Sunday, 21 December 2008

Coursework - Evaluation

By completing this coursework I have gain my knowledge on how to use technologies such as PHP, AJAX technique including JavaScript, DOM, XMLHttpRequest and html and mysql database as a platform.

At first I found difficulties on how to start designing and implementing the system because I was not really clear what the system supposes to do. It was because I did not attend lecture nor tutorial in week 2 which the hand out date for the coursework. This was because I had religious commitment (Ramadan celebration). But then I was being able to catch up by asking lots of question to my friend (Zak).

Start by analysing the system requirement, creating ERD, state diagram to the development the system (it was week 5 I could manage to start properly and know what I have to do for the system).

Learning Ajax technique is really exiting not only it has many advantages but also it has been proven that the well known website is using this technique. At the beginning Ajax is straightforward as long as you have background knowledge on how to use javascript especially you understand to replace an element inside particular page. Then it use DOM and XMLHttpRequest to get data from the server. However As I went deep into the system I found difficulities and time consuming on how to write Javascript inside PHP script to call a function (perform ajax technique) from javascript page. Such as:

echo "<tr><td>&nbsp;</td><td align='right'><a href='editContent.php?materialId=$row[m_id]'>Edit </a></td>";

echo "<td align='right'>";

echo "<div ";

echo "onclick = 'getDataReturnText(" ;

echo '"deleteMaterial.php?m_id=" + ' ;

echo "$m_id ," ;

echo " callback2)'>" ;

echo "<a href ='#'><img src='images/delete.png' /></a>";

echo "</div>";

echo "</td>";

echo "</tr>";

 

Other problem that I found is that I could not really focused on the course work as well as the tutorial exercise because I was thinking about my final project all the time. My project is to develop Web content management system using AJAX as a module in the system. Instead of finishing the coursework I was building prototype for my project and trying to make the prototype work. I think I have to more careful on organizing my time so that I could manage the time better in the future.

The other thing is that the blog is making me lazy to upload works that I have done during the week. This is because I found difficulties to organize the content whereas Microsoft word is different.

Overall coursework is excellent for me; a lot of new material has been learnt. Clear understanding on how the web is working as well as how to design and develop the system.

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