The purpose of this section is twofold:

• to demonstrate the power of web applications
• to illustrate the spectrum of ByYourSite's services

ByYourSite was involved in the development of all or part of the applications presented below.

We hope that these use cases will help you better understand how ByYourSite can serve you.

Enterprise Management System (EMS)

The context:

Eloquent, Inc. produces web-based rich media events. These presentations are a combination of classic media such as video, slides, text and sound which are synchronized with streaming media. To successfully manage the production of such events, Eloquent needs to juggle customers' expectations, production teams' requirements and project delivery processes.

The solution:

Eloquent built EMS to manage the delivery of events, to manage employee work load and to report on projects' financial information. With EMS, employees can keep track of the time spent working on an event, and a manager can control the status of a project and anticipate production bottlenecks. With EMS, Eloquent has great control of its project delivery and of its employee workload.

EMS is an Intranet application that uses Active Server Pages and Microsoft SQLServer to deliver Internet Explorer 4.0-specific web pages.

Screen shots*:

The following presentation shows only some aspects of EMS and it concentrates on some of the functionalities that ByYourSite developed for Eloquent. Please note that the presentation is HTML-based and thus keeps its Internet Explorer specificity. To open a new window with the presentation click here or on the screen shot on the right.

*These screen shots are for illustration only. Most functionalities were removed, names and figures were changed. Used with permission.

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Collaborative Publishing (CoPub)

The context:

Eloquent, Inc. produces web-based rich media events. See more about the context in our EMS presentation.

To guarantee them customers' satisfaction Eloquent built CoPub. CoPub allows the customer to be involved in every steps of event production.

The solution:

Here is how Eloquent introduces CoPub:

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Web site for project management (W4PM)

The Context:

CH2M HILL is one of the biggest project delivery firms in the Uited States. Its core business is to deliver big engineering projects such as road, water treatment plant and bridge construction. Typically such projects involve teams of contractors, and subcontractors, and the generation of documents that need review and approval. Such projects also need to meet regulations requirements, and follow strict deadlines. Communication with the client and competitive costs are two ways a project manager can win a bid.

The solution:

To improve communication between the project manager, the client and the contractor, CH2M HILL developed the W4PM. The W4PM is a set of web application modules deployed in an Extranet environment and joined together to meet specific project needs.

Among the basic modules you will find an interactive calendar, a file library with upload and download capabilities, a bulletin board, user-specific access (i.e. a project manager has different rights than a contractor), and a task management system. Customization often involves project-specific information such as contact and project description, and the addition of modules such as document-specific rights (limit access to certain documents to a certain group), document review systems, project financials, web-based Geographic Information Systems (WebGis) and the integration with other preexisting information systems.

CH2M HILL created a template for the W4PM. It reduces deployment costs and time, and allows the team to concentrate on project-specific solutions. The CH2M HILL W4PM is an Active Server Pages application written in VBScript and using SQLServer for database.

Fabrice Caporal was the lead developer and custodian of the W4PM.

Demonstration*:

*Demonstration used with permission.

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E-commerce

The Context:

The advent of the Internet brought a new medium for selling products. The Internet opened your store to the world twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, in a very cost effective way.

The Solution:

The basic e-commerce web site is a web application that has a shopping cart system to let the user shop for more than one product in a single session, a listing or catalog of the products, a credit card approval system, and a set of administration pages to manage the catalog content and the orders.

Advanced e-commerce can become very complex both in terms of hardware and software. Big e-commerce will add features such as fail-safe setups, orders and delivery automation, inventory control, and marketing support.

Many vendors specialize in the production of big e-commerce web sites, however their solutions tend to be expensive and overblown when applied to small operations. At ByYourSite we are experienced in developing small, economical e-commerce solutions.

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Document Review System

The Context:

Many documents must go through multiple review processes before the final version can be published. Document review can be time consuming and difficult to administer. With traditional methods, it is hard to keep track of all the edit requests and to keep the rest of the review team informed about the document's status.

The Solution:

Web-based document review can have two goals: collect comments about the document, and document certification.

Comment collection is typically implemented when the public or a large community will be impacted by the document (i.e. a proposal for building a road). In this situation the document is divided into sections and published through web application. Anyone having access to the site can read the document and submit comments about each specific section. No edits are done directly to the document. Later, users and project managers can visit the site and review the various comments.

The document certification process is often more complex. Usually the document has to follow a preset path before it is approved. The chief technical officer might need to review and approve the document before it gets into the hands of the chief executive officer. The result is that the document will undergo multiple edits. Because of this the application must give reviewers access to the most current version of the document, let them edit it, accept routing alterations, reinforce the approval path, warn the interested reviewer about the modification, and assure document version control (ability to review and reverse edits).

The advantages of a web-based document review system are as follows:

• Easy access to the documents
• Centralization of comments and edits
• Immediate publication of suggested changes and comments
• Version control
• Automatically enforced business rules

The document review system can easily be an integral part of a general purpose file library.

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Project Information Management System (PIMS)

The Context:

The customer wanted to have a better sense of all the projects they were involved with at any given time. We needed to develop a solution that could collect project information and that could then generate reports.

The Solution:

We developed the Project Information Management System (PIMS) Intranet-based application written in ASP over SQLServer, client-side JavaScript and Crystal Reports.

All information is collected in a central database into which various applications push and pull information.

To collect information, we developed a web-based wizard application that is used by the project managers. The project manager must go through a wizard to get a budget for his/her project. The wizard assures that the information collected follows a complex set of business rules.

Once the project manager submits the project information, the budget request has to be routed for approval. To do that, on submittal, the wizard sends an e-mail warning to gatekeepers who use a custom-made Outlook form to route the request. Since the approval has to be done with tools commonly used within the company, and processed disconnected from the Internet, we developed a Microsoft Outlook form to pull the information from the database, route the request via e-mail, and resubmit the approved information back to the database. The information exchange between the form and the database are made under the control of the gatekeepers.

To generate reports, we designed a report selector that is accessible from the Intranet. To limit code change and to increase report flexibility the report selector is driven by the database, instead of being hard coded. The user specifies which report and which filter she wants displayed through the report selector. The parameters are then passed onto the Crystal Report COM interface to generate reports "on the fly."

Demonstration*:

The following demonstrates the wizardry of the PIMS application. All the server-side codes as well as some functionalites were removed.

Please note that the presentation is HTML-based and thus keeps its Internet Explorer 4.0 specificity.

On the first page, select "Add" to view the wizard or "Report" to view the report selector. Once in the wizard, click on the various navigation buttons and tabs to cycle through the screens. Experiment and see how the client-side scripts reenforce some the business logic.

To open a new window withthe presentation click here or on the above PIMS' screen shot.

*This demonstration is for illustration only and was adapted from the original. Some functionalities were removed or changed, names and figures were changed. Used with permission.

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Web-based Questionnaire Generator

The Context:

A questionnaire is a tool to collect information from respondents -- both qualitative and quantitative data. It is one of the most critical stages of a market research survey and is an inexpensive way to gather data from a potentially large number of respondents. Often, questionnaires are the only feasible way to reach a number of reviewers large enough to allow statistical analysis of the results. Questionnaires are an essential source of information about your constituency. Standard methods of conducting a questionnaire are tedious, both for the researcher and for the respondent.

The Solution:

Web-based questionnaires are a great advantage because they are always accessible to the respondent and can be widely distributed. The web-based questionnaire generator allows the author to concentrate on the questionnaire rather than on web-specific issues.

There is no need to reenter all the information for analysis because all the information collected is stored directly into a database. The quality of the data collected is improved, as the web-based survey is easier on the respondent. Web-based surveys have advantage of being able to handle logic and thus they can skip irrelevant questions or pre-fill answers and increase interactivity. The user can access the web site at their convenience and answer the questions.

Live results can selectively be shared with the user, and thus give the respondant an increased sense of being usefull.

ByYourSite is working on such a survey generator, based on ASP, COM, and either SQLServer or Access. The current version is in alpha and will soon be available for demonstration.

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