Information Technology
The development of a computer-based information system includes a systems analysis phase which produces or enhances the data model which itself is a precursor to creating or enhancing a database (see Christopher J. Date "An Introduction to Database Systems"). There are a number of different approaches to system analysis. When a computer-based information system is developed, systems analysis (according to the Waterfall model) would constitute the following steps:
- The development of a feasibility study, involving determining whether a project is economically, socially, technologically and organizationally feasible.
- Conducting fact-finding measures, designed to ascertain the requirements of the system's end-users. These typically span interviews, questionnaires, or visual observations of work on the existing system.
- Gauging how the end-users would operate the system (in terms of general experience in using computer hardware or software), what the system would be used for and so on
Another view outlines a phased approach to the process. This approach breaks systems analysis into 5 phases:
- Scope Definition
- Problem analysis
- Requirements analysis
- Logical design
- Decision analysis
Use cases are a widely-used systems analysis modeling tool for identifying and expressing the functional requirements of a system. Each use case is a business scenario or event for which the system must provide a defined response. Use cases evolved out of object-oriented analysis; however, their use as a modeling tool has become common in many other methodologies for system analysis and design.
Read more about this topic: Systems Analysis
Famous quotes containing the words information technology, information and/or technology:
“As information technology restructures the work situation, it abstracts thought from action.”
—Shoshana Zuboff (b. 1951)
“The real, then, is that which, sooner or later, information and reasoning would finally result in, and which is therefore independent of the vagaries of me and you. Thus, the very origin of the conception of reality shows that this conception essentially involves the notion of a COMMUNITY, without definite limits, and capable of a definite increase of knowledge.”
—Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914)
“The real accomplishment of modern science and technology consists in taking ordinary men, informing them narrowly and deeply and then, through appropriate organization, arranging to have their knowledge combined with that of other specialized but equally ordinary men. This dispenses with the need for genius. The resulting performance, though less inspiring, is far more predictable.”
—John Kenneth Galbraith (b. 1908)