SYLLABUS

CSCI 457 Electronic and Mobile Commerce Systems

(a programming-intensive and no-nonsense course)
(a one-stop course for database-driven electronic/mobile commerce system construction)
School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, University of North Dakota
Spring 2024

Class times: 01:25pm – 02:15pm, MoWeFr
Classroom: Harrington Hall 218
Credit hours: 3
Prerequisite: Consent of the instructor
Class pages: http://undcemcs01.und.edu/~wen.chen.hu/course/457/
 
Instructor: Wen-Chen Hu   (my teaching philosophy)
Email: wenchen@cs.und.edu
Office: Upson II 366K
Office hours: 12:30pm – 02:30pm, TuTh
Zoom ID: https://und.zoom.us/j/2489867333


Synchronous Class Delivery
The class lectures will be delivered synchronously via https://und.zoom.us/j/2489867333, and the Zoom video will be posted on the Blackboard afterwards. Students can watch the video clips anytime they want.

Lecture Notes
No textbook will be used. Instead award-winning, interactive, informative, and practical lecture notes (based on W3Schools and other online documents and user manuals) and detailed and precise class instructions will be provided. Collectively, the lecture notes and instructions are more like a small book, which supplies much more information than regular notes do and makes the subject studies much easier. Students will not have problem learning the subjects or taking the exams after studying them and doing programming exercises.

Course Descriptions
This course gives an advanced study of electronic and mobile commerce system architecture and electronic and mobile commerce content design and implementation. It is a programming-intensive course and each student is required to design and implement several web and native mobile app programming exercises on her/his own. Topics include, but are not limited to:
  • Internet basics,
  • Business issues,
  • Dynamic web programming,
  • Mobile computing,
  • E- and m-commerce content design and construction,
  • Web- and mobile-app-host-database connection,
  • Databases and structured query language (SQL), and
  • Some other special topics.
Each student is required to build the systems based on the following two models independently:
  • A generic structure of database-driven web system —


  • Client-side mobile/handheld programming steps —


Objectives
After taking this course, students are able to achieve the following goals, but not limited to:
  • Knowledge of PHP language principles,
  • Fundamental knowledge of MySQL databases,
  • Knowledge of LAMP environment principles,
  • Knowledge of Android Java language principles,
  • Knowledge of Android Studio environment principles,
  • Proficiency in web contents design and development, and
  • Knowledge of AJAX technologies.
Evaluations
    Three programming exercises
      1. Electronic commerce system  ——  13%
      2. Mobile commerce system      ——  14%
      3. AJAX                        ——  13%
    Two exams                        ——  20% each
    Final exam                       ——  20%

Tentative Schedule
    Weeks      1  &  3  ——  Introduction
    Week             2  ——  Programming Exercise I 
    Weeks      4  &  5  ——  PHP (Hypertext Preprocessor)
    Weeks      6  &  7  ——  Databases and PHP
    Weeks  8, 10, & 11  ——  Handheld (Android) computing
    Weeks 12, 13, & 14  ——  AJAX technologies
    Weeks     15  & 16  ——  JavaScript
    Week            17  ——  E/m-commerce concepts

Remark I
Definitions, terminologies, and theories will be discussed minimally in this course. Instead practical works and programming knowledge will be emphasized and enforced.

Remark II
This is an advanced web course using LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, and PHP). For a database course, check DATA 520 Databases and CSCI 513 Advanced Database Systems using Oracle databases and JDBC (Java Database Connectivity).

Remark III
Numerous web development tools and software have been proposed and keep emerging. The reason of using the latest ones is mainly because of hype since programming languages have no major breakthroughs since 1950s, and the application cores still require about the same level of heavy human works. Unfortunately, many IT managers do not realize this truth, but once you master one specific technology, learning another should not be difficult because all foundations are about the same.

Instructor’s Qualification
The instructor initiated a database-driven web system by using Perl and Sybase in 1997, when not many people were familiar with the web development. Ever since, numerous software and tools such as ASP.NET, LAMP, and Oracle have been used by him to build various web systems. In addition, the instructor began mobile-commerce research in 2000 and started developing mobile apps in 2006. Many mobile platforms were used by him initially, but the instructor is now focusing on Android, which is the most popular one currently.

Dishonesty
Under no circumstances will acts of academic dishonesty be tolerated. Any suspected incidents of dishonesty will be promptly referred to the Assistant Dean of Students. Refer to the Code of Student Life, Appendix B.2: Academic Dishonesty.

Disability
Students who need special accommodations for learning or who have special needs are invited to share these concerns or requests with the instructor as soon as possible.





      I bought my friend an elephant for his room.    
      He said “Thanks!” I said “Don’t mention it.”