The impact of information technology will have significant effects on the structure, management and function of most organisations. It demands new patterns of work organisation and effects individual jobs, the structure of groups and teams, the nature of supervision and managerial roles. Information technology results in changes to lines of command, authority and the need for reconstructing the organisation structure and attention to job design. Computer based information and decision support systems influence choices in design of production or service activities, hierarchical structures and organisations of support staffs. Information technology may influence the centralization or decentralization of decision making and control systems. New technology has resulted in a flatter organisational structure with fewer levels of management required. In the case of new office technology it allows the potential for staff at clerical/operator level to carry out a wider range of functions and to check their own work. The result is Continue reading
Modern Information Systems
New Trends In E-Business
E-business changed the way business was being done over the years. It created more and more avenues and opportunities. E-business changed the competitive platform. While the old competitive barriers are diminishing it created new entry and competitive barriers. The hard competitive barriers are becoming weak while the soft competitive barriers became more and more prominent. It is believed that not even 50% of the potential of e-business is to be unleashed yet. This definitely indicates that e-business has lot more to offer. E-business has appealed the businesses and customers from all segments. E-business increased the connectivity among different businesses. The integration among departments, different businesses, and different sectors through e-business made it possible to offer variety of services to customers. The new technologies, high speed internet made the transactions possible. Improved integration and interoperability needs of next generation e-business systems are met by new e-business solution architectures. New technologies of Continue reading
Data Mining Functionalities
Data mining has an important place in today’s world. It becomes an important research area as there is a huge amount of data available in most of the applications. This huge amount of data must be processed in order to extract useful information and knowledge, since they are not explicit. Data Mining is the process of discovering interesting knowledge from large amount of data. The kinds of patterns that can be discovered depend upon the data mining tasks employed. By and large, there are two types of data mining tasks: descriptive data mining tasks that describe the general properties of the existing data, and predictive data mining tasks that attempt to do predictions based on inference on available data. The data mining functionalities and the variety of knowledge they discover are briefly presented in the following list: Characterization: It is the summarization of general features of objects in a target Continue reading
Virtual Private Network (VPN) Tunneling Protocols
Virtual Private Network (VPN) create secure connections, called tunnels, through public shared communication infrastructures such as the Internet. These tunnels are not physical entities, but logical constructs, created using encryption, security standards, and protocols. The VPN tunneling protocols are set of standardized rules and policy that are employed on the transmitted data. There are various standard of protocol technologies used to create a VPN tunnel and each of these protocols is specially built with some unique security features. The most widely used Virtual Private Network (VPN) Tunneling Protocols are discussed below. Internet Protocol Security (IPSec) The Internet Protocol Security (IPSec) has proposed in Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) Request for Comment (RFC) database in RFC (2401), provides data packet integrity, confidentiality and authentication over IP networks. The IPSec policy consists of sets of rules that designate the traffic to be protected, the type of protection, such as authentication or confidentiality, Continue reading
Components of Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP)
VoIP stands for Voice over Internet Protocol. It is a technology that lets you make telephone calls over the Internet, rather than a regular phone line. Which is almost always cheaper. VoIP works by using a network technology known as Packet Switching Network whereas landline telephones use the Circuit Switching Network. This is referred to as the Public Switched Telephone Network. The main difference between Packet Switching and Circuit Switching is that Packet Switching uses (data) or Packets and sends them over the Internet while Circuit Switching is accomplished by using electrical circuits to make a telephone connection. Circuit Switching is like the old Switchboard operators, frantically trying to connect the right caller with the receiver. Packet Switching is used to transfer data all across the Internet including E-mail. Packet Switching converts audio formats into data packets and transmits them over the Internet, then reassembles them on the other person’s Continue reading
Case Study of PanAmSat: Recovering from a Satellite Failure
A Galaxy 4 satellite operated by PanAmSat, a subsidiary of Hughes Electronics, tilted away from the earth at 6:13 P.M. on May 19, 1998 and began to spin because of a computer failure and the subsequent failure of a backup computer. This unexpected problem disabled 80% to 90% of the pager services in the U.S. along with a number of credit card authorization networks, television transmissions, and other networked services. PanAmSat’s effects to realign the satellite failed, but it was able to restore service within a day by rerouting the traffic the satellite normally handled. Of the 17 satellites PanAmSat had in orbit at the time, one was a spare. The recovery plan included rerouting signals for paging, retail-store services, and other services though its Galaxy 3R satellite and rerouting television signals through its Galaxy 4 had occupied since its launch in 1993. Computer failure had transformed the Galaxy 4 Continue reading