1. Why do we need information system?

Explain relation between balanced score cards and

information system.
Ans We need of information system because of the following reasons:

i. Utilization of large quantities of data and information

ii. Decision support
iii. Information security
iv. Information flexibility
v. Information sharing
vi. Smooth running of operation

The relationship between information system and balanced scorecard is that balanced scorecard issued,
because of the importance of information systems (IS) performance evaluation. Moreover, information
systems strategic management based on systems performance was considered in order to formulate the
information systems strategy based on the results of the systems performance. The information systems
strategic management was analyzed on the basis of balanced scorecard maturity model

2. Explain information system architecture.

Ans An information system architecture is a formal definition of the business processes and rules,
systems structure, technical framework, and product technologies for a business or organizational
information system.
An information system architecture usually consists of four layers:
• Business process architecture,
• Systems architecture,
• Technical architecture,
• Product delivery architecture.
The architecture of an information system encompasses the hardware and software used to deliver the
solution to the final consumer of services.Information system architecture is a blue print used to
develop, implement, maintain the elements in the organization.

Business architecture is a blue print of enterprise, that provides a common understanding of the
organization and is used to align objectives and demands.

A System architecture is the conceptual model that defines the structure, behavior and more views of
the systems. here we set the conventions, rules and standards employed in a system.

A Technical architecture defines all the Technical requirements like operational, performance, etc.

Product delivery architecture as the information regarding the delivery of the product, maintenance, etc.
Example for the system Architecture:
This is for the architecture for the banking services.

3. Define different physical and logical security that can be applied to information system. What
are the key thread and vulnerabilities against with information system must protected? What are
the different control measures that can be applied to protect information system against such
threats?

Ans The different physical and logical security that can be applied to information system are listed
below;
a. Locking the server room and providing with security guards and CCTV cameras with
burglar detection systems.

b. Educate the information system users about the different types of attach that can occur
and how they can happen.

c. Update the systems regularly and use antivirus software.

d. Use of firewalls to prevent unnecessary access to the systems.

e. Thoroughly scan the system for any data breach attempts by the use of White Hat
Hackers.

f. Check psychology of different users regularly and prevent unauthorized access by the
employees at any cost.

g. Common security measures and encryption mechanisms must be there to protect users
from prying ears.

By applying these solutions business organization can prevent themselves from great risk of
losing money and prestige.Information Systems because they store information and process them,
theyare vulnerableto different threats and misuse of information. Some of the common threats of the
contemporary information systems are shown below;

a. Physical Theft:
Information systems when not secured can be lost when they are not secure properly

b. Malware:
They are annoying, hostile and intrusive computer programs that hurts the information systems.

c. Computer Virus:
These are small pieces of software that can spread from one infected system to another corrupting and
stealing data in the computer even erasing everything in hard drive.

d. Trojan Horse:
Information System can get trojan horse software by simply downloading and installing software from
unknown sources. These appear legitimate but are rouge security software designed to lure people into
the designer’s scheme.

e.Spyware:
They are the software created by cybercriminals to spy on their victims. Spywares on the information
systems can cause severe information leaks like; trade secret leaking to the world that can cause serious
damage.

f. Spam:
Spam messages however may seem harmless and are clutter to the devices but they contain the links
which when clicked on could go to a website and install malicious software onto the system.

g. Phishing:
Phishing are fraudulent attempts by the hackers to obtain private information.In phishing user
deliberately puts the private information to the cybercriminals by which they can attack whoever are
psychologically vulnerable to give private information to illegitimate sources.
Following are some of the technologies and tools for protecting information resources.

a. Encryption:
Processing or transforming plain text into gibberish (cyphertext) that cannot be read by anyone other
than the sender and intended receiver.

b. SSL/TLS and HTTPS:

Method of encrypting network traffic in the web.

c. Digital Certificates:
Establish protection of identity of users and electronic assets for protection of online transactions.

d. Fault Tolerance and High Availability:

Redundant hardware to prevent down time of the resources.

e. Firewalls:
Software to prevent users from accessing unauthorized private networks.

f. Intrusion Detection System:

Monitor vulnerable points in a network to detect and deter unauthorized intruders.

g. Digital Signatures:
Digital code attached to electronically transmitted messages to uniquely identify contents and sender.

4. What is critical success factors? Explain with example. What are the factors one needs to take
for successful change management in an organization?

Ans Critical success factors are the management term for an element that is necessary for an
organization or project to achieve its mission. It is a critical factor or activity required forensuring the
success of a company or an organization. The term was initially used in the world of data analysis and
business analysis. Critical success factors are those few things that must go well to ensure success for a
manager or organization and therefore they represent those managerial or enterprise areas that must be
given special and continuous attention to bring about high performance.

For example, Critical success factors for a smart phone company can be attributes, product features or
service details for decent design (else unattractive to buy) , had to recognize brand (if no one heard of
company or sales) had to have new innovative features. The factors one need to take for successful
change management in an organization are as follows:

i. plan:
Before undertaking any change, a business needs to have a clear and valid reason and mission for the
change process. Make sure any undertaking, no matter its size or impact, is realistic, measurable and
achievable there ins no use in creating a difficult situation if there is no significant gain to be made for
the organization.

ii. communication:
The most important factor in changing anything within a business, small or large, is to communicate
the change and its factors to the key stakeholders within the organization.

iii. Integrate:
If it's possible for the change in the program of your business to be adjusted, then open up your plans
for consultation with your stakeholder group. The staff of an organization are the people who work
with a particular product, or encounters customers or provide services whatever the case maybe for
your organization.

iv. motivate:
one of the biggest challenges with change management processes comes in the form of motivation.
Some changes are not necessarily beneficial in tough economic changes, occurrences like mergers and
downsizing can create an unmotivated environment in some
businesses.

v. Be confident:
staff are often guilty of reverting to old ways throughout a change process. A change process needs to
be organization wide, so have faith in the change being implemented and show your trust by limiting
opportunities for staff to revert to their old habits

5. Explain the importance of web mining and its types.

Ans Web mining is the process of using data mining techniques and algorithms to extract information
directly from the Web by extracting it from Web documents and services, Web content, hyperlinks and
server logs. The goal of Web mining is to look for patterns in Web data by collecting and analyzing
information in order to gain insight into trends, the industry and users in general.

Its types are:

i) Web content mining — This is the process of mining useful information from the contents of Web
pages and Web documents, which are mostly text, images and audio/video files. Techniques used in this
discipline have been heavily drawn from natural language processing (NLP) and information retrieval.

ii) Web structure mining — This is the process of analyzing the nodes and connection structure of a
website through the use of graph theory. There are two things that can be obtained from this: the
structure of a website in terms of how it is connected to other sites and the document structure of the
website itself, as to how each page is connected.

iii) Web usage mining — This is the process of extracting patterns and information from server logs to
gain insight on user activity including where the users are from, how many clicked what item on the
site and the types of activities being done on the site.
6. Mention the types of cloud computing. Explain about data management in cloud.

Ans The types of Cloud Computing are as follows :

i) Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS):

IaaS is a cloud computing model where virtualized infrastructure is offered to, and managed for,
businesses by external cloud providers. With IaaS, companies can outsource for storages, servers, data
center space and cloud networking components connected through the internet, offering similar
functionality as that of an on-premises infrastructure. Some examples of the wide usage of IaaS are
automated, policy-driven operations such as backup, recovery, monitoring, clustering, internal
networking, website hosting, etc. The service provider is responsible for building the servers and
storage, networking firewalls/ security, and the physical data center. Some key players offering IaaS are
Amazon EC2, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Platform, GoGrid, Rackspace, Digital Ocean among
others.

ii) Platform as a Service (PaaS):

PaaS builds on IaaS. Here, cloud vendors deliver computing resources, both cloud software and
hardware infrastructure components like middleware and operating systems, required to develop and
test applications. The PaaS environment enables cloud users (accessing them via a webpage) to install
and host data sets, development tools and business analytics applications, apart from building and
maintaining necessary hardware. Some key players offering PaaS are Bluemix, CloudBees,
Salesforce.com, Google App Engine, Heroku, AWS, Microsoft Azure, OpenShift, Oracle Cloud, SAP
and OpenShift.

iii) Software as a Service (SaaS):

SaaS is special in that it incorporates both IaaS and Paas. Here, the cloud service provider delivers the
entire software suite as a pay-per-use model. SaaS lets users easily access software applications -- such
as emails -- over the internet. Most common examples of SaaS are Microsoft Office 360,
AppDynamics, Adobe Creative Cloud, Google G Suite, Zoho, Salesforce, Marketo, Oracle CRM,
Pardot Marketing Automation, and SAP Business ByDesign.

Cloud data management is the practice of storing a company’s data on an offsite server that is typically
owned and overseen by a vendor who specializes in cloud data hosting. Managing data in the cloud
provides an automated backup strategy, professional support, and ease of access from any location. The
benefits of a cloud data management system are consistent with the overall benefits the cloud has to
offer, and they are considerable.
i. Security
ii. Scalability and saving
iii. Governed access
iv. Automated backups and disaster recovery
v. Improved data quality
vi. Automated updates
vii. Sustainability
7. Differentiate between text mining and web usage mining.

Text Mining

Text Mining is the discovery by computer of new, previously unknown information, by

automatically extracting information from different written resources. A key element is the
linking together of the extracted information together to form new facts or new hypotheses to
be explored further by more conventional means of experimentation.

Text mining is different from what we’re familiar with in web search. In search, the user is
typically looking for something that is already known and has been written by someone else.
The problem is pushing aside all the material that currently isn’t relevant to your needs in order
to find the relevant information.

In text mining, the goal is to discover heretofore unknown information, something that no one
yet knows and so could not have yet written down.

The difference between regular data mining and text mining is that in text mining the patterns
are extracted from natural language text rather than from structured databases of facts.
Databases are designed for programs to process automatically; text is written for people to read.
We do not have programs that can “read” text and will not have such for the foreseeable future.
Many researchers think it will require a full simulation of how the mind works before we can
write programs that read the way people do.

Web usage mining

Web usage mining is the process of finding out what users are looking for on internet. Some
users might be looking at only textual data whereas some other might want to get multimedia
data. Web usage mining also helps finding the search pattern for a particular group of people
belonging to a particular region.

Using web usage mining, it can extract useful information from the clickstream analysis of web
server log containing details of webpage visits, transactions. Web server log analyzer may
include software such as Net Tracker, Awaits to view how often is the website visited, which
kind of product is the best and worst sellers in a e-commerce website. The ability to track web
users’ browsing behavior down to individual mouse clicks makes it possible to personalize
services for individual customers on a massive scale. This ‘mass customization’ of services not
only helps customers by satisfying their needs, but also results in customer loyalty. Due to a
more personalized and customer-centered approach, the content and structure of a web site canbe
evaluated and adapted to the customer’s preferences and the right offers can be made to the
right customer.
8. Write short notes on Next generation balanced scorecard.

Ans Next generation balanced scorecard is the concept or implementation of the things that are lacking
in the previous balanced scorecard which must be implemented for successful strategic achievement by
an organization. It includes critical alignment, shared responsibility and cause and effect relationships
which are not included in the traditional balanced scorecard. It implements the concept that the
balanced scorecard should be broken down to the underlying levels by taking few of the operational
goals and key figures from each individual strategic goals from top to down. It then assigns each of the
measured variables that can be influenced, to the responsible employees in the sense of the
performance agreement. It also manages a comprehensive target and key figures library to keep track of
the different sectors for strategic controlling.

Fourth Generation Strategic Balanced Scorecard

At Excitant we have helped many clients to systematically capture, implement and manage their
strategy, by adopting 3rd Generation strategic balanced scorecard systems. Increasingly, we have
found our clients want something more than this. For today’s environment we need a significant shift
in how we manage our strategy, people and performance. Yet, I still come across organisations
struggling to get a grip on their organisations, influence behaviour, focus activity, get their staff to do
the right things in the right way. Excitant’s Fourth Generation Balanced Scorecard Approach refines
and adapts their well proven approach for today’s environment. It continues to use those aspects that
are is still appropriate, useful and effective, whist refining what needs to be updated for today’s
environment. Today, we find that clients come from a different place. Recognising they manage amidst
uncertainty and risk, they want agility and responsiveness and the ability to learn as they execute their
strategy. They realise that control and measures are inadequate, it is about treating people as human
beings, focusing on behaviours, not simply measures and targets. They need to empower people to
make decisions locally, have conversations with customers in a human voice and that the most
successful executives are managing with both left and right brains. They need ways to capture and
manage their new models of business and new ways of thinking about strategy more appropriate to the
second and third decade of the 21st century. This is why the Excitant Fourth Generation Strategic
Balanced scorecard have evolved. To answer this different management need.
Fig: The Fourth Generation Balanced scorecard is a natural progression of management needs

9. What is a recommender system? How does it work? Discuss different examples of

recommender system?

Ans A recommendation system is a computer program that helps a user discover products
and content by predicting the user’s rating of each item and showing them the items that they
would rate highly. Recommendation systems are everywhere. Recommendation systems play
an important role in helping users find products and content they care about. Behind the
scenes, these systems are powered by a recommender function. It can be further defined as a
system that produces individualized recommendations as output or has the effect of guiding
the user in a personalized way to interesting objects in a larger space of possible
options. There are different types of recommender systems which work primarily in the
Media and Entertainment industry: Collaborative Recommender system, Content-based
recommender system and Hybrid recommender system.

i) Collaborative Recommender System:

It’s the most sort after, most widely implemented and
most mature technologies that is available in the market. Collaborative recommender systems
aggregate ratings or recommendations of objects, recognize commonalities between the users
on the basis of their ratings, and generate new recommendations based on inter-user
comparisons. The greatest strength of collaborative techniques is that they are completely
independent of any machine-readable representation of the objects being recommended and
work well for complex objects where variations in taste are responsible for much of the
variation in preferences. Collaborative filtering is based on the assumption that people who
agreed in the past will agree in the future and that they will like similar kind of objects as
they liked in the past.

ii) Content based Recommender System:It is mainly classified as an outgrowth and

continuation of information filtering research. In this system, the objects are mainly defined
by their associated features. A content-based recommender learns a profile of the new user’s
interests based on the features present, in objects the user has rated. It’s basically a keyword
specific recommender system here keywords are used to describe the items. Thus, in a
content-based recommender system the algorithms used are such that it recommends users
similar items that the user has liked in the past or is examining currently.
43Hybrid Recommender System: A hybrid recommender system combines the above two
methodologies.For example,Netflix would recommend similar videos of the one you’ve just
watched ordered by ranking of your particular “taste group”

11. Differentiate between traditional IS and Enterprise IS.

Ans In traditional Information system each functional unit like production, sales,
resources, etc in each level of management maintains its own means of data storage which is
not properly synchronized which creates problems in integration and interaction between
different units. Whereas in case of Enterprise system, there is an integrated suite of business
applications for virtually every department, process and industry. In case of Enterprise
System, all the data related to every functional units in an organization is maintained/stored at
a single data warehouse which allows proper integration and solves various problems in
traditional information systems. And Traditional Information system can exist in a modular
form whereas Enterprise system cannot.

10. Write short notes on OLTP and OLAP.

OTLAP

It stands for online transaction processing system. It is an online transactional system and manages
database modification. The main focus of OLTP system is to record the current update, insertion and
deletion while transaction. OLTP and its transactions are the original source of data. OLTP has short
transactions. The processing time of a transaction is comparatively less in OLTP. The tables in OLTP
database must be normalized (3NF). Its queries are simpler. The best example for OLTP system is an
ATM, in which using short transactions we modify the status of our account.
OLAP

It stands for Online Analytical Processing System. It is an online data retrieving and data analysis
database modification. System. It allows a user to execute complex queries to extract multidimensional
data. Different OLTPs database becomes the source of data for OLAP. OLAP has long transactions. The
processing time of a transaction is comparatively more in OLAP. The tables in OLAP database may not
be normalized. Its queries are more complex. The example for OLAP is to view a financial report, or
budgeting, marketing management, sales report, etc.

We can divide IT systems into transactional (OLTP) and analytical (OLAP). In general, we
can assume that OLTP systems provide source data to data warehouses, whereas OLAP
systems help to analyze it.
OLTP (On-line Transaction Processing) is characterized by a large number of
short on-line transactions (INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE). The main emphasis for OLTP
systems is put on very fast query processing, maintaining data integrity in multi-access
46environments and an effectiveness measured by number of transactions per second. In OLTP
database there is detailed and current data, and schema used to store transactional databases is
the entity model(usually3NF).
OLAP (On-line Analytical Processing) is characterized by relatively low volume of
transactions. Queries are often very complex and involve aggregations. For OLAP systems a
response time is an effectiveness measure. OLAP applications are widely used by Data
Mining techniques. In OLAP database there is aggregated, historical data, stored in multi-
dimensional schemas (usually star schema).
Example of OLAP:Any Datawarehouse system is an OLAP system. Uses of OLAP
are as follows

A company might compare their mobile phone sales in September with sales in
October, then compare those results with another location which may be stored in a
sperate database
Example of OLTP system: An example of OLTP system is ATM center. Assume that a
couple has a joint account with a bank. One day both simultaneously reach different ATM
centers at precisely the same time and want to withdraw total amount present in their bank
account.