Assignment 3

(Decision Support System & Expert System)

Submitted To:

Prof. Dr. Vinay Singh

By
Ishan Kakkar (2019MBA-13)
Assignment 3
Q1. In a situation of pandemic and strict national lockdown, how IT-based support
systems (DSS and ES especially) can help to organizations’ internal and external
customers.
DSS & ES can help organisations’ internal and external customers, in the following domains:
1. E-Commerce
E-commerce is defined as an attempt to increase transactional efficiency and effectiveness in
all aspects of the design, production, marketing and sales of products or services for existing
and developing marketplaces through the utilization of current and emerging electronic
technologies.
The criteria management
module manages and records
user preferences on pre-set
criteria. The users specify their
perceived relative importance
on certain product features in
fuzzy terms; they can also rule
out certain which they consider
being insignificant.
Taking the user preference
information from criteria
management module and the
product attributes from product
database, the fuzzy filter
module calculates the fuzzy “grades” for all product alternatives. The fuzzy filter module
generates the partitions with different grades of desirability, and passes this information to the
clustering module for generating clusters inside these partitions.
The clustering module executes cluster analysis to discover the dissimilar product classes in
order to present the most different suggestions. The maximum number of alternatives presented
to the customer can be determined in advance or automatically. Moreover, to avoid cognitive
overload to the customer, this number should be reasonably small.
The recommender profiles module represents the rationale behind the recommendations
generated by the system. It relates the key “values” of the customers with the features of the
recommended products. This is in-line with the means-end theory on web browsing activities
which suggests that customer’s choice on certain product attributes is essentially a means to
attain certain personal values. Decision support system plays an important role in application
of E-commerce. Benefits of e-commerce adoption include improved customer service, better
inventory control, and lower marketing and distribution costs, reduced cycle time, increased
market reach, and reduced operation costs. Other benefits include global connectivity, high
accessibility, scalability, interoperability, and interactivity. The fast expansion of low-cost
Internet access and related services has certainly been the main driver of this new business
revolution and offers many SMEs the opportunity to venture into e-commerce at a price they
can afford and at a level they can relate to. Effective use of a Website can provide increased
levels of customer service and by simply using the Internet; it can act as a valuable information
source. Thus, we can say that DSS has major impact on all types of business decisions.

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2. Business-to-Business
In business to business (B2B) applications, the buyers, sellers, and transactions involve only
organizations. Business-to-business comprises about 85 percent of the total. e-commerce
volume. In the sell-side marketplace model, organizations attempt to sell their products or
services to other organizations electronically from their own marketplace (private e-
marketplace). This model is similar to the B2C model in which the buyer is expected to come
to the seller's site, view catalogue, and place an order. In this case, however, the buyer is an
organization. The key mechanisms in the sell-side model are:
• Electronic catalogues that can be customized for each large buyer,
• Forward auctions.
DSS/B2B relationships are probably the strongest in DSS/EC. The reason is that B2B
concentrates on supply-chain relationships, where it is necessary to make decisions. regarding
inventory management, shipments and logistics, supply-chain synchronization, warehousing,
production scheduling, and more. DSS applications are traditionally concentrated in these
areas. Another area of interface is collaborative planning, collaborative design, and other types
of B2B collaboration in which workflow systems, groupware, and GDSS plays a major role.
3. Collaborative Commerce
Collaborative commerce (e-commerce) refers to non-selling/buying transactions between and
among organizations, such as joint product design, joint forecasted demand, and other joint
decision-making activities. An example would be a company that collaborates electronically
with a vendor that is designing a product or part for it. C-commerce implies communication,
information sharing, joint decision-making, and collaboration, supported electronically by
tools such as groupware and specially designed EC collaboration tools. DSS models are usually
involved. The areas of collaboration where DSS are involved are as follows:
• Retailer-suppliers: Large retailers, such as Wal-Mart, collaborate with their major
suppliers to conduct production and inventory planning and forecasting of demand.
Such collaboration enables the suppliers to improve their production planning as well.
DSS models are used for such planning, forecast etc.
• Vendor-managed inventory: This is a service provided by large suppliers, such as
Procter & Gamble, to large retailers, such as Wal-Mart, in which the vendor monitors
and replenishes the inventory for the retailer. In some cases, vendor-managed inventory
programs are now available to small retailers as well. DSS models are used to
determine under quantity.
• Product design: All the parties involved in a specific product design share data and
use special tools. One such tool is screen sharing, in which several people can work on
the same screen while in different locations. This enables suppliers to provide quick
feedback when they see the drawings of a product the customer wants. Changes made
in one place are visible to others instantly. Documents that can be processed through
collaborative product design include blueprints, bills of material, accounting and billing
documents, and joint reports and statements.
• Collaborative manufacturing: Manufacturers can create dynamic collaborative
networks. For example, Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM) outsource
components and subassemblies to suppliers, which in the past often created problems
in coordination, work flows, and communication. Collaborative tools have improved
the outsourcing process, and are especially useful during changes, which may be
initiated by any partner of the supply chain.

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Assignment 3
In these times of national lockdown as well as in normal course of business many business
activities and functions lend themselves to collaborative processes:
• Planning and scheduling: material positioning, visibility forecasts, advanced planning,
forecasting, and capacity management;
• Design: mechanical, electrical, test, and others, as. well as component selection and
design of and for the supply chain;
• New product information: design validation, bill-of-material management, prototyping,
production validation, and testing;
• Product-content management: generating changes, change-impact assessment, phase-
in of changes;
• Order management: order capture and configuration, order tracking, and delivery
arrangements;
• Sourcing and procurement: approving vendors, reverse auctions (tendering), supplier
selection, strategic sourcing, component selection. A major tool for such collaboration
is collaborative workflow management for production.

4. E-governance
E-government is the use of Internet technology in general, and of e-commerce in particular, to
deliver information and public services to citizens, business partners and suppliers, and workers
in the public sector. It is also an efficient way of conducting business transactions with citizens
and businesses and within governments. The benefits of e-government are:
• Improves the efficiency and effectiveness of the functions of government, including the
delivery of public services.
• Enables governments to be more transparent to citizens and businesses by giving access
to more of the information generated by government.
• Facilitates fundamental changes in the relationships between citizens and governments.
• Offers greater opportunities for citizens to provide feedback to government agencies
and to participate in democratic institutions and processes.
E-governance applications can be divided into three major categories:
• Government-to-citizens (G2C),
• Government-to-business (G2B), and
• Government-to government (G2G).
Government agencies are increasingly using the Internet to provide services to citizens. An
example would be direct benefits transfer (DBT), in which government transfers Social
Security, pension, and other benefits directly to recipients’ bank accounts or to smart cards.
Governments also are using the Internet to conduct business with businesses (sell to or buy
from).

5. Distance Learning/E-Learning

DSS/GSS online classroom learning advantages

• Enables brainstorming, chat, discussion boards & distribution of information, lectures
• Publishing to course site
• Videoconferencing
• Making available consistent course materials to students as well as trainers/teachers.
Also, textbooks have become electronic.
• E-mails and listservs for faster & easier communication.

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Assignment 3
• One-on-one interaction has been made possible.
• Allows for global classrooms anytime/anyplace with fixed deadlines & flexible time
frame doesn’t interfere with work shift.
• Low delivery costs with large audiences
Today DSSs are facilitating each and every aspect of the lives of the common people
(irrespective of lockdown). DSS also facilitates tons of requirements of internal & external
customers of an organisation, like facilitation of payments etc.

6. Expert System with AI

The expert systems are the computer applications developed to solve complex problems in a
particular domain, at the level of extra-ordinary human intelligence and expertise.

In this pandemic and strict national lockdown situation of COVID – 19, the Government of
India emerges out with the best application of Expert System with AI in the app named
“Aarogya Setu”.

Aarogya Setu is a COVID – 19 tracking mobile application developed by National Informatics

Centre that comes under the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, Government
of India. The stated purpose of this app is to spread the awareness and to connect essential
health services to the people of India. This app will augment the initiatives of the Department
of Health to contain the risks of COVID-19, and sharing the best practices and advisories. This
is a tracking app which uses smartphone's GPS and Bluetooth features to track the coronavirus
infection. Aarogya Setu app is available for Android and iOS mobile operating systems. Using
Bluetooth technology, the Aarogya Setu app tries to determine the risk if one has been near a
Covid-19 infected person (within six feet of distance) by scanning through a database of known
cases across India, and using location information it determines the location one is in belongs
to the infected areas based on the data available. Aarogya Setu has four sections in the new UI,
viz, Your Status, Self-Assess, COVID-19 Update, and E-pass (which is yet to go active). Your
Status tells the risk of getting COVID-19 for the user. Self-Assess lets the user know the risk
of being infected. COVID-19 Update gives update on the local and national COVID-19 cases.
The app is also built on a platform that can provide Application Programming Interface (API)
so that other computer programs, mobile applications and web services can make use of the
features and data available of Aarogya Setu.

Expert System helps businesses and government organizations take full advantage of the
growing internal and external information they manage. Many software enables the
organization to:

• Automate business processes by performing repetitive tasks that traditionally require

human intervention.
• Make better, more informed decisions by improving knowledge discovery.
• Transform customer engagement through interactions in natural language.
• With Expert System, one can bring automation and understanding to some of the most
information-intensive processes so that the teams can focus on more value added,
creative and innovative activities.

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Assignment 3
The following table shows where ES is applied in several domains:

Application Description

Design Domain Camera lens design, automobile design.

Diagnosis Systems to deduce cause of disease from observed

Medical Domain
data, conduction medical operations on humans.

Comparing data continuously with observed system or with

Monitoring Systems prescribed behaviour such as leakage monitoring in long
petroleum pipeline.

Process Control Systems Controlling a physical process based on monitoring.

Knowledge Domain Finding out faults in vehicles, computers.

Detection of possible fraud, suspicious transactions, stock

Finance/Commerce
market trading, Airline scheduling, cargo scheduling.

Design Domain
Even with the prominence of computer-aided techniques, designing a lens, or optical system,
still relies on an optical engineer's judgment based on knowledge and experience. Nevertheless,
computer programs can speed up the process by quickly generating multiple starting layouts,
which define the number, positions and types of individual lens elements in the system. The
engineer can select or generate a suitable design with which to start, and then optimize it using
software to get a final form that meets given performance specifications.

In case of automobile, Ford comes up with the idea of 3D printing in which they use certain
expert system to design the complex design to meet the customer requirements.

Medical Domain
The medical diagnostic expert system has been designed to diagnose based on the individual's
symptoms using knowledge base rule and suggests basic precautionary steps subject to the time
the patient can access medical personnel.

Monitoring Systems
An expert decision support system helps in monitoring, control and diagnosis of petroleum
production and separation, data from various components of the plant are automatically
collected and transmitted to the decision support system for analysis. The system can monitor
operations at the plant based on the input data, detect abnormalities in the data and suggest
diagnostic actions to the operator.

Process Control Systems

An expert system helps to deal with large volumes of current and historic data that can be
analysed to make inferences about the process state and the need for control actions,
consistently and quickly. Expert systems have great potential to serve as support for operator
decisions and to improve control in several processes.

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Assignment 3
Knowledge Domain
In this, the expert system uses simulation to help in complex problem solving and makes it easy
for the students to understand the concept in detail behind the problem with real life scenarios.

Finance/Commerce
In order to reduce the risk of human error in Financial domains, expert systems are seen to
offer a great advantage in big data environments. Besides their efficiency in quantitative
analysis such as profitability, banking management, and strategic financial planning, expert
systems have successfully treated qualitative issues including financial analysis, investment
advisories, and knowledge-based decision support systems.

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