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Test Study Guide: Question 1- In October 2009, IBM announced the launching of Lotus Live: Information found online/in book, and definitions: “IBM has also announced enhancements to Lotus Live and its Click to Cloud capabilities. This cloud-delivered, software as a service (SaaS) offering provides such features as including web conferencing, file storing and sharing, contact management, live chat and business forms integrated with a business network .” [] [] Chapter 5 SAAS- software as a service ASP application service provider SUBSCRIPTION LICENSING- is the monthly price of using software rather than a large initial purchase. SOA- service oriented architecture, a set of self-contained services that communicate with each other to create a working software application. Respond in terms of: LotusLive is a web-browser enabled SAAS or software as a service that uses a monthly subscription licensing which depends on what services a businesses use and how much data storage they need. They say their rates are currently $3 to $39 a month; even now there is a trail membership with 25 linked accounts for one month for free. LotusLive particularly is an application service provider (ASP) as their websites holds applications to help with Meetings, Event Management, Social Networking, calendar and even just their encrypted email called Notes. They take the stress of overburdened IT departments as they do all the work for a business in terms of security, back ups, storage, and IT to keep it maintained. They are also a named brand, IBM, so people tend to trust them over other firms. Anyone that uses their system a business would encourage all their clients to take part in it so that they can talk and interact through instant messaging, video or voice conferencing, and through encrypted email. Question 2- Chapter 3 & 12 really page 494+ Found online & added chapter 12 descriptions- [] Structured Problems Routine and repetitive with standard solution Well-defined decision making procedure so they do not have to be treated as “new” Given a well-defined set of input, a well-defined set of output is defined In general, the more structure, the less information required Tend to be in lower organizational levels (employees/teams)

Semi-structured Problems Only part of the problem has a clear-cut answer provided by an accepted procedure Has some structured aspect Some of the inputs or outputs or procedures are not well defined Middle management- IT tends to get rid of these first!

Unstructured Problems Decision maker must provide judgment, evaluation, and insight to solve problem. Decisions are novel, important and non-routine, and no well-understood or agreed-on procedure for making them Tend to be mainly higher organization levels (senior executives)

Organizational structures: ENTREPRENURIAL – Young, small firm in a fast-changing environment. It has a simple structure and is managed by an entrepreneur serving as its single chief executive officer. Small startup business. IT- poorly designed systems developed in a rush that often outgrow their usefulness quickly ADHOCRACY – A task force organization that must respond to rapidly changing environments. Consists of large groups of specialists organized into short-lived multidisciplinary teams and has weak central management. Consulting firms IT- has to be structured in a way everyone can use it efficiently, cloud computing is growing because of growing technology. It does leave the questions that who is managing and how to manage these situations. MACHINE BUREAUCRACY- A large bureaucracy existing in a slowly changing environment, producing standard products. It is dominated by a centralized management team and centralized decision-making. Midsize manufacturing firm IT- usually not a single integrated information system, each division/department has its own information system

Explain how information systems (hardware, software, databases, telecommunications, or management theory) can be applied to support unstructured, semi-structured, and structured decisions in one of these models. Response: IT can flatten organizations such as bureaucracies that have not updated their IT into integrated information systems. They are usually inefficient, slow to change and less competitive and this leads to harder decision making. Sharing the information leads to receiving more and more accurate information on time, which means faster decision-making. This also allows IT to cut out the middlemen because as everyone has the same information, people can make decisions themselves eliminating the need to be micromanaged. It also allows for more structured decisions to be made as procedures are made, and tools are made through a flowing IT system that everyone can use. In bureaucratic organizations it is important to have structured decisions because these tend to be large firms, and the value of so many decisions being made on inaccurate information is huge. An information system that allows access to all departments and has high-quality information allows also for the use of that information to help create procedures and creates high-quality decision. pgs 459 - 461 provide good examples Question 3- A domestic distributor of highly volatile and toxic chemicals commissioned a study to accumulate records of traffic accidents involving large container trucks. The study accumulated reported incidents on every road and every state, and including data from county and municipal records regarding the incident, for the last 30 years. The database scaled to hundreds of millions of records. As a part of the study, the company hired a software contractor to develop a forward and backward-chaining inference engine (Expert System) to evaluate the data. Results from the project are expected within 24 months. You are the CIO of this firm.  1. Describe the probable platform requirements to accommodate this application. Explain your reasoning. Mainframe, allowing hundreds of processors to help collate and sort the data. 24-7 server system to be constantly accessing the information Large amount of data storage (30 years of records, every road of every state equals massive amounts of data) Data warehouse that allows them to run the inference engine to evaluate the data.  2. Why an Expert System? 472 Expert systems model human knowledge as a set of rules that are called the knowledge base. The strategy to search through this knowledge base is called the inference engine. Forward chaining begins with the information entered by the user and searches the knowledge base to arrive at a conclusion. Backward chaining the strategy for searching the knowledge base starts with a hypothesis and proceeds by asking the user questions about selected facts until the hypothesis is either confirmed or disproved. The company wants an Expert System because they are in need of both forward and backward chaining strategies. They wants to be able to comb through the information entered by all the records allowing them to answer any and all questions regarding the incidents. They want to be able to look at commonly used streets and see why an incident occurred. However, they also wants to be able to ask if we use a different street will this one be safer or are the same conditions met for other incidents in that area.  3. What do you think the company is attempting to determine, accomplish, or estimate based on this data? They are trying to determine the safest areas to travel. The research can show them where most accidents occur, and what area’s to avoid so that they have no accidents with the product they are distributing. Also to potentially safeguard against future accidents in areas they generally occur.  4. Presuming that, what might be some sample rules for its rule system? In order to get more information about what may cause multiple crashes at one location, the rules would be as followed: If more then one incident, ask causes If cause was human error ignore, ask for details of environment If details of environment were not at fault, list incidents  5. How will project outcomes lend to the firm’s competitive advantage? Safety when healing with highly volatile and toxic materials needs to be placed as a core competency. By knowing which routes are safer, and where increased steps need to be taken they can help make better decisions on where to travel when distributing these materials. If they are known to be the safer choice, this will definitely give them the competitive advantage.  6. What is the risk to the firm if this project isn’t pursued? As stated above, safety must be a core competency. If this project is not pursued the company will not know where they need to take extra precautions to safeguard their materials. The risk is to the environment, to people involved in transporting, and to the company through fines (environmental, health problems) and all-in-all negative backlash that happens when something of this nature is involved in any incident.

Question 4- Explain the relationship between employee fraud and the practice of computer forensics. Computer forensics is the scientific collection, examination; authentication, preservation and analysis of data held on or retrieved from computer storage media in such a way that at the information can be used as evidence in a court of law. It deals with the following problems: Recovering data from computers while preserving the evidential integrity, Securely storing and handling recovered electronic data, Finding significant information in a large volume of electronic data, and Presenting the information to a court of law. This is particularly as an organization can be liable for needless risk and harm created if the organization fails to take appropriate protective action to prevent the loss of confidential information, data corruption or breach of privacy. The relationship between employee fraud and the practice of computer forensics is simply that companies are now monitoring and storing this data, they are able to bring information and electronic evidence against an employee if they are accused of fraud. Something an employee thought they had gotten rid of whether a file, or email that is in question may not be on their system anymore, but it will be kept in a company logs and is still useable as evidence.