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Project Summary
This Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) Phase I project is entitled Rate-It.
Rate-It is a web-based, community-driven search engine designed primarily for use by websites
offering end users the ability to rate or review the quality of various services or products. The
engine is an entirely software-based solution designed to be able to meet the needs of any review
or rating website. Such websites are therefore our primary customer. The specific application of
the engine will vary from client to client.
Essentially, Rate-It will offer a one-click up-or-down rating system both of the services
or products being reviewed as well as of end user reviews of such services or products. An
advanced weighting system will weigh each “vote” against various factors in an effort to
intelligently determine whose ratings and reviews will be most useful to other consumers looking
to base personal or even business decisions, at least in part, upon the thoughts and opinions of
other consumers. No review engine presently available offers this functionality. The engine will
also suggest services or products to users based on pre-defined user preferences and rating
history. Additionally, Rate-It will be the first engine designed not for in-house use but rather for
licensing to other sites. As an added benefit, Rate-It will offer a host of customizable templates
to meet the visual demands of the client. The task of completely revamping the “look and feel”
of a client’s website in the future will therefore be as simple as changing and customizing
templates. Finally, upgrades to the Rate-It engine will not require any reinstallation on the part
of the client; clients will be able to install updates as add-on updates much like software plugins.
The use of Rate-It amounts to an enormous benefit to rating or review websites. As
community-driven functionality becomes more of a standard, Rate-It allows such sites to add this
functionality without any delay, and therefore without any loss of their customers and of
revenue. Moreover, the use of Rate-It will actually expand review websites’ customer bases.
Finally, use of the engine makes site maintenance and upgrades a simple matter of editing or
changing templates. Use of the Rate-It engine will therefore yield an even greater profit for
those review websites to which it has been licensed.
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iv
Table of Contents
Project Summary............................................................................................................................ iii
Table of Contents ............................................................................................................................ v
Project Description.......................................................................................................................... 7
Phase 1 Technical Objectives ..................................................................................................... 8
GUI Pages ............................................................................................................................... 9
References Cited ........................................................................................................................... 12
Biographical Sketches ................................................................................................................... 13
Senior Personnel ....................................................................................................................... 13
Other Personnel - Experts ......................................................................................................... 15
Budget ........................................................................................................................................... 17
Phase 1 ...................................................................................................................................... 17
Phase 2 ...................................................................................................................................... 20
Supplemental Budget Documentation ...................................................................................... 23
Appendix ....................................................................................................................................... 26
Management Plan...................................................................................................................... 26
Marketing Plan .......................................................................................................................... 32
Staffing Plan.............................................................................................................................. 35
Staffing Plan for Phase 0....................................................................................................... 35
Staffing Plan for Phase 1....................................................................................................... 37
Staffing Plan for Phase 2....................................................................................................... 39
Staffing Plan for Phase 3....................................................................................................... 42
Staffing Plan for the Out Years ............................................................................................. 45
Funding Plan ............................................................................................................................. 48
Evaluation Plan ......................................................................................................................... 49
Phase 0 .................................................................................................................................. 49
Phase 1 .................................................................................................................................. 50
Phase 2 .................................................................................................................................. 52
Phase 3 .................................................................................................................................. 53
Risk Management Plan ............................................................................................................. 54
Resource Plan............................................................................................................................ 58
Phase 0 .................................................................................................................................. 58
Phase 1 .................................................................................................................................. 58
Phase 2 .................................................................................................................................. 59
Phase 3 .................................................................................................................................. 60
Out Years .............................................................................................................................. 60
Development Plan ..................................................................................................................... 61
Phase 0 - Research ................................................................................................................ 61
Phase I - Feasibility Prototype .............................................................................................. 61
Phase II - Refinement and Development .............................................................................. 61
Phase III - Product Rollout ................................................................................................... 62
Out Years - Product Support ................................................................................................. 62
Work Breakdown Structure and Gantt Charts .......................................................................... 63
WBS and Gantt charts Phase 0 ............................................................................................. 63
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WBS and Gantt chart Phase 1 ............................................................................................... 72
WBS and Gantt chart Phase 2 ............................................................................................... 84
WBS and Gantt chart Phase 3 ............................................................................................. 120
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Project Description
In the wake of the dot-com speculative bubble, the period spanning roughly from 1995 to
2001 which saw the rise of literally hundreds of web-based businesses, the World Wide Web has
entered a new phase of community-driven productivity. Although this was first seen in the form
of customer reviews on online bookstores and media outlets, a desire on the part of a substantial
and growing number of Internet users was fomented by the lack of a true sense of online
community coupled with the failure of existing “community” functionality to encourage
interaction between users, to filter out purely biased input and to provide a real voice for the
serious customer. Then came the social networking websites, the blogs, the more communityoriented discussion boards, online rating or review sites and a host of other new developments.
The demand for community-driven functionality to permeate across a wide spectrum of online
businesses has since skyrocketed. Many businesses have become dependent on the ability of
their websites to attract new and old customers alike. Therefore the inclusion of new and
improved, community-driven functionality is precisely what many if not most of these
businesses now see as essential in their endeavor to attract such customers, and they are now in a
race with competitors in that regard. Online stores and other web-based businesses daily add
new features such as the ability of users to flag offensive or biased content, to rate one another’s
reviews, to upload content and so on. On the other hand, as big a hit as community-driven
functionality has become, it is still in the early stages, and the functionality most sites provide
still falls far short of ideal. Rating and review websites are no exception.
To address these concerns, we have identified areas where such sites could be
dramatically improved upon in an effort to offer rating and review websites an engine which is
truly powerful, truly a few steps up, and which can offer such sites a tremendous advantage over
their competitors, the ability to attract a greater number of users as well as the ability to drive
increased activity of the users they have already secured. The ideal rating and review engine is
one which not only suggests services or products (for example) to users but which incorporates
pre-defined user preferences as well as preferences based on the user’s rating history (which
specific services or products they have searched for and/or given good ratings and reviews to) in
determining which services or products to recommend. Services or products with which a user is
already familiar should not be recommended to that user. Ideally, such an engine would also
allow one-click up-or-down ratings of such services or products, customer reviews, ratings of
customer reviews and sorting of customer reviews (in order for the good, bad and default/mixed
reviews of any one service or product to be one click away and avoid having to comb through
pages upon pages of reviews and subjectively forming an opinion based on what seemed to stand
out). Users would also be able to rate each other in terms of the quality of their ratings and
reviews and flag individuals deemed excessively biased. Additionally, users’ one-click ratings
as well as their reviews will be weighted. The ratings and reviews of a user who is in good
standing with the community, who has been highly active and who has been a member of the site
for six months will have significantly more weight than that of a user who is in poor standing
with the community, who has not been so active, and who has only been a member for a month
and a half. The ratings of the user with more weight will have a greater impact on the overall
rating of a service or product and therefore also of the likelihood that the service or product will
be recommended to others. The reviews of the user for a particular service or product will be
listed higher in the default sorting, regardless of whether they gave it a good or bad review, and
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will also be listed higher in the other sorting to which they belong (“good reviews” if they gave it
a good review, for example). Moreover, users should be able to post additional comments,
upload photos, videos, menus and other content, and all such content will also be rated and
subject to the same rules. The photo of the outside of a particular restaurant which receives the
highest rating, for example, will automatically become the main image associated with that
photo. The same can be done for additional categories of photos, for the videos and so on.
Finally, all features should be able to be selected and customized according to the individual
needs of an already existing rating or review website using any number of templates which we
provide and the software (complete with a GUI) necessary for customizing a template. As
mentioned, this would make future customization or even entire “facelifts” of the site incredibly
simple. If a site already has the engine in place and decides to completely change the “look and
feel” of the site, for example, once they have customized a different template it would simply be
a simple matter of uploading the newly customized template to their site and linking it in the
source code. Rate-It seeks to incorporate all this functionality. The combined effect equates to a
sharp increase in revenue for sites which use the Rate-It engine. The Rate-It engine is sure to
draw a high number of rating and review website customers.
Phase 1 Technical Objectives
The primary technical objective we seek to achieve during Phase I is the simulation of the
Rate-It engine’s core functionality. To achieve this objective, we will accomplish the following
tasks: design of the MySQL database, development and verification of software modules
required to retrieve and process data from this database, development of the advanced weighting
system (see Project Summary), development of Rate-It’s GUI modules, development of several
GUI templates and population of the database with a small sample of services or products in
order to demonstrate this functionality.
The Rate-It engine, regardless of the template chosen, will have a flashy yet professional
look and feel. The engine will allow users to enjoy one-click up-or-down rating of the service or
product, to create user profiles, post reviews, enjoy one-click up-or-down rating of one another’s
reviews, flag reviews for purely biased content, enjoy one-click up-or-down rating of each other
(i.e., of other users), sort the order in which reviews are listed—default (mixed), “good” reviews
first or “bad” reviews first—and browse through suggested services or products, as determined
by the Rate-It engine based upon pre-defined user preferences and rating history. Finally, and
most importantly, the engine will weight each rating or review using the advanced weighting
system.
By simulating the Rate-It engine’s core functionality, we will have demonstrated the
solid advantage of our engine over current rating or review engines. Additionally, we will have
verified the engine’s feasibility and solidified our position that the final Rate-It product, inclusive
of more finely-tuned core functionality as well as all the non-core functionality we intend on
adding in Phase 2 (such as software, complete with a GUI, for customizing templates), will be an
irresistibly attractive product to already existing rating and review websites.
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GUI Pages
The following screenshots demonstrate represent the prototype (not yet developed) we intend to
build in order to demonstrate the Rate-It engine's core functionality. What is not shown is the
engine's advanced weighting system, since the system is a behind-the-scenes means of
determining how strong of an effect an individual user's rating of a service or product has on that
service or product's overall rating. There are three screenshots:
This screen demonstrates Rate-It's one-click up-or-down rating of services or products. Once a
user has clicked "Good" or "Bad" a new service or product will be displayed. If the user would
like to rate a specific service or product, the user can click on the "Rate" button to the left, and
the engine will present the user with several starting points.
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This screen demonstrates users' ability to post reviews, Rate-It's one-click up-or-down rating of
reviews, the ability to sort reviews, and to flag reviews for purely biased content. Users will also
be able to rate or flag other users by clicking on the user's name.
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This screen demonstrates the Rate-It engine's ability to recommend services or products to an
individual user based upon that user's pre-determined user preferences and rating history.
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References Cited
http://citeseer.ist.psu.edu/hauver01flycasting.html
http://www.internetworldstats.com/
http://www.hostmonster.com/
http://www.godaddy.com/gdshop/default.asp
http://salary.hotjobs.com/
http://www.census.gov/population/www/popclockus.html
http://www.wsworkshop.com/money/ad-revenue-models.html
http://digitalenterprise.org/models/models.html
http://www.scarboro.info/dining.htm
http://www.libraryspot.com/know/workweek.htm
http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/recs/cookingtrends/cooking.html
http://www.bts.gov/publications/highlights_of_the_2001_national_household_travel_survey/pdf/
entire.pdf
http://www.aarp.org/health/staying_healthy/eating/a2004-09-16-eatingout.html
http://www.restaurant.org/rusa/magArticle.cfm?ArticleID=138
http://www.wsworkshop.com/money/ad-revenue-models.html
http://www.i-rater.com/
http://plone.org/products/rating-engine
http://www.randommouse.com/rms/about/product/REDQN/docs/manual/rqmanual_about.html
http://www.slashcode.com
http://www.cs.odu.edu/~mln/
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Biographical Sketches
Senior Personnel
Project Manager
Name: Nathan DeWitt
Background: Nathan DeWitt is a software and data architect with over 10 years industry
experience. He is currently employed as a Solutions Architect with EMC Corporation on an
extended contract with Verizon. Recently he designed and implemented a custom help desk web
application for Verizon supporting over 5,000 field technicians nationwide. He is proficient in
both client server and web applications as well as relational database design. He is a Microsoft
Certified Trainer concentrating in SQL Server and solution architecture. Nathan likes to spend
his free time getting the house ready for his first son who is due in July and walking his two
Mastiffs with his wife, Raegan.
Sales and Marketing Director
Name: Mark Polansky
Background: Mark Polansky is a senior at Old Dominion University majoring in Computer
Science and expects to graduate sometime in the future. He currently works for an aerospace
company building and testing satellites. His black Labrador Kadi keeps his wife and him on a
strict schedule throughout the week.
Accounting (Financial) Director
Name: Mark Polansky
Background: Mark Polansky is a senior at Old Dominion University majoring in Computer
Science and expects to graduate sometime in the future. He currently works for an aerospace
company building and testing satellites. His black Labrador Kadi keeps his wife and him on a
strict schedule throughout the week.
Webmaster
Name: Mark Phelps
Background: Mark Phelps a 21 year old senior computer science major at Old Dominion from
Chesapeake, Virginia. He currently works for the Office of Computing and Communications
Services here at ODU, where he maintains and updates many of the university’s websites
including the OCCS site itself (www.occs.odu.edu). He has experience with programming in
C++ and Java as well as building dynamic websites with Apache, PHP and MySQL. Outside of
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school, his interests include basketball, skateboarding, body boarding, and hanging out with
friends.
Engineering/Technical Director
Name: Mark Phelps
Background: Mark Phelps a 21 year old senior computer science major at Old Dominion from
Chesapeake, Virginia. He currently works for the Office of Computing and Communications
Services here at ODU, where he maintains and updates many of the university’s websites
including the OCCS site itself (www.occs.odu.edu). He has experience with programming in
C++ and Java as well as building dynamic websites with Apache, PHP and MySQL. Outside of
school, his interests include basketball, skateboarding, body boarding, and hanging out with
friends.
Risk Director
Name: Nathan DeWitt
Background: Nathan DeWitt is a software and data architect with over 10 years industry
experience. He is currently employed as a Solutions Architect with EMC Corporation on an
extended contract with Verizon. Recently he designed and implemented a custom help desk web
application for Verizon supporting over 5,000 field technicians nationwide. He is proficient in
both client server and web applications as well as relational database design. He is a Microsoft
Certified Trainer concentrating in SQL Server and solution architecture. Nathan likes to spend
his free time getting the house ready for his first son who is due in July and walking his two
Mastiffs with his wife, Raegan.
Researcher #1
Name: Alan Grimes
Background: A quote from researcher #1, “Well, last week I was given a thermometer/power
controller and told to program it... I had to braid my own serial cable, write my own interface
driver, and convert a GUI that was originally developed for a wave (sound editor) into a
temperature graph. I did it in three days.”
Researcher #2
Name: Patrick Markham
Background: Patrick Markham was born in Norfolk, VA and is now a senior at Old Dominion
University in Computer Science. He plans to pursue his Masters Degree here at ODU as well.
Patrick was certified a Novell NetWare 6 Administrator in high school and has experience
working several years as the network administrator for an international company, albeit a small
business.
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Other Personnel - Experts
Technical Expert
Name: Dr. Michael L. Nelson
Background: I have been an assistant professor of Computer Science at Old Dominion
University since 2002. I worked at NASA Langley Research Center from 1991-2002. Through a
NASA fellowship, I spent the 2000-2001 academic year at the School of Information and Library
Science, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. I am a co-editor of the Open Archives
Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH) and have developed many digital libraries,
including the NASA Technical Report Server. My research interests include repository-object
interaction and digital preservation. Further information about me can be found at:
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Budget
Phase 1
Salaries and Wages
The months that each employee works are broken down by phases and are determined from the
Gantt chart of the WBS. The months worked for each employee have been determined based on
the Work Breakdown Structure. The employee cost has been determined based on the annual
salary given for each employee and the months each employee will be needed.
Title
Group
Salary
Per Year
Project Manager
Accounting
Director
Webmaster
Technical Director
Risk Director
Management
$41,600.00
$20.00
20%
$8,320.00
Management
Management
Management
Management
$31,200.00
$31,200.00
$31,200.00
$31,200.00
$15.00
$15.00
$15.00
$15.00
5%
50%
25%
5%
$1,560.00
$15,600.00
$7,800.00
$1,560.00
Technical
Technical
Technical
$20,800.00
$20,800.00
$20,800.00
$10.00
$10.00
$10.00
20%
50%
25%
$4,160.00
$10,400.00
$5,200.00
Hardware
Engineer
Software Engineer
Network Engineer
Hourly
Rate
Time
Needed
Total
Total
Salaries
Overhead
Rate
Overall
Total
$54,600.00
40%
$76,440.00
Phase 1 Personnel Budget
Equipment
The number of workstations, servers, software, and network cables are based on the number of
employees that will be working at the same time. While the consultants are assisting the team
members, they will share workstations with the team members if needed.
Resources
Product
Qty.
Cost Per
Unit
Total
Web Server
Dell Power Edge
SC440 with Red Hat
Linux
1
$1,656.00
$1,656.00
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Workstations
Network Cables
Network Router
High Speed Internet
Connection
Dell Dimension E520
with Windows XP
professional
Dynex 7' Cat 6
Network Cable
Netgear FVS318
10/100 Mbps 8-port
VPN/Firefwall Router
5
$898.00
$4,490.00
10
$18.49
$184.90
1
$109.99
$109.99
Internet Connection
6
$75.00
$450.00
Total
$6,890.89
Phase 1 Equipment Budget
Total For Phase 1
$83,330.89
Major Functional Component Diagram
The functional component diagram below will be the prototype that we are going to build for the
first phase. Hard resources’ features that are going to be used in order to construct the prototype
are described above, along with their prices, and suppliers’ information. Phase 1 of our
development cycle involves the purchase of the hardware needed for the design of our prototype.
A working prototype that meets a minimum system implementation will be designed, developed,
constructed, and tested thoroughly in order to show proof of concept. The 411 budget restrictions
imposed by ODU which is a sum of $300 is going to be granted for us to use. Since we won’t
have sufficient funds to make purchases of computers in the first phase, we will be using ODU’s
computers to integrate other devices needed, ODU’s server to store data required, and also
ODU’s network. For more technical approach please refer to the development plan.
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19
Phase 2
Salaries and Wages
The months that each employee works are broken down by phases and are determined from the
Gantt chart of the WBS. The months worked for each employee have been determined based on
the Work Breakdown Structure. The employee cost has been determined based on the annual
salary given for each employee and the months each employee will be needed.
Group
Salary
Per Year
Time Needed
Total
Project Manager
Sales and
Marketing Director
Accounting Director
Webmaster
Technical Director
Risk Director
Management
$74,008.00
$35.58
50%
$37,004.00
Management
Management
Management
Management
Management
$140,342.00
$136,875.00
$76,239.00
$152,462.00
$117,326.00
$67.47
$65.81
$36.65
$73.30
$56.41
10%
25%
50%
25%
25%
$14,034.20
$34,218.75
$38,119.50
$38,115.50
$29,331.50
Hardware Engineer
Software Engineer
Network Engineer
Web Designer
Technical Writer
Technical
Technical
Technical
Technical
Technical
$53,263.00
$57,508.00
$64,018.00
$53,645.00
$45,700.00
$25.61
$27.65
$30.78
$25.79
$21.97
25%
25%
25%
25%
10%
$13,315.75
$14,377.00
$16,004.50
$13,411.25
$4,570.00
Title
Hourly
Rate
Total
Salaries
Overhead
Rate
Overall Total
$252,501.95
40%
$353,502.73
Phase 2 Personnel Budget
Equipment
The number of workstations, servers, software, and network cables are based on the number of
employees that will be working at the same time. While the consultants are assisting the team
members, they will share workstations with the team members if needed.
Resources
Web Server
Workstations
Network Cables
Product
Dell Power Edge
SC440 with Red Hat
Linux
Dell Dimension E520
with Windows XP
professional
Dynex 7' Cat 6
Network Cable
20
Qty.
Cost Per
Unit
Total
4
$1,656.00
$6,624.00
12
$898.00
$10,776.00
25
$18.49
$462.25
Network Router
High Speed Internet
Connection
Netgear FVS318
10/100 Mbps 8-port
VPN/Firefwall Router
Internet Connection
2
$750.00
$1,500.00
12
$100.00
$1,200.00
Total
$20,562.25
Phase 2 Equipment Budget
Total For Phase 2
$374,064.98
Major Functional Component Diagram
Phase 2 of our development cycle involves the purchase of the hardware needed to develop an
actual working prototype. The hardware that needs to be purchased in this phase are computers
for every team member, web server, network cables, network router, and a high speed internet
connection. Since in the second phase we will have more funds we will purchase the equipments
that are going to be used in the third phase. For more technical approach please refer to the
development plan.
21
Phase 2 MFCD
22
Supplemental Budget Documentation
Salary by Phase
$700,000.00
$600,000.00
$500,000.00
Phase 0
Phase 1
Phase 2
Phase 3
Out Years
$400,000.00
Salary
$300,000.00
$200,000.00
$100,000.00
$0.00
Phases
Phases
23
Resources by Phase
$25,000.00
$20,000.00
$15,000.00
Phase 0
Phase 1
Phase 2
Phase 3
Out Years
Salary
$10,000.00
$5,000.00
$0.00
Phases
Phases
24
Budget by Phase
$700,000.00
$600,000.00
$500,000.00
Phase 0
Phase 1
Phase 2
Phase 3
Out Years
$400,000.00
Salary
$300,000.00
$200,000.00
$100,000.00
$0.00
Phases
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Appendix
Management Plan
Purpose
The purpose of this document is to provide the steps and resources needed to achieve the
project’s objectives. This plan identifies the Green Team’s management team, defines a
communication plan, and identifies related documents that are part of this overall plan.
Corporate Structure
The Rate-it management team is assumed to be under the Old Dominion University corporate
structure. For this reason, management needs to be informed of the project’s progress on a
regular basis. The team is expected to be able to receive resources from within the corporation to
staff the team. In this way team members can be used in a matrix format by the Rate-it
management team. The relation to the Rate-it project to the corporation is as follows.
Management Team
The core management team will consist of the team members assigned in the CS410 green group
project. They will perform oversight and participate in their respective responsibilities. The
team members included are:
Project Manager
Name: Nathan DeWitt
Annual Salary: $74,008
Background: Nathan DeWitt is a software and data architect with over 10 years industry
experience. He is currently employed as a Solutions Architect with EMC Corporation on an
extended contract with Verizon. Recently he designed and implemented a custom help desk web
application for Verizon supporting over 5,000 field technicians nationwide. He is proficient in
both client server and web applications as well as relational database design. He is a Microsoft
Certified Trainer concentrating in SQL Server and solution architecture. Nathan likes to spend
his free time getting the house ready for his first son who is due in July and walking his two
Mastiffs with his wife, Raegan.
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include making sure that all tasks are assigned and are
performed with high quality. The project manager must also resolve difference between team
members and facilitate team member communications. The project manager also must develop
the WBS, assign resources, prioritize tasks, and define task dependencies.
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Sales and Marketing Director
Name: Mark Polansky
Annual Salary: $140,342
Background: Mark Polansky is a senior at Old Dominion University majoring in Computer
Science and expects to graduate sometime in the future. He currently works for an aerospace
company building and testing satellites. His black Labrador Kadi keeps his wife and him on a
strict schedule throughout the week.
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include determining the target market and supporting the
marketing aspects of the project. The sale and marketing director will choose and manage the
marketing vendor and determine the overall sales and marketing plan.
Accounting (Financial) Director
Name: Mark Polansky
Annual Salary: $136,875
Background: Mark Polansky is a senior at Old Dominion University majoring in Computer
Science and expects to graduate sometime in the future. He currently works for an aerospace
company building and testing satellites. His black Labrador Kadi keeps his wife and him on a
strict schedule throughout the week.
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include receiving funding, creating the budget, and
determining the product cost. The accounting/ financial director is responsible for the financial
and funding plans.
Webmaster
Name: Mark Phelps
Annual Salary: $76,239
Background: Mark Phelps a 21 year old senior computer science major at Old Dominion from
Chesapeake, Virginia. He currently works for the Office of Computing and Communications
Services here at ODU, where he maintains and updates many of the university’s websites
including the OCCS site itself (www.occs.odu.edu). He has experience with programming in
C++ and Java as well as building dynamic websites with Apache, PHP and MySQL. Outside of
school, his interests include basketball, skateboarding, body boarding, and hanging out with
friends.
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include determining the functionality and look of the
website that will house the rate-it engine. As webmaster, the responsibilities include creating the
team and product websites, as well as managing the web developers in future phases.
Engineering/Technical Director
Name: Mark Phelps
Annual Salary: $152,462
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Background: Mark Phelps a 21 year old senior computer science major at Old Dominion from
Chesapeake, Virginia. He currently works for the Office of Computing and Communications
Services here at ODU, where he maintains and updates many of the university’s websites
including the OCCS site itself (www.occs.odu.edu). He has experience with programming in
C++ and Java as well as building dynamic websites with Apache, PHP and MySQL. Outside of
school, his interests include basketball, skateboarding, body boarding, and hanging out with
friends.
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include determining the technical requirements and
managing the technical staff. The engineering/technical director will determine and solve the
technical problems.
Risk Director
Name: Nathan DeWitt
Annual Salary: $117,326
Background: Nathan DeWitt is a software and data architect with over 10 years industry
experience. He is currently employed as a Solutions Architect with EMC Corporation on an
extended contract with Verizon. Recently he designed and implemented a custom help desk web
application for Verizon supporting over 5,000 field technicians nationwide. He is proficient in
both client server and web applications as well as relational database design. He is a Microsoft
Certified Trainer concentrating in SQL Server and solution architecture. Nathan likes to spend
his free time getting the house ready for his first son who is due in July and walking his two
Mastiffs with his wife, Raegan.
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include managing the project risks. The risk director must
determine the risks that exist in the project, evaluate the severity and probability of the risk, and
attempt to mitigate the risks.
Researcher #1
Name: Alan Grimes
Annual Salary: N/A
Background: A quote from researcher #1, “Well, last week I was given a thermometer/power
controller and told to program it... I had to braid my own serial cable, write my own interface
driver, and convert a GUI that was originally developed for a wave (sound editor) into a
temperature graph. I did it in three days.”
Responsibilities: Research stuff
Researcher #2
Name: Patrick Markham
Annual Salary: N/A
Background: Patrick Markham was born in Norfolk, VA and is now a senior at Old Dominion
University in Computer Science. He plans to pursue his Masters Degree here at ODU as well.
Patrick was certified a Novell NetWare 6 Administrator in high school and has experience
28
working several years as the network administrator for an international company, albeit a small
business.
Responsibilities: Research stuff
Communication
Communication is vital in order for the Green Team Technologies to meet its goals. With this in
mind, the team has determined a number of different strategies to keep the team informed. These
include:
Meetings
The team meetings are scheduled on Wednesday and Sunday starting at 7:00pm until the job is
done. Everything that can be discussed is discussed in the team meetings. This is the two times
a week where the team members can get instant feed back from other team members about their
ideas and questions. The team meetings are held using Yahoo messenger.
Email
Email is an excellent way to discuss topics between two team members, when an answer is not
needed at any special time.
Google Groups
The team’s collection of information is held in the green team Google group’s account. This is
where team members can post questions and comments, or answer another team members
questions, in a message board type of forum. This is also where group members will post
documents and presentations that they have been working on so another group member can
reference the latest revision of each document.
Website
The website is where the final version of the green team’s information resides. When the final
version of each document is done or an incremental version is ready it will be uploaded to the
team’s website.
Environment
The main project development will take place at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, VA. All
employees will work out of this location. Some employees that are not local to the Norfolk area
will work remotely from their home offices. Overhead per employee has been calculated at 40%
to compensate ODU for utilities, office space, and everything else it takes to run a building.
Documents
The management plan contains the other project planning documents to provide the detailed
management plan. These documents include:
29
Staffing Plan – This document defines the organization of the project team by phase. It also
details the skills and responsibilities for each team member by phase.
Resource Plan – This document defines the hard resources that will be used in each phase of the
project. These resources will be identified and their use and needs will be defined.
Development Plan – This document details the requirements and functionality of the project
deliverables by phase. This plan documents what will be accomplished and how it will be
accomplished by phase.
Funding Plan – This plan describes the financial aspects of the project. This plan contains the
budget for the hard and human resources, the prototype and production component costs, cash
flow analysis, and break even analysis. This plan also identifies the funding agencies.
Marketing Plan – This plan describes the marketing plan for reaching our target audience. Each
marketing sub phases is defined with its objectives.
Evaluation Plan – This plan determines how we will measure success in each phase of the
project.
Risk Management Plan – This document describes how we will manage our risks. It also
identifies the current risks that have been identified and shows their potential impact to the
project.
30
Management
Plan
Staffing
Plan
Resource
Plan
Development
Plan
Evaluation
Plan
Marketing
Plan
Funding
Plan
Risk Management
Plan
31
Marketing Plan
There is a growing trend in the United States and the world to not have the same schedule
everyday of the week. What used to be called “dinner time” where the family sat around the
table and ate and talked about there day has moved to just another hour in an already short 24
hour day. This time is spent taking children to some sort of practice. Parents working late.
Maybe a single parent raising children. Both parents working, children in day care. People do
not have time to spend all day cooking mom’s special spaghetti sauce over a stove all day.
With Rate-it set to accommodate this change in society. Rate-it is proposing to develop a rating
web engine that will help figure out the good and the bad service organizations.
In Phase 0 Rate-it was dreamed up and work has begin
Target Market: Companies that need reviewing done, or review things for a living
32
Competition:
The competition matrix is defined below. This competition matrix shows the competition we
have if we were to put a restaurant rating web site on-line. However, since our main product is
selling an engine that rate service organizations, all of these websites below could turn into our
customers.
Our competition and possible customers are above in the competition matrix for the example of
the restaurant service industry. Our engine is going to be in direct competition with their already
existing web pages and types of reviewing restaurants. However, as the competition matrix
shows, there are features that only rate-it will have available.
The competition matrix above needs to change. All other types of review web sites with their
own engine.
33
Advertising & Distribution:
Beta testing will be done in several different ways. First we will interview people.
Second, we will simulate web use with software. Third we will develop our own web site which
will use our developed engine.
Finding out from the people that are ultimately going to use this is very important. If people do
not like the colors we are using, that needs to be brought to our attention. So, we will conduct
interviews with a wide variety of people and ask questions and opinions of what they like and
dislike about the look and feel of our engine.
Since this is a totally software based product we can do a lot of testing of our product using
simulation. The plan is to write simulation software that will simulate the engine being used in a
real world environment. This way we can learn how the engine handles more then one review at
a time or a million hits in a day. This can help determine what type of hardware is needed for
our customers when they deploy our engine in their business market. Since we can simulate
everything, we can find bugs in a few days instead of waiting weeks or years for that bug to pop
up in a real life application.
Thirdly, we will develop our own rating website using the restaurant industry for our example.
This way we can see how our engine will work in a real life application. This can be done rather
inexpensively to get a web page and server running for testing purposes. If this web site is a
success, then we can later put this in our business model, however at this time it is just going to
be used for development.
Advertising
More to come later
Return of Investment
More to come later
34
Staffing Plan
Purpose
This document defines the staffing requirements per phase. It describes the staff that will be
needed and what that staff will be needed to do.
The salaries for each employee have been determined based on job description and zip code from
http://www.salary.com . The employees who will be based out of our headquarters in Virginia
Beach, Virginia have been priced using the 23450 zip code.
Core management staff will be discussed in detail in the Management Plan including their names
and skills.
Consultants are available on an as needed basis and they are displayed in the organization charts
below. However, there roles are strictly advisory and only used on an if needed basis, therefore
they are not listed or discussed in this document.
Staffing Plan for Phase 0
In this phase the initial SBIR proposal is created along with a proposal presentation and product
website.
The following staff will be needed in Phase 0 of this project:
Nathan DeWitt
Project Manager
Risk Director
Dr. Michael Nelson
Digital Archive
Specialist
Mark Polansky
Mark Phelps
Accounting Director Software Director
Hardware Director
Webmaster
35
Patrick Markham
Researcher
Core Management Team
Project Manager
Annual Salary: $0
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include making sure that all tasks are assigned and are
performed with high quality. The project manager must also resolve difference between team
members and facilitate team member communications. The project manager also must develop
the WBS, assign resources, prioritize tasks, and define task dependencies.
Accounting Director
Annual Salary: $0
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include receiving funding, creating the budget, and
determining the product cost. The accounting director is responsible for the financial and
funding plans.
Hardware Director
Annual Salary: $0
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include determining what hardware is needed for the
project, including any computers and networks that need to be purchased and set up.
Webmaster
Annual Salary: $0
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include determining the overall layout of the website using
the Rate-it engine. As the webmaster they will be in charge of the overall look and feel of the
Rate-it product line.
Software Director
Annual Salary: $0
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include determining the technical requirements and
managing the technical staff. The Engineering director is in charge of all technical decisions that
need to be made concerning the development and building of the Rate-it engine and website.
Risk Director
Annual Salary: $0
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include managing the project risks. The risk director must
determining what risks exists in the project, evaluate the severity and probability of the risk, and
attempt to mitigate the risks.
36
Phase 0 Summary
Phase 0
Title
Project Manager
Hardware Director
Accounting Director
Webmaster
Software Director
Risk Director
Group
Salary Per Year
Hourly Rate
Time Needed
Total
Management
Management
Management
Management
Management
Management
$74,008.00
$74,179.00
$136,875.00
$76,239.00
$152,462.00
$117,326.00
$35.58
$35.66
$65.81
$36.65
$73.30
$56.41
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%
$0.00
$0.00
$0.00
$0.00
$0.00
$0.00
Total
$0.00
Staffing Plan for Phase 1
In this phase a lab prototype will be developed and the SBIR Phase 2 proposal will be developed.
Success will be measured by the successful completion of those two deliverables.
The following staff will be needed in Phase 1 of this project:
Project Manager
Risk Director
Technical Director
Accounting Director
Network Engineer
Hardware Engineer
Software Engineer
Webmaster
Core Management Team
Project Manager
Annual Salary: $8,320.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include making sure that all tasks are assigned and are
performed with high quality. The project manager must also resolve difference between team
members and facilitate team member communications. The project manager also must develop
the WBS, assign resources, prioritize tasks, and define task dependencies.
Accounting Director
Annual Salary: $1,560.00
37
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include receiving funding, creating the budget, and
determining the product cost. The accounting director is responsible for the financial and
funding plans.
Webmaster
Annual Salary: $15,600.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include determining the overall layout of the website using
the Rate-it engine. As the webmaster they will be in charge of the overall look and feel of the
Rate-it product line.
Technical/Engineering Director
Annual Salary: $7,800.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include determining the technical requirements and
managing the technical staff. The Engineering director is in charge of all technical decisions that
need to be made concerning the development and building of the Rate-it engine and website.
Risk Director
Annual Salary: $1,560.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include managing the project risks. The risk director must
determining what risks exists in the project, evaluate the severity and probability of the risk, and
attempt to mitigate the risks.
Technical Personal
Hardware Engineer
Annual Salary: $4,160.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include developing and integrating the web site servers and
internal company network.
Skills: A+ certification
Software Engineer
Annual Salary: $10,400.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include creating and building the Rate-it engine and
deploying it onto websites.
Skills: Java, Lots of software skills
Network Engineer
Annual Salary: $5,200.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include setting up the web server software and configuring
and installing the internal network.
Skills: MCSE certifications
38
Phase 1 Summary
Title
Group
Salary Per Year
Hourly Rate
Time Needed
Total
Project Manager
Accounting Director
Webmaster
Technical Director
Risk Director
Management
Management
Management
Management
Management
$41,600.00
$31,200.00
$31,200.00
$31,200.00
$31,200.00
$20.00
$15.00
$15.00
$15.00
$15.00
20%
5%
50%
25%
5%
$8,320.00
$1,560.00
$15,600.00
$7,800.00
$1,560.00
Hardware Engineer
Software Engineer
Network Engineer
Technical
Technical
Technical
$20,800.00
$20,800.00
$20,800.00
$10.00
$10.00
$10.00
20%
50%
25%
$4,160.00
$10,400.00
$5,200.00
Total Salaries
Overhead Rate
Overall Total
$54,600.00
40%
$76,440.00
Staffing Plan for Phase 2
In this phase the actual prototype of the product will be developed.
The following staff will be needed in Phase 2 of this project:
Project Manager
Risk Director
Technical Director
Accounting Director
Webmaster
Sales and Marketing
Director
Network Engineer
Web Designer
Hardware Engineer
Software Engineer
Technical Writer
39
Core Management Team
Project Manager
Annual Salary: $37,004.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include making sure that all tasks are assigned and are
performed with high quality. The project manager must also resolve difference between team
members and facilitate team member communications. The project manager also must develop
the WBS, assign resources, prioritize tasks, and define task dependencies.
Sales and Marketing Director
Annual Salary: $14,034.20
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include determining the target market and supporting the
marketing aspects of the project. The sales and marketing director will choose and manage the
marketing vendor and determine the overall marketing plan.
Accounting Director
Annual Salary: $34,218.75
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include receiving funding, creating the budget, and
determining the product cost. The accounting director is responsible for the financial and
funding plans.
Webmaster
Annual Salary: $38,119.50
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include determining the overall layout of the website using
the Rate-it engine. As the webmaster they will be in charge of the overall look and feel of the
Rate-it product line.
Technical/Engineering Director
Annual Salary: $38,115.50
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include determining the technical requirements and
managing the technical staff. The Engineering director is in charge of all technical decisions that
need to be made concerning the development and building of the Rate-it engine and website.
Risk Director
Annual Salary: $29,331.50
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include managing the project risks. The risk director must
determine what risks exists in the project, evaluate the severity and probability of the risk, and
attempt to mitigate the risks.
Technical Personal
Hardware Engineer
Annual Salary: $13,315.75
40
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include developing and integrating the web site servers and
internal company network.
Skills: A+ certification
Software Engineer
Annual Salary: $14,377.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include creating and building the Rate-it engine and
deploying it onto websites.
Skills: Java Lots of software skills
Network Engineer
Annual Salary: $16,004.50
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include setting up the web server software and configuring
and installing the internal network.
Skills: MCSE certifications
Web Designer
Annual Salary: $13,411.25
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include configuring and maintaining the website and
developing how the rate-it engine is integrated into websites.
Skills: HTML, web experience
Technical Writer
Annual Salary: $4,570.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include creating all the user and technical documentation
of the system.
Skills: Good communication and writing skills
Phase 2 Summary
Title
Project Manager
Sales and Marketing Director
Accounting Director
Webmaster
Technical Director
Risk Director
Hardware Engineer
Software Engineer
Network Engineer
Web Designer
Technical Writer
Group
Salary Per Year
Hourly Rate
Time Needed
Total
Management
Management
Management
Management
Management
Management
$74,008.00
$140,342.00
$136,875.00
$76,239.00
$152,462.00
$117,326.00
$35.58
$67.47
$65.81
$36.65
$73.30
$56.41
50%
10%
25%
50%
25%
25%
$37,004.00
$14,034.20
$34,218.75
$38,119.50
$38,115.50
$29,331.50
Technical
Technical
Technical
Technical
Technical
$53,263.00
$57,508.00
$64,018.00
$53,645.00
$45,700.00
$25.61
$27.65
$30.78
$25.79
$21.97
25%
25%
25%
25%
10%
$13,315.75
$14,377.00
$16,004.50
$13,411.25
$4,570.00
Total Salaries
Overhead Rate
Overall Total
$252,501.95
40%
$353,502.73
41
Staffing Plan for Phase 3
The phase is the main rollout of the product. In this phase actual production begins. The
marketing campaign also begins in this phase.
The following staff will be needed in Phase 3 of this project:
Project Manager
Executive
Assistant
Sales and Marketing
Director
Technical Director
Accounting Director
Accounting Clerk
Webmaster
Web Designer
Network Engineer
Customer Service
Supervisor
Hardware Engineer
Customer Service
Representatives
Software Engineer
Technical Writer
Core Management Team
Project Manager
Annual Salary: $37,004.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include making sure that all tasks are assigned and are
performed with high quality. The project manager must also resolve difference between team
members and facilitate team member communications. The project manager also must develop
the WBS, assign resources, prioritize tasks, and define task dependencies.
Sales and Marketing Director
Annual Salary: $70,171.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include determining the target market and supporting the
marketing aspects of the project. The sales and marketing director will choose and manage the
marketing vendor and determine the overall marketing plan.
Accounting Director
42
Annual Salary: $34,218.75
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include receiving funding, creating the budget, and
determining the product cost. The accounting director is responsible for the financial and
funding plans.
Webmaster
Annual Salary: $19,059.75
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include determining the overall layout of the website using
the Rate-it engine. As the webmaster they will be in charge of the overall look and feel of the
Rate-it product line.
Technical/Engineering Director
Annual Salary: $38,115.50
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include determining the technical requirements and
managing the technical staff. The Engineering director is in charge of all technical decisions that
need to be made concerning the development and building of the Rate-it engine and website.
Technical Personal
Hardware Engineer
Annual Salary: $13,315.75
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include developing and integrating the web site servers and
internal company network.
Skills: A+ certification
Software Engineer
Annual Salary: $28,754.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include creating and building the Rate-it engine and
deploying it onto websites.
Skills: Java Lots of software skills
Network Engineer
Annual Salary: $16,004.50
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include setting up the web server software and configuring
and installing the internal network.
Skills: MCSE certifications
Web Designer
Annual Salary: $26,822.50
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include configuring and maintaining the website and
developing how the rate-it engine is integrated into websites.
Skills: HTML, web experience
Technical Writer
43
Annual Salary: $9,140.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include creating all the user and technical documentation
of the system.
Skills: Good communication and writing skills
Customer Service
Customer Service Supervisor
Annual Salary: $53,047.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include leading all customer service representative and
keeping customer service running
Customer Service Representatives
Annual Salary: $33,047.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include answering customer’s problems and concerns
while using the Rate-it engine or website.
Skills: Good telephone and communication skills
Executive Assistant
Annual Salary: $48,690.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include managing the administrative needs of the staff.
Skills: Clerical skills
Accounting Clerk
Annual Salary: $15,596.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include producing the financial reports of the project.
Skills: Accounting skills
44
Phase 3 Summary
Title
Project Manager
Sales and Marketing Director
Accounting Director
Webmaster
Technical Director
Hardware Engineer
Software Engineer
Network Engineer
Web Designer
Technical Writer
Customer Service Supervisor
Customer Representatives
Executive Assistant
Accounting Clerk
Group
Salary Per Year
Hourly Rate
Time Needed
Total
Management
Management
Management
Management
Management
$74,008.00
$140,342.00
$136,875.00
$76,239.00
$152,462.00
$35.58
$67.47
$65.81
$36.65
$73.30
50%
50%
25%
25%
25%
$37,004.00
$70,171.00
$34,218.75
$19,059.75
$38,115.50
Technical
Technical
Technical
Technical
Technical
$53,263.00
$57,508.00
$64,018.00
$53,645.00
$45,700.00
$25.61
$27.65
$30.78
$25.79
$21.97
25%
50%
25%
50%
20%
$13,315.75
$28,754.00
$16,004.50
$26,822.50
$9,140.00
Support
Support
Support
Support
$53,047.00
$33,047.00
$48,690.00
$31,192.00
$25.50
$15.89
$23.41
$15.00
100%
100%
100%
50%
$53,047.00
$33,047.00
$48,690.00
$15,596.00
Total Salaries
Overhead Rate
Overall Total
$442,985.75
40%
$620,180.05
Staffing Plan for the Out Years
The phase is the functional and support phase of the project. The tasks in this phase are ongoing
and are not part of the project.
The following staff will be needed for Out Years support:
Project Manager
Executive
Assistant
Customer Service
Supervisor
Accounting Clerk
Customer Service
Representatives
45
Web Designer
Project Manager
Annual Salary: $18,502.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include making sure that all tasks are assigned and are
performed with high quality. The project manager must also resolve difference between team
members and facilitate team member communications. The project manager also must develop
the WBS, assign resources, prioritize tasks, and define task dependencies.
Customer Service
Customer Service Supervisor
Annual Salary: $53,047.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include leading all customer service representatives and
keeping customer service running.
Customer Service Reprehensive
Annual Salary: $33,047.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include answering customer’s problems and concerns
while using the Rate-it engine or website.
Skills: Good telephone and communication skills
Executive Assistant
Annual Salary: $48,690.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include managing the administrative needs of the staff.
Skills: Clerical skills
Accounting Clerk
Annual Salary: $31,192.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include producing the financial reports of the project.
Skills: Accounting skills
Web Designer
Annual Salary: $53,645.00
Responsibilities: The responsibilities include configuring and maintaining the website and
developing how the rate-it engine is integrated into websites.
Skills: HTML, web experience
46
Out Years Summary
Title
Project Manager
Web Designer
Customer Service Supervisor
Customer Representatives
Administrator
Accounting Clerk
Group
Salary Per Year
Hourly Rate
Time Needed
Total
Management
$74,008.00
$35.58
25%
$18,502.00
Technical
$53,645.00
$25.79
50%
$53,645.00
Support
Support
Support
Support
$53,047.00
$33,047.00
$48,690.00
$31,192.00
$25.50
$15.89
$23.41
$15.00
100%
100%
100%
100%
$53,047.00
$33,047.00
$48,690.00
$31,192.00
Total Salaries
Overhead Rate
Overall Total
$238,123.00
40%
$333,372.20
47
Funding Plan
In order to make Rate It a success, we must provide enough revenue to cover the cost of the
project. The Green Team will submit a Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) grant
proposal for Phase I and Phase II to the Department of Commerce (DOC) National Institute of
Standards and Technology (NIST). Phase III funding will be provided though venture capital
investment.
The Department of Commerce (DOC) National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)
invites small businesses to submit research proposals under this solicitation. Objectives of this
program include stimulating technological innovation in the private sector and strengthening the
role of small business in meeting Federal research and development (R&D) needs. This program
also seeks to increase the commercial application of innovations derived from Federal research
and improve the return on investment from federally funded research for the economic benefit of
the Nation.
Funding Agency: US Department of Commerce SBIR
Division: National Institute of Standards and Technology
Topic: Information Technology (IT)
Deadline: June 13, 2007
Awards Amount:
Phase I award: $100,000
Phase II award: $750,000
Phase III funding will be provided through investment by venture capital firms such as:



Envest Private Equity (http://www.envestventures.com/)
Y Combinator (http://ycombinator.com/)
CIT GAP Fund (http://www.cit.org/gap)
.
48
Evaluation Plan
Purpose
The purpose of this document is to define the parameters, so that we will know each phase is a
success. In each phase the deliverables will be evaluated based on the project management
criteria of time, cost, scope, and quality.
Phase 0
In Phase 0 our project was conceived. Researching and defining our project was done in order to
clearly identify our objectives, goals, and risks. In this phase the initial SBIR proposal is created
along with a proposal presentation and product website.
Main Deliverables
SBIR Proposal
Proposal Presentation
Product Website
Time
Our milestone presentation and Work Breakdown Structure declares the estimated completion
time of the deliverables. If these deliverables are completed by the estimate completion date,
then the criteria will have been deemed successful. The team leader ensures all project members
are completing tasks within the deadlines of the milestones in the WBS. To prepare for the main
deliverables, listed above, there have been milestones that delivered presentations: conception
(individual), feasibility (team), and milestone (team). Assignments have been posted to the team
website and Google Groups website to prepare for the Product Website and development team
coherence and communications.
Cost
Since there is no cost for this phase, this criteria will not be used to measure success.
Scope
The scope will be measured by comparing the grading criteria against each deliverable. If each
deliverable meets each graded criteria, then this criteria is deemed a success.
Quality
49
Quality of the proposal presentation will be determined by an independent panel. This panel will
evaluate the presentation based on the grading criteria established. An average score of 90 will
determine that success of this deliverable.
The SBIR proposal and product website will be evaluated by the CPI advisor. A grade of 90 or
more for each deliverable based on the grading criteria will indicate a success.
Peer evaluations have been completed after each team milestone. Evaluation is performed by
team members to measure participation, quantity and quality of each team member. Weekly
discussions and constructive criticism take place in CS410 class to improve quality of
deliverables.
Phase 1
In this phase a lab prototype will be developed and the SBIR Phase 2 proposal will be developed.
Success will be measured by the successful completion of those two deliverables. Evaluation
during this phase will also consists of bi-weekly team meetings to ensure that the project is
progressing as planned and the hardware and software components are correctly implemented.
Formal evaluations will be conducted each month or as often as necessary to ensure we stay
within the guidelines of the WBS.
Development of product software will be completed in this phase. Our product software includes
software for:
 Rate It Engine
 Proof of Concept Website
We will follow the work flows of analysis, design, implementation and validation.
We will also be developing documentation for our product.
Main Deliverables
Lab Prototype
SBIR Phase 2 Proposal
Time
The project plan defines the date at which these deliverables should be completed. If these
deliverables are completed by the estimate completion date, then this criteria will have been
deemed successful.
Cost
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The funding plan determines the cost estimates of each phase. The human and hard resource
actual costs will be compared to the budgeted costs in the funding plan. If the actual costs are
with 5% of the budgeted costs, then this criteria will be deemed successful.
Scope
The scope will be measured by comparing the grading criteria against the SBIR Phase 2
requirements. If SBIR contains all the required items, then the criteria will be deemed
successful. The lab prototype will be measured against the requirements document developed in
Phase 1. If the prototype contains all of the required functionality from the document, then the
criteria will be deemed successful.
Quality
Quality of the proposal presentation will be determined by the SBIR decision board. If the
decision board grants the proposed funding, then the SBIR proposal will be deemed successful.
These criteria for the lab prototype will be deemed successful if it meets all of the requirements
in the requirements document and meets the performance requirements also in that document.
We will begin evaluation with code reviews of each module for proper structure and syntax.
After successfully passing code reviews we will begin testing of each module. We will end the
evaluation for each module after successful testing. We will have evaluations for every module
being integrated into the system. We measure success when we have completed each evaluation
successfully and in accordance with the WBS time frame.
The prototype must pass all tests in the test plan. The test plan will make sure our objectives are
met:
•
•
•
•
•
Module Tests
• Rating Module Test
• Comment Module Test
• Vote Aging Module Test
• Login Module Test
• User Customization Module Test
Template Tests
Database Tests
Website Security Tests
Engine Security Tests
Once the test plan execution has been completed with no known bugs, then the criteria will be
deemed successful.
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Phase 2
Phase two is where the project shifts into refinement and development of the actual Rate
It engine. Evaluation during this phase will continue much like in Phase 1. Bi-weekly meetings
will be held to determine if the project is on schedule and within budget. Testing plans will be
drafted to ensure quality assurance and components will be vigorously tested and the results of
those tests will be discussed at the bi-weekly meetings to work out any problems. In this phase
we will also conduct a beta test and success will be declared when the beta test results in few
errors or errors that are of little significance. Feedback will also facilitate refinements to our
product and support materials. Formal evaluations will be conducted each month or as often as
necessary to ensure we stay within the guidelines of the WBS.
Main Deliverables
Actual Prototype
Time
The project plan defines the date at which these deliverables should be completed. If these
deliverables are completed by the estimate completion date, then this criteria will have been
deemed successful.
Cost
The funding plan determines the cost estimates of each phase. The human and hard resource
actual costs will be compared to the budgeted costs in the funding plan. If the actual costs are
with 10% of the budgeted costs, then this criteria will be deemed successful.
Scope
The prototype will be measured against the requirements document. If the prototype contains all
of the required functionality from the document, then the criteria will be deemed successful.
Quality
The criteria for the prototype will be deemed successful if it meets all of the requirements in the
requirements document and meets the performance requirements also in that document. The
prototype must pass all tests in the test plan. Once the test plan execution has been completed
with no known bugs, then the criteria will be deemed successful. The criteria for the prototype
will be determined by a beta test market. A test market will be used to determine if the product
is marketable. After the beta test, a study will be performed by surveying the test market
participants. The prototype and support materials must also undergo a satisfaction beta test
survey.
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Phase 3
In this phase, the main focus will be on further refinement of the product based on the beta
testing and moving the project into full time production. To ensure quality, evaluation of the
production process will be a key factor. Additionally, evaluation of the marketing strategy will
be conducted to ensure that we are targeting the correct market. Formal evaluations will be
conducted each month or as often as necessary to ensure we stay within the guidelines of the
WBS. Success in this phase will be determined by how many units we sell and when we start to
see a profit. In addition to that, we will be evaluating customer feedback to gauge customer
satisfaction.
Main Deliverables
Product Rollout
Time
The project plan defines the date at which these deliverables should be completed. If these
deliverables are completed by the estimate completion date, then this criteria will have been
deemed successful.
Cost
The funding plan determines the cost estimates of each phase. The human and hard resource
actual costs will be compared to the budgeted costs in the funding plan. If the actual costs are
with 10% of the budgeted costs, then this criteria will be deemed successful.
Scope
The scope of the rollout will be measured against the marketing plan. If the product has been
produced, is available for download/installation, and the marketing has been performed per the
marketing plan, then this criteria will be deemed successful.
Quality
If the test market survey of the product’s quality and usefulness as compares to the goals and
objectives of the project is favorable, then this criteria is deemed successful.
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Risk Management Plan
Purpose
The purpose of this document is to provide a plan to identify and manage risks.
Management Plan
To manage risks, we will use the following procedure:
1.
Identify the risk
2.
Identify the phase that the risk is in.
3.
Enter the risk into our team’s risk management plan.
4.
Determine the risk’s probability of occurring and the severity to the project if the
risk occurs.
5.
Enter the risk probability and severity.
6.
Determine a strategy for managing the risk from the Risk Management Strategy
section.
7.
Mitigate or otherwise deal with the risk.
8.
Track the risk
We will deal with the risks by using the most appropriate risk management strategy. These
strategies are:
1.
Acceptance – If this strategy is chosen, we simple simply accept the consequence
of a risk if it does occur. This strategy will be chosen if the cost to deal with the risk is
greater than the cost of the risk occurring. This will also be the default strategy for any
risk that occurs that we have not identified.
2.
Avoidance – If this strategy is chosen, we will take steps to avoid the risk whatso-ever.
3.
Mitigation – If this strategy is chosen, we will take steps to decrease the severity
of the risk and/ or the probability that the risk will occur. We can accomplish this by
making contingency plans.
Risks that may impact our project:
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A. No Customers
B. Overwhelming Customer Participation
C. Biased Users Flood Engine with Overly Positive/Negative Reviews
D. Overwhelming Customer Support Requests
E. Failing to Keep on Schedule
F. Competitors Copy Engine Functionality
G. Customers Require Many Specific Design Templates
A. No Customers: The success/failure of our product depends on it’s acceptance by the service
industry as a valuable tool used in rating and reviewing services of many different types. If the
service industry does not see the need for our product, then we will have little to no customers.
Mitigation Action: Proper marketing and product design is essential in mitigating this risk. Our
marketing team will be responsible for communicating to the service industry that there is an
intense need for our product. Also, our developers are responsible for creating the very best
engine possible so that it accepted by the service industry.
B. Overwhelming Customer Participation: The opposite of our first risk is that there will be
too many customers that are requesting our product that we will not be able to keep up with
demand. For each customer that we acquire, we must devout time to implementing, testing, and
tailoring our solution to fit their needs; all which require time and energy.
Mitigation Action: The number of employees greatly affects our production potential. Hiring
more employees means that we can have more customers to satisfy through the sale and
implementation of our engine. Employee training and competence also comes in to play. The
more knowledgeable our employees are, the better they can assist our customers.
C. Biased Users Flood Engine with Overly Positive/Negative Reviews: The proper
functionality of our engine depends on unbiased user ratings and reviews. If certain users choose
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to unfairly rate and review services either positively or negatively for personal gain, then the
objectiveness of our engine will be compromised and the quality of our product will suffer.
Mitigation Action: Our engine must have a way to determine which users are abusing the
system and which ones are not. This can be done through the logging of usernames and IP
addresses when many positive/negative reviews are made by a certain user in a given amount of
time. This user will then be flagged, and can be dealt with later by site administrators.
D. Overwhelming Customer Support Requests: Once our engine has been installed and
configured to work with a client’s server and database backend, our work is not completely
finished. The customer will be able to purchase a service contract which will obligate us to
support any questions and come up with solutions to problems that the customer may have in the
future while using our product.
Mitigation Action: To mitigate this risk we need a full-time, dedicated Customer Support Team.
This team will be in charge of maintaining Customer Support Contracts and will assist our
customers with the problems that may arise from the user of our product.
E. Failing to Keep on Schedule: Making the deadlines is a problem with most all projects. Our
project involves the development of a lot of software, as well as the testing of this software. With
our project, we have service websites that are going to be counting on having our product for
their patrons by a certain time. If we fail to deliver the product in time, they’ll be losing money,
and we’ll be losing money.
Mitigation Action: The best way to ensure we deliver our product on schedule is to carefully
manage our development time. This can be done through the use of project management tools.
We plan to use Microsoft Project for the development of Rate It. By carefully breaking down all
of the tasks that must be completed it becomes easier to develop and accurate achievable
schedule. Using Microsoft Project we track our progress on individual tasks, making it easier for
us to track our overall progress and keep ourselves on schedule. Also, bi-weekly meetings will
keep everyone on the project up to date with current tasks and due dates.
F. Competitors Copy Engine Functionality: Because our engine is completely software based
and can be developed using free open source technologies such as PHP and MySQL, there is the
potential that competitors will choose to copy our engine’s functionality and design and perhaps
add new features that our engine does not have. The source code for our product will not be
available to the public, however clever developers will be able to copy the functionality of our
engine if they so choose.
Mitigation Action: Excellent marketing techniques and a creative development team will be
required to help mitigate this risk. The marketing team must convey to customers that our engine
is the best one to suit their needs. Also, the development team must constantly be coming up
with new ideas to keep us “ahead of the game” with our competitors. Finally, we must be able to
take legal actions against competitors that blatantly copy our engine’s design and functionality in
order to ensure the success of our product.
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G. Customers Require Many Specific Design Templates: Since our engine is marketed
towards many different service industries, there will be the need for equally as many design
templates. These templates must be able to fit the specific needs of our customers while being
somewhat unique from customer to customer. This presents a challenge for the template
designers in that they do not want to have to design an entirely new template for each new
customer.
Mitigation Action: Much thought must be put in to each template so that it will work with
multiple service industries. The templates must be able to be customized with minimal effort by
the developers in order to save time and money. After we acquire a few customers from each
type of service industry, we will be able to create “master templates” for each industry that can
be retro-fitted with each specific customer’s logo and color palette.
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Resource Plan
Purpose
This document defines the hard resources associated with the project per phase. The purpose of
this document is to define what hard resources are necessary per phase and to explain their
purpose. Each phase defines new hard resources that are introduced; however it should be
assumed by the reader that any hard resource that is used in a previous phase will be used for the
same purpose in subsequent phases unless otherwise noted.
Although human resources are in integral part of the resource plan, these resources have been
addressed in the separate document, Staffing Plan, contained within this SBIR. The reader is
referred to the funding plan for any detailed financial information.
Phase 0
In this phase the initial SBIR proposal is created along with a proposal presentation and product
website.
Since this phase only involves research and the proof of concept, no hard resources are required.
Phase 1
In this phase a lab prototype will be developed and the SBIR Phase 2 proposal will be developed.
Success will be measured by the successful completion of those two deliverables.
The following hard resources are needed for Phase 1:
Qty.
Cost Per
Unit
Total
Dell Power Edge SC440 with
Red Hat Linux
Dell Dimension E520 with
Windows XP professional
1
$1,656.00
$1,656.00
5
$898.00
$4,490.00
10
$18.49
$184.90
Network Router
Dynex 7' Cat 6 Network Cable
Netgear FVS318 10/100 Mbps
8-port VPN/Firewall Router
1
$109.99
$109.99
High Speed Internet
Connection
Internet Connection
6
$75.00
$450.00
Resources
Web Server
Workstations
Network Cables
Product
Total
$6,890.89
Web server (1) – This web server will hold all of our engine development and proof of concept
web site. This computer will be a Dell PowerEdge RedHat Linux.
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Workstation (5) – We will have 5 team members for CS411, so we will need five workstations.
This will include the default installation of Windows, and MS Office.
Router/Switch (1) – This is used to network the computers together.
Cables (10) – These are used to patch the PCs into the switch.
High Speed Internet Connection (6 months) – Since we are going to be running a proof of
concept webpage, we want to make sure that we have a reliable internet connection.
Phase 2
In this phase the actual prototype of the product will be developed.
The following hard resources are needed for Phase 2:
Resources
Web Server
Workstations
Network Cables
Network Router
Product
Dell Power Edge SC440 with
Red Hat Linux
Dell Dimension E520 with
Windows XP professional
Dynex 7' Cat 6 Network Cable
Netgear FVS318 10/100 Mbps
8-port VPN/Firefwall Router
High Speed Internet Connection Internet Connection
Qty.
Cost Per Unit
Total
4
$1,656.00
$6,624.00
12
$898.00
$10,776.00
25
$18.49
$462.25
2
$750.00
$1,500.00
12
$100.00
$1,200.00
Total
$20,562.25
Web servers (2) – This web server will hold all of our engine development and proof of concept
web site. These computers will be a Dell PowerEdge RedHat Linux.
Database servers (2) – these database servers will hold all of the information that is in the
website. These computers will be a Dell PowerEdge RedHat Linux.
Workstation (12) – For this phase we will need 12 workstations. This will include the default
installation of Windows, and MS Office.
Router/Switch (2) – This is used to network the computers together.
Cables (25) – These are used to patch the PCs into the switch.
High Speed Internet Connection (12 months) – Since we are going to be running a proof of
concept webpage, we want to make sure that we have a reliable internet connection.
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Phase 3
This phase is the main rollout of the product. In this phase the warehouse and manufacturer is
secured and actual production begins. The marketing campaign also begins in this phase.
The following hard resources are needed for Phase 3:
Qty.
Cost Per
Unit
Workstations
Dell Dimension E520 with
Windows XP professional
5
$898.00
$4,490.00
Network Cables
Dynex 7' Cat 6 Network Cable
25
$18.49
$462.25
Resources
Product
Total
Total
$4,952.25
With the engine built and the proof of concept website running in Phase 2, we only need to
purchase PCs for our new office staff.
Workstation (5) – These workstations will have MS Office installed with the default version of
Windows. These workstations are for the new staff that is brought on in Phase 3.
Out Years
The phase is the functional and support phase of the project. The tasks in this phase are ongoing
and are not part of the project.
Since Out Years maintains and supports the products that are created in the project, any hard
resources needed for that support would have been identified and setup in Phase 3. Therefore
there are no hard resources defined specifically for Out Years the Out Years hard resources come
from previous phases.
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Development Plan
Abstract
Rate-it is a web based search engine developed by the Green Group to search and rate service
organizations. This engine will be a completely software based, community driven rate it engine
that can be used as a plug in to other rating web sites. This engine will allow the customer to rate
service organizations so that the data and ratings will be useable and trustworthy to other
consumers. Some highlights of the system will be one click up or down rating, a weighting
system that decides which votes are more important and why, and a complex decision making
process that determines the logged in users preferences and likes and dislikes over time. This
engine can be used with any rating site that wants a comprehensive rating system for their
service organizations. The engine can be sold to already developed websites and stay with the
same look and feel of the developed website through the use of customizable templates.
Phase 0 - Research
The initial phase of the project will begin by researching the underlying problem, determining
what capabilities the Rate It Engine must have, and drafting a requirements document detailing
what hardware and software will enable the engine to perform its function. To begin, the main
functions that the engine must perform will be identified and adequate hardware and software
components chosen that will give the engine the required capabilities. After the initial hardware
and software requirements are determined, a plan to develop those components will be produced
and submitted to the team by the principle investigator.
Phase I - Feasibility Prototype
After determining what hardware and software components are needed for Rate It Engine
to perform its function, a prototype will be developed to show the technical feasibility of the
chosen design. This will be accomplished through a proof of concept website. We will develop a
ratings website based on the restaurant industry that uses our Rate It engine in order to prove the
successfulness of our product. The website will reside on Dell Power Edge servers powered by
RedHat Linux.
Phase II - Refinement and Development
During refinement and development, the actual Rate It engine will be developed and
made for other websites to use. To ensure that the project has a clear plan for development,
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requirements documents will be drafted for each software component. Those documents will be
used as the metric by which success of the development procedures will be measured. A final
design prototype will be developed during this phase and testing of the full system will be
conducted in order to ensure all design requirements are met and the system works as intended.
Phase III - Product Rollout
During production rollout of the Rate It engine, the project manager will oversee the
development and deployment of the final product. The sales and marketing director will then
make sure his/her staff markets the product to the right companies.
Out Years - Product Support
During the projects out years, Rate It support staff will be involved in the support of the
product. An Customer Support Manager will be appointed and will manage the overall business
of supporting the Rate It engine. Under that manager, customer support representatives to take
orders, complaints, and general customer comments.
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Work Breakdown Structure and Gantt Charts
WBS and Gantt charts Phase 0
63
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65
66
67
68
69
70
71
WBS and Gantt chart Phase 1
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
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80
81
82
83
WBS and Gantt chart Phase 2
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
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98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
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107
108
109
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113
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117
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119
WBS and Gantt chart Phase 3
120
121
122
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