Remake of the CS Department Website
Using Dr. Beidler’s PHP Classes
Extended Abstract
Matthew Yasiejko
September 2, 2005
Submitted in partial fulfillment
of the requirements of
CMPS 490 – Computer Projects
1. Context of the project
1.1 Who needs it
This new website will be used for the Computing Sciences Department students
and faculty, and will retain links to the personal websites of professors and students. In
terms of coding, the website will be assembled using the PHP Web Programming
Language, making extensive use of Dr. Beidler’s PHP Classes. This will help to clean up
the code, adding to abstraction and readability. It will also make maintaining the website
much simpler once the code is revised. This project would be completed as per Dr.
Beidler.
1.2 Reasons for the New Website
These classes were implemented in order to make web development and
programming a simpler task. Not only would the initial development of a website be
made easier, but the maintenance and updating of that website, whether by the original
programmer or any other web developer, would be greatly simplified.
1.3 Where It Will Be Used
This website will be accessible to anyone who has access to the internet, though
the project will target those associated with the Computer Science Department, both
faculty and students. It would also be of use to incoming freshmen looking for a
potential degree in computing to obtain information about the department and the major
itself.
Extended Abstract – September 2, 2005 3
1.4 Hardware / Software Requirements
The only requirements are that there be access to a PHP compiler and Dr.
Beidler’s PHP Classes. For general users, this will not be an issue, as the Computer
Science Department Servers already have a PHP compiler incorporated, and the classes
can simply be placed within the appropriate directories on those servers for easy access.
In terms of development and upkeep, any programmer working on the website needs to
have a PHP compiler configured in coordination with server software, for example
Apache, and have access to the PHP Classes. Instructions and tutorials describing how to
configure this setup can be found on the internet.
2. Overview
2.1 Reason for Using PHP and PHP Classes
Dr. Beidler’s PHP Classes also help to clean up the code quite nicely. For
example, to place a table in a Web Page using HTML, you need to enter the data row-by-
row, and column-by-column within each row, such as that found on the Lab_Hours page
of the Department’s Website. Even with PHP alone, there is no simple way of
accomplishing this, and the code gets to be quite cumbersome. Taking care of these
details and abstracting them to one of Dr. Beidler’s classes makes the task much easier
and more efficient, and makes modifying the page or finding potential errors a less time-
consuming task.
2.2 Things to be included
Extended Abstract – September 2, 2005 4
The website will include links to individual websites of professors and students
and relevant links to useful resources. It may also be possible to create a login option
where users can personalize the site based on the courses they are teaching / taking.
2.3 Feasibility
Given prior experience in PHP, both in the Web Programming Course and outside
of classes, this project is realistically doable within the time constraints.