Proposal for development of Music Distribution Website proposal

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Copyright © 2007 Captive Design
Mr ###
### Street
Pietermaritzburg
3201
Captive Design
Pietermaritzburg
3201
Senior Software Engineer: Chris Morton
Phone: 0741012850
Email: chris@captivedesign.co.za
Table of Contents
Proposal for Development of Music Distribution Website ..................................3
Executive Summary ...........................................................................3
Introduction......................................................................................3
Features and Core Functionality............................................................4
Assumptions ..................................................................................4
Primary Purpose ............................................................................4
Scenario ......................................................................................4
A session in the life of www.musicfusion.co.za ............................4
Targeted Audience .........................................................................5
Core Features ................................................................................6
Proposed Module Overview ..............................................................6
Diagram 1 ............................................................................6
Searching and Display ....................................................................8
Community Forums........................................................................9
Customer Reviews/Ratings ..............................................................9
Customisability..............................................................................9
User Profiling .............................................................................. 10
Top 10....................................................................................... 10
Shopping Cart and Payment Processing ........................................... 11
Jewel Case Insert Creation ............................................................ 11
Access Levels and User Roles......................................................... 12
Internal Users ..................................................................... 12
Public Users ........................................................................ 13
Administration Panels ................................................................... 13
Value Added Features.................................................................... 14
Musician Pages ............................................................................ 14
Ringtones................................................................................... 14
My Scratches, My Albums Sharing .................................................. 15
Band Voting ................................................................................ 15
Events Guide .............................................................................. 15
Audio Streaming.......................................................................... 16
News and Hot Topics.................................................................... 16
Ticket Sales................................................................................ 16
Optional Newsletters .................................................................... 16
RSS Streams .............................................................................. 16
Competitions and Special Offers ..................................................... 16

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Advertising ................................................................................. 17
Site Reports................................................................................ 17
Layout and Design ........................................................................... 17
Proposal 1 ................................................................................... 18
Features: ................................................................................... 18
Pros: ......................................................................................... 18
Cons: ........................................................................................ 19
Proposal 2 ................................................................................... 19
Features .................................................................................... 19
Pros: ......................................................................................... 19
Cons: ........................................................................................ 20
Proposal 3 ................................................................................... 20
Features .................................................................................... 20
Pros: ......................................................................................... 21
Cons: ........................................................................................ 21
Development Strategy ...................................................................... 21
Prerequisites................................................................................ 21
Consultation ................................................................................ 21
Milestones ................................................................................... 22
Milestone Summary ..................................................................... 22
Diagram 2 .......................................................................... 22
Explanation ................................................................................ 23
Database Design .......................................................................... 23
Application Design ........................................................................ 24
Testing ....................................................................................... 25
Deployment ................................................................................. 25
Support ...................................................................................... 26
Upgrades .................................................................................... 26
Documentation............................................................................. 26
Scope ............................................................................................ 26
Inclusions.................................................................................... 26
Limitations .................................................................................. 27
Suggestions .................................................................................... 27
Transferral of Data........................................................................ 27
Hosting ....................................................................................... 27
Cost .............................................................................................. 28
Cost Break Down ......................................................................... 28
Diagram 3 .......................................................................... 28
Keys .............................................................................................. 29
Technological Summary .................................................................... 30
Exclusive Permissions ....................................................................... 30
Document Summary......................................................................... 30
Support Documentation .................................................................... 30

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Proposal for Development of Music Distribution
Website
Author: Chris Morton
Executive Summary
This document is a proposal for the development of a website for your client.
The document covers a scenario on which the rest of the document is based
upon. From the scenario I have extracted the technical aspects, financial aspects
and development aspects for the proposal.
Three important diagrams summarise the documents content and will be useful
for a preliminary glance about this proposal. It is important to understand that
reading the content of the document will give you a better understanding of the
entire proposal.
I hope you find this document useful in creating your proposal to your client.
Introduction
Please note: Keys used in this document are listed here.
The purpose of this document is to formally conceptualise the development of
www.musicfusion.co.za1 in order to support the acceptance of the work offered by
your client.
The core functionality of this application supports the online registration of users
who once registered can compile custom compilations of music CD’S2 according to
the music available on the site. The registered users can upload images and can
create jewel case inserts for their compilations and proceed to pay for and order
their compilation to be delivered to their selected destination.
The site must support the customisation and updateability of certain content via
an administrator access portal3.
The site must also allow for feature rich interaction of registered users where
users can review and rate music. Registered users must also be able to
participate in forums.
In this document I will attempt to address the following issues raised by your
client:
1. Site Layout
2. Customisability
3. Information presented to a user of the site.
4. Searching
5. Community Forums and Customer Reviews
6. Suggestions for integrating existing data into the new application
7. Suggestions to make the site appealing to the public
8. Hosting Solutions
Please note that at the time of writing the site http://mas.musiccreator.de/ was
down or inaccessible from my machine.

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Features and Core Functionality
Assumptions
I have defined two assumptions that I am basing this proposal on as described
under the pertinent headings. Please be advised that I have based these
assumptions from my initial consultation with First Technologies representative
and from the information given to me.
Primary Purpose
The primary purpose of www.musicfusion.co.za is addressed in the introduction in
a condensed summary. A more detailed description is documented here:
I have used my creative licence to document an excerpt that describes user
interaction in order to describe the purpose:
Scenario
A session in the life of www.musicfusion.co.za
An anonymous user browses to www.musicfusion.co.za whereby he4 is presented
with an attractive, feature rich website that immediately prompts him to discover
the massive mp3 collection that is now available for his perusal.
The user browses the music collection and previews the music he likes. Hopefully
he discovers many musicians he really enjoys and has already seen the possibility
of legally acquiring a copy of his favourite music collection. As he has been
browsing he has been ‘tagging’ music that he likes and dislikes and after a preset
(by the administrator) number of previews he is prompted to login or create an
account to continue his browsing.
Assuming this user is a new unregistered user he decides to sign-up and enjoy
the benefits of belonging to www.musicfusion.co.za. He discovers that his
‘tagging’ has been saved in his online profile in his ‘My Scratches’ section. He
continues his browsing activity and he is now given the option of longer previews
and the ability to rate his music preferences.
As a new registered user he is slightly uncertain of paying for music as he is
unfamiliar with the site and wants to know more, which prompts him to browse to
the FAQ section. This section briefly describes that the music is legal and shows a
customisable (by administrator) price list and most importantly describes that the
music in his ‘My Scratches’ can be compiled into a CD which he can purchase
from www.musicfusion.co.za. Hopefully he is satisfied and the FAQ suggests he
looks in the forum to find out more about what ever he needs to know.
He browses the forum and discovers he has reached the utopia of the music
culture in South Africa. Thousands of other users just like him are participating in
threads about genres, bands, songs, events, instruments – you name it and he
finds it. He discovers he can start his own thread and promptly starts one on
‘Alternative Jazz’. He is prompted by www.musicfusion.co.za to update his profile
with a picture and some other information. He is allowed to put a watch on this
thread and the other ones he has participated in, which he will be alerted via
email or an RSS feed when something changes.

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The user logs off and returns a few days later from a different computer. He logs
in continues to review, rate and tag his music. Eventually this sceptical user gets
the urge to splash out and order some of his scratched music to be compiled into
CD format and delivered to his residence. He clicks on his scratch he has entitled
‘Electronica from The Depths’ and he is invited to use some templates for his
jewel case insert or upload his own. He decides to upload his own. Unfortunately
he interrupted and needs to come back later to finish his order.
That evening at his residence he logs on again and goes to his ‘My Scratches’
section. Alas he discovers his ‘Electronica from the Depths’ is no longer there but
notices that his ‘My Albums’ section is showing (1) next to it. So he goes to ‘My
Albums’ and previews his album before proceeding to the checkout. He notices
that he has one track on the album that is not really Electronica and removes it.
The track moves back to his ‘My Scratches’ section and he selects another to be
added to his 64 minute compilation. The track he selects is 7 minutes long and
the system advises that the album cannot include the track he has selected. He
types in ‘ElecTRonica 2001 south Africa’ in the search box and 10 results are
displayed. Luckily he finds exactly the track he wants by Felix Laband and adds it
to his ‘My Scratches’ where he proceeds to add it to his ‘Electronica from the
Depths’ album.
He proceeds to the ‘Get It’ section where he confirms his identity using a sec ure
access password and is redirected to a SSL protected Paypal hosting page and
enters his credit card details. After a couple of seconds his payment is processed
and he receives an email in his inbox confirming his purchase and the estimated
time of arrival. He is redirected back to www.musicfusion.co.za and continues the
important business of browsing the music.
After the specified time he gets his album via mail and is extremely happy to
receive the excellent quality pre-packaged article and secretly reckons he has got
a bargain.
That night he has a party and his friends comment ‘Dude! That is the best music
of that sort I have listened to for a while – but it’s not really my jive’. He replies
‘Yeah I ordered it on the net….. Ah …. www.musicfusion.co.za has a huge
selection of music you can listen to and if you like it you can order a CD if you
want. Check it out man.’
And the story continues…
End of Excerpt
Although unconventional, I find it easiest to describe functionality in this way, as
it is much more interesting than dry technical explanations. Captive Design
documents such explanations in an article entitled ‘User Requirement
Specifications’.
Targeted Audience
As suggested in the excerpt the target audience assumed for the application is
essentially a moneyed young professional.
In this document I have written the features to appeal to a wide range of
audiences including but not limited to:
 students

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 young adults
 professional musicians
It assumed that the target audience has a minimal degree of technological savvy,
own credit cards or have a paypal account, and are of course music fans.
Core Features
Proposed Module Overview
A Summary of the proposed modules is presented below in table format:
The codes in the righter most columns represent the module types; multiple
values represent a combination of them:
Keys:
S – Standard Core Functionality
F – Value Added feature
V - Visible
I – Invisible or contains an Invisible Component
C – Module collection of a number of Custom Controls
T – Contains third party components
R – Revenue Generator
Diagram 1
Module Description Module
Type
Searching Used to search for music according to
any criteria
S,V
Display Allows User to see more detailed
information on his selection. Using
this he can preview, rate, review, tag
and nominate mp3’s. he can also look
at linking pertaining to the music.
S,V,C
Community Forum Allows anonymous users to browse
community forums.
Allows registered users to participate
in forums
Allows administrators to review posts
and prevent certain users from
participating. Administrators can also
hide and disable threads.
S,V,C
Ratings Allows Registered Users to rate music S,V
Review Allows Registered Users to write a
review of music
S,V
User Profile Allows users to edit and view their
details. Includes the My Scratched
and My Albums modules.
S,V,C,I
Top 10 Displays the top ten of a selected list.
The default is most listened to music.
S,V
My Scratches Keeps track of the users interest of
music. He can tag music which goes
into his scratches so he can compile
S,V,C

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albums
My Albums My Albums in the Shopping Cart of
this site. Here the user can create his
desired product and jewel case
design, preview, edit and change the
album.
S,V,C
Get It Get It is the Checkout of this site. This
allows the user to enter his banking
details under a SSL and confirm his
order and proceed to purchase it.
S,V,C,T,R
Jewel Case Creation Wizard This allows a user to create a jewel
case using either a template wizard or
uploading a custom insert.
S,V,C,T,R
Login Module Provides a security layer for
registered users
S,V
Registration Module Allows new users to register S,V,C
Access Control Module Runs as background service that
manages sessions and access control
S,I
Administration/Customisation
Modules
Allows authorised users to perform
customisation tasks of various types
through different interfaces according
to the customization task
S,V,C,T
Musician Pages Provides an interface whereby a user
can upload information on his band
and create a band profile page.
F,V,C,R
Ringtone Wizard Allows registered users to create
custom Ringtones from the mp3s
available and mms them to their
phones
F,V,C,T,R
Sharing Module Allows a to share is albums or
scratches for the perusal of other
users
F,V,C,R
Events Calendar Allows users to configure their events
online and add them to a national
events calendar. Users can down load
an outlook calendar event to add to
there outlook
F,V,C,R
Voting/Survey Module Allows the site administrators to post
voting an surveys about current
issues. Allows users to vote for bands
they would like to see.
F,V
Audio Streaming Module Performs an online radio service F,V,I
News and Hot Topics Module Allows the administrators to keep the
site current with current cultural
events etc
F,V,C
Ticket Sales Integrates with event calendar to
allow the online sale of tickets
F,V,C,T,R
Optional Newsletters Allows users to sign up for optional
news letter that have been composed
by an administrator
F,V,C
RSS Feed module Allows users to get feeds from the site
from selected areas
F,V
Competitions/Special Offers
Module
Allows users to enter competitions
and partake in special offers to
F,V.R

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maintain a loyal user base.
Advertising Module Allows administrator to configure
advertising on the site
F,V,C,R
Site Reports Module Allows administrators to generate
reports pertaining to activity on the
site to gauge performance of various
aspects of the site.
F,V,C,R,T
The core features of www.musicfusion.co.za are described below with some
description of technical aspects involved:
Searching and Display
The search functionality for www.musicfusion.co.za is implemented using queries
against data stored in a database about the mp3’s available.
The mp3 format contains a piece of information called a meta-tag which stores
metadata about the actual mp3 file. Please follow these links for more
information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MP3
http://www.id3lib.org/id3//id3v1.html
Essentially this metadata can store information such as the song title, artist,
genre, year, album and other data about the music. When using software such as
Win Amp or Windows Media Player searches conducted on a users system use
this information to return results.
Assuming5 the metadata of the mp3 files on our client’s server is good it is
possible to write a small windows application to retrieve this data from the mp3’s
files and write it into SQL Server which can then be used to query against by
www.musicfusion.co.za.
Using SQL server and C# to execute query logic against a SQL database will be
the fastest and easiest way of implementing an effective search mechanism.
Alternatively searching directly against the meta-tags for a very large number of
individual files by multiple users simultaneously may produce significant overhead
and hence slow the application significantly.
At this stage the implementation of the search functionality depends heavily on
acquiring a copy of the mp3 files in order to analyse, develop, test and implement
functionality for a search engine. Please follow these links for further information:
http://www.id3.org/id3guide
http://channel9.msdn.com/ShowPost.aspx?PageIndex=11&PostID=250823
http://www.searchtools.com/info/mp3-search.html
Once an effective search engine is created it is very important to display the
results in a way that the user can comprehend.
Essentially to address this www.musicfusion.co.za will only show song titles,
album names, artists and genre (and perhaps a thumbnail if it is available) in the
initial result set. The user is required to click on the item which will display the

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entire information set (and perhaps related data such as ‘other music like this’ or
‘other music from this artist’).
Once the user is viewing the selected information he can listen to a preview of the
track (length according to login status), tag it, rate it or review it according to his
preference.
Community Forums
To support community forums www.musicfusion.co.za will use a similar forum
format to the one displayed here:
http://forums.asp.net/
The forum represented here is very advanced software and some of the
functionality of the http://forums.asp.net/ forum is unnecessary for
www.musicfusion.co.za and I therefore advise that consultation be undertaken
with the client to establish the exact needs for www.musicfusion.co.za.
Essentially the forum will support thread creation by registered users, thread
disabling or hiding (essentially the same effect as deleting) by administrators,
post creation that supports avatars (i.e. users can use a pseudonym and a picture
to represent themselves), post hiding by administrators and moderators.
Please note that forums do carry risks with them as they are a public area for
people to express what ever they like, which may cause incidents leading to legal
intervention. In order to prevent this type of thing happening it is important to
have a particular policy about how users conduct themselves and additionally
there is a need for enforcement of certain policies by moderators.
Customer Reviews/Ratings
Registered Users will be able to rate music from 0-5 stars according to their
preference.
The average ratings of a particular mp3 will be displayed to all users to gauge the
quality of the music however the individuals rating will be displayed for that
particular user in order for him to compile albums his particular taste.
www.musicfusion.co.za will use the AJAX control listed here:
http://ajax.asp.net/ajaxtoolkit/Rating/Rating.aspx
to implement rating.
Users will also be able to write reviews on music or bands which I will refer to as
‘Blurbs’. The ‘Blurbs’ or reviews may also carry risks similar to the forums risks.
Customisability
Customisability of www.musicfusion.co.za will include the option to upload a
number of different master pages which can include different graphics, CSS and
page layouts. The limitation to this approach is that the master page(s) must
follow a consistent naming convention, XHTML validation and code behind file to
ensure that the application does not produce formatting errors or application

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errors. For this to be ensured a professional programmer should be employed to
maintain compatibility of a new layout.
It is important that customisability options exist to enable administrators to
update certain content on the site (for example news, advertising, graphics etc)
to keep the site attractive and to encourage repeat traffic of existing visitors. To
allow this www.musicfusion.co.za will implement some of the third party controls
specifically designed for this purpose, for example:
http://www.freetextbox.com/
Another aspect of customisability is the option to customise email messages sent
from an application such as this. This functionality will be supported by a section
whereby an administrator can compose HTML messages using the interface
provided where ‘generic’ datatags that represent different values can be inserted
at various locations within the message.
Examples of a generic datatags could be ‘!@Username@’, ‘!@FirstName@’,
‘!@LastName@’, ‘!@AlbumName@’ and ‘!@Price@’ where the values pertaining to
the particular user account are substituted into the configurable HTML email
message.
An example of this functionality can be seen in messages received from Microsoft
Subscription Services.
User Profiling
User profiling will encompass the collection of data pertaining to:
 Names
 Locations
 Contact Details
 Login Information
 Avatar Information
The above mentioned data is typically collected by most sites that require some
kind of registration.
Further more, user profiles will contain information about music preferences,
usage statistics, financial transactional information (i.e. how much has a
particular user actually bought), rating information, ‘My Scratches’, ‘My Albums’
and other data should it be required.
From the aspect of an administrator, he must be able to generate statistical
reports based on the data in the system.
Top 10
Top 10 need not be limited to actual ‘sales’ of music. The potential of the top 10
concept can include the following:
 Sales
 Most Listened To
 Highest Rated (the traditional top 10 chart)
 Most Active Users
 Newest

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The top ten can be implemented using similar controls as demonstrated here:
http://www.imate.com/
http://www.imate.com/t-devicedetails.aspx
Shopping Cart and Payment Processing
The shopping cart functionality consists of three sections:
 ‘My Scratches’
 ‘My Albums’
 ‘Get It’
Once I again I have used my creative licence to suggest ‘cool names’ that are not
as intimidating or as boring as ‘Shopping Cart’ and ‘Check Out’. I am very familiar
with online shopping and suggest that a ‘Wish List’ be implemented as an
accurate generalisation people are sceptical about shopping online and need the
psychological reassurance of the option to back-out or change their mind. This
functionality can be seen on http://www.amazon.com/.
For clarification please note the following equivalencies:
‘My Scratches’ roughly equates to amazon.com’s ‘Wish List’
‘My Albums’ equates to the ‘Shopping Cart’
‘Get It’ equates to the ‘Checkout’
The basic business process behind compiling and purchasing a CD from
www.musicfusion.co.za is described in the excerpt entitled ‘A session in the life of
www.musicfusion.co.za’.
The process of online purchasing follows this procedure:
 A registered user tags his music which is added to his ‘My Scratches’
section.
 When the user decides to purchase some music he creates an empty
album in his ‘My Albums’ section.
 The user proceeds to add his scratches to the new album until the time
limit of 70 minutes is reached. The album can be edited until the user is
satisfied.
 The user is encouraged to create a jewel case insert from existing
templates or upload his own.
 Once the user is satisfied with his album he can decide to ‘Get It’ which
directs him to a secure access site hosted by Paypal where he proceeds to
transact. For further information please follow this link:
https://www.paypal.com/IntegrationCenter/ic_pdnHome.html.
 On successful completion of the transaction he is send a message of
confirmation of his order and a delivery estimate (ETA).
Jewel Case Insert Creation
The creation of jewel case inserts is implemented in two methods:
 The selection of a pre-existing template ‘wizard’.
 The uploading of a user created jewel case insert.

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The wizard allows the user to select various colour schemes, fonts and images to
be included in his jewel case insert. www.musicfusion.co.za produces an XML
document that contains the information for the users album (including track data
and jewel case insert data) and adds it to the ‘manufacturing queue’ 6.
The uploading of a user created jewel case insert should support two generic
formats, namely the .ncd file format that is created by the popular Nero Cover
Designer software, and .psd format files created by Photoshop 5.0 or above.
In order for a registered user to up load his custom jewel case insert design a
tutorial should be published on www.musicfusion.co.za that covers both methods
of creation.
Additionally .ncd and .psd files should be downloaded or sent to the registered
user with strict instructions that he is to modify the documents according to the
tutorial and upload them. This must be enforced to allow for consistency and
therefore efficiency in the manufacturing process.
Needless to say an additional charge should be requested for custom jewel case
inserts.
Access Levels and User Roles
During the creation of this document several possibilities of access levels have
been deliberated by me.
I have referred to the ‘administrator’ as the person who can perform certain
functionality. I have also referred to moderators, registered users and anonymous
users.
The challenge with only having one type of internal user in this type of application
(referred to as the ‘administrator’) is that the work required to maintain the site
would over-burden a single person. Alternatively if there where a number of
administrators with exactly the same permissions it would be almost impossible
to delegate tasks effectively and apply some kind of quality assurance. With
reference to this scenario the need to provide a number of different roles for the
application with specific tasks and access permissions becomes apparent.
In order to clarify the access levels and users rights assignments I propose the
following roles for the application. I typically refer to these as user types. Below is
a summation of my proposed user types and the roles they perform in the
www.musicfusion.co.za application:
Internal Users
1. Administrator
The administrator is responsible for the configuration settings of the application
such as the length that an anonymous user can preview a track, uploading of
different master pages and the configuration of other internal user accounts or
disabling of registered users accounts. The administrator will also be able to
generate statistical reports relating to site usage etc. The administrator also
inherits the permissions of the content publisher, forum moderator, review
moderator and music moderator.

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2. Content Publisher
The role of the content publisher includes the ability to update content on the site
relating to news, advertising, general information, email messages, FAQ’s and
jewel case insert templates (wizards). The content publisher does not inherit the
forum moderators, review moderators or music moderators’ permissions.
3. Forum Moderator
The forum moderator will be tasked to monitor the thread on the forum and can
disable or hide the threads that may be controversial, irrelevant or exhausted.
The forum moderator can also nominate registered users who are not following
the conduct guidelines to be disabled from using the forums section. The
administrator will disable a disruptive users account.
4. Review Moderator
The review moderator is tasked to monitor reviews of music on the site. The
prevention of legal interaction by copyright holders of the music available should
be a high priority in www.musicfusion.co.za. The review moderator inherits the
permissions of the music moderator.
5. Music Moderator
The music moderator is responsible for censoring offensive material from
sensitive audiences. When a registered user signs up he is given the option of
‘safe-searching’ which will prevent offensive material from being displayed for the
particular user. Additionally people below a certain age will automatically have
‘safe-searching’ enabled on their accounts. In order to implement such a strategy
music should be graded manually according to its offensive content. I cannot
think of anyway of automating this process except that users who come across
unrated offensive material can nominate it to be reviewed by the music
moderator to allow it to rated.
Public Users
6. Registered User
A registered user has permissions to listen to longer previews of music, rate
music, review music, and participate in forums and voting. A registered user can
also add and remove items from his ‘My Scratches’ section, create and order
albums.
7. Anonymous User
An anonymous user has access to search and preview music (for a shorter
interval), tag music (tags will be stored on the client’s cookies until he signs up),
access the forums (read only) and browse all other sections of
www.musicfusion.co.za except for the SSL section.
Administration Panels
As documented above customization is an integral part of www.musicfusion.co.za,
it therefore stands to reason that ‘special’ internal user access panels be available
for this purpose. Unfortunately the name ‘Administration Panels’ might be slightly
misleading to the reader of this document. To clarify: Administration refers to a
verb (administrate) as opposed to a noun (administrator), thus all internal users
who have the ability to administrate content have access to certain administration
panels according to their permissions.

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At this stage it is impossible to describe all the aspects of administration without
a consultation with the client.
Value Added Features
As requested by the client suggestions to make www.musicfusion.co.za more
appealing to the general public would be appreciated. The following suggestions
may actually be beyond the scope of www.musicfusion.co.za but I have thought
to myself as I have been writing this document about ideas that are just
appealing or are both appealing and could be used to generate revenue.
Musician Pages
The music industry in South Africa is still developing and many musicians and
bands out there do not have the resources to fund a great deal of marketing. I
believe that giving South African bands the opportunity to create a page on
www.musicfusion.co.za would be beneficial for all parties involved, especially
concerning the important aspect of generating revenue for
www.musicfusion.co.za.
I propose that a band can upload information on the site about their band and be
assigned a sub domain on www.musicfusion.co.za.
An example sub domain could be: www.thebandname.musicfusion.co.za. This
concept has been around since I can remember and is implemented on sites such
as:
http://geocities.yahoo.com/
http://www.myspace.com/
http://googlepages.com
This has proven to be a popular revenue generator.
During the upload process the band is mandatorily required to send a cd of their
music to the www.musicfusion.co.za administration offices for review before the
musician page is approved (by the content publisher).
Secondly big international bands such as Metallica, U2 or Madonna could have
pages on www.musicfusion.co.za that I will call band profiles. These profile pages
would be created by a Content Publisher as and when needed.
An example URL for such a page could be:
http://www.musicfusion.co.za/profiles.aspx?t=band&b=HootieAndTheBlowfish
When a user searches for music and selects an mp3 to preview, if a profile page
exists for the band (either a musician page or a profile page) the user can browse
that page if they want to.
Ringtones
From my personal experience, I find the sms services available in this country
that distribute Ringtones of popular music are below standard and too expensive.
I have resorted to creating my own Ringtones and uploading them on to my
phone (I have a phone that accepts mp3’s as Ringtones).

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I propose I service whereby a user can select music and create up to 20 second
long Ringtones and have them mms’ed to his phone via www.musicfusion.co.za
for a fee.
I believe this could be a good revenue generator if the technology is available.
My Scratches, My Albums Sharing
A lot of people out there rate themselves as DJ’s or would like to impose their
taste of music on other people.
The idea of individual users ‘sharing’ their scratches or albums may have
commercial potential in terms of market research for CD manufacturers and
record companies who are looking for new ideas in order to create compilations of
music that will sell.
If users have the ability to publish their scratches and albums in
www.musicfusion.co.za data could be collected for corporations in order to collate
and eventually find out what is ‘really’ happening in a certain demographic of
music buying public.
This data could be used to generate another large revenue stream.
Band Voting
In general the South African public still feels ‘left-out’ of the international music
scene.
Using a ‘survey/voting’ system www.musicfusion.co.za could gauge which bands
the South African public would most like to see.
With strategic partnerships in place www.musicfusion.co.za could arrange for
events companies to invite bands to South Africa and receive revenue based on
ticket sales (see Ticket Sales).
Events Guide
One of the most annoying things for me is the marketing of musical events in
South Africa and my failure to add them to my Outlook Calendar to remind me
when something is happening.
I think a good revenue generator for www.musicfusion.co.za could be the ability
of registered users who have marked themselves as Venues to configure an
Outlook Calendar Event on www.musicfusion.co.za and users browsing the site
can download an Outlook Calendar Event and add it to their Outlook Calendars.
To view a demonstration of what I am talking about please follow this link:
http://www.snowcovered.com/Snowcovered2/user_uploads/BookableEventsDemo
3.html
Please note that this is a calendar that has been designed specifically for
DotNetNuke and that I would have to develop my own. I would also provide a
quite a different implementation.

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In terms of revenue generation users who configure an event would be charged
to use the functionality. Users who download an Outlook calendar event would do
so for free.
Audio Streaming
Audio streaming to facilitate online radio could be implemented so that a
registered user could listen to his scratches or an online DJ’s selection of music.
I am not sure that this would encourage use of the site nor generate revenue. I
would also require very large bandwidth quotas.
Although this is an appealing feature of the site I don’t think it would benefit
www.musicfusion.co.za’s revenue stream.
News and Hot Topics
This would be absolutely essential to www.musicfusion.co.za in my opinion. The
possibility of integrating this into the events calendar/ticket sales modules is
achievable.
Ticket Sales
In line with publishing event online it would make sense to partner with an
organisation that distributes tickets for events and possibly either buy bulk
bookings (risky/higher profit) and resell the tickets or provide a link to the ticket
sellers online booking system and receive commission (low risk/low profit).
To implement this will involve consultation with the selected distributor.
Optional Newsletters
Although everyone hates spam, the ability for a user to receive optional news
letters is important. It must be clearly explained to the user that these are
optional news letters and they have the choice to unsubscribe at any time.
RSS Streams
An alternative to optional newsletters to keep users informed it the availability of
RSS feeds that more technological savvy users can subscribe to.
For a brief description of RSS feeds please follow this link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RSS
Competitions and Special Offers
Competitions and special offers are well used marketing tools to gauge the
success or failure of a particular concept or product. In my opinion it is also fair to
offer users who frequently purchase products from www.musicfusion.co.za special
offers in order to keep their custom.
Competitions could also be useful for encouraging sales within
www.musicfusion.co.za for example:
If www.musicfusion.co.za holds a competition on the most attractive jewel case
insert design, users who have the inclination will rise to the challenge of

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designing the best cover design (which could be democratically decided by votes)
and I am certain that in the process the users who design the covers will buy
their ‘own’ product. Additionally as a spin off some users who vote for the best
cover will also buy the cover designers album. (I have another appealing idea
here: musicbucks, if a particular user album is profitable he earns music bucks
which could allow him to get special discounts on his next purchase – you could
even go so far as to say to the public ‘get your favourite free legal music
delivered to your door for life – enter our jewel case insert design competition for
free!!!”)
Advertising
A web site without advertising is very scarce these days. I have added this in the
Value Added Features section as it has not been specifically mentioned by the
client.
To support adverting functionality there are many different possibilities available
and I cannot describe the suitable solution without first knowing what the clients
need is.
Needless to say this is a revenue stream.
Site Reports
Perhaps one of the most important aspects of modern e-commerce site design is
the ability to monitor activity within the site without resorting to log reports from
the IIS webserver. To this effect I can design certain functionality to support the
monitoring of activity with in the site if required.
Another aspect of site reporting is the ability to get statistical data from entities
such as users, mp3’s and voting.
This is potentially very complex and needs consultation to minimise the
requirements as much as possible.
Layout and Design
When reading this section please bear in mind that the proposals presented here
are only three of the designs I thought as suitable for www.musicfusion.co.za in
my personal capacity. If none of these are suitable I have a number of other
possibilities that may appeal.
Should one of these designs be suitable but have ‘missing’ elements we are able
to add those elements (features) accordingly.
Should the colour scheme of these proposals not be suitable we are able to
change it accordingly.
Graphics demonstrated in these proposals are only the purposes of
conceptualisation. In reality any graphics could be represented.
The purpose of the layout and design section of this document is to allow the
client to explore the possibilities of the application functionality matched with the
interface design.

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The designs represented here are designed to be displayed correctly on 800 by
600 resolution display with 32 bit colour support. The screenshots are taken on a
1152 by 864 resolution display.
Proposal 1
This design presents a modern interface with exiting options for
www.musicfusion.co.za. The interface will support advanced navigation options
thus a feature rich site.
Features:
As you can notice from the search engine section a user can search for music
according to their genre preference. The three orange blocks on the right hand
side could be used to display news and hot topics or as adverting space.
The content section on the left hand side could display information pertaining to
the top artists/trends on the site. The light grey panel above the content and
news sections can be used to display important information to the users or host
some flash media.
Pros:
 Allows for a large amount of different information to be displayed on the
screen real-estate.
 Looks professional and neat.
 Provides a rich graphical user interface pertaining to images and flash
media.

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Cons:
 May be ‘too complex’ in terms of navigation possibilities for an average
user.
 The colour scheme and graphics may need revision.
 There is a danger of presenting the user with ‘information overload’.
Proposal 2
This interface is very simplistic and allows for an average user to navigate easily
to what the essence of www.musicfusion.co.za is: the distribution of music.
Features
The primary focus of this interface is the search functionality. It presents a search
box and an alphabetical indexing section.
The secondary focus of this interface is a large content section that is sparsely
populated with images and text, supporting the simplistic navigation model.
The ternary focus of this site is a panel on the right that could be used to display
news and hot topics/advertising/navigation menus etc.
Pros:

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 An attractive and simplistic interface.
 Promotes primary focus on the essence of www.musicfusion.co.za: the
ability to search for music.
Cons:
 The overly simplistic design limits the navigation model (thus the features)
of the site.
 The screen real-estate is not used optimally.
 The users of this site may interpret such a simple design to mean that
www.musicfusion.co.za does not have a lot of features.
 Some more adult users might not appreciate the adolescent appeal of this
design.
Proposal 3
This interface is also a simplistic design but allows for advanced navigational
options (and therefore a feature rich site). In this interface there are two content
sections, the first one displaying a flash element that could allow the user to
scroll latest albums. The first content section could be used to show advertising,
news and hot topics, navigation menus, album/track info or anything else with a
graphical nature. The second content section can be used for text data
representation.
Features
The primary focus of this interface is the navigation element of
www.musicfusion.co.za which will allow for rich feature support with easy

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navigation for the average user. Also supported is a search box and a header
section.
Pros:
 Advanced navigation possibilities to support feature rich content.
 Two distinct content sections for different types of data.
 From a developer point of view this allows for the simplest development
path for feature rich support.
Cons:
 Some users may interpret the interface as boring or not funky enough.
 Search could be improved
 A right hand content section (in the second content section) could be
implemented.
Development Strategy
In order develop www.musicfusion.co.za within an agreed time frame and to the
specified standards a development strategy needs to be defined together with the
client and other stakeholders. At this stage it is difficult for me to give a concrete
development plan however below I have documented some typical steps in the
development of a site such as this.
Prerequisites
In order to develop an accurate and fast search engine to retrieve mp3’s we will
require a mp3 library similar to the clients (in terms of number of individual files,
metadata, file organisation (i.e. how are the files organised in the file system))
and hardware that meets similar performance of the file server where the files are
to be hosted on (if the file server has raid and the development environment does
not it will be impossible to determine how well or otherwise the software is
performing).
Additionally electronic documents containing the actual text content of the site
need to be supplied in order to develop the software as quickly as possible
without resorting to sample data (e.g. “Lorum ipsum dolor…”).
Preferably media content such as images should be supplied in the highest
resolution and biggest file sizes possible to allow us to edit them and produce the
highest quality images of appropriate file size for the site.
Unfortunately without these prerequisites the development time will be much
longer and therefore incur a higher cost.
Consultation
It is of paramount importance that a consultation between the developer and the
client take place before the next stage of this process can take place (the next
stage being the User Requirement Specification Document/Project Plan/UML
document stage).

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It is also very important that regular communication takes place between the
developer(s) and the client as milestone are reached to ensure that the client
gets what they want on completion of the project. Unfortunately without regular
consultation with the client projects like this tend to have scope creep (the
developers do to much or to little) which will have cost implications for the
developer (in particular the risk of losing money due to either over development
or misguided developers). Simply put, just like in any industry time is money,
and spending a little time in effective communication can and always does
prevent wasted resources.
Milestones
The singular most important purpose of a project plan is to identify milestones. A
milestone consists of several tasks within a certain time frame that defines a
recognisable stage within the project plan. Without any concrete information is it
difficult to identify actual downloads however I have identified these milestones
that will definitely part of the project:
Milestone Summary
Keys:
I – included for the deposit price
P - Cost of labour R300 per hour
O – Cost of labour R250 per hour
C – Consultation needed
R – Research Required
M – Research may be required
A – Acquisition of third party components required
Diagram 2
Milestone Description Keys Estimated
Development
Time
URS/Project Plan/UML
Documentation
including initial
consultation
Documents relating to the
actual development
process
I,C,M 7 days
Database
Development
Continues throughout the
application development
I,C,R N/A
Database Integration Integrate existing data
into the database
P,C,R,A 5 days
Generic Interface
Design
Create appealing interface
and define navigation
paths and content display
O,C,M,A 6 days
Registration and
Login
Facilitates the sign-up and
login of new users
P,C 1 Day
Access Control Defines the permissions
that certain user types
have and their access
rights
P,C 3 Days
Search And Display Allows for search and
display of content on the
P,C,R 10 days

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site
User Profile Allows users to view and
edit their account
P,C,M 4 days
My Scratches, My
Albums, Get It
integration and
Development
Incorporates the
functionality of
purchasing process
P,C,R,A 14 days
Integration and
development of
Administration Panels
Involves the development
of many different panels
and integration into the
structure of the application
P,C,R,A 10 days
Integration and
development of a
Community Forum
Development of a
community forum system
P,C,R,A 20 days
Jewel Case Creation
Wizard
Development of Jewel
Case Wizard
P,C,R,A 6 days
ATP, User Manual,
Observation Register
Documentation I,M 3 Days
Explanation
As software development is not a tangible product and often has a very abstract
nature (for example class development that has no visible user interface)
sometimes milestones are difficult to identify as project manager, because of this
fact a project plan for software development project uses a different premise to
determine milestones.
Captive Design depends on regular cash flow to ensure that our bills are paid.
Captive Design therefore works according to a tightly integrated arrangement
that follows this process:
Once a milestone is reached, a consultation with the client is arranged. At this
stage we kindly ask the customer for a payment in order to fund the next stage of
development.
Ideally this results in the following: a customer who is delighted with our
excellent work, a project that has been delivered on time and within budget, and
a team of developers who have not had to struggle to pay their bills between the
conception of the project (i.e. when deposit has been paid) and the end of the
project.
I always try to avoid any trouble. For me this is the best way of avoiding trouble,
with the added bonus of make clients very happy.
Database Design
The database design for this project will follow the 3rd normalised database design
rules. The database will be designed to fulfil the requirements of a high
performance OLTP application. The database will not be designed for replication.
The following describes the life cycle of a database design:
The Database design of any software project typically follows 5 stages:
Identification of entities, fields within those entities, the relationships between the
entities. This is translated into a ‘rough’ design that some of the core functionality

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can be build upon. (My personal philosophy is that the database design is the
foundation of building good software, just like a builder needs a strong foundation
to build a strong house).
The next stage is encountered in the development phase of the project where
developers start to extend the database to meet the applications requirements
more specifically.
The third stage of developing a sound database design is often the need to add,
change or remove certain relationships that might have been initialised by some
kind of client request. Some times this kind of scope creep will cause minimal
changes and could take an hour to do but more often produces late nights,
unhappy developers and could lead to project failure (which means wasted
resources all round). Although I always try to avoid this, I have discovered it is
inevitable. This is why it is important to keep communication flowing, especially in
phase 2, to keep stage 3 infrequent and short lived.
The fourth stage of database development is the optimisation of things such as
indexes, clustered indexes and full text indexes using tools such as SQL Profiler in
order to create the fastest possible database for the application. Often this
requires the population of certain tables with a great deal of test data to imitate
the situation in a real life scenario.
The fifth stage is to create a special deployment version of the database that will
be used for the application’s commercial implementation. This is essentially a
database with exactly the same structure as the one used in development but
only includes the data that needs to be in the database to on the deployment
day.
Application Design
The application will be coded using C#. The application development will follow a
guideline as set out in User Requirement Specification document. If there is time
to publish a project plan and a UML the developers will also draw upon these
documents to guide development.
Typically in the development life cycle there are four stages:
Planning and Documentation
Development
Testing
Deployment
This is a cross-section of a larger module called the application lifecycle.
From my experience I have learned two valuable development concepts: KISS
(keep it simple stupid) and the concept of continuous improvement.
To develop software successfully a developer needs to have a clear idea of the
end product before he writes even the first line of code. This justifies frequent
consultation as the project materialises.
The second thing about application development that will keep development
easier and upgradeability a reality with out total application re-write is the good
application of sound object oriented programming principals.

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The third thing about well designed web application that must be in the
developers mind when he develops is the ‘two-clicks/two-seconds’ principal.
Where ever possible ‘two-clicks/two-seconds’ is what the user wants when it
comes interacting with the site. In other words a user must be able to perform
simple interaction using one or ‘two-clicks’ and some kind of response must
happen within ‘two-seconds’ even if is just a message that says ‘loading…’.
During the development of this site I will try to keep the guidelines mentioned
here in mind while we develop code.
At this stage it is not possible to give you a detailed application development
description as without a consultation with the client their needs have not been
gauged and a guideline cannot be established.
Testing
The testing of an application is paramount to the success of a product.
Unfortunately with online applications should your application present a
unhandled exception to the client they will not come back. In reality the bigger
the site is the more likely this is to occur.
The best way to prevent unhandled exceptions is to employ people who are
actually developers that have not worked on your project and give them the
instructions ‘break it’.
Additionally it is advisable to give your application to novice users with the same
instruction.
Assuming that these testers find bugs there needs to be some mechanism in
place whereby the bugs can be documented and sorted out.
To do this I implement a special class that is called the error handler which I use
to records the error details either in a SQL database or as emails. This invisible
background functionality presents the end user with the illusion that there wasn’t
any error and lets him continue browsing, yet back at the office we know what
really happening.
Even the biggest and best programming companies have problems with software
bugs and they recommend a single design concept to minimise the possibility of
bugs – it is – write less code! In other words the KISS principle resurfaces here
again.
Deployment
From my experience deployment is often the easiest stage of the development
life-cycle for this type of application.
Having said this upon deployment there are always differences between the
clients infrastructure and the development infrastructure. The developer needs to
take note of certain differences before he begins to develop, or perhaps replicate
the clients’ environment in order to develop. (This applies more to windows
development not really web development).

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The questions that need to be asked by the development team are, amongst
others: will we have a dedicated web server, will the database be on a separate
server, will the file server be in a separate server, will the application be run in a
web farm and how will this effect our sessions, what protocols will be available
(i.e. FTP and https).
To deploy successfully a senior developer must get to know the administrators of
the system he will deploy on. He needs to earn their trust and give them the
peace of mind that he knows what he’s doing and if he doesn’t he will ask before
doing anything.
Support
Support to the client will be provided if needed and may incur costs.
Upgrades
We will attempt to develop this application so that it can be upgraded if
necessary. Obviously cost will be incurred for upgrades.
Documentation
Documentation is very important to the development of applications as it levels
the playing field for the client and developer. In the form of documentation topics
concerning development can be communicated without uncertainty. This is why
documents such as the User Requirement Specification, Project Plan, UML,
Observation Register and Acceptance Test Procedure documents exist.
Having said this it is important to note that documents can take a significant
amount of time to compile and must be worked into the cost of development.
Scope
In this document I have covered many different possibilities for the development
of www.musicfusion.co.za. As this document is only a proposal consisting of a
collection of ideas the scope can only be defined loosely.
On consultation with the client a clear scope definition will established according
to their needs and our development restrictions (cost of development and time
allowed), which will be documented in a document entitled ‘User Requirement
Specification’s’.
The implied scope thus includes inclusions and limitations as described below:
Inclusions
Once the client has decided on the options presented in this document and we are
confident that we can develop these features within the specified budget and
timeframe, the chosen features become the inclusions within the scope of the
project.
This means that what we are certain we can deliver what the client needs within
our restrictions.

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Limitations
Should the customer change their minds or request additional features during the
development phase (once we have completed the project up to certain point)
these requests fall out of scope of the inclusions of the URS.
The implementation of such requests falls within the development teams’
discretion as to whether to implement them or not and should implementation
take place these requests will incur additional cost and development time.
The reason for this approach is to manage the cost and development time within
restrictions and to prevent possible architectural changes which could cause
unexpected exceptions in the code.
Suggestions
Transferral of Data
With reference to the quoted text:
“Suggestions for integrating the site into our existing data base (methods of
delivering the order from website to content creation)”
I have assumed the following:
 The database may consist of mp3 indexes in a SQL Server
 Or the database could represent a file structure
 Content creation referrers to a manufacturing facility
In order to transfer SQL tables between databases this is a fairly7 easy task as
particular methods are well established.
If the database represents a file structure an application can be written to scan
the file structure and import the data into SQL server.
In terms of transferring the orders to the manufacturing facility a separate
application may have to be written to subscribe to the XML web service that
www.musicfusion.co.za will provide. In order to accurately describe integration
options it is necessary to analyse the existing infrastructure.
Hosting
In terms of hosting I recommend that the Webserver, SQL Server and File Server
be hosted on different physical servers.
Although this may seem like an expensive option the benefits outweigh the cost.
The benefits are as follows:
Better Performance:
As each machine has different hardware there is less chance of over burdening
the individual systems.
Better Security:

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As the data stored on the file server and SQL server could have particular value
to hackers and other miscreants, using separate machines will provide an extra
layer of security both in terms of attempted unauthorised hacking and in terms of
unauthorised physical access.
Ease of maintenance and upgrades:
As the site grows the demand on the servers will increase which will eventually
prompt the need for upgrade or maintenance tasks to be performed. Since the
separate machines will need upgrades at different intervals and to different
specifications an infrastructure like the one I have suggested would facilitate the
most cost effective solution in the long term.
Ease of backup:
As the application hosted on the webserver will most likely not have much change
in the file system over time backups will only need to be performed infrequently.
Conversely the SQL Server and Fileserver will need to be backed up frequently.
Having distinct physical infrastructure for each machine will allow separate
backups and backup sets to be easily defined.
Cost
Cost Break Down
With no concrete plans it is difficult to estimate an actual cost breakdown
however the table below describes the cost break down (at industry standard
rates) according to Diagram 2.
Diagram 3
Chargeable
Entity
Cost Notes
Deposit R13333.33 Essential to fund
the development
until the first
milestone
Labour (based on 8
hours a day)
Days Rate
per
hour
Total
Rands
63 Days P R151200
6 Days O R12000
Total R163200
Based on standard
rates in this
industry. Please
refer to Diagram 2.

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Components: Component Dollar
Price
Rand
Price
FreeTextBox
Distribution
Licence
USD
199.99
R
1,428.69
Developer
Express
Xtra
Reports
USD
299.99
R
2,144.26
Total R3572.96
Pre-developed
modules save time
and development
costs
Outsourcing: Entity Rand
Price
Can this be
done in
house
Graphic
Design
R700 Yes
Advanced
Flash
R2000 Yes
Total R2700
This can be done in
house at the rate
of 250 an hour. It
is cheaper to
outsource it to
specialists.
Consultation Fees Waived Excludes Travel
Expenses
As you can see from the cost breakdown of the above diagram, at industry
standard fees the site is very over budget. I am willing to make an arrangement
of some sort to compensate my labour. I will be still be able to develop this site
for the amount offered to me on the offer of in house contractual employment or
another type of arrangement.
The cost of development will only include features agreed upon that a within the
scope as determined by the stakeholders involved in this project.
The total cost of the solution will be R40000.008
This includes the following:
 Development of the database and application functionality for the
proposed website only
 Documentation of User Requirement Specification, Acceptance Test
Procedure and Administration Training manuals.
 Deployment if required
In order to commence work a 33% deposit is required of R40000.
Keys
Back to top
1. For the purpose of this document I will refer to the above mentioned
music distribution site as www.musicfusion.co.za.
2. 70 minutes of music in CDA format not mp3 compilation disks
3. The administrator portal is modelled upon similar functionality of the
DotNetNuke web applications.
4. For the purposes of simplicity all users and roles players in this document
are presumed to be male.
5. Assuming that the clients mp3 collection consists of 100000+ unique files,
organized into directories with usable metadata.

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6. The manufacturing queue is not addressed in this document however it
should be noted that a consultation is needed to gauge what the client
needs in order to integrate this into a pre-existing manufacturing
infrastructure.
7. Assuming that the tables with the data have been designed in a way that
supports data integrity (i.e. normalised).
8. Negotiable bearing in mind the actual cost of development.
Technological Summary
Technology: AJAX enabled ASP.net 2.0
Server Side Scripting
Language:
C#
Client Side Scripting
Language:
JavaScript
Backend Database: SQL Server 2000
Webserver: IIS 6.0
Server Platforms: Windows Server 2003 Web Edition/Enterprise Edition
IDE: Visual Studio 2005 Professional Edition
Media: Flash 8.0, Photoshop 7.0
Exclusive Permissions
The exclusive permissions granted by Chris Morton to First Technology pertaining
to the use of this document are:
1. The use of the entire document or part thereof in the compilation of a
proposal for First Technology’s client on provision that a reference is made
to the Author of this document where applicable.
2. Permission to change and append the document contents provided an
original back-up copy is kept (unchanged).
3. Permission to distribute this document either electronically or in printed
form internally or to the client.
4. All other rights are reserved.
Document Summary
File Name: Proposal for Development of Music Distribution Website.doc
Author: Chris Morton
First Created: 2007/02/22 08:33 PM
Last Modified: 2022/03/18 08:32 PM
Word Count: 9833
Support Documentation
Quotation:

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