Convergent Newsroom Project Requirements

What is it? Convergent Newsroom is a place for journalist to manage, collect and share their work, coordinate their activities, and collect feedback from readers. When using Convergent Newsroom journalist will have access to present and prior assets which include images, text documents, and videos.

Class Diagram People Stories Assets –Text –Photo –Video

People Attributes –role (editor,reporter, photographer, public) –name –job Relationships –A person will be related to stories through their job (Reporter John Smith is working on story “Dog Learns to Talk”).

Stories Attributes –title –authors and editors – priority (is it a front page story?) –format (video, radio, newspaper, web) –publish date –rights –assets Relationships –Stories will be related to people through authors and editors (Story “Dog Learns to Talk” is being written by John Smith and Edited by Greg Smart). –Stories will be related to documents through assets (Story “Dog Learns to Talk” references documents dog.jpg, interview.doc, etc.)

Assets (Text) Attributes –title –author –date –short description –file type –References Relationships –Text is related to a person through author ( The Barack Obama interview has author John Smith).

Assets (Photo/Video) Attributes –Title –Creator –Date –Format –Source (location where photo/video was taken) –References Relationships –Photos and video are related to a person through creator (Dog.jpg was taken by Sally Dees).

Persistent Structures Newsroom will keep track of which assets go with which stories. It will organize these assets according to the editor’s opinion. Newsroom will keep track of which reporter, editor, and photographer is working on which story. Newsroom will keep a list of the top stories. This list will be updated through votes from the public as to which stories they would like to see.

Dynamics The system will interact with people through simple user interfaces on a web site. User interfaces will be created for uploading, voting, messaging, and managing assets. The system will interact with a database, subversion management system, and RSS feeds. The changes to the system will include uploading/deleting assets, assigning authors and photographers to stories, changing priorities of stories, adding/deleting users.

Users Convergent Newsroom will have three types of users … –Editors –Reporters/Photographers –Public user

Editor Editor will be able to … –Access/Add any asset in the database. –Delete any assets that are no longer useful. –Assign stories to reporters and photographers. –Delete users from the system –Change a story’s priority –View comments from public users –Message co-workers

Reporter/Photographer Reporter/Photographer will be able to … –Access/Add assets. –View assignments –View comments from public users –Message co-workers

Public User Public user will be able to … –Read the news. –Give suggestions to the journalists. Vote for slugs they are interested in. Leave a comment (“That front page story last Monday offended me!”)

Schedule First Quarter –Next Week – Begin Coding (login/Messaging). –Week 6 – Continue Coding (login/Messaging). –Week 7 – Begin Coding (upload/Messaging). –Week 8 – Continue Coding (upload/Messaging). –Week 9 – Play catch up. –Week 10 – Testing.

Schedule Next Quarter –Week 1 – Overlook everything from last quarter –Week 2 – Research RSS. –Week 3 – Begin coding (RSS updates). –Week 4 – Continue Coding (RSS updates). –Week 5 – Continue Coding (RSS updates). –Week 6 – Begin Coding (Slug voting). –Week 7 – Make web site visually nice. –Week 8 – Continue from week 7. –Week 9 – Play catch up. –Week 10 – prepare for launch.