Courseware for Observational Research v3

Overview

Our problem that was given to us by our sponsors of Penn State Behrend was to revamp and revitalize an old depreciated educational software. COR v2 was designed to run off QuickTime videos which now pose a security risk to most school internet systems, so the software has become unusable. The software is useful and unique enough to warrant a revamp.

Objectives

Our objective was not just to simply remake a system that has the same functionality, it was to upgrade the system. Make it web based for accessibility and make it flexible by dynamically creating and loading lessons, case studies, and laboratories. It will also have a dynamically loaded and flexible glossary.

Approach

• Gather requirements from our industry mentors.
• Ask pointed questions regarding the use cases of the software to better understand.
• Extract user functional requirements and non-functional requirements from the data gained.
• Browse through the original software, noting component possibilities and how to meet newly acquired requirements.
• Research other options on the market, make sure the software isn’t already developed by someone else. 
• Read documentation regarding modules that are available for the chosen platform. If a task seems too hard there is probably a library that can help.
• Draw out high level designs and start implementation based of test-driven development. 
• Test a known needed functionality until the test results come back as a pass.
• Double check the created component with the original software, making sure functionality is maintained.

Repeat the process until system is fully built out.

Outcomes

• A functional and unique educational software that can be used on a multitude of topics and systems. 
• Once made, lessons will make teaching time more effective, and efficient as these lessons can be done from anywhere by the student.
• Project made headway for the potential future of this software type, dynamic creation of lessons without the need of additional tools.
• Below is pictured a Case Study, as well as an edit being made to said Case Study.