ISQA 8060 - RESEARCH IN MIS

1. Your company hired a consulting firm to conduct a research study and make recommendations on the implementation of a new E-business strategy: mobile technology. The consulting firm has completed its study and submitted a report to your supervisor, the head of the IT Department. Your supervisor has asked you to critique the report and put in writing your comments on the report's quality. Discuss in detail how you will determine the quality of the research report.

2. Answer all parts thoroughly.
   1. Describe a problem facing an IT manager that could be addressed by a research project. (5%)
   2. Present a research proposal for developing recommendations to resolve the problem. Use the outline for research proposals you used for the ISQA 8060 course project. Make certain you include the theoretical framework and possible hypotheses. (80%)
   3. Indicate the statistics you would use to test the hypotheses and defend your choices. (15%)

1. Describe the inputs to, the outputs from, and the decisions made in the CRC Card Analysis phase.

2. Describe in detail the concepts of cohesion and coupling and the effects of each in designing computer programs. Be sure to include examples of each type of cohesion and coupling so that the reader will understand exactly what each is.

• Upon graduating from UNO, you are approached by a recruiter who invites you to apply for the job of IS development team leader at a large national financial service company. Each team leader is part of the advisory board to the CIO and is expected to provide recommendations on a number of relevant issues. Enthusiastically, you apply for this position. Part of the application package you have to submit concerns a memo for the CIO providing her with advice on why to change the 'standard' development approach in the company from 'structured' to 'object-oriented'.

  Question 1: Provide 5 arguments that the CIO can use to justify changing the company's development approach from 'structured' to 'object-oriented'

  1. Substantiate each argument with either relevant examples and/or references.
  2. Are there any project management implications due to this change? If not, why not? If so, what are they?

  Question 2: Provide a plan to introduce the object-oriented approach into the development organization in the company.

  1. List the steps to follow in the introduction, including context issues that are critical to a successful introduction.
  2. Identify 5 specific techniques to deal with resistance to change that may be expected.

  Highly impressed by your memo, the company makes you an offer of employment. After joining the company you find that you are working in a 'component driven environment'. The IT department does not develop or buy applications as a whole. Rather, it perceives each application as consisting of components (modules) that are either developed in-house, or are directly bought as (configurable) custom-off-the-shelf. For example, an on-line ordering system consists of a self-made data entry module, a custom security module, and a tailored custom product portfolio display module.

  Question 3: After a few weeks on the job, you find this component-driven environment both exciting and challenging. Discuss the challenges and its consequences.

  1. Name 5 specific systems development challenges that you face in a component-driven environment. How do you address each of these challenges?
  2. Name 5 specific project management challenges that you face in a component-driven environment. How do you address each of these challenges?
  3. Recommend a portfolio of a maximum of 4 systems development methods that you think your company should have to efficiently and effectively develop component-based systems. Make sure to describe and justify the importance of each specific method that you are recommending.

  Note: Don't forget to use summary tables where appropriate, in order to make your paper more readable. Be sure you have answered all parts of all three questions.

1. The following diagram [not included here] represents a small internet consisting of two linked Ethernet networks. Assume that host computer B communicates with another host computer (Z) over this internet. Explain the steps by which host B communicates with host Z using internet protocol (Ipv4). (Assume that the IP datagrams that are sent include no options.)

   In answering this question, discuss the role of the Internet (IP) layer and the layers below it. Include in your answer a discussion of address resolution, next hop forwarding, and MTUs. Be specific.

2. Transmission control protocol (TCP) plays an important role in the transmission of data over the Internet. Discuss the following issues related to TCP.
   1. Describe the important features (characteristics) of TCP. What functions does it perform that are unique to this protocol?
   2. Through what processes does TCP guarantee delivery of data? Explain these processes and how they work.
   3. What is meant by the term "sliding window" in relation to TCP? Why is it used, and how does it work? Give an example.
   4. Explain the process of the "three way handshake". What is it, and how is it used by TCP?
   5. Explain the relationship between TCP and IP.

ISQA 8380 - MANAGING THE DISTRIBUTED COMPUTING ENVIRONMENT

1. In the last few years web services and a service oriented architecture based on web services has captured the attention of software vendors, corporate developers and system integrators. Describe the basic elements of a web service and diagram how these components work together. Describe how web services are being used by contemporary software vendors such Peoplesoft to ease the burden of system integrators as they seek to integrate other systems with Peoplesoft transactions. Also describe how a legacy system such as a mainframe based CICS application which uses a DB2 database might expose it's transactions as web services in a composite application used in a business. Again use a simple diagram to illustrate this and explain the parts of the diagram and the flow of the transaction.

2. A major catalog company specializing in clothing currently uses a call center application on Windows XP workstations. It is a client server application written in Visual Basic that connects each workstation to the following systems:
   • An order entry and status system for catalog orders running on a mainframe under CICS and connecting to the workstation through IBM MQ series messaging. The system uses DB2 as the database.
   • A UNIX system that has the customer service database. The Visual Basic application communicates to this system via ODBC. The database is in Oracle.
   • A package tracking system which is connected to various companies like FEDEX which provides status of orders placed and other items such as least cost package routing to various vendors. The system is running on Windows 2000 servers with Microsoft Transaction Server and SQL Server. The Visual Basic talks to this system through DCOM.

   While this system has served the company well for a number of years, management has identified the following issues:

   • The cost of maintaining, testing and updating the visual basic application on a thousand desktops in call centers located in 5 different states is increasingly expensive.
   • Because the company is finding it hard to find qualified call center staff, they are considering letting some specialists work from home on a part time basis. The catalog company can route the calls to these "home office users" and install a high speed, Cable or DSL connection in their home and connect using a VPN.

   Suggest an architecture for the following integration problem. Identify all of the middleware components in your architecture and how they are used to solve the problem. Provide a diagram which outlines your architectural approach. Explain why you selected each middleware component and what their function is in your architecture.

1. A local health club wishes to offer an on-line exercise tracking system that would allow its members to record their exercise activities and determine the number of calories burned as a result. This web-based system requires a database, which you have been hired to design. Each member is identified by a unique member number. In addition, a person's name, address, year of birth, gender, and e-mail address are recorded. A person's current weight is also recorded, since this value will have to be taken into consideration when calculating the calories burned during a particular activity. While a record of weight change over time would be nice to have, this functionality will not be part of the current system; only the current weight needs to be recorded. The system will be password protected, so a member's password (encrypted) will also be stored. The health club is interested in sending period marketing e-mail messages to its members, but members may opt not to receive such e-mail. Their preference must also be recorded in the database.

   Members may choose to associate themselves with an organization, such as their place of work. Each organization has a name and a location (city & state). In this way, aggregate results for organizations can be calculated.

   Members engage in exercise activities, which include aerobics, cycling, machines, martial arts, running, rowing, swimming, weights, and so forth. Within each of these activities are a number of different kinds of exercises. For example, within the aerobics activity one has dance aerobics, step aerobics, etc. Within machines, one has treadmill, cycle machine, rowing machine, etc.

   Members log the exercises the engage in. For each log entry, they record the exercise, the date, the intensity (minimal, challenging, strenuous), the duration, and, if appropriate, the distance. Members may also record notes for each log entry.

   Each type of exercise burns a certain number of calories per minute, but this value is a function of the intensity of the exercise and of the weight of the individual. When an individual makes a log entry, the system will compute the calories burned, given the duration and intensity of the exercise and the weight of the individual. The result of this computation is stored with the log entry. This computation is not a design issue. However, the database is to store, for each type of intensity for each exercise, a calories per minute value which is used in the computation.

   To facilitate the design of the interface, the database will also store a list of favorite exercises for each individual.

   1. Create a conceptual or logical data model for this scenario. Please feel free to make (and write down) any assumptions that do not contradict the text above.
   2. Design a set of appropriately normalized relations (tables) that is consistent with your data model.
   3. Which columns should have indexes? Feel free to make assumptions about sizes of tables and justify your answer in light of these assumptions.
   4. Based on your tables, formulate SQL queries that will do the following:
      1. Create the LOG table, with appropriate constraints. Make common-sense assumptions regarding the data types.
      2. For each member associated with UNOmaha, list the number of kilometers during May, 2004.
      3. Show Mary Washington's (member # 1234) exercise log for May, 2004. Show the name of each exercise.
      4. Add a new member to the database
      5. Create a view that shows, for each day and each organization, the total amount of time spent exercising by the organization's members.

2. Compare and contrast the design of an on-line transaction processing database, with that of a data warehouse. Include in your answer the similarities and differences of the two and the underlying rationale for the differences.

1. You are the CIO of a successful software vendor. When your company was formed, funds and the availability of information systems professionals were limited. This resulted in the off-shore outsourcing of the company's help desk (customer service) function.

   Today, things have changed. The company has ample funding and information systems professionals are available at reasonable costs.

   The CEO just returned from visits to several key clients and in a staff meeting he reported that some of the clients were not pleased with the help desk. He also mentioned that Dell had recently brought its help desk function back to Dell's headquarters.

   After these comments, he turned to you and asks you to make an explicit recommendation about whether the help desk function should be in-sourced or whether it should remain as it is. Additionally, he asks that you justify your position.

2. In your position as the Vice President of Information Technology for your an company, you recently attended a conference on systems' security where there was a panel on password security.

   One of the panelists said; "Security is such an important issue that every employee in a successful financial company should be required to carry a security token that generates a new password every time the person logs off."

   Another panelist said; "Security threats are overblown. Imposing on employees to carry a security token is too much to ask."

   Discuss both sides of this issue.

1. List and define the 5 (five) classical activities of management. Compare and contrast those with the specific components (i.e. schedule management, cost management, risk management, etc.) of project management.

2. As a project manager you must deal with risks. What is the PMI method for risk management? Be sure to include in your answer and the tasks you are required to perform for risk management and some examples of risk that might occur in a project to install new server hardware.