The core of the project was a new platform development for the online educational product. Also, as a secondary goal, the software had to provide ASP possibilities for the customer (application server should be used for providing online educational courses for any other organization and students). The principal requirements were user friendliness, light-weight and customizable web-design, multiple browsers (even PDA-based) support and usability.

The first solution that we delivered and integrated with the university’s educational software suite enabled a user to create an HTML-based educational presentation comprising two kinds of materials: explanations and interactive tests. Furthermore Itransition suggested more ideas for advanced software design and they were highly appreciated by the investors, so the new project was funded.

Online Courses is a web-based application supporting different browsers. The architecture is based on a three-layer framework, which uses customizable JSP Tag Libraries for the presentation layer, JAVA and Servlet API classes for business logic, file system and MySQL for content and data storage. Implemented framework is already re-used in other web-based JAVA which proves it scalability and lower cost of integration.

The system features the following functional modules:

• Course Beans (standalone Java Swing application);
• Application & Course User Management;
• Course Management;
• Build-in forum;
• Announcement;.
• Calendar (available on PDA);
• Course Pool;
• Course Exams (available on PDA);
• Course Modules (available on PDA);
• Learning-Oriented Maps Modules;
• Course Grade Books;
• Learning Chat Rooms.

The solution is based on sophisticated, scalable and JAVA Servlet (Pages) API based architecture and framework.

Technologies used: JDK 1.4, Java Swing API, Java Servlet API, JSP, JavaMail API, JDBC, Java, JavaScript, HTML, SQL, XML/XSLT, MySQL 4.1, Apache Tomcat 4.x, RUP, MS Project, IBM Clear Case, IBM Rational Clear Quest.

Efforts: 17 man-months.