Information System Business

A system, whether automated or manual, that comprises people, machines, and/or methods organized to collect, process, transmit, and disseminate data that represent user information.

The elements of an information system are Workload, Response time, Throughput, Resource utilization, Resource service time. In other words information system is a system in which all the data is stored, analyzed and output with all the options is given to the managerial level to make decision for the development of the business.

It is a system which is helpful at levels of business.

• Information systems deal with the development, use and management of an organization’s IT infrastructure.

• In the post-industrial, information age, the focus of companies has shifted from being product oriented to knowledge oriented, in a sense that market operators today compete on process and innovation rather than product: the emphasis has shifted from the quality and quantity of production, to the production process itself, and the services that accompany the production process.

• The biggest asset of companies today, is their information, represented in people, experience, know-how, innovations (patents, copyrights, trade secrets), and for a market operator to be able to compete, he/she must have a strong information infrastructure, at the heart of which, lies the information technology infrastructure. Thus, the study of information systems focuses on why and how technology can be put into best use to serve the information flow within an organization.

• Compare and contrast the roles of systems designers from systems builders.

System Designer has to collect the information for the system to be designed. Than analyze the gathered information. Create a document to show how the system is going to functioning; what are the requirements, who are the users, what would be the environment for the system.

System builders: Based on the system design document system builders develops a plan to build the system, resources needed to develop the system, resource utilization plan, time needed to build the system.

• What are the similarities and differences between business and data requirements?

Business Requirement:

• A requirement is a description of what a system should do. Systems may have from dozens to hundreds of requirements.

• A requirement describes a condition to which a system must conform; either derived directly or indirectly from user needs. A requirement for a computer system specifies what you want or desire from a system.

• Requirements should be:

• unique in scope. Is this the only requirement that defines this particular objective?

• precise in wording. Are there any vague words that are difficult to interpret?

• bounded by concrete expectations. Are there concrete boundaries in the objectives?

• irrefutably testable. Can you build one or more test cases that will completely verify all aspects of this requirement?

Data Requirement:

• To build or create the above business requirement data is needed to analyze the business requirements.

• Based on the data collected report is created to justify the business requirement.

• How does the concept of work-flow change the focus of a traditional information system?

• Workflow can be described simply as the movement of documents and tasks through a business process. Workflow can be a sequential progression of work activities or a complex set of processes each taking place concurrently, eventually impacting each other according to a set of rules, routes, and roles.

• Workflow is acknowledged in the industry for facilitating powerful and flexible process automation. It is a tool that both business users and IT professionals can use to automate business processes and track work as it moves through the organization – ensuring that the right work gets to the right person at the right time. It can be scaled from a small departmental solution to an enterprise-level Business Process Management solution that supports thousands of concurrent users across multiple sites. By that productivity can be increased and managed.

• Workflow Management Systems

• Workflow Management Systems allow organizations to define and control the various activities associated with a business process. In addition, many management systems also allow a business the opportunity to measure and analyze the execution of the process so that continuous improvements can be made. Such improvements may be short-term (e.g., reallocation of tasks to better balance the workload at any point in time) or long-term (e.g., redefining portions of the workflow process to avoid bottlenecks in the future). Most workflow systems also integrate with other systems used by the organization: document management systems, databases, e-mail, office automation products,

• Describe the major aspects of a feasibility analysis.

The feasibility of a project can be ascertained in terms of technical factors, economic factors, or both. It is a study documented with a report showing all the aspects of the project. Different Feasibility studies are as follows:

• Technical Feasibility. It refers to the ability of the process to take advantage of the current technology in pursuing further improvement. The technical capability of the personnel as well as the capability of the available technology should be considered. Technology transfer between geographical areas and cultures needs.

• Managerial Feasibility: It involves the capability of the infrastructure of a process to achieve improvement. Support of Management, Involvement of employee, and commitment are key elements required for managerial feasibility.

• Economic Feasibility: This involves the feasibility of the proposed project to generate economic benefits. A cost-benefit analysis is important aspects of evaluating the economic feasibility of projects. The tangible and intangible aspects of a project should be translated into economic terms to facilitate a consistent basis for evaluation.

• Financial Feasibility: It involves the capability of the project organization to raise the appropriate funds needed to implement the proposed project. Project financing can be a major obstacle in large multi-party projects because of the level of capital required. It is done to determine that whether it is worth to spend that much money according to the profit analysis.

• Cultural Feasibility. It deals with the compatibility of the proposed project with the cultural setup of the project environment. As an example: religious beliefs may influence what an individual is willing to do or not do.

• Social Feasibility. Social feasibility addresses the influences that a proposed project may have on the social system in the project environment. The ambient social structure may be such that certain categories of workers may be in short supply or nonexistent. The effect of the project on the social status of the project participants must be assessed to ensure compatibility. It should be recognized that workers in certain industries may have certain status symbols within the society.

• Safety Feasibility. Safety feasibility is another important aspect that should be considered in project planning. It refers to an analysis of whether the project is capable of being implemented and operated safely with minimal adverse effects on the environment.

• Political Feasibility. Political considerations often dictate direction for a proposed project. This is particularly true for large projects with national visibility that may have significant government inputs and political implications.

• Environmental Feasibility. Concern must be shown and action must be taken to address any and all environmental concerns raised or anticipated. It mostly done for bio technological projects..

• Market Feasibility. The market needs analysis to view the potential impacts of market demand, competitive activities, etc. and market share available. Price war activities by competitors, whether local, regional, national or international, must also be analyzed for early contingency funding and debt service negotiations during the start-up, ramp-up, and commercial start-up phases of the project.

• What is scope creep? Give an example and describe methods for controlling creep.

A scope creep means when an unavoidable or unexpected change occurs while the project development. It can also result in a project team overrunning its original budget and schedule. If budget or schedule is not increased along with scope, the change is usually considered an unacceptable addition to the project is known as scope creep.

Methods for controlling creep :

• Expect that there will be scope creep. Implement Change Order forms early and educate the project drivers on your processes. A Change Order form will allow you to perform a cost-benefit analysis before scheduling changes requested by the project drivers.

• Be sure you thoroughly understand the project vision. Meet with the project developers and deliver an overview of the project as a whole for their review and comments.

• List the priorities. Make an ordered list for your review throughout the project duration. Items should include budget, deadline, feature delivery, customer satisfaction, and employee satisfaction

• Define your deliverables and have them approved by the project developers. Deliverables should be general descriptions of functionality to be completed during the project.

• Divide the approved deliverables into actual work requirements. The requirements should be as detailed as necessary. The larger your project, the more detail you should include. If your project spans more than a month or two, don’t forget to include time for software upgrades during development and always include time for ample documentation.

• Break the project into major and minor milestones. Minor milestones span should not be more than a month. Whatever your method for determining task duration, leave room for error. When working with an unknown staff schedule 140 to 160 percent of the duration as expected to be delivered. If your schedule is tight, reevaluate your deliverables.

• Once a schedule has been created, assign resources and determine your critical path using a PERT Chart or Work Breakdown Structure. Your critical path will change over the course of your project, so it’s important to evaluate it before development begins. Follow the map to determine which deliverables must be completed on time.

• Describe PERT charts. What major elements are tracked?

PERT (Program Evaluation and Review technique)
A PERT chart is a project management tool used to schedule, organize, and coordinate tasks within a project. It is a methodology developed by the U.S. Navy in the 1950s to manage the Polaris submarine missile program. A PERT chart looks more like a flow chart and concentrates on the relationships between tasks and less on the timeline. PERT charts emphasize task relationships rather than time.

• Major Elements tracked are :

• Identify the specific activities and their milestones.

• Determine the proper sequence of the activities

• Construct a network diagram.

• Estimate the time required for each activity. It has 3 types of timing which are Optimistic time, Most likely time and Pessimistic time.

• Determine the critical path in the process. It is helpful to determine ES (Earliest Start Time), EF(Earliest Finish Time), LS (Latest Start time) and LF (latest Finish Time.

• Update the PERT CHART along the progress of project.

• Define Systems Analysis.

Systems Analysis is a deep and through study of an existing system or the new system that has to be created. In it all the aspects are taken into condition like whether the new system would be helpful for the business to grow or run smoothly, Cost effective, improve the overall system process for the business. System Analysis more emphasis is given to understanding the details of an existing system or a proposed one and then deciding whether the proposed system is desirable or not and whether the existing system needs improvements. Thus, system analysis is the process of investigating a system, identifying problems, and using the information to recommend improvements to the system. An analysis report is generated and based on it system design document is prepared.

Or

Systems analysis of an operating system consists of the evaluation of the efficiency, economy, accuracy, and productivity of existing procedures measured against the stated objectives of the library; and the design of new procedures to satisfy the demands of management and user.

• What is a use case? What are the elements and how is it used?

USE CASE:

• A Use Case is a top level category of system functionality (i.e.: Log on, Shut down, etc.). A Use Case has graphical representation and/or a text description.

• The diagram or description identifies all the actors (outside of the system) involved in the function, as well as an indication of how the Use Case is initiated. The collection of Use Case diagrams provides a ‘context’ diagram of system interfaces.

• Each Use Case constitutes a complete list of events initiated by an Actor and it specifies the interaction that takes place between an Actor and the System. In a Use Case the system is viewed as opaque, where only the inputs, outputs, and functionality matter.

Components of USE CASE:

• The Use Case diagram just provides a quick overview of the relationship of actors to Use Cases. The meat of the Use Case is the text description. This text will contain the following:

• Name

• Case ID

• Brief Description

• SRS (software requirement specification)Requirements Supported

• Pre & Post Conditions

• Event Flow

• The requirements in the SRS are each uniquely numbered so that they may be accounted for in the verification testing. These requirements should be mapped to the Use Case that satisfies them for accountability.

• What is the purpose of Primary and Foreign Keys on database tables?

Primary key constraint is set a database table to make a record unique. In other words to avoid duplicate records primary key constrain is created. It can be on field or an combination of more than one field.

Foreign key constraint is created to check a matching entry in another table which it refers. It is useful to link two tables with different details. It can have relationship like one to one or one to many. Foreign key is referenced by the primary key or unique key field in another table.

BONUS

• Describe the similarities that exist between the Project Management, Systems Analysis and Information Systems lifecycles.