Applied ICT A Level Unit 3 - Database Design
Part 4 - Evaluation Criteria and Test Plans
It's best to think about how you're going to evaluate your database at this point.
You have designs by now, hopefully with a pretty good idea of the database system that you're going to make. You also have client needs. You could just go ahead and build the database, but it's really helpful to think about evaluation criteria before you do so.
Don't forget - you can always come back and tweak things after you've got the database built.
Evaluation Criteria:
Each client need will require at least one evaluation criteria. The criteria need to include both qualitative and quantitative points.
The criteria should be something that can be tested directly:
- a client need says "the system needs to produce an invoice"
- an evaluation criteria for that need might be "the system has produced an accurate invoice"
The more detailed your needs are, the easier it is to write criteria!
With your criteria you need to include details of how you're going to test your database. A table works well here:
| Client Need | Evaluation Criteria | Quant/Qual | How the criteria will be tested |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | An accurate count of all customers in the database can be reported | Quantitative | A copy of rptCustomers will be generated, using qryCustomerList. This will include an accurate count of the number of customers in the database |
| 2 | All reports and forms will have the company name, address and logo on them | Qualitatiive | Each form and report will be inspected to ensure that the details required by the client are present |
It's important to have both quantitative and qualitative criteria. Quantitative ones tend to be trickier. It might be worth thinking about things like:
- accurate calculations for the receipt
- font size 12+ (or whatever - might be different on forms to reports etc...)
- No more than 5 buttons per form
- receipt fits on one side of A4 when printed
...and so on.
You'll then come back and do the actual testing in Part 6 and evaluate the solution in Part 7.
