DESIGN AND IMPLEMENTATION OF STUDENT RESULT NOTIFICATION SYSTEM

1.1 Introduction

Email and SMS is a mobile technology that allows for sending and receiving text or even binary messages to and from a mobile phone. The relative ease of use of SMS makes it possible for a user to learn how to send SMS easily. Computers with the power of the Internet have succeeded in aiding communication among people. The telephone system, which is the main communication system that was invented several years ago, has undergone a great improvement, so much that today we have fixed wireless phones, mobile phones, and the like. With the rapid development of mobile phones come several services, like the Short Messaging Service (SMS) and Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS), which are readily available and add to the usefulness of mobile phones. SMS in particular is widely used in communication and, more recently, has been leveraged to provide several services like airline ticketing, banking services, and commercial services such as share and sell where subscribers can easily share and/or sell airtime (Mavrakis, 2004).

As a prelude to other parts of this study, this chapter will discuss the background upon which this study was initiated, the statement of problems that led to this study, the Aim and Objectives of the study. Others are Significance of the study, Scope of work, Limitations of the Study and Definition of technical terms.

1.2 Background of the Study

Today, the world is full of technologies; there are lots of inventions made to use the latest technologies. To be specific on technology, Mobile phones have been a part of our everyday use where we share lots of information through this communication channel. Nowadays, android system is becoming more popular, especially in the Smartphone market. Because there are some of the development tools which is available free are used to generate many applications in an android platform. The main reason for its popularity is, it also provides a very convenient hardware platform for developers (Umar ManzoorI, 2014).

The advancement of technology today has immersed itself towards education. The presence of technology has reached its maximum of providing sustainable technology towards quality education through delivery and effective learning. It helps to develop more advanced economies, and now it can be used for spending our leisure time. Social desires towards educational leadership in economics and academic matters rely on upon the integration of technology in each aspect of society (Marsha, 2012). The Tai Solarin University of Education is one of the state owned institutions that embrace information and communication technology now. As they immersed themselves with technology through their delivery towards academic excellence and other forms brought about by information technology.

Rapid growth and popularity of smart phones had made mobile applications integration into a new way of learning, teaching and passing of information, causing the majority of scholars to research. How to make students get information as quick as possible by the way of mobile is a time of great significance for research. The mobile student result notification integration based on Android has been proposed.

The current academic environment is dominated by the use of advanced communication technologies. Such technologies are used extensively by students and staff at institutions of higher learning for accessing and disseminating information. A closer look at the gadgets around us, it is clear that we are becoming more comfortable with wireless communication systems; there is no doubt that the world is moving towards wireless communication. It’s significant to note (Song and Lee’s, 2012) study of mobile device ownership among international business students, which shows clearly that close to 82% students owned smartphones. Olatokun (2008) observes that “Mobile phones have become an inseparable part of everyday life”. Mobile devices have become more attractive mainly because of the availability of e-commerce related applications and the ease with which one can access desired information from anywhere anytime. The real impetus for the mobile devices started with the arrival of web 2.0 applications especially the active participation of the user towards the web which has pushed the growth of mobile devices in academic institutions. When we look at the different gadgets used around us it’s obvious to note most of them are wireless. “Everywhere we go we cannot help but notice the number of mobile devices being used; cell phones, iPods, iPads, android devices, MP3 players, GPS systems, blackberries and even mini-laptops”. Jacobs (2009) observes that “mobile access is the remediation of wireless internet”.

Students, being the relatively younger generation, are more likely to be familiar and early adopters of new technology. However, technology is only a tool and can thus be a double-edged sword. The use of technology, while making learning more interactive and thus more attractive to younger generations has also the potential to deter them to be physically present for learning activities (Gomis et.al, 2011).

Nowadays, mobile phones and internet are indispensable factors of our daily life. This reality played a very important role in coming up with the proposed mobile alert/notification system. This service provides a means to alerts or notify student whenever an update occurs at the website in terms of push notification. There are other mechanisms through which users of the app could get the update about release of result, through short messaging service (SMS), e-mail subscriptions etc but this research work shall be focusing on the most recent form of delivering update to users of mobile application which is Push Notifications.

1.3 Statement of the Problem

Investigation revealed that students have to search the internet each time to know about any news updates like fee payment dates, exam results etc. in the university or department result website. The project entitled “Mobile Student Result Notification System” is a system which sends latest news updates from the department website to student in form of push notifications. The system is developed so that students do not miss out on any alert and save their valuable time rather than the usual method of time-to-time checking whether the results have been uploaded to the website or not as they will also be able to check these results without having any course to visit the website.

1.4 Aim and Objectives of the Study

The aim of the study is to design and implement an online student result notification application, which will be highly efficient for the process of retrieving necessary information pertaining to every relevant notification about the student results. In achieving this aim, the following specific objectives were laid out as follows to develop an application software that will:

1. Implement a SMS result alert application system, which is user friendly and can provide up to date information;
2. Enable students to have access to real time information; and
3. Provide instant notification about information relating to their result via SMS;
4. Provide students with the ability to check their result without having any cause to visit any notice board.

1.5 Significance of the Study

The study is significant has it helps to integrate modern day technology to the university system. It gives and improves key indications on developing an electronic information system. The project is quite significant in its nature because of the various advantages mobile technology poses; in the design of the system it keeps student abreast of instant notification about their results and other relevant news.

The outcome of the study “Student Result Notification System” will provide a range of benefits in the ease of access of information to students. Some of the benefits are listed below:

1. Enable students to have access to real time information.
2. Instant notification about information relating to their result via push messages.
3. Ability to check their result without having any cause to visit any website.

This study will be of immense benefit to other researchers who intend to know more on this study and can also be used by non-researchers to build more on their research work. This study contributes to knowledge and could serve as a guide for other study.

1.6 Scope of the Study

The scope of this research focuses on the design and implementation of an online result alert system through SMS or Email. This research will cover only the department of Computer Science in Federal Polytechnic Ilaro, Ogun State.

1.7 Limitation of the Study

During the course of this study, many things militated against its completion, some of which are:

1. Time Constraint: The time frame given to accomplish this project was very short due to school academic calendar and it was carried out under pressure which made the researcher not to implement some necessary features.
2. Establishment Policies: Establishment policies posed a serious limitation as most staffs are not ready to release information needed for this project work. There were lots of information needed from the staffs of this institution to enhance the study which took them time to release or they did not release at all for security purposes, hence the scope was reduced.
3. Research material: availability of research material is a major setback to the scope of the study.
4. Frequent power failure: This made the researcher append more money on fuel to ensure sustainable power.
5. Financial Constraint: Insufficient fund tends to impede the efficiency of the researcher in sourcing for the relevant materials, literature or information and in the process of data collection (internet).

1.8 Methodology

The project would be developed, using an iterative development methodology getting user’s specification. Also at intervals a sample prototype would be installed on user’s phone, to help get additional user’s requirement during the course of development.

The following methods would be applied during the course of this project, the method for collecting requirement specifications would include;

1. Investigation into the current system in use and the processes involved.
2. Conduct information gathering from students, lecturers, and staffs in the department
3. Implement a prototype system that will meet the user’s specification (students).
4. The implementation stage will include coding, testing and installation on different android platforms.

The following technologies / Languages would be used during implementation or development

1. Programming language: Ionic Framework, AngularJS and PHP
2. Database variant: MYSQL
3. SMS API
4. Target Mobile platform: Android operating system.

1.9 Definition of Terms

SMS: It stands for Short Message Service and is also commonly referred/called to as text message. With SMS, you can send a message of up to 160 characters to another device.

MMS: It stands for Multimedia Messaging service and this type of text messaging is an evolution of the SMS. With a MMS, you can send message in including pictures,. Video, or audio content to another device.

Alert: It is a notification that a threshold has been reached.

Email: It is a message that contains text, files, images, or other attachments sent through a network to a specified individual or group individuals.