INFM 603: Information Technology and Organizational Context (Fall 2013)

Assignment 0 due September 5

Note: This assignment is due on the first day of classes, which means that you should have completed the assignment prior to our first class meeting. Although this assignment will not be graded, it is important that you complete it successfully on time to avoid falling behind.

Assignments for this course will be "handed in" as web pages, and in this assignment you'll create a homepage for INFM 603. You'll "hand in" subsequent assignments by adding new pages linked from your homepage.

If you've never created a website before, these instructions will show you how to create and upload your first web page on your TerpConnect account. Alternatively, if you already have a web site elsewhere and would like that use that instead, feel free to do so.

Download and install Sublime Text (latest version is 2.0.2). An evaluation license to use the software is free. This is the text editor we'll be using throughout the semester. If you're already comfortable with some other text editor, you're welcome to use that.

Create a file named index.html (all letters lowercased) with the following contents:

<html>
<head><title>Hello World!</title></head>
<body>
<p>Hello world! I'm Jimmy. Welcome to my INFM 603 homepage!</p>
</body>
</html>

Instead of my name, substitute your own!

You should be able to open up the file in a web browser and see a very rudimentary webpage. Next, we're going to upload it to your TerpConnect account.
Download one of following FTP clients, depending on your operating system:
- Fetch (Mac OS X)
- WinSCP (Windows)
Now follow these instructions to upload index.html onto the server. Put the file in the folder /pub/USERID/INFM603/ (where USERID is your Directory ID). Note that the directory probably doesn't exist initially, so you'll have to create it. For additional details, see this page for Fetch (Mac OS X) and this page for WinSCP (Windows).
If you've completed these steps successfully, you should be able to navigate to your TerpConnect homepage for INFM 603: http://terpconnect.umd.edu/~jimmylin/INFM603/. Obviously, the URL for your homepage should have your Directory ID, not mine.
To complete this assignment, send me an email with your name and the URL of your INFM 603 homepage. Note that this URL will either be of the form above (unless you've decided to host your page elsewhere, which is fine also).

Assignment 1 due September 12

"Turn in" this assignment by creating a new web page that contains answers to these questions. This page should be linked from your course homepage (the URL you gave me in Assignment 0).

Consider the specifications of a laptop that you might consider buying:

Processor: 2.5GHz dual-core Intel Core i5
Hard drive: 500 GB, random access time of 10 ms
RAM: 4 GB, 100 ns access time
Peripherals: DVD-RW

Although we talked about modern processors having multiple cores, for this assignment assume that all operations are performed by a single core. To simplify calculations, you can assume that 1 megabyte is 1,000,000 (one million) bytes, 1 gigabyte is 1,000,000,000 (one billion) bytes, etc.

Answer the following questions:

If you buy some 4.7 GB DVDs, how many would you need to back up a full hard drive to DVDs (assuming no compression)? Do you think it's convenient to back up your hard drive onto DVDs?
Now let's see how much stuff that hard drive can hold. Assume you have access to the following information for all 314 million people in the United States:
- Name: 40 characters
- Phone Number: 10 characters
- SSN: 9 characters
- taxes owed: one four-byte number
Assume that each character is stored in one byte.

Would all of these data fit on the hard drive of the laptop described above? If not, how big a hard drive would you need? If so, what fraction of the disk would this fill?
Now let's see how long it would take to read that much data off the disk. Assume you have a hard drive large enough to store all the data.

Suppose you wanted to add up the taxes owed by all 310 million people. Assume that you access the data in a random order, and that you start a new disk access for each person (in the specifications above I have provided the latency of disk access). How long would it take to access all the data?
Assume for the sake of comparison that all of this data could fit in RAM.

How long would it take to access all the data from RAM (in the same manner as above: reading data in a random order, one person at a time)? In the specifications above I have provided the latency of RAM access.
Which is faster, RAM or the hard disk? By how much?
Now let's see how long it would take to move the bits around.

How long would it take to move the contents of your entire hard drive to your friend's computer in California over a dial-up modem? Over broadband? Overnight mail? Note that this question requires you to figure out what the speeds of each of those techniques are. Cite your sources.

When you are done, your course homepage (i.e., the link you sent me in Assignment 0) should contain a link a page which has these answers. There is nothing to explicitly turn in; I'll look at your assignment directly over the web.

Assignment 2 due September 19

The purpose of this assignment is to exercise the HTML and CSS skills learned in class. On this very simple page you'll find a list of red and white wines (Credit for the wine descriptions goes to Total Wine). Build a simple wine catalog website that contains that content. Your site should have at least three inter-connected pages: a main page, a page for red wines, and a page for white wines. These pages should contain all information from the source page above, but you are welcome to add in whatever additional content to "round out" the site. When you are done, your course homepage (i.e., the link you sent me in Assignment 0) should contain a link to the main page of this wine catalog.

Note that each wine comes with regular, structured data such as type, price, image, description, etc. It is expected that you will use appropriate markup to organize the data, such as tables, lists, etc. It is also expected that you use CSS to control the style of elements on your site. Your assignment will be graded in terms of technical execution (e.g., use of appropriate HTML elements) as well as esthetics (e.g., the overal flow of the site, organization of material, etc.).

For extra credit, design the site using Bootstrap, which is the collection of HTML/CSS tools used for this course website.

Assignment 3 due September 26

Write the following two programs and post links to your solution on your homepage. Each solution should be its own web page:

Create a web page with a JavaScript program that computes the future value of an initial investment that receives x% interest per year after n years. Feel free to use this template as a starting point (the page currently does not work, but it lets you know where you should put your code). Wikipedia provides a refresher on compound interest.
Create a web page with a JavaScript program that computes the minimum number of years that an initial investment will at least double at a particular interest rate per year. As with above, feel free to use this template.

Note that although it is possible to compute the answers directly, you are required to use loops, as that is the point of the exercise.

Hint: We learned about two different types of loop constructs in class. One provides a natural solution to one of the questions; the other provides a natural solution to the other question.

Assignment 4 due October 3

In this assignment, you will start with the two pages you created for assignment 3 and add to them. In addition to showing the final answer (for part 1 and part 2), each page will also show a table with the value of the investment over time.

For example, in part 1, if I set the interest rate to 7% and number of years to 10, I should see something like this:

year	amount
1	1070
2	1144.9
3	1225.0430000000001
4	1310.7960100000003
5	1402.5517307000005
6	1500.7303518490005
7	1605.7814764784307
8	1718.186179831921
9	1838.4592124201556
10	1967.1513572895667

Your JavaScript program will have to manipulate the DOM and add table rows programmatically. Note that if I enter a particular set of values, and then another set of values, the table should only show results from the most recent computation—this means that you have to make sure the table is "cleared" before each computation begins.

Note that although it is possible to compute the answers directly, you are required to use loops, as that is the point of the exercise.

Assignment 5 due October 10

For this assignment, start with the wine as objects (part 3) demo. Modify the program in the following ways:

The demo only displays five wines. Add in content for all ten wines in the template from assignment #2. There is no need to include the wine description, e.g., "Elegant, Cherry, Raspberry, Medium-bodied..."
The demo only displays the name of the wine and its price in the table. Modify the program so that it displays all of the object's properties (name, image, location, varietal, price). Note that the table should show the image of the wine. There is no need to include the description.
The discount button currently discounts prices by $1.00 each time. Add a text box (note, not an alert box) where you can input how much to discount the wines by each time you click the button. Note that per the exercises in class, discount() should be a method of the object, not a function.
Implement a button that is the exact opposite of the discount method: it raises prices of the wines. There should be a text box that allows the user to enter how much to raise prices by. This should be implemented as a method, not a function.
Add some CSS to change the appearance of the page so it does not look so "plain".

Assignment 6 due October 17

In this assignment you'll be working with a simple SQL database engine called SQLite. Download SQLite Manager, which is an add-on to Firefox (so you'll need to get it first if you haven't already).

We'll be working with the database Chinook_Sqlite.sqlite, which is the Chinook Database (version 1.4). You'll find the database schema very helpful as you go about these exercises.

Open Firefox and start the SQLite Manager (under the Tools menu). You should now be able to open Chinook_Sqlite.sqlite, downloaded from above.

For the assignment, answer the following questions. For each, provide both the answer and the SQL statement you used to compute the answer.

What's the total revenue (i.e., sum of all the invoices)?
How much in total was InvoiceId 404? (Answer this question with the Invoice table)
How much in total was InvoiceId 404? (Answer this question with only the InvoiceLine table)
How many times did John Gordon make a purchase?
Each time John Gordon made a purchase, on average how much does he spend?
How much as John Gordon spent in total?
What are the names of the songs that John Gordon has purchased? How many of them are there?
How many employees are also customers?
Who are the 5 top spenders (customers who have spent the most money) and how much have they each spent?

Assignment 7 due October 24

In this assignment you'll be building on the Chinook PHP demo application presented in class. Modify the application in the following ways:

Currently, there is a functionality to search by artist. Searching by artist will return all the tracks by that artist and what album the track is from. Modify the PHP search script so that in addition to the artist, album, and track, the price is also displayed. Also, the search results should include the total cost of buying all the tracks in the list of results.
Add the ability to search by track name. That is, the user should be able to enter a track name in a form, and a PHP script will return a results page containing all tracks with that name, with artist and album names.
The current application interface looks very primitive. Redesign the overall site, making use of CSS so it doesn't look so "plain".

To submit this assignment, your course homepage should contain a link to your live web application.

Final Project

The final project is an open-ended assignment designed to demonstrate your mastery of technologies introduced in class. You may work individually or in teams of up to three people. However, my expectations for the scope and complexity of the project will be commensurate with the size of the group. In rough terms, I expect a level of effort comparable to three homework assignments, multiplied by the number of people in your group.

There are two aspects of the final project:

The project must meet some real need. That is, it should be useful for something, for someone, or for some purpose.
The project must substantively exercise many of the technologies introduced in class. It is expected that you will engage in some amount of self-learning beyond the material covered in lectures and assignments.

More details will be discussed in class and you will be given an opportunity to ask questions.

Before the class session on November 7th, a project proposal will be due, via email to me. The proposal should contain a few, succinct paragraphs addressing the following:

stating who the project group members are, or if you're working alone;
what the purpose of the project is (what problem are you trying to solve, who are you trying to help, etc.);
what technologies you plan to use.
on what date you would like to present (see below).

Only one email per group is needed. I will provide feedback on the appropriateness of the scope of the project and the use of technology.

Final Project Presentation

The class sessions on December 5 and December 12 will be devoted to final project presentations. Note that there are advantages and disadvantages to either presentation date: with the earlier date, you get the project "out of the way", which will likely allow you to focus on other classes you may be taking. The later date, of course, gives you an extra week; I will also expect a somewhat more refined project given the extra time. I will take into account your preferences to schedule the presentations and send you the schedule ahead of time. Note that you're giving me preferences: I'll determine the final schedule based on balance across the two sessions and other factors.

Each group will be allotted a presentation slot based on the number of group members: 10 minutes if you are working by yourself and 15 minutes for a team of two or three. How you decide to use the presentation time is completely up to you, but my recommendation would be to start with a (short) presentation using slides to set up the context, and then provide a demo of your project. Some of the topics that would be appropriate to cover in your presentation (either in slides or as part of the demo) might be:

What is the purpose of the project? What does it do? Who is it intended for?
Overview of the architecture, for example, the data model if you're using SQL.
Overview of key features.
Any lessons learned in building the project: Was there something you would have done differently? What worked particularly well? No so well?

Please arrive a few minutes early to class to test out the projector.

Project Grading

The deliverable for the final project is an email (one from each group) containing the following information:

Slides used during the presentation (if any).
URL for the project, along with any instructions, e.g., how to log in (if applicable), a feature you want to highlight, etc. Please note that the project must remain operational until at least the end of the semester so I can explore its functionality.

The email containing this information is due on the day of your presentation session.

The final project grade will consist of the following components:

Technology (6 points): Does the project demonstrate appropriate use of technology?
Design (3 point): Does the project demonstrate good visual design?
Content (3 points): Does the project contain an appropriate amount of content?
Presentation (3 points): Does the presentation clearly provide an overview of the project?

All the component scores sum to 15 points. The final project will be worth 35% of your course grade.

Assignments INFM 603 (Fall 2013)