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5 Components of Information Systems

WRITTEN BY:  Erik Gregersen SHARE:  

The computer age introduced a new element to businesses, universities, and a multitude of other organizations: a set
of components called the information system, which deals with collecting and organizing data and information. An
information system is described as having ve components.

1 Computer hardware
This is the physical technology that works with information. Hardware can be as small as a smartphone that ts in a
pocket or as large as a supercomputer that lls a building. Hardware also includes the peripheral devices that work
with computers, such as keyboards, external disk drives, and routers. With the rise of the Internet of things, in which
anything from home appliances to cars to clothes will be able to receive and transmit data, sensors that interact with
computers are permeating the human environment.

2 Computer software

The hardware needs to know what to do, and that is the role of software. Software can be divided into two types: 
system software and application software. The primary piece of system software is the operating system, such as
Windows or iOS, which manages the hardware’s operation. Application software is designed for speci c tasks, such as
handling a spreadsheet, creating a document, or designing a Web page.

3 Telecommunications
This component connects the hardware together to form a network. Connections can be through wires, such as
Ethernet cables or bre optics, or wireless, such as through Wi-Fi. A network can be designed to tie together
computers in a speci c area, such as an of ce or a school, through a local area network (LAN). If computers are more
dispersed, the network is called a wide area network (WAN). The Internet itself can be considered a network of
networks.

4 Databases and data warehouses

This component is where the “material” that the other components work with resides. A database is a place where
data is collected and from which it can be retrieved by querying it using one or more speci c criteria. A data
warehouse contains all of the data in whatever form that an organization needs. Databases and data warehouses
have assumed even greater importance in information systems with the emergence of “big data,” a term for the truly
massive amounts of data that can be collected and analyzed.

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5 Human resources and procedures

The nal, and possibly most important, component of information systems is the human element: the people that
are needed to run the system and the procedures they follow so that the knowledge in the huge databases and data
warehouses can be turned into learning that can interpret what has happened in the past and guide future action.

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