Features

• Light-Weight: The whole application, including all images,scripts and stylesheets, is only 1.35 MB uncompressed and just 714KB when compressed.

• Fully automated installer: QuickSlots comes with a fully automated installer, meaning that the administrator just has to run the installer and does not have to look into ANY PART OF THE SOURCE CODE AT ALL.

• One-click total system backup and restore: Backup and restore settings and databases, even across different servers, just with a single click.

• Generate ready-to-print timetable image snapshots.

• Support for LDAP authentication.

 Files and Descriptions

• .\setup.php -- Initial system setup.
• .\index.php -- Displays the timetable applying the provided filters, if any.
• .\login.php -- Provides interface and back end routines that handle user logins.
• .\logout.php -- Logs out the user when visited
• .\allocate.php -- Provides interface and back end routines for allocation of courses to time slots
• .\dean.php -- Homepage of dean level users, it provides interface and back end routines to edit and save global settings. Access is restricted to dean level users.
• .\manage.php -- Provides interface and back end routines to manage departments, faculty, batches and rooms. Access is restricted to dean level users.
• .\faculty.php -- Homepage of HOD and faculty level users, provides interfaces to add/delete courses. Access requires at least faculty level account.
• .\register.php -- Contains back end routines for user management. It is invoked by manage.php and setup.php
• .\connect_db.php -- Initiates database connections. Required by all files that needs to perform database operations
• .\functions.php -- Contains various common helper routines used across most files
• .\courses.php -- Contains back end routines to add/delete courses. It is invoked by faculty.php
• .\batches.php -- Contains back end routines to add/delete batches. It is invoked by manage.php
• .\depts.php -- Contains back end routines to add/delete batches. It is invoked by manage.php
• .\rooms.php -- Contains back end routines to add/delete batches. It is invoked by dean.php
• .\backup.php -- Contains back end routines to generate/restore backups, invoked by dean.php
• .\download.php -- Back end routines that call PhantomJS to generate printable timetable snapshot images.
• .\js\grid.js -- Client side script to render timetable grids
• .\js\form.js -- Handles all form submissions and validation that needs to be done via AJAX
• .\js\capture.js -- Contains PhantomJS routines for printable table snapshot generation
• .\css\styles.css -- Defines generic styles shared by the whole QuickSlots UI
• .\css\table.css -- Defines generic styles for QuickSlots table grids
• .\css\dashboard.css -- Defines the stylings for various elements of the dashboard

                External Libraries and Programs Used

• PhantomJS: PhantomJS web stack (for generating screenshots) (https://phantomjs.org/)

• jQuery Core: The jQuery Core javascript library (https://jquery.com/)

• jQuery UI: The jQuery UI library (https://jqueryui.com/)

• jQuery UI Touch Punch: Touch Event Support for jQuery UI (http://touchpunch.furf.com/)

• Chosen.js: Select Box Enhancer for jQuery (http://harvesthq.github.io/chosen/)

                       System Requirements

• Apache Web Server: Version 2.4 or higher recommended

• MYSQL Database Engine: Version 5.5 or higher recommended

• PHP Hypertext Preprocessor: Version 5.5 or higher recommended

                     Installation Instructions

• Make sure that the apache user has read/write permissions on the file "config.php", and the directory "tmp", used respectively for configuration and backup & screen-shot generation.

• Visit setup.php through a web browser and provide the required database and LDAP configurations. Thereafter, set up the first dean/admin account to complete the setup.

                        Usage Instructions

• Login using the "dean"(admin) account. You will be redirected to the "Manage Timetables" page.

• Create a timetable by clicking on the drop-down on top, beside "Configure Timetable:"

• Add departments, faculty, courses and rooms.

• HOD of every department can create courses and allocate timetables for all faculty of his/her department.

• Faculty is the account with the least set of privileges: creating courses and managing, the timetable for his courses. These privileges are shared by the HOD and dean as well.

                       Viewing the timetable

The timetable can be viewed by two groups of users:

• Public/guest users (like students):

• Without needing any login, guest users can either visit the application web-root to view the timetable by applying filters on their own, or by visiting the links generated by faculty.
• When they visit the web-root, only the current active timetable is displayed by default. As before, users can further apply the various filters such to find what they need.
• The system also displays a link based on these filters which can be saved/bookmarked by them for direct display of the filtered timetable.

• Authorized users (Faculty/HOD/Dean):
  • Once authenticated faculty can view, generate links and download snapshots for all instances of the timetable, with any set of filters applied.

                    Manage Timetable Instructions

• Multiple instances of timetable can be created. While creating a new timetable, number of slots, working days and starting time can be configured.

• In a authenticated users can easily manage timetable with the help of the intuitive GUI and instructions that accompany.

• Timetables can be frozen by a dean at any time when a finalized timetable is needed. It can be used if you want to avoid any accidental changes on the timetable once finalized. A frozen timetable cannot be edited unless a dean choses to de-freeze it.

                           Backup/Restore

• The system allows the dean to download a whole backup of the database.

• System can be restored to the previous state by uploading the backup file back.