Project Background and Introduction
The document intends to provide brief description of a system development lifecycle of a project titled “Website Migration”. As per the given scenario, Tony’s Chips owns a website and has recently been bought by a new independent company. The higher management of the new company wishes to migrate the website hosted externally to their own internal hosting solution. The higher management of the new independent company is concerned that the website migration process should be done with minimal downtime, redundancy for their website and proper backup of the website. In this way, the company wishes to provide their clients an access to the website twenty four hours and seven days a week (24 / 7) so that the clients can order online. The company has recruited me (as a project manager) to complete this project successfully.
In order to complete the Website Migration Project, the project manager is required to develop architecture of the website including disaster recovery management. The web architecture should ensure the availability of the website even in failure. Moreover, the web architecture includes the selected operating system for hosting website. The document also provides a detailed project plan showing critical path of the project as well as the Gantt chart. The document further illustrates the system architecture selected for the website to be hosted in an internal solution. Use cases for ordering chips from the website are developed and illustrated in the document. And in the end the document provides operational requirements of the website and explains the success criteria of the project.
Analysis of Alternate Hosting Options
The company has multiple options for hosting their website include; but are not limited to the external hosting (outsourcing or deploy the website at web hosting company) and internal hosting (deployment of website at own software and hardware infrastructure). It is recommended to evaluate both options before deciding to host the website internally or external setup / solution. Both solutions have their own advantages and disadvantages. One of the long term advantages of hosting website internally is the cost effectiveness and complete control on the management of the website. Whereas, hosting the website externally reduces the website management headache, however, the company would be required to bear high cost. Keeping in view the analysis, I would recommend the company to host the website internally.
Website Architecture
The architecture of a website explains standards, foundation technologies and system software to be utilized for the development and deployment of the website. Being a project manager of this project, I would recommend the higher management of the company to develop the website using HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) and PHP in the backend. Moreover, it is recommended that the company should use Oracle as a backend database to store information of the clients and their orders. In order to justify the above provided solution, it is stated that the PHP is an open source platform to be utilized for the development of secure websites with minimal cost. Moreover, the Oracle database is utilized to store huge data, as it is expected that the data of the company would have a large number of clientage. As far as operating system of the solution is concerned, I would recommend deploying Linux and Apache server is required to utilize for the deployment of the company’s website.
The above given web architecture is based on the open source technologies, therefore, it is not only cost effective but also fulfills all the requirements of the higher management of the company.
Strategy for Website Migration
Being project manager of this project, I would recommend following five (5) step strategy to migrate the website from an external hosting to an internal hosting solution (Lim, 2013). I would recommend to design and develop the new website before migration of the old website. Once the new website has been developed, it is recommended to take backups by downloading the files and data of the existing website. The newly design website based on the existing data of the clients should be gone live while not cancelling the hosting plan of the existing website. The last step of the website migration project should be testing of the new website. Once the newly designed website has been successfully tested and then the website should be available for the clients to access. It is expected that the above given five (5) steps strategy would facilitate the company to migrate the website with minimal downtime not disturbing the clients of the company.
Strategy for Disaster Recovery
Four (4) steps strategy is recommended for disaster recovery of the website and making the website available for twenty four hours and seven days a week. The basic step for disaster recovery is to remember and save the login credentials information of the website including the Content Management System (CMS), File Transfer Protocol (FTP) and web hosting control system. The second step is to take regular backups of the files and data of the website on daily, weekly and monthly basis. Thirdly, it is recommended to develop and specify a disaster recovery implementation plan to be executed for disaster recovery. And in the last, I would recommend to store the already taken backups at a different place other than hosting the website (Vowell, 2012). It is expected that the above given strategy would help the company to recover from a disaster and make website available twenty four by seven (24 / 7).
Website Development and Migration – Project Plan
A project plan has been developed for developing and designing a new website and migrating the existing website from externally hosting to internal hosting solution. The project plan is given below including five (5) major tasks and three (3) sub-tasks.
6a. Project Plan – Gantt Chart
Website Deployment – System Architecture
A client sever architecture would be utilized to deploy the website of the company. In this architecture, the client should request for the website using browser through URL for accessing the website of the company. As the website is deployed internally at LINUX and Apache web server, therefore, the client would be granted access. Moreover, the Oracle database of the website stores data / information of the clients. The following snapshot shows the system architecture of the website.
Use Case – Client Order
The use case is utilized to describe the diverse processes of the system graphically as well as theoretically (Fakhroutdinov, 2015). The following use case diagram illustrates the process of ordering a bag of chips online utilizing the website of the company. However, theoretical description of the use case is followed by the use case diagram.
The following section of the use case provides stepwise description of ordering a bag of chips using the system along with responses of the system.
Implementation and Operational Requirements
It is required for the company to execute the project as per the developed and specified implementation plan of the website migration project. In this regard, the company should have already recruited a team of human resources utilized to manage the hardware infrastructure. Moreover, the company should also considering deploying the hardware and network infrastructure required to implement the website migration project. The requirements already specified in the web and system architecture section of the document are required to be fulfilled. The company is required to develop standard operating procedure for operationalizing the website.
Interface of Website
The interface in the form of wireframe of the website is given below.
Evaluation of Website’s Performance
It is required for the company to evaluate the performance of the website. In this regard, four (4) metrics can be utilized to evaluate the performance include, the fulfillment of functional requirements, non-functional requirements, client’s visits (hits) and page view of the website (Cain, 2015). The website should fulfill all the functional and non-functional requirements as specified by the company. The website should have all the functionalities from displaying items for sale to providing status of the products delivered. Moreover, as per the non-functional requirements, the website should be easy to use, effective and efficient in terms of performing the tasks requested by the clients. It is required to monitor the performance of the website by reviewing that how much users / clients visit the website for online shopping on daily, weekly and monthly basis. Moreover, the company should also monitor the page view of the website informing that how much time a user has spent on a specific page (Gulden, 2014). Just in case, any of the above given metrics of the website is not as per the specified standard, the company is required to improve the metrics. Otherwise, the website would be categorized as good enough to be used and liked by the clients.
References
Cain, k. (2015). Measuring Marketing Effectiveness: 6 Metrics You Need to Track. Retrieved from: http://contentmarketinginstitute.com/2012/10/measuring-marketing-effectiveness-metrics/
Chung, L. (n.d). Client Server Architecture. Retrieved from: https://www.utdallas.edu/~chung/SA/2client.pdf
Fakhroutdinov, K. (2015). UML Diagrams Example Online Shopping. Retrieved from: http://www.uml-diagrams.org/examples/online-shopping-example.html
Gulden, J. (2014). The 9 Website Performance Metrics That Matters. Retrieved from: http://engage.synecoretech.com/marketing-technology-for-growth/bid/199065/The-9-Website-Performance-Metrics-That-Matter
Lim, H. (2013). 5 Steps to Migrate Website with Minimal Downtime. Retrieved from: http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/website-migration-guide/
Vowell, T. (2012). Website Disaster Recovery Plan. Retrieved from: http://info.tmrdirect.com/bid/110529/Website-Disaster-Recovery-Plan
