IT-Projects

Web tools developed / maintained or driven by I-MATH and the I-MATH Framework QFQ:

• Institute of Mathematics (https://math.uzh.ch/): General homepage, all data shown are directly maintained by administration, professors and assistants.
  • Intranet (https://math.uzh.ch/my) : Lecture & seminar management, students homework submission, online grading, human resources, mailing lists, finances, IT management, newsletter, ....
  • Proctoring (https://exam.math.uzh.ch/): Remote Exam Tool (webcam, screenshare, chat, controlled download & upload), computer based exams.
  • Online Recruiting (https://math.uzh.ch/ort): Application (regular& student jobs) and review.
• Institute of Geography > Intranet (https://lean.geo.uzh.ch): Human resources, Finances, Excursion management, Staff Homepage management
• Junior Euler Society (https://jes.math.uzh.ch): Homepage, event management.
• Zurich Graduate School in Mathematics (https://www.zgsm.ch): PhD Application and review.
• Life Science Zurich Graduate School (https://join.lszgs.uzh.ch): PhD Application and review.
• Faculty of Sciences:
  • Student Admin (https://studentadmin.mnf.uzh.ch/): PhD tool.
  • SeminarLive (https://seminarlive.mnf.uzh.ch): One Click 4k Live Multi Stream Blackboard & Screensharing / Recording.
• Faculty of Medicine > Medtool (https://medtool.uzh.ch): Master Thesis management, Dissertation management, Filling the Gap application and review, 'Beförderung' application and review
• Graduate Campus (https://grctool.uzh.ch): Grant application and review.
• UZH Investitionskredit (https://www.ik.uzh.ch): Grant application and review.
• Universitäre Lehrförderung (https://form.ulf.uzh.ch/): Grant application and review.
• myUZHGrants (https://myuzhgrants.uzh.ch): Grant application and review.
• Hartmann Müller Stiftung (https://hms-tool.uzh.ch): Grant application and review.

History

Motivation: The Institute of Mathematics realized in 2001 that a dedicated webmaster, responsible for a huge amount of institutes webpages, is a constant bottleneck and potential delay in publishing information. Data should be edited and published by the person who is responsible for the information (reduce workload on the webmaster). Furthermore, most data is related to other data and the same data is often shown on different places. But presenting data is already the second step - the first step is to collect the data. A web browser is a nice tool to present data, as well as to collect data via forms. An online web-tool, with a database in the background, seemed to be a good approach in 2001 and still is.

Application development: Implementing forms and reports (presenting data) is a repeating task during application development - to reduce workload (again), the application developer should focus on the application workflow (not the boring details), it should be quick and easy to implement forms and to retrieve data from a database. 

Framework: The Institute of Mathematics developed dbq2/form2 in 2001 (which is outdated since 2014) and re-implemented and improved the concepts in the current framework https://qfq.io (licensed under GPL). The first production version has been published in 2015. Beside the efficiency requirements (forms and reports), QFQ  (=Quick Form Query) implements the strategy 'Secure by default'. Protection agains parameter manipulation and SQL injection is a major concern.
To get an impression about QFQ functionality todays: the dbq2/form2 documentation was printed on two DIN-A4 pages, the QFQ documentation currently have more than 130 pages. 

Constant demand on new Web-Tools

Due to the success of I-MATH web tools, other departments asks for help on implementing various types of workflows. Currently between 6-8 web developer of I-MATH  maintain and implement applications as well as working on QFQ. Feel free to contact support(at)math.uzh.ch to discuss your future UZH web tool project.