Online Examination System

CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
The traditional examination has been unable to meet the requirement of modern examinations.
With the rapid development of computer applications, online exam has been recognized by many
companies and schools. Examination system improve reliability, availability, efficiency for examination
and reduce the exam cost, it will become an indispensable examination mode. It is easy to manage, meet
the multi-course test and evaluation requirements. Exam system provides a platform for teachers, and
provides students with independent learning conditions. The main purpose of the system is to efficiently
evaluate the candidate thoroughly through a fully automated system that not only saves a lot of time but
also gives fast results. It is a cost-effective and popular means of mass.
The whole process of assigning test and evaluating their scores after the test, was done manually
till date. It is very time consuming. Also it is difficult to keep the answer sheets being generated as well
as the maintenance of the record of each examination. The chance of loss of records is high and record
searching is difficult. Result processing takes more time and the presence of more invigilators is a must
if there are more number of students to write the exam. Plus due to new syllabus students are facing
more and more subjects in online examination form, till date it was simple to take tests and practice
exam but we dont have any software to conduct tests and exams. Thats where online examination
system came in.
Online examination system is becoming more and more essential now a days, as a more subjects
are becoming online exams. We are building this examination system on the base of PHP and MYSQL.
Since the Administrator and the student/user are the main target group of our software, we will only
concern about some important functions for the admin and the user. The administrator of the system
prepares the tests and questions for each exam. The candidates can login through the client computers
with their register number given to them and can take the exam. The questions are shuffled in a random
order so that possibilities for getting questions in the same order for the students who are sitting near, is
very less. A timer will monitor the time and after the time limit the system itself submit the test. If it is
before time, candidates can submit it to view their result. The result analysis is very easy as it is done by
the system. So it saves a lot of time since no manual correction is needed in the system. No restriction is
there that the invigilator has to be present when the students take the test. With the rapid development of
network technology, in education, distance education is accepted by most people. In the distance
education, online exam is an important part. Exam management is a difficult work for each manager,
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Online Examination System

such as organization propositions, students examination, grading, performance assessment, paper
analysis. With the increase of the number of students, test administration is more and more difficult. The
traditional examination has been unable to meet the requirement of modern.

PHP introduction:
PHP is an open source, server-side, HTML-embedded scripting language used to create
dynamically generated Web pages. With an easy-to-use syntax and a large, extensible library of
modules, PHP makes it fast and easy to create powerful data-driven Web sites for e-commerce,
community portals, and other Web-based applications.

MySQL:
MySQL is a relational database management system that runs as a server providing multi-user
access to a number of databases. It is named after developer Michael Widenius' daughter, MySQL
phrase stands for Structured Query Language. The MySQL development project has made its source
code available under the terms of the GNU General Public License, as well as under a variety of
proprietary agreements. MySQL was owned and sponsored by a single for-profit firm, the Swedish
company MySQL AB, now owned by Oracle Corporation.

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Online Examination System

CHAPTER 2
FEATURES OF ONLINE EXAMINATION SYSTEM
This system must be designed as user required. So, the complete requirement must be
found:

1. Quick scheduling:
The system helps the faculty member to generate an automatic exam instead of using
papers. Which save a time for writing, checking and for input marks. Also, student can see the
exam when he login as an individual to the system.

2. Immediate results and solutions:

When the student finishes his exam, the system checks her answers and compared with
the correct answer. And the system saves the incorrect and correct answers and calculates the
mark of correct answers. Then give the total mark. And send a report for student to see where
he is fault.

3. Easy to store and retrieve information:

Rather to save the information on a papers or in separate sheets. There are a data base
management to store and retrieve the information needed by the administrator or Faculty
member or student according a report generated by the system.

4. The features available to the Administrator are:

a. The administrator has the full-fledged rights over the OES.
b. Can create/delete an account.
c. Can view the accounts.

5. The features available to the Students are:

a. Can view the different categories of Test available in their account.
b. Can change password.
c. Can view their marks.
d. Can view the various reading material.
e. Can view and modify its profile but can modify it to some limited range.
f. Any institute or company can register their various types of certificate/non-certificate
programs and conduct an online examination for the same.
g. Just register the programs, their fees (if paid) and the centers (where the exam will be
conducted) in order to start the examination process.
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h. Questions and answers would be objective type and the format would be as per the
companys choice.
i. User can select the company, its program, exam schedule and pay fees online in order to
give his exam at the selected center.

6. Sequencing Information:
All the information regarding exam details, student list, question details, display of result
should be handled sequentially that is data should be stored only in a particular sequence to avoid
any inconvenience.

7. Error Handling:
If any of the validations or sequencing flows does not hold true then appropriate error
messages will be prompted to the user for doing the needful.

8. Performance:
No. of terminals to be supported is dependent on the server that we will use at the time of
deployment. The web application server used should provide good performance and ability to
manage performance with techniques such as support for caching. After completing the exam,
the entire score of the student will be calculated as per the rules in less than a second.
The system would be used by multiple users at a time and may grow as time passes; the
system would need to implement multithreading to achieve acceptable performance. Further a
database connection pool may also be required for assigning faster database connection.

9. Availability:
Online Examination site has 24*7 availability. It can be accessed for 24 hours a day. For
this UPS support must be on the server site with a backup of at least 8 hours in case of power
failure. Students can take exam only during the previously allotted time slots, however can open
site anytime to access other information. Colleges can register for the exam anytime. The
examination system being an online system should be available anytime. Though the system
should be available 24x7 some features may be restricted. Quiz creator may allow the specific
test to be available only at certain time like scheduled examination. The test may be time limited
so the candidates appearing will have limited time to answer the test.

10. Reliability:
It means the extent to which program performs with required precision. The website
developed should be extremely reliable and secure so that information about any questions etc. is
not leaked before the actual exam is held.

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Online Examination System

11. Usability:
The website should be user friendly and should require least effort to operate. The web
server used should provide services like session management to maintain sessions in the
application.

12. Portability:
The website is made using HTML, JSP etc. Which are platform independent and can be
transported to other servers with minimum effort. The web application will be built using PHP
which has support to run on any platform provided the required compilers are available. For
database either XML or MySQL would be used, that too has extensive support over many
popular architectures and operating systems.

13. Flexibility:
It is effort required to modify operational program. The whole website should be made
using independent modules so that any changes done in 1 module should not affect the other one
and new modules can be added easily to increase functionality.

14. Technologies:
This section lists all the technologies for the web based system.
a. PHP scripting for server side scripting as it has a very strong support for XML and
MySQL.
b. MySQL as database format: The database performance requirements are not very high
and the ability to have custom fields in case the quiz creator needs to add more than
expected answer options. This is limited in any other database management system where
we have to first specify the maximum number of fields.
c. WampServer as web server has a tight integration with PHP and is also available for
various popular platforms.

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Online Examination System

CHAPTER 3
PROJECT OBJECTIVES & DESCRIPTION
A. Objective of Online examination System:
1. To provide an interface through which student can appear for examination online for
objective as well as subjective type questions.
2. To provide registration for students done by themselves.
3. To not provide facility of copy and paste while attempting the Subjective questions on the
web page.
4. When the student starts the exam the timer will start automatically and show the student
how much time is left.
5. The questions will be display randomly from question bank.
6. Objective answers will be checked automatically by the system from the database for
subjective answer manually checking by exam department will take place.
7. To provided user name and password facility and credentials should be checked properly
at the time of login for student, expert, controller and Exam Dept. Admin.
8. To provide an interface from where controller will create new Expert and Admin for
Exam Dept.
9. The authority to modify the criteria is provided to the controller of examination.
10. To facilitate Experts to send a collection of questions in Question Bank.
11. The Exam Dept. will manage the question bank sent by experts. To facilitate Exam Dept.
Admin to make schedule and declare Result.

B. Description:
Online examination system is becoming more and more essential now a days, as a more
subjects are becoming online exams. We are building this examination system on the base of
PHP and MYSQL. Since the Administrator and the student/user are the main target group of our
software, we will only concern about some important functions for the admin and the user. The
administrator of the system prepares the tests and questions for each exam. The candidates can
login through the client computers with their register number given to them and can take the
exam. The questions are shuffled in a random order so that possibilities for getting questions in
the same order for the students who are sitting near, is very less. A timer will monitor the time

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Online Examination System

and after the time limit the system itself submit the test. If it is before time, candidates can
submit it to view their result. The result analysis is very easy as it is done by the system. So it
saves a lot of time since no manual correction is needed in the system. No restriction is there that
the invigilator has to be present when the students take the test. This Examination interface aims
at providing facility to conduct online examination worldwide. It saves time as it allows number
of students to give the exam at a time and displays the results as the test gets over, so there is no
need to wait for the result. It is automatically generated by the server. It also thereby helps in
saving resources- both human and natural. User can register, log in and give the test with his
specific id, and can see the results as well. This application uses HTML, PHP and JavaScript as
front-end and My-SQL as back-end on the Apache Server Framework and supports HTTP
protocol with English Language.

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Online Examination System

CHAPTER 4
REQUIREMENT ANALYSIS
This document specifies requirements for the online examination for conducting all kind
of subject exams.
The basic issues to be addressed by this document, as defined in the standard, are:

Functionality: The tasks the software is required to perform.

External Interfaces: How the system interacts with people, hardware and external
hardware and software Performance: Speed, availability, response time, recovery time.

Attributes: Portability, correctness, maintainability, security, etc.

Design Constraints: Required standards, implementation language, policies for database integrity,
resource limits, operating environments, etc.

The requirements analysis contained in this document defines the specific functionality
that must be met in order to successfully deploy a new online examination system. The clients
desires for the new system have been translated into accurate and secure examination rules and
functions to allow for successful development of a comprehensive new online examination
system. The intended audience for this SRS includes technical personnel involved in the design,
coding and testing of the system as well as management and conduction of all kind of
examinations.

A) Modules Description:
System aims at removing the drawbacks of old Billing system & introduces a user a new
& simple software based Billing system. In the flexibility of uses the interface has been
developed a graphics concepts in mind, associated through a user interface.
The GUIs at the top level has been categorized as follow.
1. Login page
2. User Interface
3. Signup for new user.
4. Add Test
5. Result.
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B) Number of Modules:
The system after careful analysis has been identified to be presented with the following
modules:
The Modules involved are:
1. Authentication and Security Module
2. Database Management Module
3. Result Module

1. Authentication and Security Module:

The user details should be verified against the details in the user table and if it is valid
user, they should be entered into the system. Once entered, based on the user type access to the
different modules to be enabled/disabled.

2. Database Management Module:

This module consists of the following sub modules:

a. Student Module:
In this module we store the information about customer and their Class like
Student id, Student roll number, E-mail, Address etc. This module helps to Administrator
of the shop to find out the information about Student and their Subjects.

b. Administrator Module:
In this module we store the information about Administrator, like their Name,
mail, Address etc. This module is Useful for the Teachers for adding as well as editing
the test papers. Also he is the only object who can be able to access the database of the
whole system.

3. Result Module:
In this model software calculate all results and also displays the previous results of
tests you have been appeared for.

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A) SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS:
Operating System

Windows 7/ Windows 8

User Interface

WampServer

Programming Language:

PHP, JavaScript, CSS (Cascading style

sheet), HTML

Database

SQL Server

B) HARDWARE REQUIREMENTS:
RAM

512 MB or more

Processor

Pentium Dual

Hard Disk

120GB

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CHAPTER 5
PROJECT FEASIBILITY
Feasibility and risk analysis are related work in many works. If project risk great, the feasibility
of producing quality is reduced.

Feasibility Study:
Once scope has been identified (with the concurrence of the customer), it is reasonable to
ask: Can we build software to meet this scope? Is the project feasible? All too often, software
engineers rush past this questions (or are pushed past them by impatient managers or customers),
only to become mired in a project that is doomed from the onset. When we are developing the
system (software), we must know the proposed system will be feasible or i.e. practically
implemented or not it may possible the proposed( candidate ) system may not implemented due
to many reasons like it may take long time in development than the specified time limit ,cost may
increase than proposed one etc. Therefore we must analyse the feasibility of the system.
Feasibility is the analysis of risks, costs & benefits relating to economics, technology & user
operation.
There are several types of feasibility depending on the aspect they covers. Some important
feasibilities is as follows:I) Technical Feasibility
II) Operational Feasibility
III) Economical Feasibility

I.

Technical Feasibility:
The technically feasibility study basically centres on alternatives for hardware, software

and design approach to determine the functional aspects of system. This project on Online
Examination will be platform independent since it is being coded in PHP language. HTML is
used to create web pages. MySQL database will be used for storing data. Hardware requirements
used are compatible with all O.S. Only authorized person would be able to use the website so it
would be secure. The system can also be expanded as per the needs of requirement specification.

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Online Examination System

II.

Operational Feasibility:
Operational Feasibility is a measure of how people are able to work with system. This

type of feasibility demands if the system will work when developed and installed. Since website
is very user friendly so users will find it comfortable to work on this site.

III.

Economic Feasibility:
Economic analysis is the most frequently used evaluating the effectiveness of proposed

system, more commonly known as Benefit analysis. The Benefit analysis is to determine benefits
and savings which are expected from candidate system and compare them with cost. If the
benefits are more than the cost, then decision is made to design and implement the system. The
cost and benefits may be direct or indirect and tangible or intangible.

IV.

Legal Feasibility:
A determination of any infringement, violation or liability that results From the

Development of the system comes under this type of feasibility. We have taken above care and
have collected information from website, published papers as well as well-known magazines
which are easily available to anyone.

V.

Behavioral Flexibility:
An evaluation of the behavior of the end users, which may affect the envelopment of the

system. People are inherently resistant to change and computers have to know to facilitate
changes and computers have to know to facilitate changes. An estimate should be made of how
strong a reaction the user staff is likely to have towards the development of a computerized
system. It is a common knowledge that a computer installation has omitting to do with turnover,
transfer, retraining and changes in employee job status, therefore the introduction of a candidate
system requires special effort to educate, sell and train the staff on new ways of conducting
examination. The personal of the user organization will be affected by the proposed system. As
the aim of the system is only to satisfy the information needs, no employees will lose their
position by the proposed system.

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Online Examination System

CHAPTER 6
SYSTEM DESIGN
A. Data Flow Diagrams:
A graphical tool used

to describe and

analyze the moment of data through a

system manual or including the process, stores of data, and delays in the system. Data flow
Diagrams are the central tool and the basis from which other components are developed. The
transformation of data from input to output, through processes, may be described logically and
independently of physical components associated with the system. The DFD is also known as
data flow graph or a bubble chart. DFDs is the model of the proposed system. They clearly
should show the requirements on which the new system should be built. Later during design
activity this is taken as the basis for drawing the systems structure charts. The Basic Notation
used to create a DFDs are as follows.

1. Dataflow:
Data move in a specific direction from an origin to a destination.

2. Process:
People, procedures, or devices that use or produce (Transform) data. The physical
component is not identified.

3. Source:
External sources or destination of data, which may be people, programs,
organization or organizations or other entities.

4. Data Store:
Here data are stored or referenced by a process in the system.

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1. LEVEL 0 DFD FOR ONLINE EXAMINATION SYSTEM:

Figure 6.1 Level 0 DFD for Online Examination System

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2.

LEVEL 1 DFD FOR ONLINE EXAMINATION SYSTEM:

Figure 6.2 Level 1 DFD for Online Examination

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3.

LEVEL 2 DFD FOR ONLINE EXAMINATION SYSTEM:

Figure 6.3 Level 2 DFD for Online Examination System

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Online Examination System

B. UML Diagrams:
1. USECASE DIAGRAM FOR ONLINE EXAMINATION SYSTEM

Figure 6.4 Use case diagram for Online Examination System

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2. ACTIVITY DIAGRAM FOR ONLINE EXAMINATION SYSTEM:

a)

For Administrator:

Figure 6.5 Activity Diagram for Online Examination for Administrator

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Online Examination System

b) For User:

Figure 6.6 Activity Diagram for Online Examination System for User

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Online Examination System

3. CLASS DIAGRAM FOR ONLINE EXAMINATION SYSTEM:

Figure 6.7 Class Diagram for Online Examination System

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Online Examination System

4. SEQUENCE DIAGRAM FOR ONLINE EXAMINATION SYSTEM:

a. For User:

Figure 6.8 Sequence Diagram for Online Examination System for User

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Online Examination System

b. For Administrator:

Figure 6.9 Sequence Diagram for Online Examination System for Administrator

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Online Examination System

CHAPTER 7
ADVANTAGES

A. Advantages:
a) Advantages for Students:
1. Online assessments can give you instant feedback, unlike paper examinations in a
traditional classroom learning session.
2. Automated online assessments give you the option of taking practice tests
whenever you want.
3. Students dont always have to be in a classroom setting to take assessments. Some
assessments are Internet-based, which allows the student to take the test at home
or anywhere else he likes.

b) Advantages for Teachers:

1. Teachers can distribute multiple versions of the exams and assignments without
having to manually monitor which students got which tests. This cuts down on
cheating.
2. Electronic assessments allow teachers to quickly evaluate the performance for the
group against the individual.
3. Report-generating capabilities help teachers identify learning problem areas for
the group and individual students.
4. Online assessments take up less storage space in respect to keeping records than
paper. All data can be stored on a single server.
5. Teachers can mix and match the question styles on exams, including graphics and
make them more interactive than paper exams. Eliminates human error in grading.

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Online Examination System

CHAPTER 8
SYSTEM OUTPUT

Fig. 8.1. Login for User.

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Online Examination System

Fig. 8.2 Login for Administrator

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Online Examination System

Fig. 8.3 Adding Questions for Test

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Online Examination System

Fig. 8.4 Subject Selection and Results

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Fig. 8.5 Subject Selection.

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Fig. 8.5 Appearance of Test

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Fig. 8.6 Test Results

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Fig. 8.7 Previous Test Results

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Fig. 8.8 Review of Test Questions

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CHAPTER 9
CONCLUSION
This software is very much useful to take the internal examination of the different
colleges within a very short span of time. This project will provide an efficient platform both for
the students and the teachers, by enabling examinations to be taken online. The less manual work
and improved security and efficiency of this system would be useful in conducting any kind of
examination in less time. Minimization of fraud and error, being one of the main features of this
system, would prove to be very useful to the examination conducting body.

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REFERENCES
1. Software Requirements Specification for project iTest, 2008.
2. http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/0,,sid9_gci1103696,00.html,Sat.

29/10/2011.

3. Software Requirements Specification for Problem Based Learning Module, Soudan Mandal,

2010.
4. Software Design Specification (SDS) Acropolis Course Management System, 2011.
5. IEEE Recommended Practice for Software Requirements Specifications, Software

Engineering Standards Committee of the IEEE Computer Society 1998.

6. Software Requirements Specification for PPDP Contact Management System (CMS).
7. http://www.ehow.com/facts_5156877_preface-book.html, Sat. 29/10/2011.
8. http://www.sil.org/lingualinks/literacy/referencematerials/glossaryofliteracyterms/WhatIs

APreface.htm, Sat. 29/10/2011.

9. http://www.deftinfosystems.com/index.php/application/e-education-system/online-

examination-system.html, Mon. 9/1/2012.

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