Smart Medical System: Project Scope And SDLC Methodologies

Discussion on Project Schedule

Discuss about the Smart Medical System.

ACT Medical Center (AMC) and Canberra Software Development (CSD) are developing Smart Medical System or SMS in short. Project staff will include designer, analyst, tester and programmer from both the centers. Two technical staff members from each centre are assigned initially. Two developers from both the teams are assigned to develop programs using the Object Oriented Programming or OOP. In addition, a part time nurse will assign from the medical centre. The new Smart Medical System will contain many specifications that will help the centers to maintain and manage everything smoothly. The objective of this report is to understand the scope of the project and the selection of the Software Development Life Cycle methodologies and the four types of techniques, tools and models to support the activities and tasks of SMS development.

The analysis report outlines a brief introduction about the scope of the project. It also includes the tools and techniques to support the SMS development activities. The impact of the selection of any methodology directly affects any project. The analysis report contains the SDLC methodology that is to be used for SMS development (Wells, 2012). It also outlines the advertisement of a junior analyst that is needed for this project. Suitable recommendations are provided in the report with a brief conclusion. The description of the discussion is given in the following paragraphs.

The project schedule is the technique, which communicates what task is necessary to be executed, which resources of the company will execute the task and the time limit in which that particular task needs to be executed. The project schedule represents the entire task that are associated with submitting and delivering the project within time limit. Project schedule is extremely reasonable and important for this particular project as time limit will help the project to complete it within time or even before time. A given slot of time will also reduce and stop the use of excess resources for the project (Tuteja & Dubey, 2012). Since the SMS project is related to patients, there is always an urgency to complete this project. SMS project will allow the doctors, nurses, receptionist and the management staff at the AMC to view patient history and schedule appointments using any laptop or computer inside or outside the centers. It will even upgrade the centre webpage, which will allow the patients to book appointments with the doctors via online. The third salient feature of this project is to develop a mobile application using the android studio that will allow the patients to pay bills and book appointments through that particular application.  Therefore, this project is tremendously important for both the centers and thus project schedule is reasonable in this case.

SDLC Methodologies

The systems development life cycle or SDLC, which is also referred to as the application development life cycle, is an expression utilized in software engineering, information systems, and systems engineering to outline a process for testing, creating, planning, and installing an information system (Unuakhalu, 2014). There are generally six different types of Systems Development Life Cycle methodologies. They are as follows:

1. Waterfall Model: This is the simplest and the oldest SDLC methodology (Model, 2015). In this model, at first a phase is finished, and then another phase is started.
2. V-Shaped Model: This model is known as V-shaped model because the execution of the processes in this model happens in a sequential V-shape manner.
3. Iterative Model: The iterative model focuses on the simple implementation that gains more complexity and a larger set of aspects until the system is completed.
4. Spiral Model: This model is a risk driven process model generator for different software projects (Rastogi, 2015). This model helps the project to identify its risks and challenges.
5. Big Bang Model: This particular model of SDLC does not have any specific process. The benefit of this model is that due to no specific process, the implementation of this model is extremely easy for any project.
6. Agile Model: This SDLC model is the amalgamation of incremental and the iterative process models with the focus on customer satisfaction and adaptability of processes (Matharu et al., 2015).

Smart Medical System or SMS needs a suitable SDLC methodology to complete the project (Mishra & Dubey, 2013). Software Development Life Cycle can be broadly classified into three categories. They are as follows:

Predictive methodology

1. b) Adaptive methodology
2. c) Mixed methodology

In this particular case study of SMS project, predictive methodology would be suitable to make the project complete soon. A predictive methodology is such a methodology that can predict the result of the project. It should contain three characteristics. The first feature is to support the design of the software proposed, so that it can meet the needs of the project (Sabale & Dani, 2012). The second aspect is to support the construction of the software to reach the specific design of the project. The third and the last characteristic of predictive methodology is to support the deployment of the software to the production of the software.

The example of predictive methodology is the Waterfall model. This particular model is the oldest and the simplest model that can be implemented in a sequential manner (Bassil, 2012). There are eight different phases of this model. They are as follows:

Conception

1. ii) Initiation

 Analysis

1. iv) Design
2. v) Construction
3. vi) Testing

Implementation

Maintenance.

The main advantage of this model is that the second step starts only when the first step executes. SMS project is a big project that has many steps. Waterfall model will be beneficial for this project as after completion of one-step, the other step will start (Balaji & Murugaiyan, 2012). This will maintain a sequential manner in the steps of the project and will make the project free from errors.

Waterfall model will be the best choice for Smart Medical System project as it has different steps that will make the project easier to implement (Alshamrani & Bahattab, 2015). The detailed activities of this particular model in the SMS project are as follows:

1. i) Conception: This is the first step of this model. In this step, the specific analyst proposes the conception of the project. He/she will bring the concept of this particular project and his/her proposition is selected amongst all other possible conceptions.
2. ii) Initiation: After the first step is completed, that is the concept of the SMS project is selected, the project work starts. In the initiation step, the planning of the SMS project starts. Success of a project depends on its planning (Clarke & O’Connor, 2012). Therefore, this step is extremely beneficial for any project.

Analysis: The analysis of a project is done in this phase. The tools, techniques and the methods of SMS project is done in the analysis step.

1. Design: The design of the project is created in this phase. AMC and CSD will assign four technical officers to check the technical field of SMS project. Moreover, two developers will be assigned to develop the programs using Object Oriented Programming. The design is the USP of this project. The design should be in such a way that it meets all the requirements and the necessities of the project (Gupta, 2014). The requirements includes the medical and the management staff to access and view patient history with any computers, upgrade the centre webpage to allow the patients to book appointments of doctors online and also develop an application in mobile using android studio that will allow the patients to pay bills and book doctor’s appointment. The design of these massive requirements of the project is done in this particular step. As AMC and CSD have anticipated a five months development schedule for an initial version of the server software and android based client side software (Kumar, Zadgaonkar & Shukla, 2013). Amongst these five months, three months period is for design, so designing takes a much longer time.
2. Construction: The construction of the SMS project is done in this particular step. This step is time consuming as the total construction of the project is done in this step. If there is any kind of errors in this step, the project will become a huge failure. However, if the construction of the project is good, the SMS project will be a huge success and beneficial to both AMC and CSD.
3. Testing: The construction of a project will become successful if it passes the various testing techniques. Amongst the five months time taken by AMC and CSD, two months are for testing. There are various types of testing, which includes black box testing, white box testing (Larman, 2012). All these types of testing are done in this two months period. When the project will pass all the tests, it will be considered as a successful construction.

Implementation: In this particular step, the final implementation of the project is done. If the project construction, testing and the coding of SMS project is perfect, the implementation of the project becomes successful. Similarly, if the construction, coding and testing of the project is imperfect and errors are there, the implementation of the project will become unsuccessful. The project leader and the staffs of both the centers have to be sure about the implementation step that whether the SMS project is actually ready or not. If the project is not ready, it is baseless to implement it.

Suitable SDLC methodology for SMS

Maintenance: This is the last and the eight step of Waterfall model and the most important step in this whole model. A project and a system will never last forever if it is not maintained perfectly (Bassil, 2012). The maintenance of any system is extremely important. Similar case is with SMS project. Maintenance of this project should be done on an annual basis to tenure the longevity of the system.

SMS project can be implemented using various SDLC models. In the above paragraphs, the utilization and the advantage of Waterfall model are clearly mentioned. However, this particular project can be implemented with three other models (Balaji & Muruguiyan, 2012. The models that can be used to develop the SMS project are as follows:

Waterfall Model

1. b) Agile Model
2. c) Spiral Model
3. d) Big Bang Model.

The above mentioned models will also help to develop the SMS project and will help the SMS project to be as successful it will be with Waterfall model.

WALK-IN INTERVIEWS

SMART MEDICAL SYSTEM

We are recruiting for our new joint project of AMC and CSD

Post: JUNIOR SYSTEMS ANALYST

Skills required: Programming skills, good communication skills, management skills

Experience: Minimum 3 years field experience

Educational Requirements: B.E in IT, M.S

Interested candidates please bring along the updated resume, qualification documents, 3 passport size photos and salary proof of previous jobs.

Interviews on 5 September 2017 between 10.00am to 3pm at below mentioned venue:

ACT Medical Centre

A/214, George Street,

Sydney, NSW, Australia – 2000

Conclusion

Therefore, from the above discussion it can be concluded that Smart Medical System or SMS project will be a successful project and it will be beneficial for both ACT Medical Centre and Canberra Software Development. The project however will be more successful and longer lasting with a few recommendations. Since this is a big project, there should be at least two junior analysts, each from one of the centers; else, it will be creating a massive pressure on any one of them. Although Waterfall model is sequential model and it follows sequences, there is a drawback of this model. It is tremendously time consuming as only after finishing one step, the other step can start. This even increases the cost of the total project. In this case Big Bang model will be helpful. The maintenance of this project is mandatory, if not monthly, then annually. This will increase the longevity of the project and the project will improve day by day. The above-mentioned recommendations will help the project to attain more success and thus will be helpful to the doctors, nurses and all the medical staff of ACT and CSD

References

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Balaji, S., & Murugaiyan, M. S. (2012). Waterfall vs. V-Model vs. Agile: A comparative study on SDLC. International Journal of Information Technology and Business Management, 2(1), 26-30.

Bassil, Y. (2012). A simulation model for the waterfall software development life cycle. arXiv preprint arXiv:1205.6904.

Clarke, P., & O’Connor, R. V. (2012). The situational factors that affect the software development process: Towards a comprehensive reference framework. Information and Software Technology, 54(5), 433-447.

Gupta, A. (2014). Quality Assurance and Its Standards: Importance in Various SDLC Models. International Journal of Advanced research in Computer Science and Management studies, 2(12).

Kumar, N., Zadgaonkar, A. S., & Shukla, A. (2013). Evolving a new software development life cycle model SDLC-2013 with client satisfaction. International Journal of Soft Computing and Engineering (IJSCE), 3(1), 2231-2307.

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