APPLICATION DESIGN (CHAPTER 7)

CHAPTER  7

APPLICATION  DESIGN

7.1      User Accounts

7.1.1   General Description

The passenger ( also called  as the ‘user’) has 2 choices by the reservation system, whether he/she is a new user or a registered user and wants to check the availability of tickets or also buy them. The term ‘registered user’ mean a user who has earlier purchased the ticket through the reservation system (ARSystem) and would have been given a user id and a password. He/she would have his/her personal information stored in the database as ‘tbl_registration’. This ‘personal information’ would be henceforth referred to as ‘profile’. Such a user with a profile in tbl_registration shall be called a ‘registered user’. A registered user will be able to check the availability of tickets as well as buy a ticket by logging into the system.

A new user would either have to (a) register himself/ herself with the system by providing personal information or (b) log into the system as a new user to check the availability of ticket.

In case of ‘a’, the new user becomes a registered user.  In case of ‘b’, the new user would remain a new user.

 ‘Availability of tickets’ always refers to viewing the flight schedule for given days, the price of tickets and any discount offers. The system shall present the user with an option to exit from the system at any time during the  processes.

7.2      Registration and creation of user profile

7.2.1   General Description

The system shall require a user to register, in order to carry out any transactions with it except for checking the availability of tickets. It will ask the user for the following information atleast – a user id, a password, first name, last name, address, phone number, email address, sex, age, preferred credit card number. The system will automatically create a field and initialize it to zero in the user’s profile.

7.3      Checking Availability/Query Flight Details

7.3.1   General Description

 After logging the ARSystem, the home page will be displayed. The system shall request him to enter the following details – origin city and destination city. “City’ is a generic term and refers to a city or town as the case may be. The origin and destination cities would be entered as text through drop down provided by the system.

The system shall now ask the user to enter the following details - class, one-way or round trip, departure date and the number of adult passengers, children and infants, if any. ‘Class’ refers to Executive class/ Economy class. This choice shall be made by the user through a drop down menu indicating all the possible combinations of choices.

One-way/round trip shall be a radio button selection. ‘Departure date’ refers to  a single date entered through a calendar-like menu which will show dates in the current month and of the next month. In case, the trip is a round trip, the system shall also ask the user to enter the departure date on the return trip.

After the origin and destination cities are ascertained, the system shall now access the flight schedule database as ‘tbl_flight_info’ and checks if there is a direct operational service between the two cities.

Having taken all of the information, the system shall now access the flight schedule database ‘tbl_flight_info’ and queries it using the input provided by the user checks which of the flights on the schedule have seats available.

The system shall now refer to the flight schedule database as ‘tbl_geographical_cities’ , which contains list of cities from where the flights operates.

The system displays the results in a suitable form (a tabular form) with the following information depicted – for each flight number – the flight number, departure time in origin city, arrival time in destination city, the duration of the flight (taking into account the possibility of a change of time zone) and the number of seats available on that flight along with cost for one ticket.

There can be several flights between two cities and all of them will be listed for the particular date that the user wants to depart from the Origin City.

The user is now asked to check one flight number and time. In case of a round trip, the user is asked to check one for the onward trip and one for the return trip separately. The system will display a form to enter details of each passangers- first name, lastname, adult  and/or child and/or infant. After that the system will display the price of the ticket for the trip. This will be the sum of the prices for all the members of the travel party being represented by the user.

The system shall also list any rules regarding the cancellation of tickets – what percentage of the price will be refunded within what date ranges. This will be displayed as a table.

7.4    Making Reservations

7.4.1   General Description

After having taken the user through the steps, Checking Availability. The system will now ask the user if he wishes to buy the ticket. If yes, then he/she has first to register and become a registered user and then log onto the system.

If the user is already a registered user, and if he/she has logged on already, he can buy the ticket and the system will ask the user to check the submit button.

The system accesses his/her  profile and charges the price of the ticket to his/her credit card number or the other options given in the check boxes. It simultaneously generates a confirmation ticket and displays it to the user for him/her to note down. The ticket has been reserved.

7.5      Cancellation

7.5.1   General Description

The system shall also give the user an option to cancel a confirmed ticket.

For a confirmed ticket, the system will ask for the confirmation number and accesses tbl_reservation and presents the details of the trip reserved.

It then lists the applicable rules for cancellation of tickets and depending on the system date and the departure date, it displays the % of the amount that would be refunded if the user cancels the ticket.

After the user cancels the ticket, the system generates a cancellation number and displays it for the user to note down. It accesses tbl_reservation and updates it by incrementing the number of available seats on that flight by the number of travelers in the user’s party. It accesses DB-user and credits the refund amount to his credit card number.

7.6      Update Profile

7.6.1   General Description

The system shall enable the user to update his profile at any time. Changes can be made in fields including but not limited to address, phone number and preferred credit card number.