CASE STUDY: Happy Homes Ltd
Happy Homes Ltd is a large developer which builds new houses and apartments in England.

Happy Homes Ltd has its head office in York but has several regional sales offices across England, including the South West region, Central region, North East, and North West regions. . At any one time, Happy Homes has about 10 developments in progress, some of which may be in the same city. Each development is managed by one regional office, depending on where that development is, for example, developments in Carlisle are managed by the North West region because Carlisle is in the North West of England.

Happy Homes employs numerous staff, including sales advisors and site managers, all of which are allocated to specific developments.

The developments vary in size, ranging from about 20 apartments, to larger areas on which Happy Homes is building 100s of houses and 100s of apartments.

Happy Homes builds a variety of different house and apartment types which differ according to factors such as:

€¢ number and size of bedrooms
€¢ number and size of reception rooms (dining room, lounge)
€¢ number of floors
€¢ type of bathroom eg. separate or ensuite

In addition, each house/apartment has a parking allocation, which is either a single garage, double garage, parking space, or carport.
Each house/apartment type has a name to indicate what it is like, for example the house type, Charleston’ has 3 large bedrooms, a kitchen, separate dining room, lounge, one ensuite, and a double garage.

Site managers are usually allocated to one development at a time, but if the development is small they may be allocated to more than one at the same time. It is the job of the site manager to employ the many contractors who will work on the properties on the development, such as builders, plumbers, roofers and carpenters. In addition, once a buyer has bought a property and is living in it, if they find any problems that need sorting out, such as a leaking tap, they will contact the site manager to get them to arrange for it to be fixed.

The job of the sales advisors is to try to market the properties to sell them as quickly as possible. The sales process works with potential buyers visiting the sales office and viewing the show homes. The sales advisors can then show the buyers which house types are currently available for sale and which plot of land each is located on.

Once a buyer agrees to buy a specific property they need to contact their solicitor to organise the conveyance (legal transfer of the house from being owned by Happy Homes to being owned by the buyer). In addition, the buyer also needs to contact a mortgage broker to apply for a mortgage for the property. Once the conveyance is under way, the buyer’s solicitor will communicate with Happy Homes’ solicitor who will keep the sales advisors, and buyer informed of the progress of the sale.

TRANSACTION and DATA REQUIREMENTS

Listed below are the some of the transactions that should be supported by the Happy Homes Ltd database application.
€¢ which property types, and plots are being built at each development
€¢ which staff work at which development
€¢ which properties have been bought, by which buyers and what the status of their conveyance is

€¢ how many properties each sales advisor has sold and in which month
€¢ which property types are more popular amongst buyers
€¢ which local sales offices are managed by which regional sales offices
QUESTIONS for the Case Study: Happy Homes
Q1
Discuss the security measures you will take to protect the Happy Homes Database System. Your discussion should focus on database security. In this question you should focus on a maximum of FOUR security issues and they must relate to database security.
Q2
Draw a diagram of how the Happy Homes database system could be designed as a Distributed Database Management System. On the diagram clearly label the underlying architecture. Write a brief discussion about where the data should be stored and explain why you have made these decisions.
Q3
Draw a diagram of how the Happy Homes database system could be designed as a Web Based Database Management System. On the diagram clearly label the underlying architecture. Write a brief discussion about the different performance issues in a DDBMS and a WBDBMS.
Q4
A system such as Happy Homes should be optimised to provide the best performance. Discuss the need for optimisation, the different optimisation techniques available and state why optimisation is needed on the Happy Homes database.