Individual Programming Assignment: Design and Develop a Novel Cloud-Based Application

Objective

Objective
The objective of this individual programming assignment is to get a flavour of the effort involved in designing and developing fully functional browser-based application hosted in the cloud. You will practice designing and developing a novel cloud-based application of your choice using a cloud provider offering infrastructure as a service (i.e., you must instantiate a VM and configure it yourself).

Task and Guidelines
Design and develop a novel, easy to use, and useful cloud-based application of your choice. It must accomplish something useful and has some novel features. Your cloud application must provide at least 3 client-side services (note that authentication will not count as a service in this assignment), and must be built according to the following requirements:
1) Must instantiate a VM of your choice (Linux or Windows Server).
2) Must install and run a Web server of your choice on the VM.
3) Must install and run a SQL database of your choice such as MySQL, PostgreSQL, MariaDB, etc. Your app must use a SQL database (number of tables is up to you) for storage/retrieval of data/info.
4) Must install a Web framework of your choice, and it can be a basic framework such as LAMP for Linux or WAMP for Windows; or advanced frameworks such as Angular,React, Laravel, NodeJS, Ruby on Rails.

You may use any programming language: Java, JavaScript, Python, Ruby, PHP, etc You may use any cloud service provider, but must use infrastructure as a service (i.e., instantiate a virtual machine in the cloud and set it up): AWS EC2, Google Cloud, IBM, Microsoft Azure,etc.

Important Notes
Deadline: Assignment#1 must be submitted by 11:59pm (night) on Friday, Feb 5. No extensions, so plan accordingly. Your solution must be designed and developed by yourself (your own work).While students are encouraged to discuss the assignment and general ideas for solutions, each student must design and develop his/her own solution and code. No code sharing is allowed,and no two or more students can have the same application. JPlag will be used for detecting code similarity.The assignment will be assessed based on the grading rubrics provided on page 3 of this document.

Submission Guidelines (note the 2-step submission)
1) Source files, and a README file: Submit your assignment solution source code, along with a README file on Github by 11:59pm (night) on Friday, Feb 5 as per the following instructions:
a. I am assuming you already have a Github account...otherwise create one.
b. Go to the following Github Classroom link for Assignment #1:
c. If you have not used Github before, go through this one-hour tutorial:
d. Your submission must include a README file with a brief description (a couple of paragraphs) of the application, a link to the cloud hosted application, and instructions on how to run your application.
e. If your application requires any resource files, make sure you include them in your submission on Github.
2) Report: Submit your assignment report through Canvas by 11:59pm (night) on Friday, Feb
5 (look under Assignments –> Individual Programming Assignments). Your report must be in PDF or Word and must include (please use the template provided):
a. One full-page (approx. 500 words) detailing your application idea, the 3 client-side features you have designed and implemented, challenges and solutions. That page may include one clear diagram of the application.
b. Max 10 pages describing the tests you have run to demonstrate the functionality of your application. You must describe the actions with screenshots, and clearly demonstrate this was done by you and on your own VM instance in the cloud.