OOPVotingSystem

A prototype voting system which can be use to cast votes, create and manage elections and parties.

User Requirements

• A user must be able to cast a vote.
• A admin must be able to create and manage elections, parties and candidates.
• The system must be able to interact with other types of voting systems, e.g. First Past the Post, Single Transferable Vote, etc.
• Auditors must be able to add votes which were not entered through the voting system.
• The system must be able to respect and follow GDPR rules.

Framework

This project is using Blazor Server to manage a database and provide web based GUI for users.

Client Side

A user would connect to a hosted instance of application. This instance would provide the HTML and CSS across the wire for it to be displayed to an end user.

Server Side

This system uses EntityFramework as the database management system. The backing provider for the database is SQLite with the .db found at the root of this project.

Design Patterns

This project is using the Repository pattern. The repository pattern isolates the data access layer from the service layer and GUI layer, only exposing the appropriate methods for services to interact with.

This design pattern also helps de-couple the service layer, data access layer and GUI layer. By doing so changes on a single layer would have little to no impact on the methods and classes which use it. It also increases testability as a small part of the code can easily be isolated and tested.

Class Diagrams and Sequence Diagram

Find the following files in the Assets folder in this directory.

• InitialClassDiagram.drawio - My initial design before i started my project.
• PrototypeClassDiagram.drawio - The design of the current system after i had implemented all my code.
• SequenceDiagram.drawio - A sequence diagram displaying the general flow of the application.

Supported features in the current prototype

• Users can login and create an account.
• Users can cast a vote in a election for a part.
• Users can manage and view they accounts.
• Admins can preform CRUD operations on elections and parties.
• Data is persisted using a SQLite database file.

Running the application

1. Find the Published Project in this directory. Note: This published version was created using a self-contained runtime, therefore, does not require the user to have the .NET 7 runtime installed on the PC. It also only supports win-x64.
2. Double click on the OOPVotingSystem.exe.
3. Navigate to http://localhost:5000 to view the published application.

Running the application from Visual Studio 2022

Note: This project is targeting .NET 7 which is not supported by Visual Studio versions prior to 2022.

1. Open the solution directory.
2. Right click on OOPVotingSystem.sln and select Open With > Microsoft Visual Studio 2022.
3. In Visual Studio press F5 to start the application. A browser will automatically appear with the running application.

Running the unit tests

Note: The test project targets .NET 7 and will therefore the runtime and the SDK will need to be installed for the tests to run.

1. Open up a terminal in the current directory.
2. Run the command dotnet test. This will look for suitable test and run them. Expect all the tests to pass.

Code Coverage

The test primarily focus of the service layer as well as the data access layer (repositories). They aim to test individual units of a service / repository and confirm they work as expected. For example, a call to CreateAsync should increase the number of records in the database. Or a call to UpdateAsync should change the record but still have it retain it's Id.

Using the application

Using it as a administrator

Note: Administrators are not allowed to cast votes.

1. Run the application.
2. Click Sign In in the top right.
3. Use the credentials admin for both the username and password to log in as an administrator.
4. On the home page click here to view the administrator page. From here you are able to view existing elections and parties, as well as create, update and delete parties.

Using it as a user

1. Run the application.
2. Click Sign In in the top right.
3. Click here to create an account. If you already have credentials then you can use them to log in.
4. Sign in with your existing / newly created credentials.
5. Click here to cast a vote.
6. Select and election and a candidate to vote for and click Cast Vote.