CHAPTER 4

SYSTEM DESIGN AND SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT

4.0

Introduction

Based on system requirements analysis in Chapter 3, this chapter describes the methodology and concepts applicable to design and develop GIS-Based Preparedness Response System (GPRS). The purpose of this topic is to explain a system design and development methodology that promotes successful deployment of proposed system. System design consists of four stages i.e. data collection, database modeling, database design and graphical user interface design. System development discuss on the development environment, development tools, development platform, and DBMS used.

4.1

System Design Process

The main focus of system design is to integrate the functional components from the system requirement study (Chapter 3) into one system that satisfies user needs. It also addresses the non-functional requirements that have been set for the developing system. System design includes determining specifications for the following components: selection of study area; data collection; database modeling; and graphical user interface design.

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4.1.1

Selection of Study Area

Figure 4.1 shows the location of the study area (Alor Gajah District of Malacca). This study area was chosen based on availability of data.

Figure 4.1: The Alor Gajah District of Malacca Map

Alor Gajah District of Malacca had been chosen as study area in this research and the DVS Ayer Keroh Malacca would be evaluating the implementation system. Alor Gajah District of Malacca covers a vast area of 66,302 hectares (660 km 2) with 16 small towns and 31 sub-districts. To the north it borders Tampin and to the north-west is Port Dickson, both in Negeri Sembilan. It is one of the three districts of Malacca state, the other two being Melaka Tengah and Jasin. In total, Malacca has a population of 759000 as of 2007 which is composed of Malays (57%), Chinese (32%) including the Peranakan community, Indians including Chitty people (a sizeable minority) and a small community, Kristang (people with partial Portuguese ancestry). 76

4.1.2

Data Collection

There are two types of data collection involved in his research; spatial data (depicting location of geographical objects) and non-spatial data or attribute data (describing physical characteristics of each object).

a) Spatial Data The spatial data needed to develop the GPRS covering an area of Alor Gajah District include the following:
Table 4.1: Spatial Data Data Topography Map from Department of Survey & Mapping Malaysia (JUPEM) Digital Topography JUPEM Map from Map Sheet Number 144 Rembau 152 Pasir Panjang 153 Melaka 154 - Jasin None Map Scale 1:50000 Layer Land Use River Village Boundary Water bodies Drainage Contour Boundary Road Boundary Population

1:50000

Road Map from Public Works Department Malaysia (JKR) Peninsular Malaysia Map Point of premises location by GPS survey

Siri 1307 None None

1:750000 1:75000 None

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b) Non-Spatial Data Table 4.2 listed out livestock information gained from veterinarians officer.
Table 4.2: Non-Spatial Data Data Livestock population Attribute Farm_owner Farm_Name Farm_I/C number Phone Number Address Species and total number X_coordinate Y_coordinate

4.1.3

Database Modelling

The database needs a structure definition to be able to store and to recognize the content of the database and be able to retrieve the information. The structure has to be developed for the need of applications, which help to perform an application process to achieve an added value for the users. There are three levels of database modeling; conceptual, logical and physical.

a) Conceptual Database Design Conceptual database design is the concepts that a user needs to learn about the total of application to be used. It is done from the users point of view. Conceptual database design, along with system requirement analysis, makes up the initial stage of the design process. Getting the conceptual database design correct in the beginning avoids the risk of costly redesign further down the line. More important to ensure the user needs are

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known before design begins. A clear conceptual database design allows to understanding of the whole system design, avoiding wasted time and effort later on. The feature of conceptual database design includes the important entities and the relationships among them. It has no attribute and no primary key is specified. Figure 4.2 shows the conceptual database design also known as the Entity-Relationship for the proposed of GPRS.

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Figure 4.2: GPRS ER-Diagram

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Their relationships are described below: a) Each farm is belonging to one owner and one owner can have many farms. b) Each farm has many livestock that is divided by livestock categories. c) Each farm can caused many diseases and each disease assigned by disease type. d) Each farm is located at farm location within an area which apart of Mukim. e) One area can be in one Mukim and one Mukim can have many areas. f) One District can have many Mukim, and Mukim is located in one District. g) One District is located in one State but the State consists of many Districts.

b) Logical Database Design The process of logical database design involves arranging data into series of logical relationships called entities and attributes. An entity represents a chunk of information. In relational databases an entity often maps to a table. An attribute is a component of an entity that helps define the uniqueness of entity. In relational databases, an attribute records to a column. Figure 4.3 present the logical data model for the proposed GPRS and how it relates to each others.

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Figure 4.3: GPRS Logical Database Design

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c) Physical Database Design The physical database design is a process of producing a description of the implementation of the database on secondary storage. It must include an estimate of the space required to store the database. It also describes the base relations and file organizations to achieve efficient access to the data and security measures. The physical database design of GPRS is represented in the Figure 4.4.

Figure 4.4: GPRS Physical Database Design

The most uses geographic database organization is the geo-relational model (or dual architecture), that utilizes a relational DBMS like Access, to store in its tables the attributes of the geographic objects, and separate graphic files to store the geometric representation of these objects.

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4.1.4

Database Design

Database can have different structure patterns according to various applications. Database design is a basic task which documents the logical and physical structure of the layers of the GIS. The aim of the database design is to establish a practical database which can reflect the affiliations between entities in the real world and can effectively access and manage data in order to realize the goal of the system. On one hand, the spatial databases of GPRS are designed for storing and managing space and attribute information about livestock population and AID. On the other hand, it should be able to provide references for forecasting the change of AID outbreak pattern. In this system, the location data (spatial data) are stored in vector or grid structure, and the attribute data associated with every geographic feature are stored in a group of database tables. According to the aim and demand of the system construction as well as the character of main spatial data model used in this system, the shapefile will be chosen. Shapefile is suitable to medium-small sized map data, and it permits aggregating simple features to compose complex features and can display graphic map quickly.

i)

Attribute Database Design

An attribute database is constructed with the common DBMS software such as Microsoft Access and SQL. Here the Microsoft Access DBMS is used. The connection of spatial data with its attribute data can be made through the unique ID. This unique ID is affiliated to a spatial entity which is digitalized into point, line or region. This unique ID should be put into the attribute data table as a keyword field. So it will work when a mutual search is being done. In this system, a method of managing spatial and attribute database was adopted separately (Figure 4.5): the spatial data are organized and managed by ArcGIS 9.2 and the attribute data by Microsoft Access. 76

Figure 4.5: System Data Managing Model

ii)

Spatial Database Design

A spatial database in GPRS was created in ArcGIS 9.2. Data types and sources are listed in Section 4.3. All base data such as roads, rivers were digitized and stored in database. These data were maintained in vector shapefile. All reports of livestock population and disease report were imported and convert to shapefile. Table 4.3 presented sample data dictionary of all layers in GPRS.

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Table 4.3: Sample Data Dictionary Layer State Layer Name STATE Layer Types Lines Attribute Sempadan Negeri_1 Length_km Sempadan Daerah_1 Length_km Sempadan Daerah Mukim Area_km_sq Type Length_m Type Length Type Area Type Length Farm_Owner Farm_Name Total Species Address Contact_Num X_Coordinate Y_Coordinate Area Disease_Type Location X_Coordinate Y_Coordinate Date Species_Effected Total_Case Total_Dead Total_AtRisk Action_Taken Reporter_Name Description State border of Negeri Sembilan

District

DISTRICT

Lines

District border of Alor Gajah

Sub District

SUBDISTRICT

Polygons

Digitized Sub-District boundary

River Drainage Water bodies Road Livestock Population

RIVER DRAINAGE WATERBODIES ROAD POPULATION

Lines Lines Polygons Lines Points

Digitized river from topographic map Drainage from CAD file Water bodies from CAD file Digitized road from road map Collection of population some livestock

Disease Cases

DISEASE

Points

Assuming point for influenza disease case

avian

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4.1.5

Graphical User Interface (GUI)

A user interface is a computer program that acts as an interpreter between the user and a computer. It generally operates on top of a GIS package as a menu-driven shell to the softwares commands. A graphical user interface (GUI) is a popular type of user interface that replaces difficult to remember text commands by interactive computer graphics consisting of menus, dialogue boxes, input and output windows and icons. Creation of a custom GUI is optional. It is recommended when the GIS functions are very complex and/or the end users are complete novices. A custom GUI can be used for user authentication using passwords. In order to facilitate the implementation of GPRS for AID management system, user interface in GIS have been developed using Visual Basic 6.0 and MapObject 2.3, which provide communication between the user and the GIS software through a set of methods or procedures. The interfaces developed perform integration of multiple databases, simulation models and flow logic to arrive at the desired result with minimal time and without expert GIS knowledge by the user. The GPRS interfaces have various modules to explore: 1. 2. System logging module: to log in the system with user password. After entering the main window interface, the user can run the subsystem. Database module: include input and output procedure. All attribute data are stored in Microsoft Access while spatial data are stored in shapefile format. All these data then will be together displayed in map display. 3. Toolbar control module: to control map display properties. There are four toolbars, named it as navigation toolbar, map content toolbar, draw graphic toolbar and query/search toolbar. All these toolbars have related activity to map display. 4. Layer control module: to complete an optional load of layers and control their visibility. The layer control makes complicated geographic information management more convenient and tenable. The information can be conveyed 79

definitely, orderly and clearly through the combination of layers and redefinition of layer relationship. 5. Map control module: to display and visualize graphical information. Map display contains multi layer such as roads, rivers, livestock population and water bodies. There are some tools to control map display such as toolbar, map tips, legend editor and navigations tools (pan and zoom function). The system structure and functionality will be discussed further in Chapter 5 (Section 5.3).

4.2

System Development

System development consisted of a writing code to solve a problem or automate a procedure. In this stage, the requirements and system specifications from the system design steps are translated into machine readable computer code. During this stage, executable system is developed from detailed design specifications. The system is validated through a sequence of functional, integration, system interface, and acceptance test activities. The objective is to ensure that the system functions as expected and user requirements are satisfied. This stage is essential to ensure that the implementation of the GPRS runs smoothly. This section will discussed on the development environment, tools, development platform, and DBMS used.

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4.2.1

Development Environment

The suitable development environment has to be established to ensure that the implementation process runs smoothly. The following describes the software and hardware requirement for the development process.

i)

Hardware Requirements

Table 4.4 describes the hardware requirements of the GPRS.

Table 4.4: GPRS Hardware Requirements Hardware Processor Memory Hard disk space Others Requirements Intel Pentium Dual Processor or higher or other equivalent processors At least 512 MB Recommended: 1 GB or more At least 50 MB A set of handheld GPS Color Printer

iii)

Software Requirements

Table 4.5 describes the software requirements for the GPRS.

Table 4.5: GPRS Software Requirements Software Operating System Database Management System Programming Languages Data Processing Requirements Microsoft Windows XP or higher Microsoft Access 2003 or higher Microsoft Visual Basic 6 MapObject 2.3 ArcGIS Version 9.2

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4.2.2

Development Tools

a)

Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0 Professional edition

Visual Basic 6 was designed to be easy to learn and use. The language not only allows programmers to create simple GUI applications, but can also develop complex applications as well. Programming in VB is a combination of visualizing arranging components or controls on a form, specifying attributes and actions of those components, and writing additional lines of code for more functionality.

b)

MapObject Version 2.3

MapObjects is an ActiveX based GIS component developed by ESRI company. It provides 35 OLE (Object Linking and Embedding) objects attributed to Microsoft basic classes. These OLE objects can be divided into nine categories on their different functions, which include view-window control object, view-window event objects, image-layer objects, spatial data objects, spatial database accessing objects, external database linking-accessing objects, symbol objects, cartography objects and address objects. An application programmer can use any programming environment which supports ActiveX, such as Visual C++, Visual Basic, Java and etc., to develop an application program based on GIS. MapObjects component can be directly inserted into most standards developing tools such Visual C++ and Visual Basic environment. Through embedding this component into a user application program can perform cartographic function and most GIS function.

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4.2.3

Development Platform

The Windows XP operating system was selected as the platform for the development of the GPRS. The fact that the potential users are already using and are familiar with the Windows XP environment played an important role in the selection. Since the inception of the operating system, the developers of Windows XP have continually improved its stability while providing a user-friendly environment.

4.2.4

Data Processing

ARCGIS 9.2 are used in processing data including digitizing, conversion and editing. ARCGIS is a software product produced by ESRI. ARCGIS desktop software is an integrated system that includes all the tools needed to get the most out of a GIS. This software has the essential tools for visualizing, creating, managing and analyzing geographic data. ARCGIS Desktop consists of several integrated application, including ArcMap, ArcCatalog and ArcToolbox. ArcMap is the application used to view, edit and query geospatial data, and create maps. ArcCatalog is the data management application, used to browse datasets and files and allows user to preview the data on a map. ArcToolbox contains geoprocessing, data conversion and analysis tools along with much of the functionality in ArcInfo. The current version of the ARCGIS software is 9.3. The ARCGIS 9.2 release includes a geoprocessing environment that allows execution of traditional GIS processing tools (such as clipping, overlay and spatial analysis) interactively or from any scripting language that support Component Object Model (COM) standards.

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4.2.5

Database Management System (DBMS)

A GPRS database stores descriptive information about map features as attributes. For example, an animal system database includes attributes for age, type, quantity, and owner; and premises system database contains attributes for types of animals, address, and contact number. Successful GPRS applications require a database that provides appropriate information in a useful and accessible form. The design of the database is, therefore, driven by application needs. GPRS used Microsoft Access as DBMS. Microsoft Access is part of Microsoft Office. It handles data management tasks the same way as Word handles document management and Excel handles statistics. A database is a collection of objects that allow storage of data, organize it and retrieve it in any way. Microsoft Access also supports Visual Basic and has the ability to link to COM objects, which provides powerful programming capability and keeps the application easily open to future enhancements.

4.2.6

Interface Development

The developed interface is a useful tool for AID management. This also endorsed the use of advanced computer assisted technology applied to the management of AID. The interface provides the inexperienced or new user with an entry point to a powerful GIS without any detailed training in the GIS modeling. The interface command buttons perform a series of inherent GIS instructions and displays the results in a user friendly format. Due to the system requirement analysis, the GUI was developed using two main software; Visual Basic 6.0 and MapObject 2.3. The combination of Visual Basic 6.0 (VB6) and MapObjects (MO) has been regarded as a positive step forward for mapping application development in economical method. Compared with other mapping 84

applications developed with Arc Macro Language (AML) or Avenue, applications developed with VB6 and MO has some significant advantages. First, it is easier to build programs with VB6 and MO. The developers can apply nearly any OLE automation objects provided by Microsoft or other vendors into an application. Second, the application will have a small memory footprint. VB EXE files consume a small to modest portion of the systems memory. Third, the data from MO draws much quicker than other windows mapping software. This is due to MO running directly on the Microsoft Foundation Class (MFC). Another important advantage is, with VB6 Database Jet Engine the application handles large database queries and searches with extreme speed.

4.4

Chapter Summary

This chapter explained the process involved in Phase 2 (system design and development) of the research methodology. The explanations are combining the process to design and develop the GPRS. The designing processes include selection of study area, data collection, database modeling, database design and user interface design. It followed with development processes which covers development environment, development tools, development platform, and DBMS used. This phase is essential to ensure the implementation of the GPRS is succeeded and meets the user requirements. Next phase (Phase 3), system implementation and system evaluation will discuss later in Chapter 5.

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