Web site Prototype Design to Suit the Education and Research Purposes of University Departments

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1 Recent Research Developments in Learning Technologies (00) 0 Web site Prototype Design to Suit the Education and Research Purposes of University Departments B. Prieto, J. L. Bernier, P. Castillo, A. Cañas Departamento de Arquitectura y Tecnología de Computadores ETSI Informática, C/ Periodista Daniel Saucedo s/n Universidad de Granada, Granada Abstract: This paper presents a Web site design that offers widespread access and easy management of education and research information within university departments. The Web site has two main sections: a general access area in the foreground and a content management area in the background with identity-based access. The first provides an easy and structured way of accessing the information, portraying a modern corporate image and design. The second organises the content in a relational database in such a way that information displayed in the general access area is modified, edited or updated through a series of forms. Although the system contains some static HTML content, the majority of the pages are generated using PHP, as it is the more appropriate programming language to create a bridge between the MySQL database and the content displayed on the Web site. This work illustrates the potential that information and communication technologies have in the field of academic administration and management. Keywords: Web services, education information management, Web Server maintenance, MySQL, university administration, Web applications.. Introduction Information technology can aid in the daily running of the education centres in several ways, from computer aided teaching (self teaching and assessment systems [-], for example) to administrative formalities (student registration, classroom allocation, etc) and, of course, teaching and research information management. The present work focuses on this last aspect. Under the Spanish legislation regarding University regulation -Ley de Ordenación Universitaria or LOU- university departments are the bodies responsible for coordinating the teaching of one or more areas of knowledge, in one or more centres, according to the official education program, and for promoting educational or research activities among teachers. With these objectives in mind, we need to take into account the following factors regarding data management: The different types of users: students, professors, administrative staff, as well as organizations and individuals outside the university who also need easy access to the information provided. The range of topics to be included. This will depend on the teaching and research activities of the department in question. In our opinion, a Web site is a cornerstone for achieving the level of quality and excellence which any organization, either official or private, should aspire to meet. Within the context previously outlined, this work focuses on the design and layout of a Web site which aims to cover the wide range of activities which a department performs, constituting a marked example of how information and communication technologies can aid the teaching and research activities as well as enable new functions and services to attain the greatest efficiency. The presented work covers two aspects:

2 B. Prieto et al.: Web site Prototype Design to Suit the Education and Research Purposes of University The presentation on a Web site of the corporate image of an organization and the Web site hierarchy, with the aim of efficiently covering the basic requirements of a given university department, in terms of both information layout and management.. A modular and dynamic Web site design in the form of a relational database with two clearly defined zones: one for general use to access the information in a structured manner, and another with identity-based access for managing the content, with a very user-friendly interface to enable users with basic computer skills to easily update the contents. The rest of this work has the following structure: Section gives a brief description of the Web site structure; Section briefly describes the implementation of the site; and finally, in Section, a series of conclusions are given.. Web Site Structure As has been previously explained, the Web site comprises two different zones: a general access area in the foreground and a content management area in the background, as shown in Figure. In what follows, both are described in detail. Users General Access GUI Foreground PHP Database MySQL Content Management GUI Background Fig.. Diagram of the Web site structure Members with ID. General Access Area The main section of the Web site is the general access area (Figure ), intended to convey a modern corporative image using a stylish and professional design presenting the various Web sections. The right hand margin of the page provides links to the main University divisions related to the department. In the centre of the screen a rotating banner with the last news can be found as well as a row of buttons in the lower part of the screen which link to the Web site s main sections: Introduction, Teaching, Research, Staff, Awards, Links, Others and Restricted Area. The Introduction section gives a brief description of the history of the department and presents its regulations, structure and committees, all of this through static pages. The Teaching section contains hyperlinks to all the subjects taught in the department classified under the following categories: Undergraduate courses, Final year projects: regulations and list of topics for the projects proposed, Postgraduate courses and Additional courses. In this section, teaching projects in which the lecturers and professors participate are also shown: textbooks, papers published on the subject of education in journals or seminars, monographs and lecture notes, among others. On entering the section entitled Undergraduate courses, the user can access a list of degree titles with sublinks to a list of corresponding subjects. Information on each subject is available as well as a link to the online self-teaching system or SWAD [ and ]. The Final year projects section provides students with access to regulations and a list of available topics. The Postgraduate section links the user to a different Web page with the same design and layout. The section marked Additional courses shows the courses offered. They are listed according to the centre that organizes them, and are divided into those already imparted and those planned. In this section, the user can also access a list of innovative projects currently underway or already published. It also includes teaching material produced by members of PHP

3 m-icte department, in other words, textbooks, journal articles, published seminar papers, monographs and lecture notes. Fig.. Web site home page In the section entitled Research, a description of the lines of investigation is given: a summary of the research activities, a list of sponsored projects, I+D+I (National Plan for Scientific Research, Development and Technological Innovation) schemes and regional local government funded projects. The publications are classified under books, chapters, articles in international journals, articles from national seminars and articles from international seminars. The search engine allows the user to browse by year and author fields. This section also includes patents, doctoral thesis carried out or directed by professors of the department and information on invited professors who have collaborated with that department. The section entitled Staff shows the department members directory. It incorporates two drop down lists: one in alphabetical order and another classified in areas or specialization, and includes telephone numbers. Both lists link to a standard personal file which in turn is linked to the private Web site of each member of the staff. Under the Awards section, a list is given of the awards and outstanding academic or research achievements earned by the department or any of its members. The section entitled Links is designed to offer direct access to other sectors connected to that department: companies in the line of computer architecture and technology, departments in the same field, etc. Under the section marked Others, a list is given of the seminars which the department has either organized or taken part in, with links to the corresponding Web pages. It also includes a media coverage section with all the press releases concerning the department. The Others section gives access to statistics regarding the use of the Web site. The contents of the Restricted Area may only be accessed using a password. This section contains freeware available for download, the memorandums of the departmental boards, a photo album and other privileged information which should only be available to the department team. The News section contains a list of recent events organized in date order; which can be accessed by clicking a button displayed in the centre part of the home page, next to the rotating banner showing the latest news headlines.. Content Management Area The information displayed on the Web site is updated through the content management area (Figure ). One area where many Web sites stumble is maintenance. For this reason, special attention has been paid

4 B. Prieto et al.: Web site Prototype Design to Suit the Education and Research Purposes of University... 0 in the design of this area. The basic idea is that the area dedicated to update or insert new content is a Web site on its own, which runs on the background. Each section of the Web site is linked to a database. Therefore, the user only needs to amend the corresponding table in order to introduce any changes or add new data. Fig.. Web site management area The content management system has been designed in such a way that the Web site s administrator is able to assign a password to each member of the department which grants access only to the sections which concern them. On entering the corresponding section, a list of the contents of the associated table is given as well as the option of deleting, editing or adding new information (Figure a). On selecting edit or add new information, the user is asked to fill in a series of data fields (Figure b). The content displayed on the Web site is automatically updated as soon as the data is submitted. Fig.. (a) List of current contents with the option of editing, deleting or adding new data. (b) Data fields to amend or add new information We consider this to be the most effective way of updating information on the Web site for the following reasons: Anyone with minimum computer skills is capable of carrying out updates. The people who generate the information are responsible for updating the Web site, thus avoiding that the task be passed on to a third party.

5 m-icte It does not require the installation of a specific program; the updates can be carried out from any computer with a browser and an Internet connection. No knowledge of HTML programming language is required, since the data is compiled using forms.. Implementation A small part of the Web site displays static type information through documents written in HTML, however, the greater part of the pages are dynamic and their information is read from a MySQL database. JavaScript has also been employed for animation purposes and in the display of certain Web elements. The Web site's management area shows a list of contents in database tables (Figure a) in which information can be modified or inserted through forms (Figure b). The result is a flexible and reliable system that maintains all the necessary information of any given department. PHP has been used as the programming language to connect the Web site to the database since it is very intuitive and specifically designed for this purpose. It allows all the Web site pages to be well structured making maintenance much simpler. In addition, it is also one of the programming languages more frequently used for this type of projects.. Conclusions In this paper, we have presented the implementation of a Web site designed for widespread access and trouble free management and sharing of a university department s teaching and research activities. The system consists on a relational MySQL database, based on tables, which are accessed from two graphic user interfaces (GUI): one public, for users who wish to access departmental information (usually, student, professors and administrative and service staff), and the other for the management of contents, which allows authorised members of the department to easily update the database information through forms. The implemented system fulfils all the specific requirements of a university department. The same concept can be applied to whichever field of education. The aim of the system developed is to provide a modern and corporative design in order to display all the information in a well-structured manner which is easily accessible. We have tried to devise a convenient layout in order to manage the content using modern programming languages and tools to obtain a modular and scalable system easy to update. References [] Andrzejewska, M; Zajoc, M.; Internet bulletin for education (IBE). A web based library for teachers. Advances in Technology-Based Education: Toward a Knowledge-Based Society. Volume II Proceedings of nd International Conference on Multimedia and Information & Communication Technologies in Education (m- ICTE00), pages -. [] Benigno, V; Ott, M; Tavella, M; Netform: building up a virtual teaching community. Advances in Technology- Based Education: Toward a Knowledge-Based Society. Volume II Proceedings of nd International Conference on Multimedia and Information & Communication Technologies in Education (m-icte00), pages -0. [] Cañas, A.; Díaz. A. F.; Prieto, A. Sistema de servicios web de apoyo a la docencia y gestión de una asignatura. VIII Jornadas de Enseñanza Universitaria de la Informática (JENUI'00), ISBN: -00--X, pages -, Cáceres, 00. [] Cañas, A.; Díaz. A. F.; Rodríguez, M.; Bernier, J. L.; Prieto, A. Development and Evaluation of a web-based tool to support university education and administration Information Society and Education: Monitoring a Revolution, Serie Sociedad de la Educación (ISBN: ---), nº, vol., pages -, Ed. Junta de Extremadura, 00. [] Castillo, P.A., Prieto, A., Cañas A., Prieto B.; Autoevaluación a través de Internet por medio de test. Actas IX Jornadas de Enseñanza Universitaria de la Informática (JENUI 00), pages -, Edt. Thomson Paraninfo SA. ISBN: ---; Cádiz 00.