Tracking the Consignment Transportation in Ship via Online Dr.T.Arumuga Maria Devi, D.Christen Jeba Raj Assistant Professor, M.Tech Scholar Centre for Information Technology and Engineering, Manonmaniam Sundaranar University, Tirunelveli Abstract This paper describes the Customer relative system through any one can enquiry about their shipment details. The System helps the customer s to know about their details without any other s help. The Tracking facilities developed in this system helps the User to know the shipment details station to station where the shipment arrives. All of need is the user to enter the cargo registered number in the required field. All the status about the Shipment details is displayed with timings. The system mainly works with two main modules. One is administrator side and the other is the customer side. The administrator is the system controller and he knows all the operation about cargo ship movement. The administrator is responsible for the correct registration of cargo; the registration process includes the source and destination address and the middle stations where the shipment will stay. The customer side mainly concentrating on registers their cargo and steady follow up of the cargo up to the destination reaches. This system can be developed using the Asp.net 2008 as front-end and SQL server 2008 as back-end. Index Terms- Cargo Tracking System- Book Shipment-Port Master. I. INTRODUCTION A. Cargo Tracking System Cargo Tracking System is an application, which is based on web that have designed and developed to meet the requirements between the cargo shipment and delivery. The system removes the barrier among the Customer, employee of Shipping Company, and the port authorities. This system envisaged not as a web site to give information about the transactions or services they are rendering but to process the requirement set by different authorities to make the system a tool to manage the whole process. This system mange s itself with all processes arise in the requirement of end users such as details about an entity, status of an entity, Reports about the different bits and pieces will manage. Objectives An integrated system of all process arise in cargo management Accessible to any where Easy updating of Information Automatic processing of data where it needs Tracking of information about an entity should be transparent Overview The paper has divide in to four major modules they are Port Master Employee Customer New Customer Registration Who wants to send a cargo via ship will approach this system and register for his cargo to the ship with the needed information. The port master, who is the overall controller of the system have register the information about the ships, the ports, the materials those are allowed as consignments, the amount for different material the port charging are available in the system at the moment the customer login. After register, the customer wants to wait for approval from the Employee of port. After the approval, he can transport the consignment. Besides he can track the information about the status, he can track the location where the ship is now with his consignment. This keeps the track of information about the consignments weight and the capacity of the ship. If that over, it put aside the other registrations and approve the same when registrations are cancelled or some consignments have unloaded at some ports. B.Profile This system has been developed using the ASP.NET 2005 as front-end and SQL server 2005 as back-end. The sub modules of each modules have designed to accomplish the task assigned to each level of people those who are involving in the various processes. Authentication of each user is traceable because it allows the user to access the system who has registered with the system and who supply the correct user name and password. II. SYSTEM STUDY System study is the process of gathering and interpreting facts, diagnosing problems and using the information to recommend improvements to the system. In this phase of system study we analyze the existing system for the newly proposed one and the demerits for the same. Also we look at the proposed system and its merits upon the existing one. A. Existing System The existing systems for the current papers are available at present, which are both in online or in stand-alone applications. Even in availability of systems; those did not provide an integrated system to give the all solution. The existing systems need intermediaries between the shipping company and port and between customers and shipping 275
company. The customer will approach an intermediary to get approval from the shipping authority to ship his cargo. The customer will not get the proper information about his registration of consignment and the status of his cargo. That system were in need of more human resource to manage the stand alone application as it needs more inputs and due to its lack of efficiency to manage system with updating itself. The standalone applications are providing limited accessibility to the end user while considering the geographical area. B.Propsed System The Proposed system has designed to overcome the limitations of the current system. The proposed system is an online system and it has centralized server to manage the entire process. After registering, the customer wants to wait for approval from the employee of port. After the approval, he can transport the consignment. Besides he can track the information about the status, he can track the location where the ship is now with his consignment. As the system is an online application, besides its global access to the system it provide updated information about the cargo shipment. he whole modules have integrated and form new systems that have the facilities that the existing system could not. The inter connection between the different authorities have integrated well for the smooth execution and working of the processes. As the customer can track, the information regarding the status could help the customer to get details about the Cargo. III. SYSTEM SPECIFICATION AHARDWARE SPECIFICATION The hardware requirements may serve as the basis for a contract for the implementation of the system and should therefore be a complete and consistent specification of the whole system. They are used by software engineers as the starting point for the system design. It should what the system do and not how it should be implemented. PROCESSOR : PENTIUM IV 2.6 GHz, Intel Core 2 Duo. RAM : 2 GB DD RAM MONITOR : 15 COLOR HARD DISK : 40 GB CDDRIVE : LG 52X KEYBOARD : STANDARD 102 KEYS MOUSE : 3 BUTTONS B. SOFTWARE SPECIFICATION The software requirements document is the specification of the system. It should include both a definition and a specification of requirements. It is a set of what the system should do rather than how it should do it. The software requirements provide a basis for creating the software requirements specification. It is useful in estimating cost, planning team activities, performing tasks and tracking the teams and tracking the team s progress throughout the development activity. Operating system :Windows 07/ XP Professional Web Development tool : ASP.Net Coding Environment : C#.NET Back-End Tool : Ms- SQL Server IV. SYSTEM DESIGN A. DESCRIPTION This paper has mainly divided in to four major modules. Each module has well designed to accomplish different tasks, those are listed and designed as part of system development and the different authorization based on the designated level. Each module has different sub-modules too to make the system a power full one. Modules have come up with high end security such as password protection and other security features.. The different modules available in this system are Port Master Employee Customer New customer Registration 1 Port Master The Port master can be defined in the context of this paper as the authority with all authorizations other overall controller of this system. As each module are secured with password and login name the administrator too need login name and password to get login. To do so the system developer would supply a pre defined login name and use the following options those are authorized to him. The sub-modules are: Change Security Code Register Employee Manage Employee Add Ship Details Add Materials Register Port details Create Schedule Change Security Code Port master can change his password by giving old password and new password in proper field. There is a confirm password field to confirm new password this is validated using compare validation control. Register Employee Employee details are registered using this process. In this there is a unique id which is automatically generated using coding by changing the count from database. Employee registration consists of User Name, Address1, Address2, Contact info, email ID, Registration Date, Login id, and password and confirm password field. Manage Employee This option is used to keep an employee from using this system. To do so the administrator selects the id of the particular employee from the dropdown list. This is available in the form after clicking this option. While clicking on the id, the detailed information about that salesman will display on the screen. By clicking on the suspend button he will kept away from the system. Add ship Details This sub-module is used to enter ship details to the system. The ship details are the information about the ships which are 276
used for cargo transportation. Ship information s such as name, source, destination, passing ports, cargo capacity are entered and keep it in database. Add Materials This sub-module used by the port master to enter and store information about the materials those are allowed to transport through the port and ship. The listed materials are allowed for transshipment. Register Port Details Port details which are essential for the customer to know about the ports, to where transportation available with the system. The port master adds the information about the ports such as name, address, facilities at the port, nearest left port and right port which is selected from the dropdown list where the registered port names are available. Create Schedule This option is used by the port master to create a schedule for the ship. A schedule can be defined as the traveling of ship from one source to another destination and the port the ship passing through. While creating the schedule the port master enter the information of starting date, arrival date, passing port and the ship which is scheduled for this schedule. 2 Employee Employee is the secondary user registered by the administrator. There may be more than one salesman to do the operations of the employee. The salesman, who is supplied with the username and password, can use that information to login. Login operation for the employee is only possible if he is authorized by the administrator. Employee is authorized to do the following operations. The operations are Change Account View Ship Details View Materials View Ports View Booking Order Set Booking order Status Update Cargo Tracking Reset Schedule Change Account Employee can change his password by giving old password and new password in proper field. There is a confirm password field to confirm new password this is validated using compare validation control. View Ship Details This option is used to view the information about the ships those are registered with the system. By using this option the employee can view the tabulated format of the registered ships information with the filed name as column head. View Materials This option is used to view the information about the materials those are registered with the system. By using this option the employee can view the tabulated format of the registered materials information with the filed name as column head. This option is very used much by the employee to view the detailed information about the materials at a glance and put side by side the data. View Schedules This option used by the customers to view the different schedules available. By viewing the schedules the customer can book for the shipment of their cargo. Based on the schedule-which is designed by the port master for a ship-the registered customer s book for their cargo to some destination ports through which the scheduled ship passed. That booking information is available with this sub-module. View Booking Order View booking order as the name implies this option is used to view the booking orders placed by the customers for the shipment of their cargo. Based on the schedule-which is designed by the port master for a ship-the registered customer s book for their cargo to some destination ports through which the scheduled ship on the booking id. Set Booking Order Status This option used by the employee to set the booking order status. Cargos are shipped based on the availability of space in the ship-it will not exceed the limit of the capacity of the ship. Update Cargo Tracking This option used by the employee while unload the cargo at each ports where the ship arrives. After selecting the particular id from the list box where the schedule of all ships is listed, the detailed information about the schedule will display on the screen. Reset Schedule Reset schedule helps the employee to reset the ship capacity after a successful completion of a schedule. While clicks on the reset button by the employee the system identifies it as the completion of schedule by the ship which was schedule by the port master under the currently selected scheduled id. 3 Customer The customers are the real beneficiaries of the system. The whole system is developed to attract the customer in a huge way.. The customer home contains the following sub modules Change Account View Ship View Materials View Schedules Book Shipment View Status of Book View cargo status Track Cargo status Change Account Employee can change his password by giving old password and new password in proper field. There is a confirm password field to confirm new password this is validated using compare validation control. New password field is restricted by entering less than or equal to six characters, this is done by proper coding. View Ship Details 277
This option is used to view the information about the ships those are registered with the system. By using this option the employee can view the tabulated format of the registered ships information with the filed name as column head. View Materials This option is used to view the information about the materials those are registered with the system. By using this option the employee can view the tabulated format of the registered materials information with the filed name as column head. View Schedules This option is used to view the information about the ports those are registered with the system. By using this option the employee can view the tabulated format of the registered ports information with the filed name as column head. Book Shipment The user can book for their shipment using this module. To book a shipment the customer wants to select the schedule id of the ship in which he likes to send the shipment. View Status of Booking This option is used by the customer to view the booking order status. Cargos are shipped based on the availability of space in the ship-it will not exceed the limit of the capacity of the ship. View Cargo Status This option is used by the customer to view the current status of the cargo. That is the cargo is on ship or it is unloaded. Track Cargo Status This option is used by the customers to view the capacity remaining at a ship. While selecting the schedule id the information about the availability of the space will display by the system. 4 New Customer Registration This sub-module will help the new customer or the visitors of this site to use this site he wants to register with this system. To get registered with this site the user give the information regarding him will given in the prescribed format such as name, address, log name, password and so on. V. SOFTWARE ARCHITECTURE A. Three-tier architectures The paper is developed to implement in three-tier architecture. It provides the application logic layer in three-tier architecture, enabling client components to interact with data resources and legacy applications. The first tier represents the company and customer with production unit access. The second tier is the application server which receives the queries. The third tier is the data base server from which information are fetched and served for requests. Collectively, three-tier architectures are programming models that enable the distribution of application functionality across three independent systems, typically: Client components running on local workstations (tier one) Processes running on remote servers (tier two) A discrete database, resource managers, and mainframe applications (tier three) B. DATA FLOW DIAGRAM DFD: Level-0 Logi n Login Proces s Valid Invalid Invalid Port Valid Mast er Fig.1 Login Details Empl oyee Cust omer Invalid Valid VI. 6. SYSTEM DESIGN A. INPUT DESIGN Data enter the system as input and this is the data on which the processing is performed. It is necessary to ensure that the input design is suitable. While designing inputs, an important aspect is the input design form. When designing input the objective is to ensure that the data processed by the system is collected and entered into the system efficiently, according to the specified requirements and with minimum number of errors. The designer will generally choose a method of input that is cost effective and that which is acceptable to the end user. The Input design goes through two phases of development: Logical and Physical Design. Logical Design The logical flow of a system and define the boundaries of a system. It includes the following steps: Reviews the current physical system its data flows, file content, volumes, frequencies etc. Prepares output specifications that is, determines the format, content and frequency of reports. Prepares input specifications format, content and most of the input functions. Prepares edit, security and control specifications. Specifies the implementation plan. Prepares a logical design walk through of the information flow, output, input, controls and implementation plan. Reviews benefits, costs, target dates and system constraints. 278
Physical Design Physical system produces the working systems by define the design specifications that tell the programmers exactly what the candidate system must do. It includes the following steps: Design the physical system. Specify input and output media. Design the database and specify backup procedures. Design physical information flow through the system and a physical design Walk through. Plan system implementation. Prepare a conversion schedule and target date. Determine training procedures, courses and timetable. Devise a test and implementation plan and specify any new hardware/software. Update benefits, costs, conversion date and system constraints The design/specification activities are: Concept formulation Problem understanding High level requirements proposals Feasibility study Requirements engineering Architectural design Input Stages Several activities have to be carried out as part of the overall input process. They are Data recording Data transcription Data conversion Data verification Data control Data transmission Data validation Data correction The objectives guiding the design of the input focus on: Effectiveness Accuracy Ease to use Consistency Simplicity Attractiveness B. DATABASE DESIGN Database design is recognized as a standard of MIS and is available for virtually every computer system. In database environment, common data are available which several authorized user can use. General theme behind a database is to integrate all the information. A database is an organized mechanism that has the capability of storing information through which a user can retrieve stored information in an effective and efficient manner. The data is the purpose of any database and must be protected. The database design is a two level process. In the first step, user requirements are gathered together and a database is designed which will meet these requirements as clearly as possible. This step is called Information Level Design and it is taken independent of any individual DBMS. In the second step, this Information level design is transferred into a design for the specific DBMS that will be used to implement the system in question. This step is called Physical Level Design, concerned with the characteristics of the specific DBMS that will be used. A database design runs parallel with the system design. The organization of the data in the database is aimed to achieve the following two major objectives. Data Integrity Data independence To structure the data so that there is no repetition of data, this helps in saving. To permit simple retrieval of data in response to query and report request. To simplify the maintenance of the data through updates, insertions, deletions.. This is the difference between logical and physical data. While designing a database, several objectives must be considered. They include the redundancy of Easy to leaving and use Data independence More information at low cost Accuracy and integrity While creating the tables, above objectives were considered to avoid redundancy of data. Table 1:TBL_CAPACITY C. OUTPUT DESIGN The output design of the system is very important. The output should be clear and easy to understand. In the designing of the output we should consider the following points. Determination of what information is to be present. This is meant to determine whether the produced output is the expected decide whether to display print and speak. The determination is made of presentation of the output. In most cases the output should be printed A quality output is one, which meets the requirements of the end user and presents the information clearly. In any system results of processing are communicated to the users and to other systems through outputs. In the output design it is determined how the information is to be displayed for immediate need and also the hard copy output. It is the most important and direct source information to the user. Efficient 279
and intelligent output design improves the system s relationship the user and helps in decision-making The output types are: External outputs Internal output Operational output Interactive outputs Turnaround time The outputs may be defined in terms of type of output, content, format, location, frequency, response, volume, sequence and action required. VII. SYSTEM IMPLEMENTATION Implementation is the stage of the paper where the theoretical design is turned into a working system. In this stage the installation of the package in the teal environment, to the satisfaction of the intended user and the operation of the system. If the implementation is not carefully planned and controlled it can cause chaos and confusion. Implementation includes all those activities that take place to covert from the old system to new one. The new system may totally replace existing system or it may be major modification to an existing system. It involves careful planning, investigating of the current system and its constraints on implementation, design of methods to achieve the changeover. The more complex the system being implemented, the more involved will be the system analysis and the design effort required just for implementation. The implementation stage involves following tasks. Careful planning are: Investigation of system and constraints Design of methods to achieve the changeover Training of the staff in the changeover phase Evaluation of the changeover method. interconnected operations to transact the cargo via ship. This system will do the necessary for the above viable information processing and keep the process a unique one in all aspects. This system not only functioning as information provider of updated status but also as in information processor for effective management of cargo tracking.the newly developed system is feasible in all aspects like technically, Economical, and Operational. All these above mentioned feasibility studies showed that the system could be viable to the end user. Due to the flexibility in.net framework the future enhancement, will also not a problem for the end user and developer. As the viability of the system is acceptable to all so the system is a success in great extend. X. SCREEN LAYOUTS AND REPORTS Home Add Ship Details Figure 10.1 Cargo Tracking System Figure 10.2 Adding Shipping Details VIII.FUTURE ENHANCEMENT Future enhancement for any application is not available at any circumstance because change is ever and the need of the end user change where the new technologies have placed there foot prints. In our systems, the enhancement could be done with reporting systems, which have SMS facility too. The customer ships the cargo from one port to other port where the receiver is.the customer gets the delivery date at the time of registration.if the receiver not receives the concerned consignment on that date, he cans complaint to the reporting system. the SMS based system will sends the information about the confirmation of cargo shipment, Delivery, and waiting status information to the user. IX. CONCLUSION The deliverable part of Cargo Tracking System has come up with the facilities available in the current system and the requirement by the end user for added facility. This system, as a whole, is quite enough to manage different departments those do not have any similarity in work, but have REFERENCES [1]. Mastering SQL Server2008 : Mike Gunderloy & Joseph [2]. Sql Server 2008 Programming : Roh Vieira [3]. The Complete Reference ASP.NET: Mathew Mac Donald [4]. Teach yourself ASP.NET Technology : Ivan Bayross [5]. Programming Microsoft Visual Studio.Net Version 2008-Francesco Balena Website Reference [6] www.learnvisualstudio.net [7] www.startvbdotnet.com [8] www.dotnetwatch.com www.codepaper.com [9] www.devsource.com [10] www.vbcodesource.com [11] www.dotnetfreaks.com [12] www.dotnetwatch.com. 280
AUTHORS T. Arumuga Maria Devi Received B.E. Degree in Electronics & Communication Engineering from in Manonmaniam Sundaranar University, Tirunelveli India in 2003, M.Tech degree in Computer & Information Technology from Manonmaniam Sundaranar University, Tirunelveli, India in 2005 and also Worked as Lecturer in department of Electronics & Communication Engineering Sardar Raja College of Engineering. Currently, she received Ph.D Degree in Information Technology Computer Science and Engineering and also the Assistant Professor of Centre for Information Technology and Engineering of Manonmaniam Sundaranar University. Her research interests include Signal and Image Processing, Multimedia and Remote Communication. D.Christen Jeba Raj Received M.Sc degree in Software Engineering, Manonmaniam Sundaranar University, India in 2011, Currently he is doing M.Tech degree in Computer and Information Technology (CIT) from Manonmaniam Sundaranar University. His research interests include Image Processing. 281