MSDNAA

Executive Summary

Background

Every student that goes takes any class from the Information Systems (ISYS) department or the Computer Science (CS) department receives a username and password to the Microsoft Developer Network Academic Alliance (MSDNAA) site.

The MSDNAA is a program that Microsoft created for academic organizations (mainly colleges and universities) to acquire licensed copies of the popular Microsoft software. The software is normally obtained through a service run by e-academy or through a dedicated website run by the school or organization.

Currently BYU subscribes to this MSDNAA program. Because of this, every student has the ability to download and obtain licenses for the many incredible software packages available. They can be accesses by going to the download site for BYU which is located at https://msdn05.e-academy.com/elms/Security/Login.aspx?campus=byu_accinfo.

Problem

The problem comes in the difficulty in downloading the software. It is easy to login and to download individual copies of the software that the site provides, but it is difficult to manage all of your downloads. Also, because the individual subscription lasts only until you graduate, it is important for you to download everything before you graduate. That becomes a difficult thing to do when there are over 200 products to download.

In summary the problem can be summarized as follows:

1. Difficulty in managing downloads

2. Tedious process to download products

3. Long process to download products

4. Subscription period is too short

Solution

With these problems, the downloading process needed to be easier and better managed. So, I came up with a solution that would include one of Microsoft’s products – Excel.

The solution was to automate the process of downloading products from the MSDNAA website. That included the process of:

1. Logging in

2. Recording previously downloaded items

3. Adding the products to the online cart

4. Checking out

5. Recording the information needed for each product:

a. The product name and version (and a picture to associate the product with)

b. The license key if it has one

c. The download location

All of this is done in one location to remove the difficulty in finding product keys, etc.

This is done by simply opening an Excel spreadsheet and entering your information like username and password. Once that information is filled out on the user form, the Excel program does the rest.

This solution saves the student around 100 hours of time so that they don’t have to waste their time clicking through things that they would already accept anyway.

Links to files:

http://files.gove.net/shares/files/11w/benjami3/MSDNAA.xlsm
http://files.gove.net/shares/files/11w/benjami3/Final_-_MSDNAA.pdf