CSC 101 – Applications of Information

and Communication Technologies

Lecture 10 – Information Systems

Outline

 Information Systems & System Development:

 Need for System Development Enterprise
Architecture
 Business Intelligence (BI)
 Users of Information Systems
 Types of Information Systems
 Responsibility for System Development
 System Development Life Cycle (SDLC)
 Approaches to System Development

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 What Is an Information System?

• System
– Collection of elements and procedures that interact to
accomplish a goal
• Football game, transit systems, etc.
• Information System
– A system used to generate the information needed to
support the users in an organization
• Digital Ecosystem
– The collection of people, products, services, and business
processes related to a digital element
• Apple digital ecosystem = Apple hardware, software,
and online services

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What Is an Information System?

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 What Is an Information System?

• The Need for System Development

– Systems development
• Process of designing and implementing a new or
modified system
– System development may be required because of:
• New laws
• Changes to the legal requirements for retaining
business data (e-disclosure, etc.)
• Introduction of new technology

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 What Is an Information System?

• Enterprise Architecture
– Provides a detailed picture of an organization, its function,
its systems, and the relationship among them
– Allows managers to organize and maximize the use of IT
resources and make better decisions
– Not easy to develop and requires time and effort, but
once in place, it is an invaluable decision support tool

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 What Is an Information System?

• Business Intelligence (BI)

– The process of gathering, storing, accessing, and analyzing
data in order to make better business decisions
– Business analytics (BA)
• The process of analyzing data to evaluate a company’s
operations
– Data Warehouse
• Comprehensive collection of data about a company and
its customers
• Data mart is smaller and typically stores data related to
a particular subject or department

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 What Is an Information System?

– Data Mining
• The use of intelligent software to find subtle patterns
that may not be otherwise evident
• Can identify processes that need improvement
• Can be used for customer profiling
• Web Mining
– Data mining used in conjunction with Web data
• Text Mining
– Analysis of text-based data (online forms, emails,
call-center notes)

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 What Is an Information System?

• Social media analytics – mining and analyzing data from

blogs and social media sites
• Often used with the massive amounts of data
generated today – called Big Data

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 Users of Information Systems

• Users of Information Systems

– Used by one person or all employees
– Enterprise Systems
• A system that is used throughout an entire enterprise
– Inter-enterprise Systems
• Used by a business and its suppliers and other business
partners
– Some information systems are designed for management
decision making

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 Users of Information Systems

– User Groups
• Executive managers
• Middle managers
• Operational managers
• Nonmanagement workers
• External users

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Types of Information Systems

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 Types of Information Systems

• Transaction Processing Systems (TPSs)

– Processes and records data created by an organization’s
business transactions
– Usually processed in real time
– Order Entry Systems
– Payroll Systems
– Accounting Systems

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 Types of Information Systems
• Decision Making Support Systems
– Help individuals make decisions
– Management Information Systems (MISs)
• Provides decision makers with regular, routine, and timely
information that is used to make decisions
• Decision Support Systems (DSSs)
– Provides people with the tools and capabilities to organize
and analyze their decision making information
– Typically are interactive and provide information on demand
• Geographic Information Systems (GISs)
– Combines geographical information with other types of data to
provide a better understanding of relationships among the data

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 Types of Information Systems

– Expert Systems
• Provides the type of advice that would be expected
from a human expert and has two main components
• Knowledge Base
– Database containing facts provided by human
experts and rules the system should use to make
decisions based on those facts
• Inference Engine
– Program that applies the rules to the data stored in
the knowledge base, in order to reach decisions

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Types of Information Systems

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 Responsibility for System
Development
• The Information Systems (IS) Department
– Responsible for an organization’s computers, systems, and
other technology
– Also called the Information Technology (IT) department
– Systems Analyst
• Studies systems in order to determine what work
needs
to be done, and how this work may best be achieved
– Other IT personnel include:
– Business analysts, application programmers,
operations personnel, and security specialists

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 Responsibility for System
Development
• Outsourcing
– Hiring outside vendors to perform specific business tasks
– Offshore
• Outsourced to another country
– Nearshoring
• Outsourcing to nearby countries
– Homesourcing (homeshoring)
• Outsourcing to home-based workers

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 Responsibility for System
Development
– Crowdsourcing
• Taking job traditionally performed by an employee and
outsourcing it to a large, undefined group of people
• Often performed via the Web
– Advantages
• Lower costs
• Flexible staffing
– Global sourcing
– Strategic sourcing
– Socially responsible outsourcing

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 Responsibility for System
Development
– Disadvantages
• Personnel changes at the outsourcing company
• Conflicts between in-house and outsourcing personnel
• Communication problems
• Cultural differences
• Quality control and security
– Captive offshoring
• U.S. companies own facilities in other countries and
hire employees in that country
• Gives company more control over employees and
procedures than with conventional outsourcing

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 The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)
• SDLC : The development of a system from the time it is first
studied until the time it is updated or replaced

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Approaches to System
Development

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 The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)
• Preliminary Investigation
– A feasibility study is performed to assess whether or not a
full-scale project should be undertaken
– Documentation: Feasibility Report
• Contains findings on status of existing system and
benefits/feasibility of changing to a new system
• Includes system analysts’ recommendations regarding
whether or not the project should move on to the next
stage in the SDLC

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 The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)
• System Analysis
– Examines the problem area to determine what should be
done
– Data Collection
• Gathering information about the system (organizational
chart, observation, interviewing users, etc.)
– Data Analysis
• Analyzing information to determine the effectiveness
and efficiency of current system and/or requirements
for new or modified systems

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The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)
• Entity-Relationship Diagrams (ERDs) and Data Flow
Diagrams (DFDs)
– Used to model the entities in a system and the
flow of data within the system
• Decision Tables and Decision Trees
– Useful for identifying procedures and summarizing
the decision making process of one step of a system

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The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)

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The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)
– Business Process Modeling Notation (BPMN)
– A graphical, standardized notation used to model
the business processes used within systems
– Designed to be understood by all individuals
involved in the system
– Expresses processes graphically using
diagrams similar to flowcharts

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The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)
• Class Diagrams and Use Case
Diagrams
– Used to
illustrate
systems that
are based on
the concept of
objects

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 The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)
– Documentation: Diagrams, Tables, Trees, and Models
• Consists of any instruments used for data gathering and
the resulting diagrams, trees, models, and other tools
used to summarize and analyze the data
– Questionnaires
– Interview questions
– Diagrams, models, etc.

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 The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)
• System Design
– Specifies what the new system will look like and how it will
work
– Developing the Design and Specifications for the New
System
• Model of new system is developed
• Diagrams can include:
– Data dictionary: describes all data in a system
– Data flow and/or class diagrams of the new
system
– User interface (UI) designs

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The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)

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 The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)
– Cost-Benefit Analysis
• Considers both tangible and intangible benefits to
determine if the benefits of the new system outweigh the
cost
– Documentation: System Design/Specifications
• Developed during the system design phase
• Consists of all documentation necessary to
illustrate the new system

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 The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)
• System Acquisition
– System analysts determines where to obtain the necessary
hardware, software, and other system components
– The Make-or-Buy Decision
• Determining if the software needed will be purchased
from a vendor or developed in-house
– If developed in-house, software to be developed
moves into the program development process

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 The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)
• System Implementation
– The new system is installed, tested, and made operational
• Data migration
– System must be thoroughly tested
• Test data should be realistic and include incorrect data

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 The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)
 User Training
– All training manuals should be developed and given to users
– Training takes place on the actual system
– Can occur one-on-one or in groups
 Documentation: Implementation Schedule, Test Data and Results,
and Training Materials
• Implementation schedule, test data, test results, training materials should be
saved for future reference

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 The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)
– System Conversion - Once testing phase is completed, system
is installed
– Direct conversion
» Old system deactivated and new system is
immediately implemented
– Parallel conversion
» Both systems are operated simultaneously until it
is determined that the new system works
properly
– Phased conversion
» System is implemented by module
-- Pilot conversion
>> New system used at just one location within
the organization 50
The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)

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The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)

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 The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)
• System Maintenance
– Maintenance is an ongoing process
– Minor adjustments are made to the finished system to
keep it operational until the end of the system’s life or
until the time that the system needs to be redesigned
– Post-Implementation Review
• Identifies any glitches in the new system that need to
be fixed
– When a major change is needed, the project goes
through the SDLC again

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 The System Development
Life Cycle (SDLC)
• Documentation: Completed Project Folder
– Results of the post-implementation review are added to
the accumulated documentation
– Information can be useful to auditors who may check to
see that proper procedures were followed

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Summary

 Information Systems & System Development:

 Need for System Development Enterprise
Architecture
 Business Intelligence (BI)
 Users of Information Systems
 Types of Information Systems
 Responsibility for System Development
 System Development Life Cycle (SDLC)
 Approaches to System Development.

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