MIS180 Chapter 9 – Flashcards
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Planning Phase
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Establishes a high-level plan of the intended project and determines project and determines project goals.
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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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Business Requirements
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The specific business requests the system must meet to be successful, so the analysis phase is critical.
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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 (turns the project focus to the physical or technical point of view)
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Development Phase
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Takes all the detailed design documents from the design phase and transforms them into the actual system.
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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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Implementation Phase
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The organization places the system into production so users can begin to perform actual business operations with it.
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Maintenance Phase
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The organization performs changes, corrections, additions, and upgrades to ensure the system continues to meet business goals.
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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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Project assumption
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Factors considered to be true, real, or certain without proof or demonstration. Examples include hours in a workweek or time of year the work will be performed
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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 objectives
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Quantifiable criteria that must be met for the project to be considered a success
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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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Status report
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Periodic reviews of actual performance versus expected performance
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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 Management Office (PMO)
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An internal department that oversees all organizational projects.
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Project Stakeholders
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Are 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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Executive Sponsor
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The person or group who provides the financial resources for the project.
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Project Charter
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A document issued by the project initiator or sponsor that formally authorizes the start of a project and provides the project manager with the authority to apply organizational resources to project activities.
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Change Control Board (CCB)
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Is responsible for approving or rejecting all change requests.
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Systems Development Life Cycle (SDLC)
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Overall process for developing information systems, from planning and analysis through implementation and maintenance. Foundation for all systems development methods. Includes determining budgets, gathering system requirements, and writing detailed user documentation
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Legacy system
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Old system that is fast approaching or beyond the end of its useful life within an organization
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Conversion
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Process of transferring information from a legacy system to a new system
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Software customization
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Modifies software to meet specific user or business requirements
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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 organization's needs
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What are the 7 phases of Systems Development Life Cycle (SDLC)
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1) Planning 2)Analysis 3)Design 4)Development 5)Testing 6)Implementation 7)Maintenance
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Change agent
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Person or event that is the catalyst for the implementing major changes for a system to meet business changes
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Brainstorming
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Technique for generating ideas by encouraging participants to offer as many ideas as possible in a short period without any analysis until all the ideas have been exhausted
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The Project Management Institute (PMI)
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Develops procedures and concepts necessary to support the profession of project management (www.pmi.org)
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Project
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Temporary activity a company undertakes to create a unique product, service, or result (usually dynamic in nature)
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Project management
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Application of knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to project activities to meet project requirements
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Project manager
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An individual who is expert in project planning and management, defines and develops a project plan, and tracks the plan to ensure that the project is completed on time and on budget
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Project scope
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Describes the business need (the problem the project will solve) and the justification, requirements, and current boundaries for the project
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Project plan
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Formal, approved document that manages and controls the entire project
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Business requirements
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Specific business requests the system must meet to be successful, so the analysis is critical because business requirements drive the entire systems development effort (it will state what the system must accomplish in order to be considered successful)
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Requirements definition document
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Prioritizes all the business requirements by order of importance to the company (like a hierarchal to-do list)
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Sign-off
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Users' actual signatures indicating they approve all of the business requirements
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Software engineering
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Disciplined approach for constructing information systems through the use of common methods, techniques, or tools
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Computer-aided software engineering (CASE)
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Tools which provide automated support for the development of the system
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Control objects for information and related technology (COBIT)
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Set of best practices that helps an organization to maximize the benefits of an information system, while at the same time establishing appropriate controls to ensure minimum errors
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Scripting language
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Programming method that provides for interactive modules to a website
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Object-oriented languages
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Group data and corresponding processes into objects
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Fourth-generation languages (4GL)
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Programming languages that look similar to human languages. For example a typical 4GL command might state, "FIND ALL RECORDS WHERE NAME IS "SMITH"
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Programming languages in order
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1) First generation: Machine language difficult for people to understand 2) Second generation: Assembly language difficult for businesspeople to understand 3)Third generation: High-level programming languages, such as C, C++, and Java 4)Fourth generation: Programming languages that look similar to human languages 5) Fifth generation: Programming languages for artificial intelligence and neural networks
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Bugs
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Defects in the code of an information system (each time the actual result is different from the expected, a "bug" is generated and the system must be fixed in development)
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Test conditions
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Detail the steps the system must perform among with the expected result of each step
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Ambiguous requirement
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The financial report must show profits in local and U.S. currencies (example-requirements may contain everyday words whose meanings are "obvious" to everyone, yet different for everyone)
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Unambiguous requirement
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The financial report must show profits in local and U.S. currencies using the exchange rate printed in The Wall Street Journal for the last business day of the period reported (a requirement is unambiguous if it has the same interpretation for all parties)
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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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Online training
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Runs over the Internet or on a CD or DVD, and employees complete the training on their own time at their own pace
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Workshop training
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Held in a classroom environment and led by an instructor
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Help desk
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Desk or group of people who respond to users' questions (one of the best ways to support users)
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Alpha testing (test used in systems development)
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Assess if the entire system meets the design requirements of the users
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Development testing (test used in systems development)
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Test the system to ensure that it's bug free
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Integration testing (test used in systems development)
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Verify that separate systems can work together, passing data back and forth correctly
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System testing (test used in systems development)
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Verify that the units or pieces of code function correctly when integrated
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User Acceptance Testing (UAT) test used in systems development
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Determine if the system satisfies the user and business requirements
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Unit testing (test used in systems development)
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Test individual units or pieces of code for a system
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Parallel Implementation (a part of system implementation methods)
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Uses both the legacy system and the new system until all users verify that the new system functions correctly
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Plunge Implementation (a part of system implementation methods)
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Discards the legacy system and immediately migrates all users to the new system
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Pilot Implementation (a part of system implementation methods)
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Assigns a small group of people to use the new system until it is verified that is works correctly; then the remaining users migrate to the new system
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Phased Implementation (a part of system implementation methods)
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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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Corrective maintenance
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Makes system changes to repair design flaws, coding errors, or implementation issues
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Preventative maintenance
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Makes system changes to reduce the chance of a future system failure
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Internal report
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Presents data that are distributed inside the organization and intended for employees within an organization. Internal reports typically support day-to-day operations monitoring that supports managerial decision making
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Detailed internal report
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Presents information with little or no filtering or restrictions of data
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Summary internal report
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Organizes and categorizes data for managerial use. Summarizes total sales by product for each month is an example of summary internal report
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Exception reporting
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Highlights situations occurring outside of the normal operating range for a condition or standard. Include only exceptions and might highlight accounts that are unpaid or delinquent
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Information system control report
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Ensures the reliability of information, consisting of policies and their physical implementation, access restrictions, or record keeping of actions and transactions
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Informations systems audit report
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Assesses a company's information system to determine necessary changes and to help ensure the information systems' availability, confidentiality, and integrity
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Post-implementation report
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Present a formal report or audit of a project after it's up and running
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Methodology
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Set of policies, procedures, standards, processes, practices, tools, techniques, and tasks that people apply to technical and management challenges
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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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Traditional waterfall methodology
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No longer serves most of today's implementation efforts. It is inflexible and expensive and requires rigid adherence to the sequence of steps. It's success rate is only 1 in 10
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Issues related to the Waterfall Methodology
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1) The business problem: Any flaws in accurately defining and articulating the business problem in terms of what the business users actually require flow onward to the next phase 2) The plan: Managing costs, resources, and time constraints is difficult in the waterfall sequence. Unexpected contingencies may sabotage the plan 3) The waterfall methodology is problematic in that is assumes users can specify all business requirements in advance
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Prototyping
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Modern design approach where the designers and system users can use the iterative (repeating a process until reaching a goal) approach to building the system
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Discovery prototyping
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Builds a small-scale representation or working model of the system to ensure it meets the user and business requirements
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Advantages of prototypes
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-Encourages user participation -Evolve through iteration, better supports change -Prototypes have physical quality allowing users to see, touch, and experience the system as it is developed -Detect errors earlier -Accelerates the phases of the SDLC, helping to ensure success
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Iterative development
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Consists of a series of tiny projects. It has become the foundation of multiple agile methodologies
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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. It is fast, efficient, lower cost, and fewer features
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Primary forms of agile methodology
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-Rapid prototyping or rapid application development methodology -Extreme programming methodology -Rational unified process (RUP) methodology -Scrum methodology
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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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Fundamentals of Rapid Application Development (RAD)
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-Focus initially on creating a prototype that looks and acts like the desired system -Actively involve system users in the analysis, design, and development phases -Accelerate collecting the business requirements through an interactive and iterative construction approach
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Extreme programing (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. It's four phases are: planning, designing, coding, and testing. Saves time and produces successful projects
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Four phases of Extreme Programing Methodology broken down
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-Planning-user interviews, meetings, and small releases -Designing-functionality is not added until it is required or needed -Coding-developers work together soliciting continuous feedback from users, eliminating the communication gap Testing-test requirements are generated before any code is developed
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What does Extreme Programming (XP) encourage people to do?
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XP encourages managers, customers, and developers to work together as a team to ensure the delivery of high-quality systems
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Rational Unified Process (RUP) methodology
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Owned by IBM, provides a framework for breaking down the development of software into 4 gates. Each gate consists of executable (able to run by a computer) iterations of software in development
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The four gates of Rational Unified Process (RUP)
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-Gate one-Inception: This phase ensures all stakeholders have a shared understanding of the proposed system and what it will do -Gate two-Elaboration: This phase ensures all stakeholders have a shared understanding of the proposed system and what it will do -Gate three-Construction: This phase includes building and developing the product -Gate four-Transition: Primary questions answered in this phase address ownership of the system and training of key personnel
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Scrum methodology
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Uses small teams to produce small pieces of software using a series of "sprints" or 30-day intervals, to achieve an appointed goal. Each day ends or begins with a stand-up meeting to monitor and control the development effort
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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 (examples-decreased expenses, decreased errors, decreased response time, and increased quality)
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Intangible benefits
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Difficult to quantify or measure (examples-improved decision making, improved community service, improved goodwill, and improved morale)
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Feasibility
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Measure of the tangible and intangible benefits of an information system
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Economic feasibility
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Measures the cost-effectiveness of a project
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Operational feasibility
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Measures how well a solution meets the identified system requirements to solve the problems and take advantage of opportunities
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Schedule feasibility
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Measures the project time frame to ensure it can be completed on time
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Technical feasibility
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Measures the practicality of a technical solution and the availability of technical resources and expertise
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Political feasibility
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Measures how well the solution can be implemented within existing legal and contractual obligations
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Legal feasibility
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Measures how well a solution can be implemented within an existing legal and contractual obligations
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Primary reasons projects fail
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-Unclear or missing business requirements (most common reason) -Skipped SDLC phases -Changing technology -The cost of finding errors -Balance of the triple constraints (balance of time, resources, and scope)
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What did the Project Management Institute create?
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The Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK) for the certification and education of project managers
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Project deliverable (PMBOK)
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Any measurable, tangible, verifiable outcome that is produced to complete a project or part of a project
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Project scope statement (PMBOK)
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Links the project to the organization's overall business goals. Describes the business need and the justification, requirements, and current boundaries for the project. Defines the work that must be completed to deliver the product with the specified features and functions
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Responsibility matrix (PMBOK)
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Periodic reviews of actual performance versus expected performance
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Kill switch
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Trigger that enables a project manager to close the project before completion
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Program Evaluation and Review Technique chart (PERT)
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Graphical network model that depicts a projects tasks and the relationships between them. PERT charts define dependency between project tasks before those tasks are scheduled
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Dependency
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Logical relationship that exists between the project tasks, or between a project task and a milestone
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SMART Criteria for successful objective creation
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-Specific -Measurable -Agreed Upon -Realistic -Time Frame
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Critical path
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Estimates the shortest path through the project ensuring all critical tasks are completed from start to finish
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Gantt chart
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Simple bar chart that lists project tasks vertically against the project's time frame, listed horizontally. It works well for representing the project schedule and progress of tasks
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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 within an organization
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Out-sourcing
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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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Common reasons companies outsource
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-Acquire the best practices and business process expertise of highly skilled technology -Financial savings -Rapid growth -The Internet and globalization
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Three forms of outsourcing options
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1) Onshore outsourcing-engaging another company within the same country for services 2) Nearshore outsourcing-contracting an outsourcing arrangement with an company in a nearby country (usually shares a border) 3) Offshore outsourcing-using organizations from developing countries to write code and develop systems
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Outsourcing challenges
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-Length of contract (usually several years) -Threat to competitive advantage -Loss of confidentiality
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Mission impossible project
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Great chance of success and you will find happiness in the work
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Ugly project
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High chance of success but is very painful and offers little happiness
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Kamikaze project
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Little chance of success but very passionate about the content/it makes you happy
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Suicide project
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No chance of success and offers no happiness
