Abstract
The motivation for the project was to manage and produce a project which developed a
property letting website and content management system for seniors specifically for the
Costa Blanca region of Spain. Extensive research was conducted into developing for
seniors, different technologies, current online agencies and the property market in Spain.
Issues in the product have been clearly outlined and effective solutions have been explained
and put in place. A participant testing group of 5 seniors was used through the project and
provided accurate feedback and results in order to supply recommendations for future work.
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,Contents
Description Page Number
Article I. Introduction 4
Article II. Research and Skills 5-6
Article III. Methodology 7
Article IV. Project Management 8-9
Article V. Project Evaluation 10-11
Article VI. Project Conclusion 12
Article VII. Bibliography 13
Article VIII. Appendices
8.01. User Consent Form 14-15
8.02. User Profile 16
8.03. Participant Interview Questions 17
8.04. Participant Interview Findings 18
8.05. Risk Analysis 19
8.06. Test Plan 20
8.07. Proof of Validation 21-24
8.08. Audacity Screen Shot 25
8.09. Meeting Record Sheets 26-31
8.10. Communications Plan 32
8.11. Gantt Charts 33-35
8.12. Requirements Catalogue 36
8.13. Wireframes 37
8.14. Skills Audit 38
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,Article I. Introduction
The aim of the project was to investigate the usability and accessibility requirements the
development of a property website/content management system for long term and short-
term rentals specifically aimed at seniors would demand, and this report will evaluate all
areas of the production project from start to finish.
The report will start by discussing the research and skills applied to the project, evaluating
the main ways research and skills contributed to the selection of product development
methodology and product implementation. Strengths and shortcomings will be indicated and
the successfulness of the product will be fully evaluated.
The report will then focus on the methodology, evaluating the approaches, methods and
techniques used to develop the product and how problems were overcome with effective
solutions. An indication will be made to explain how successful the chosen approaches were
and any alternatives that wereconsidered or changes that were made throughout the
process will be discussed in detailand evaluated.
Moving on to project management, the report will evaluate the effectiveness of the project
management strategies and documents used. References to people involved in the project
will be made and an evaluation will be conducted on how effectively the project went,
working with these users. Supporting documents such as the meeting record sheets and the
project plan will also be discussed in this section.
A detailed evaluation of the product will then be given, taking into consideration the quality,
difficulty, originality and usefulness of the product. Testing documents and details of how
issues during development were resolved and alternative methods and skills which were
applied during implementation will be explained.
The report will finish with a project conclusion which explains how the project linked to the
initial objectives and outcomes, including a review of the initial planning, research, selection
of methodology and issues which arose during implementation, testing and evaluation.
The conclusion will also include recommendations for how the project would have been
completed differently and it will define future work that could be added to the project to
further refine and develop current outcomes. A reflection of the project will then be made,
emphasising what has been learnt from the process and a bibliography and the appendices
will be found at the end of the document.
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, Article II. Research and Skills
The research conducted throughout the project included investigating seniors using the web,
looking at their attitudes towards the web and examining any accessibility issues they may
be faced with. By conducting an interview focusing on two websites built specifically with
seniors it mind, it showed that the majority of seniors would benefit from websites which
featured more accessibility functions.
The research conducted was an ongoing process throughout the project and this was used
to derive a set of requirements which was followed during the implementation stage. Luckily
the research undertaken provided a strong framework and was a particular strength of the
project, along with the documentation produced.
A lot of the requirements were obtained from the National Institute of Aging guidelines to
developing for seniors, for example the use of high-contrast colour combinations, the use of
a text resizing button and the use of a speech function to have the text read aloud. (National
Institute of Aging, 2002)
The skills used to develop the product were the use of HTML, CSS and PHP along with
integrated Ajax and JavaScript features and functions. PHP was chosen due to the fact it is
a popular, quick and free open source language, with a lot of support online which means
problems can be easily fixed. (Taei, P, 2013)
A skills audit was produced early on in the planning of the project which can be found in
appendix 8.14, however as the project was underway it was easy to see how the estimated
skills was not as strong as originally thought for example the skill level of PHP was estimated
at an 8 but during development it was clear that this should have been estimated at around a
6.
Project management skills was estimated at a 9 but this again proved to be lower in reality
and the main focus from the skills audit was to improve presentation skills but the option to
present the product sitting down was given so this was no longer necessary.
The bootstrap framework was researched during the early stages of the project and decided
on, due to the fact that the templates are built with responsive design, meaning all the media
queries are all ready set, it provides a quicker development process and there is plenty room
for customization. (Blogoftheworld, 2014)
The choice to use a bootstrap template worked well and saved a lot of time during the early
stages of development. However a lack of technical skills in advanced PHP was a
shortcoming in the product, due to the fact certain technical expectations could not be met
and certain pre-build functions in JavaScript and Ajax were not functioning appropriately; this
proved difficult to fix, due to a lack of knowledge in these areas, although alterations were
made and simple solutions were put in place to ensure most, if not all requirements were
met.
Another shortcoming which was apparent throughout the implementation stage of the
product was the lack of skills to manage a project effectively, which will be discussed in
detail later on in the report.
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