SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS

SPECIFICATION FOR
E-Ballot
A semi-automated vote Casting system
VERSION 1.0
Supervisor:
Course:
Date:

Mr. Jonathan Kizito

Bachelor of Science in Computer Science
31 January 2016

Prepared by Group CS 16 035

Names

Registration No.

NAMIIRO MARTHA

13/U/11025/EVE

KABENGE JOSEPH

10/U/23283/EVE

Email

Software Requirements Specification for E-Ballot

Page ii

Contents
1

REVISIONS ................................................................................................................................................................... III

INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................................................................ 1
2.1
2.2
2.3

DOCUMENT PURPOSE ..................................................................................................................................................... 1

PRODUCT SCOPE ............................................................................................................................................................ 1
INTENDED AUDIENCE AND DOCUMENT OVERVIEW ........................................................................................................ 1
2.3.1
Document Overview ............................................................................................................................................. 1
2.4 DEFINITIONS, ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS ............................................................................................................ 2
2.4.1
Definitions ............................................................................................................................................................ 2
2.4.2
Acronyms and Abbreviations ............................................................................................................................... 2
2.5 DOCUMENT CONVENTIONS............................................................................................................................................. 2
2.5.1
Formatting Conventions ...................................................................................................................................... 2
2.5.2
Naming Conventions ............................................................................................................................................ 2
2.6 REFERENCES AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ........................................................................................................................ 3
3

OVERALL DESCRIPTION............................................................................................................................................ 4
3.1

PRODUCT PERSPECTIVE .................................................................................................................................................. 4

3.1.1
Proposed Flow of Activity .................................................................................................................................... 5
3.2 USER CHARACTERISTICS................................................................................................................................................. 6
3.3 GENERAL CONSTRAINTS................................................................................................................................................. 6
3.4 ASSUMPTIONS AND DEPENDENCIES ................................................................................................................................ 6
4

SPECIFIC REQUIREMENTS ........................................................................................................................................ 6

4.1

EXTERNAL INTERFACE REQUIREMENTS ......................................................................................................................... 6

4.1.1
Software Interface ................................................................................................................................................ 6
4.1.2
Hardware Interface: ............................................................................................................................................ 7
4.1.3
Communication Interface: ................................................................................................................................... 7
4.2 FUNCTIONAL REQUIREMENTS......................................................................................................................................... 7
4.2.1
Voters ................................................................................................................................................................... 7
4.2.2
Administrator ....................................................................................................................................................... 7
4.2.3
Candidate ............................................................................................................................................................. 8
4.3 BEHAVIOUR REQUIREMENTS .......................................................................................................................................... 8
4.3.1
Use Case View ..................................................................................................................................................... 8
5

NON-FUNCTIONAL REQUIREMENTS ..................................................................................................................... 9

5.1

PERFORMANCE REQUIREMENTS ..................................................................................................................................... 9

5.1.1
Time / space bounds ............................................................................................................................................. 9
5.1.2
Reliability ............................................................................................................................................................. 9
5.1.3
Security ................................................................................................................................................................ 9
5.2 SOFTWARE QUALITY ATTRIBUTES .................................................................................................................................. 9
5.2.1
Availability ........................................................................................................................................................... 9
5.2.2
Robustness ........................................................................................................................................................... 9

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1 REVISIONS
Version

Primary
Author(s)

Description of Version

Date
Completed

Software Requirements Specification for THE e-BALLOT

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2 INTRODUCTION
2.1 Document Purpose
The purpose of this document is to make the functional and non-functional requirements of the eBallot Vote Casting System easy to comprehend. It also serves the purpose of making the
functionality clear to end users

2.2 Product Scope

The system produced will be an electronic vote casting system. The software will be used by citizens
to cast their vote using biometrics as the way of authentication. It will also enhance computing of
voting percentage. It will only be used for casting the ballot not any other functionality. This will leave
it independent of fraud and easy of manipulation.
The aim of this is to create an easy in the way people vote in various elections and as well reduce
amounts of money spent on ballot papers. It will be used at the time of elections. Before voting each
voter will get a unique id number that corresponds to their biometrics. to caste their valuable vote. It
will maintain a database of all the eligible voter biometric information with each biometric having a
corresponding number that only corresponds to a voter. It will also maintain a database of candidates
contesting in a particular position. With the fingerprint detail, it will have details of the voters such as
citizen name, date of birth, their constituency area, and region.

2.3 Intended Audience and Document Overview

The purpose of this document is to make the functional and non-functional requirements of the eBallot System easy to understand and as well put the intended parts of the system apart. It also serves
the purpose of making the functionality clear to end users. For academic purposes the document is for
full analysis of the supervisor to see it fit for accomplishment of the project.

2.3.1 Document Overview

The remainder of this document identifies the actors, use-cases, use-case scenarios, activity
diagrams, assumptions and dependencies needed for the analysis and design of the e-Ballot System
software package. The rest of the document contains the overall description of the system,
requirements, data model and behavioral description of the system and project planning.

Software Requirements Specification for THE e-BALLOT

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2.4 Definitions, Acronyms and Abbreviations

2.4.1 Definitions

Biometrics : Mainly referring to the finger print as the main biometric property of use in this
project
Apache Tomcat:

2.4.2 Acronyms and Abbreviations

HTML:
Hypertext Markup Language is a markup language used to design static web
pages.
CSS:
Cascade Style Sheets.
JDBC:
Java database Connector.
J2EE: Java 2 Enterprise Edition is a programming platform part of the Java Platformfor
developing and running distributed multitier architecture Java applications, based largely on
modular software components running on an application server.
SQL: DB2 Database is the database management system that delivers a flexible and cost
effective database platform to build robust on demand business applications.
HTTP: Hypertext Transfer Protocol is a transaction oriented client/server protocol between
web browser & a Web Server.
WAS: Web Application Server.
HTTPS: Secure Hypertext Transfer Protocol is a HTTP over SSL (secure socket layer).

2.5 Document Conventions

2.5.1 Formatting Conventions
In general this document will follow APA formatting requirements. The entire documents will be
justified with spacing 1.15. Headings will be aligned to the left and will be numbered according to the
heading type.

2.5.2 Naming Conventions

Naming will be done mainly using paragraphs, Chapters will be in Gill Sans Font type, 16 for Font size
and automatic heading. Sections will be in Gill San MT font type, 14 font size and normal text will be in
Gill San MT font type, 12 font size.

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2.6 References and Acknowledgments

Olaniyan O.M, Mapayi .2T, & Adejumo. 3S.A, 2011. A Proposed Multiple Scan Biometric-Based System
for Electronic Voting. Afr J. of Comp & ICTs. Vol 4, No. 2. pp 9-16

Raura. L, 2013, A Secure Electronic Voting Software Application based on Image Steganography and
Cryptography, Swinburne University of Technology

Rexha, B., Neziri, V., & Dervishi, R., 2012. Improving authentication and transparency of e-Voting
system Kosovo case. International Journal of Computers and Communications, 84-91.

Richard. S. and Patrick, D, 2007, Security analysis of remote e-voting. E-voting. Architecture. Issue
Date: Aug-2007. Proceedings of the International Conference on Computing and ICT Research.
Retrieved online from http://dspace.mak.ac.ug/handle/123456789/682

Volkamer, M 2009, Evaluation of Electronic Voting - Requirements and Evaluation Procedures to

Support Responsible Election Authorities, Springer, Google Books, viewed 27 May 2013.

D. P. Gilliam, T. L. Wolfe, J. S. Sherif, and M. Bishop, Software Security Checklist for the Software Life
Cycle, in Proc. WETICE03, 2003, pp. 243-248

HTML Forms http://www.w3schools.com/html/html_forms.asp accessed on 2 january 2016

Aneesha. B, (2001), Java Servlet Pages, Prima Tech

SRS report for ONEVS, iTeam4, 2010, www.ceng.metu.edu.tr/~e1591114/SRS

Web Application, www.experiencezen.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/04/adaptive-path-ajax-a-new%20approach-to-web-applications1.pdf, accessed on 2 January 2016

Software Requirements Specification for THE e-BALLOT

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3 OVERALL DESCRIPTION
3.1 Product Perspective
The software product is a standalone system and not a part of a larger system. The system will be
made up of two parts. Before the Election Day, the system will be used for general purposes such as
setting up users and their privileges and administration, entering candidate details, profiling
candidates for the election and setting the various modules before elections. The voters will reach
the system through web pages by using web-browsers such as Mozilla, Internet Explorer and Google
Chrome or by clicking on the icon of the system software on mobiles that have finger print
recognition functionality. The system will be modular in a way that it can be used for various
election i.e. it will allow for customization.
During election, the system is connected to the thumb print database with all the voters
information. This system will be adapted to the computers at the polling stations. The voters cast
their votes using the interface that are provided at these machines. These votes are accepted by the
system on the server. The SSL will ensure secure thumb print information transfer and easy access.

SSL
Client Interface
Finger Print Module

Finger Print
DB

HTTP

HTTP

Web App Server

Voter DB

The web pages (XML/JSP) are present to provide the user interface on customer client side.
Communication between customer and server is provided through HTTP/HTTPS protocols. On the
server side web server is for java servlets and database server is for storing the information. Product
functionality
The election admin will be able to register Candidates in the system after their nomination.
Candidates can then verify this on the system there and then.

A detailed profile the candidates, will also be include

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Voters will be able to vote from anywhere in the area of voting, since there is centralised
control of the voting process. This will provide for convenience and time saving

The Election Administrators will be able to update thumb print and voters Database through a
sync function with their existing voter pool available. The sync function can be a later stage
development idea.

The system would show the statistics after voting of the votes casted and the votes obtained by
the various candidates. But to reduce controversy, the system will report after election time is
closed

The system will not provide for manual input of election result by any one user

3.1.1 Proposed Flow of Activity

Start

Voters
Thumb
ID

Candidates

Administrator
Invalid
Invalid

Log In
Details

Invalid

Log Ins

Valid
Valid
Voters
Activity

Admin
Activity

Valid
Candidates
Activity

Stop

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3.2 User characteristics

Every user should be comfortable of working with computer and net browsing.
Every user must have basic knowledge of English too.

3.3

General Constraints

The system is only in English.

This system is working from multiple servers including a web server then two database servers.
The system is tied to HTTP/HTTPS only.
Novice and handicapped are not into system knowing.

3.4 Assumptions and Dependencies

For the proper working of the system these are required.

Biometric finger print scanner either inbuilt or attached

Internet connection

A web server should have Java installed on the machine, along with Javas cryptographic
packages.

The web server runs on a http server, that is java server pages (jsp) and servlet enabled.

A web browser through which the voters access the server should have minimal support for cookies
and encrypted transactions.

4 SPECIFIC REQUIREMENTS
4.1 External Interface Requirements
4.1.1 Software Interface

Client on Internet: Web Browser, Operating System (any)

Web Server:

Data Base Server: DB2, Operating System (any)

WAS, Operating System (any)

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Development End: WSAD (J2EE, Java, Java Bean, Servlets, XML), DB2, OS (Windows), Web
Server.

4.1.2 Hardware Interface:

Client side

Server side

Ram
256 MB

Free Disk Space

100 MB

Web Application Server

256 MB

120 MB

SQL

512 MB

512 MB

Web Browser (any)

Web app

4.1.3 Communication Interface:

Client on Internet will be using HTTP/HTTPS protocol.

4.2 Functional Requirements

The system should be able do the following for the users and the voters

4.2.1 Voters
The citizens of the country who are eligible for casting vote.
Get a Biometric ID The voters should be able to access the system using their voter ID
number and be able to generate a unique biometric ID that they will use during elections.
Cast vote the system should the voters to cast their votes for their favorite candidates
on the system either online in their choice location or at a gazetted place using a finger
print as access authentication.
View their Details The voters will view their own details which they filled up at the time
of their registration using the system.

4.2.2 Administrator
Responsible for maintaining all the databases, generating results of polling and nominating candidates
for elections.

Register candidates Administrator will register the candidates who will nominate
for the position area.

Register other user and Candidates Using the system, the admin must be able to
register other officer with the same privileges and also register candidate accounts for
them to view results and polling activities.

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Voter Details Administrator must be able to connect the system with the voter
database or register voters.

4.2.3 Candidate
Register for nomination, add details to profile, modify profile and campaign for elections.

View Election results Candidates will be able to view election details also view
statistics
View own details The details filled by the candidates at the time of nomination will be
viewed by them for future references.

4.3 Behaviour Requirements

4.3.1 Use Case View
Below is a use case diagram of the whole system including the voter perspective and then the
administrator perspective?
Place Thumb
Print
Get BioMetric ID
View Results
View Profile
Details

View Profile
Details
Voter

Candidate

Cast Vote

View Election
Reports Statistics

Add Candidate
Account

Nominate
Candidate
Add Voters Details
Add User
Administrator
Users

Log In

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5 NON-FUNCTIONAL REQUIREMENTS
5.1 Performance Requirements
5.1.1 Time / space bounds
The system is expected to have a short response time. The user, candidate and voters should be
able to get response for their requests in less than 5 seconds in relations to their connection
strength.

5.1.2 Reliability

The system in all case should avail integral information to all users
The system will in all cases update changes in vote casting in all user accounts

5.1.3 Security

All Biometric information is transmitted encrypted and then decrypted at the receiving end
The data transaction between client and server must be encrypted using SSL technology.
All the passwords that are generated or accepted must be stored in database in an
encrypted form.
In election mode, the different password should be generated for a TCK in every different
election.
To help the voters the system should allow for three tries to enter Biometric ID In which
it will be invalid pending equitation of another

5.2 Software Quality Attributes

5.2.1 Availability

At the voting time, the e- Ballot system shall be available to users on the network and to dial-in
users 99.9% of the time between 7:00am and 5:00pm local time for voting and 95% of the time
between 5:00pm and 6:00am local time for winner announcement.

5.2.2 Robustness

If the connection between the user and the system is broken prior to voting being either
confirmed or canceled, the E-Ballot System shall enable the user to recover an incomplete vote
casting process.