams with John Vandrine.


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Initial Project Brief for Diamond Video Rentals Introduction Diamond Video Rentals is a small business that has been operating in a large country town for five years. Its main business is to rent videos to its members. There are approximately 5000 members and 10,000 videos in stock. In the early years the business grew steadily however, in the last year, growth in members and rentals has not occurred. Business Details The business is owned and managed by John Vandrine. There are six permanent staff and up to six casual staff. Of the permanent staff, Deb Papadopoulos and Dawn Schultz are the most experienced and supervise the running of the store, one on each shift. Danny Jones, Paul Trang, Mae Willis and Terry De Santo are also permanents and at least two of them are rostered on each shift. Ted Sloan is responsible for the accounting and purchasing functions of the business and Mary Johnson handles preparation of the rosters and payroll. The accounting function is currently computerised, using an accounting software package. All other functions are still performed manually. John Vandrine also manages the business. This involves planning and decision making regarding the business, and resolving problems and issues that arise, such as customer complaints that cannot be resolved by the staff. Deb and Dawn work mainly at the counter, handling rentals, bookings and over dues. Danny, Terry, Paul and Mae spend much of their time shelving videos and any other duties as directed. The casuals perform both counter work and reshelving tasks. Problem The population of the town has grown steadily in the last two years and another video store opened in the town six months ago, which, whilst not as old or as big as Diamond Video Rentals, has grown rapidly in the short period. John Vandrine is concerned that the business has not grown in line with the town’s growth and patronage seems to be static or even in a slight decline. Also, customer complaints seem to be increasing. With the advent of the new video store, John is keen to increase the competitiveness of his business. John has asked IT Solutions to perform an investigation into the benefits of computerising the day-to-day business of the video store.


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Minutes of interview - Diamond Video Rentals

Date: Monday 12th

June 200X, 2.00pm

Present: John Vandrine, owner of Diamond Video Rentals

Mary Adams, Systems Analyst, IT Solutions

John believes that his business is not growing in line with expectations, based on the growth of the town. His measures of growth include:

Profit - down about 2% last year on the previous year. Mainly due to a decline in revenue. Expenses remained pretty much the same.

Number of members. Perception that the number of members has declined. Difficult to tell as members do not let you know they are leaving, they just do not come back. Not attracting new members as well as in the past.

Number of rentals. Once again, difficult to determine, but feeling is that this is static or declining slightly.

John attributes the lack of growth or possible decline to competition from the new video store in town.

Some customer complaints include:

the lengthy time it takes to answer queries, such as whether a particular video is available

inaccurate information, such as indicating a video is available when it is not

customers booking videos and not being notified when they are available

the time it takes to process a video rental.

Two other areas of particular concern are:

Over dues - slow in following up overdue videos. Should be done daily, but sometimes more pressing tasks take precedence. A charge is levied on over dues, but not retrieving the videos as soon as they are due means that someone else misses out, and this causes member dissatisfaction.

Decisions affecting future directions, marketing strategy etc. are made based on 'gut feeling' rather than solid fact. The data about such things is in the card files, but is too cumbersome to extract.

The accounting system is computerised – a popular software package is currently used. Both the computer and the package are several years old but continue to work effectively. There are no current problems with the payroll or purchasing operations.

Much of the staff’s time is spent keeping the card records of members and videos up to date. Based on recent observation it is estimated that the equivalent of one third of a staff member's time is spent recording this information. Using an average salary of $30,000 per year, approximately $10,000 can be allocated against record keeping.

A maximum budget of $30,000 is available for this project, and a solution is required within a couple of months if possible.


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Diamond Video Rentals - Minutes of JAD Session

Date: Monday 20th

March 2XXX, 2.00pm

Present: John Vandrine, owner of Diamond Video Rentals

Deb Papadopoulos, Dawn Schultz, Ted Sloan

Systems Analyst, IT Solutions

Purpose

Review the scope of the system as outlined in the interview with John Vandrine.

Identify more detail of the data and processes required.

Get agreement from the team that we are proposing a solution which will work well for all aspects of the business and that the staff are comfortable with using.

Identify requirements raised outside the scope as components to be developed later if cost justified, ensuring that the design allows for easy later additions.

Output

Functions to be developed Data requirements

Create a customer database Customer no, name, phone, address

Create a video database Video no., name, classification, storage location, availability for rental or sale

Customer/Video link Customer no., video no., date due, date booked

Overdue video report Date due > current date, video no., title, customer name

Reserved video report Date booked, video no., title, customer name

Mail out to customers of advertised specials

Customer name, address, labels, special information sheet

Automatic links to accounting system

May be a later enhancement to the system?

Review available titles over the internet

May be a later enhancement to the system?

Reserve titles over the internet May be a later enhancement to the system?

Low activity customers report Customer no., date last rented, number of videos rented

Slow moving videos report Video no., date last rented, date purchased, number of days rented

Reshelving list for returned videos

Video no., title, storage location

Access cards for new customers Customer

Card swipe customer recognition and title link

Customer no. from card reader, title from bar code reader. Allow for linking multiple titles in one transaction


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The last two requirements may be outside the initial scope but the staff’s feels that speeding up the customer interaction will solve some customer satisfaction issues not previously raised by the owner.

Actions

John will review the initial budget and possible timing of implementation.

IT Solutions will review the capacity of the current hardware to accommodate the required functionality of the proposed system.

IT Solutions will draw up sample screen and report layouts for further review with the staff.

Requirements outline for the new North Sydney Office

The new office will have the following staff:

1 office assistant/customer service clerk

1 manager

6 sales staff

You will need to install a LAN for the new office. The manager has requested the following:

Microsoft Windows XP Professional as the workstation operating system

Microsoft Office XP to be installed on all the workstations

Anti-virus software to be installed on all the workstations

Accounting software to be installed.

The manager has also requested to be able to do the following:

Share folders and resources on the network

Print to one printer from all of the workstations on the network

Share an Internet connection.

The operating system for the server has not been specified (use your judgement).

Additional documents attached:

The whole network installation summary—provides the template to use when organising processes when dealing with a new network installation or a major change in an existing network.

Hardware evaluation spread sheet—provides the template to use when objectively evaluating hardware.

The layout diagram for the new North Sydney office —shows existing infrastructure that will be built on for the new network.

The users identification register —shows user IDs (log in names), with full names and levels of access to folders that apply to each user.

The Diamond Video IT standards and procedures manual — has policies and procedures for many aspects of the organisation.


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You need to document all your answers including the diagrams in a MS Word document and submit to your Trainer.


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Your tasks:

1. Develop an organisation chart for the Diamond Video Rentals Company, presented in a word

processor document (e.g. MS Word).

2. Create a document confirming the networking requirements, including but not limited to:

1. the number of new users

2. current networking equipment used

3. current licenses available for the different software needed

4. any other information that may be needed to plan the network additions.

3. Derive a Requirement Elicitation Process for IT Solutions which could be applied to analyse Diamond Video Rentals requirements.

The process must address-

1. Requirement Elicitation Process

Description/purposes of this process

1.1. Prepare for Elicitation

Purpose- What is the purpose of this task?

Input- What are the inputs to this task?

Techniques- What are the techniques you going to use for this task?

Stakeholders- Who are the stakeholders for this task? Output- what are the outputs from this task? 1.2. Conduct Elicitation Activity Purpose- What is the purpose of this task?



Stakeholders- Who are the stakeholders for this task? Output- what are the outputs from this task?

1.3. Document Elicitation Results Purpose- What is the purpose of this task?



Stakeholders- Who are the stakeholders for this task? Output- what are the outputs from this task?

1.4. Confirm Elicitation Results




Stakeholders- Who are the stakeholders for this task?


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Output- what are the outputs from this task? 2. Conclusion Process outcome/Summary

4. Develop a Stakeholder Requirement Analysis Process for IT Solutions considering Diamond Video Rental’s network installation project.

The process document must contain:

1. Stakeholder Requirement Analysis

Description/purposes of this process

1.1. Prioritise requirements




Elements- What are the factors/criteria to be considered for this task? Output- what are the outputs from this task? 1.2 Organise requirements Purpose- What is the purpose of this task?



Elements- What are the factors/criteria to be considered for this task? Output- what are the outputs from this task?

1.3 Specify and model requirements Purpose- What is the purpose of this task?




1.4 Define assumptions and constraints




Elements- What are the factors/criteria to be considered for this task? Output- what are the outputs from this task? 1.5. Verify requirements Purpose- What is the purpose of this task?


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Elements- What are the factors/criteria to be considered for this task? Output- what are the outputs from this task? 1.6. Validate requirements Purpose- What is the purpose of this task?




2 Conclusion

Process outcome/Summary

5. Develop a hardware evaluation sheet (use the template provided) detailing products from the different vendors (suppliers) that are identified for the above equipment. Identify the networking equipment (not workstations or server) that will be needed for the new site. Identify at least TWO suppliers for this equipment and get prices and details of availability.

6. Develop a network installation plan for the new North Sydney office, in which you:

5. Identify the components required to meet the technical requirements of the user’s network.

6. Prioritise the tasks involved and contingency plans to achieve minimum business disruption or delay with the installation.

7. Identify the appropriate people and obtain approval for plans including security clearance and schedule.

7. Develop a Test Plan for the above installation. The test plan should:

8. list the function or service to be tested, and within each function or service, list items to be tested in sequence

9. list the procedure to test each item and the expected results of the test procedure

10. provide for documenting actual test results with comments

Also provide examples to show how the test plan will work.


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8. Document change impact analysis for Diamond Video Rental using following template:

General Information: General Information includes name of the project and owner

Impact Summary: Impact Summary includes a descriptive statement of the

change and detailed description of the impact listed

Impacted Stakeholders: Impacted Stakeholders are assessed for the level of impact

they may experience:

High: The change has significant impact to the stakeholder

including new processes, changed job expectations, and/or

new ways of doing work

Medium: The change has a noticeable impact to the stakeholder but the job and /or way of

doing work fundamentally remains the same

Low: The change may be recognized by the stakeholder but

does not directly change the way of doing work

Change: This section asks what kind of change is taking place;

Process: what will change with respect to current activities,

workflows and procedures

People: who will perform new/revised processes, workflows,

activities

Tech/Tools: what tools will be needed and how will these

tools be used

Change Management Needs: This section outlines the key change management needs:

Communications: list potential communication and

socialisation efforts needed due to the change

Training/Learning: list potential training/learning needed due

to the change

Organisational/HR: list any HR activities needed due to the

change

Comments: Additional comments pertaining to change may be

documented

11. Document the business requirements for Diamond Video Rentals in a Business Requirements Document (BRD) format.

12. Your BRD report is to summarise your findings and is required to be outlined as specified below:

13. Cover page identifying all team members

14. Version Control and Signoff

15. Table of Contents

16. Executive Summary

17. Introduction


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18. Company Description

19. Problem Definition which includes:

20. Business Need

21. List of Stakeholders and their roles

22. Scope

23. Business Objectives

24. Available Resources

25. Constraints

26. List of Assumptions

27. Specific Requirements including:

28. Functional Requirements

29. Non Functional Requirements

30. Conclusion

31. Glossary

32. Outline strategies of gaining client’s sign-off on project completion.

Documents

Assessment 2 Project - Transtutors...large rural town, for a report into the business need or opportunity in computerising some or all of the day to day business of the video store