Direct Congress Dan Skorupski Dan Vingo 3 December 2008

Overview of features Retrieve and store legislation from the United States Congress Display legislation based on various filter (popularity, if it has been voted on, etc) User accounts that permit certain features to be used, like voting and posting in forums Forum to post discussions about legislation User profiles that display info about each user

Retrieval of legislation Legislation is retrieved from the United States Congress and stored within our database. Retrieval is performed separately from the web app to easily allow the source of the data to be changed (as the source of the legislation is out of our control)

Display of legislation By default all legislation is displayed in a list format Users have the option to filter legislation based on the following criteria:  In alphabetical order of the title  The most recently updated legislation first  The popularity of the legislation  Based on whether the user has voted on the legislation (user must be logged in)

User Accounts Anyone can create a user account There are no data integrity checks (whether this person actually lives at the address they say etc) No end user agreement Same person can create multiple accounts No automated account creation checks

User Profiles After registering user logs in and can view their profile Profile contains:  Your 'karma' points  Legislation you recently commented on (most recent 6)  Legislation you recently voted on (most recent 6)  Gives the option to update your profile

Voting on Legislation Click on title of legislation to get detailed view If the user is logged in they can vote on the legislation User can log in from the legislation page and be redirected back

Commenting on Legislation A very simple forum is provided to chat with others After you post other users can vote your comment up or down Admin has ability to modify all data

Wish list Data integrity checks  Allow one person to have one account. Mobile web version of front end Prettier user interface More filters for legislation  Ex: View legislation that has already been passed in Congress Search legislation (available elsewhere, integrate with other sites) More sophisticated forum