MINS 301 Ch. 9 Vocabulary – Flashcards
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Agile Methodology
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Aims for customer satisfaction through early and continuous delivery of useful software components developed by an iterative process using the bare minimum requirements.
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Alpha Testing
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Assess whether the entire system meets the design requirements of the users.
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Analysis Phase
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The firm analyzes its end-user business requirements and refines project goals into defined functions and operations of the intended system.
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Brainstorming
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A technique for generating ideas by encouraging participants to offer as many ideas as possible in a short period of time without any analysis until all the ideas have been exhausted.
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Bugs
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Defects in the code of an information system.
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Business Requirement
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The specific business requests the system must meet to be successful.
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Change Agent
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A person or event that is the catalyst for implementing major changes for a system to meet business changes.
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Communication Plan
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Defines the how, what, when, and who regarding the flow of project information to stakeholders and is key for managing expectations.
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Computer-Aided Software Engineering (CASE)
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Software suites that automate systems analysis, design, and development.
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Control Objectives for Information and Related Technologies (COBIT)
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A set of best practices that helps an organization to maximize the benefits of an information system, at the same time establishing appropriate controls to ensure minimum errors.
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Conversion
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The process of transferring information from a legacy system to a new system.
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Corrective Maintenance
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Makes system changes to repair design flaws, coding errors, or implementation issues.
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Critical Path
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The sequence of activities that determine
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Data Flow Diagram (DFD)
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Illustrates the movement of information between external entities and the processes and data stores within the system.
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Dependency
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A logical relationship that exists between the project tasks or between a project task and a milestone.
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Design Phase
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Establishes descriptions of the desired features and operations of the system including screen layouts, business rules, process diagrams, pseudo code, and other documentation.
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Development Phase
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Transforms all the detailed design documents from the design phase into the actual system.
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Development Testing
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Programmers test the system to ensure that it is bug-free.
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Discovery Prototyping
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Builds a small-scale representation or working model of the system to ensure that it meets the user and business requirements.
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Executive Sponsor
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The person or group who provides the financial resources for the project.
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Extensible Markup Language (XML)
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A markup language for documents containing structured information.
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Extreme Programming (XP) Methodology
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Breaks a project into four phases, and developers cannot continue to the next phase until the previous phase is complete.
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Feasibility
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The measure of the tangible and intangible benefits of an information system.
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Fourth-Generation Language (4GL)
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Programming languages that looks similar to human language.
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Gantt Chart
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A simple bar chart that lists project tasks vertically against the project's time frame, listed horizontally.
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Help Desk
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A group of people who respond to users' questions.
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Implementation Phase
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When the organization places the system into production so users can begin to perform actual business operations with it.
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Interoperability
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The capability of two or more computer systems to share data and resources, even though they are made by different manufacturers.
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In-Sourcing (In-House Development)
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Uses the professional expertise within an organization to develop and maintain its information technology systems.
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Intangible Benefits
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Difficult to quantify or measure.
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Integration Testing
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Verifies that separate systems can work together passing data back and forth correctly.
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Interactive Development
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Consists of a series of tiny projects.
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Joint Application Development
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Session in which employees meet to define or review the business requirements for the system.
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Kill Switch
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A trigger that enables a project manager to close the project before competition.
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Legacy System
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An old system that is fast approaching or beyond the end of its useful life within an organization.
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Loose Coupling
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The capability of services to be joined on demand to create composite services or disassembled just as easily into their functional components.
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Maintenance Phase
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When the organization performs changes, corrections, additions, and upgrades to ensure that the system continues to meet its business goals.
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Methodology
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A set of policies, procedures, standards, processes, practices, tools, techniques, and tasks that people apply to technical and management challenges.
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Nearshore Outsourcing
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Contracting an outsourcing arrangement with a company in a nearby country.
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Object-Oriented Language
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Languages group data and corresponding processes into objects.
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Offshore Outsourcing
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Using organizations from developing countries to write code and develop systems.
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Off-The-Shelf Application Software
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Supports general business processes and does not require any specific software customization to meet the organization's needs.
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Online Training
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Runs over the Internet or on a CD or DVD, and employees complete the training on their on time at their own pace.
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Onshore Outsourcing
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Engaging another company within the same country for services.
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Outsourcing
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An arrangement by which one organization provides a service or services for another organization that chooses not to perform them in-house.
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Parallel Implementation
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Uses both the legacy and new system until all users verify that the new system functions correctly.
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PERT (Program Evaluation and Review Technique) Chart
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A graphical network model that depicts a project's tasks and the relationships between them.
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Phased Implementation
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Installs the new system in phases (for example, by department) until it is verified that it works correctly.
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Pilot Implementation
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A small group uses the new system until it is verified that it works correctly, then the remaining users migrate to the new system.
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Planning Phase
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Establishes a high-level plan of the intended project and determines project goals.
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Plunge Implementation
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Discards the legacy system and immediately migrates users to the new system.
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Preventative Maintenance
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Makes system changes to reduce the chance of future system failure.
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Project
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Temporary activity a company undertakes to create a unique product, service, or result.
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Project Assumption
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Factors considered to be true, real, or certain without proof or demonstration.
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Project Constraint
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Specific factors that can limit options, including budget, delivery dates, available skilled resources, and organizational policies.
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Project Deliverable
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Any measurable, tangible, verifiable outcome, result, or item that is produced to complete a project or part of a project.
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Project Management
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The application of knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to project activities to meet project requirements.
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Project Management Office (PMO)
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An internal department that oversees all organizational projects.
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Project Manager
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An individual who is an expert in project planning and management, defines and develops the project plan, and tracks the plan to ensure that the project is completed on time and on budget.
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Project Milestones
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Represent key dates when a certain group of activities must be performed.
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Project Objective
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Quantifiable criteria that must be met or the project to be considered a success.
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Project Plan
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A formal, approved document that manages and controls project execution.
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Project Requirements Document
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Defines the specifications for product/output of the project and is key for managing expectations, controlling scope, and completing other planning efforts.
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Project Scope
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Describes the business needs and the justification, requirements, and current boundaries for the project.
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Project Scope Statement
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Links the project to the organization's overall business goals.
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Project Stakeholder
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Individuals and organizations actively involved in the project or whose interests might be affected as a result of project execution or project completion.
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Prototyping
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A modem design approach by which the designers and system users use an iterative approach to building the system.
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Rapid Application Development (RAD) Methodology (also called rapid prototyping)
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Emphasizes extensive user involvement in the rapid and evolutionary construction of working prototypes of a system to accelerate the systems development process.
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Rational Unified Process (RUP) Methodology
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Provides a framework for breaking down the development of software into four gates.
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Requirements Management
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The process of managing changes to the business requirements throughout the project.
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Requirements Definition Document
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Prioritizes all of the business requirements by order of importance to the company.
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Responsibility Matrix
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Defines all project roles and indicates what responsibilities are associated with each role.
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Scripting Language
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A programming method that provides for interactive modules to a website.
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Services
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Tasks that customers will buy to satisfy a want or need.
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Sign-Off
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Users' actual signatures, including they approve all of the business requirements.
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Software Customization
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Modifies software to meet specific user or business requirements.
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Software Engineering
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A disciplined approach for constructing information systems through the use of common methods, techniques, or tools.
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Status Report
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Periodic review or actual performance versus expected performance.
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Systems Development Life Cycle (SDLC)
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The overall process for developing information systems, from planning and analysis through implementation and maintenance.
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System Testing
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Verifies that the units or pieces of code function correctly when integrated.
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Tangible Benefits
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Easy to quantify and typically measured to determine the success or failure of a project.
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Test Condition
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Details the steps the system must perform along with the expected result of each step.
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Testing Phase
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Brings all the project pieces together into a special testing environment to eliminate errors and bugs and verify that the system meets all the business requirements defined in the analysis phase.
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Unit Testing
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Testing individual units or pieces of code for a system.
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User Acceptance Testing (UAT)
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Determines whether the system satisfies the user and business requirements.
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User Documentation
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Highlights how to use the system and how to troubleshoot issues or problems.
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Waterfall Methodology
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A sequence of phases in which the output of each phase becomes the input for the next.
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Web Service
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An open-standards way of supporting interoperability.
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Workshop Training
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Held in a classroom environment and led by an instructor.
