Why do you think prototyping has become a popular way to develop new Computerbased business systems?

Many people think it is easier to program a bios/atmega or a PCI chip rather buying the pre programmed chip. Also, many chips are soldered into the board.

Role:

- support business process and operations. IS helps manager to conduct their daily activities and functions properly. e.g. in bank different activities like account creating, withdrawal of money, statement generation etc take place. IS help mangers to conduct such activities accurately and timely manner with the helop of softwares. - support decison making for employees and managers. IS can simply be defined as input -> process -> information. IS takes data as input and processes them and generate information. Managers can use these information for the betterment of their organizations. e.g. IS can analyze exisiting historical data about customers in bank and generate informations like good customers, bad customers etc. Managers can use this information while deciding to provide loan for new customers. - support in making strategic decision for competitive advantages. IS can give informations like which items to launch in which location by analyzing data collected from different sources such that company can have advantage by using these information over their competitors. IS also can help business houses in conducting their business process differently than thier competitors.

yes Six reasons why information systems are so important for business today include: 1. Operational excellence 2. New products, services, and business models 3. Customer and supplier intimacy 4. Improved decision making 5. Competitive advantage 6. Survival Here is onother answer to this question The emegence of a global economy, transformation of industrial economies,

transformation of the business enterprise, and the emergence of digital firm make information systems essential in business today. Information system is a fondation for conducting business today. In many businesses, survival and the ability to achieve strategic business goals is difficult without extensive use of information technology. There are six reasons or objectives why businesses use information system: 1. Operational excellence. Business improve the efficiency of their operations in order to achieve higher profitability. Information systems are important tools available to managers for achieving higher levels of efficiency and productivity in business operations. A good example is Wal-Mart that uses a RetailLink system , which digitally links its suppliers to every one of Wal-Mart's stores. as soon as a a customer purchase an item , the supplier is monitoring the item , knows to ship a replacement to the shelf. 2. New products, services, and business models. Information system is a major tool for firms to create new products and services, and also an entirely new business models. A business model describe how a company produces, delivers, and sells a product or service to create wealth. Example: Apple inc transformed an old business model based on its iPod technology platform that included iPod, the iTunes music service, and the iPhone. 3. Customer/supplier intimacy. When a business serves its customers well, the customers generally respond by returning and purchasing more. this raises revenue and profits. The more a business engage its suppliers, the better the suppliers can provide vital inputs. This lower costs. Example: The Mandarin Oriental in manhattan and other high-end hotels exemplify the use of information systems and technology to achieve customer intimacy. they use computers to keep track of guests' preferences, such as their preffered room temperature, check-in time, television programs. 4. Improved decision making. Many managers operate in an information bank, never having the right information at the right time to make an informed decision. These poor outcomes raise costs and lose customers. Information system made it possible for the managers to use real time data from the marketplace when making decision. Example: Verizon Corporation uses a Web-based digital dashboard to provide managers with precise real -time information on customer complains, network performance.. Using this information managers can immediately allocate repair resources to affected areas, inform customers of repair efforts and restore service fast. 5. Competitive advantage. When firms achieve one or more of these business objectives( operational excellence, new products, services, and business models, customer/supplier intimacy, and improved decision making) chances are they have already achieved a competitive advantage. Doing things better than your competitors, charging less for superior products, and responding to customers and suppliers in real time all add up to higher sales, and higher profits. Example: Toyota Production System focuses on organizing work to eliminate waste, making continues improvements, TPS is based on what customers have actually ordered.

6. Day to day survival. Business firms invest in information system and technology because they are necessities of doing business. This necessities are driven by industry level changes. Example: Citibank introduced the first automatic teller machine to attract customers through higher service levels, and its competitors rushed to provide ATM's to their customers to keep up with Citibank. providing ATMs services to retail banking customers is simply a requirement of being in and surviving in the retail banking business. Firm turn to information system and technology to provide the capability to respond to these. Information systems are the foundation for conducting business today. In many industries, survival and even existence without extensive use of IT is inconceivable, and IT plays a critical role in increasing productivity. Although information technology has become more of a commodity, when coupled with complementary changes in organization and management, it can provide the foundation for new products, services, and ways of conducting business that provide firms with a strategic advantage.

The major functional information systems are :

1. A management information system (MIS) : It is a system or process that provides information needed to manage organizations effectively [1]. Management information systems are regarded to be a subset of the overall internal controls procedures in a business, which cover the application of people, documents, technologies, and procedures used by management accountants to solve business problems such as costing a product, service or a business-wide strategy. Management information systems are distinct from regular information systems in that they are used to analyze other information systems applied in operational activities in the organization.[2] Academically, the term is commonly used to refer to the group of information management methods tied to the automation or support of human decision making, e.g. Decision Support Systems, Expert systems, and Executive information systems.[2]

2. Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) is the latest high end software solution, Information Technology has lent to the world of business application. An ERP software solution seeks to streamline and integrate operations, processes and information flows in an enterprise, to synergize the resources of an organization namely men, material, money and machine. In other words, ERP systems integrate all data and processes of an organization into a unified system. A typical ERP will use multiple components of computer software and hardware to achieve the integration. A key ingredient of most ERP systems is the use of a unified database to store data for the various system modules. Most organizations across the world have realized that in a rapidly changing business environment, it is impossible to create and maintain a custom designed software package which

will cater to all their requirements and also be up-to-date. Realizing these requirements of organizations, companies have designed and developed ERP software, which offer an integrated software solution to all the functional processes in an organization. Although, in the initial stage ERP originated in the manufacturing environment, now ERP software solutions typically cover all basic business process/functions of any organization, regardless of the organization's business or charter. A typical ERP module include: Manufacturing, Supply Chain, Financials, Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Human Resources, Warehouse Management and Decision Support System. These solutions are often incorrectly quoted as back office solutions indicating that customers and the general public are not directly involved. This is contrasted with front office systems like Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems that directly deal with customers, or ebusiness systems such as eCommerce, eGovernment, eTelecom, and eFinance, or Supplier Relationship Management (SRM) systems. In reality, ERP modules are cross-functional and enterprise wide software solutions. All functional departments that are involved in operations or production can be integrated in one system using it. In addition to manufacturing, warehousing, logistics, and Information Technology, it also includes; accounting, human resources, marketing, and strategic management. There are many different flavors of ERP that serve businesses' varying procedure types. An ERP solution has numerous benefits depending on the type of business that it serves; these are business solutions and industry solutions. The industry solutions are designed for people who are working in specific industries, like finance, communications, education, healthcare to name a few. Importance of ERP software for businesses: ERP softwares business solutions are designed for companies that work in a wide variety of areas. IT combines a large number of different elements into a single unit. Three of the most important ERP tools available today are manufacturing, human resources, and finance. The finance tools allow companies to successfully maintain their financial information like that of the assets, accounts, budgets and cash. ERP can also assist a company in managing internal as well as external factors affecting it. A company that uses ERP financial products can save a great deal of money over the long term, the reason being, the productivity of the organization will be improved. Enterprise Resource Planning is instrumental in getting rid of time consuming activities as paper management. A company is able to study their processes, earnings, and performance by merging their operational information with their financial information. Once this information is connected together, a company can become more competitive and productive. Synergy is an important part of ERP solutions. The concept of combining multiple processes into a single whole will allow the company to become successful in the long term.

In addition to finance and business processes, it is also important to look at materials maintenance. Enterprise Resource Planning will allow a company to successfully automate the process of buying materials and maintaining them. There are modules that track the supplies that are purchased and can also make calculations about how these materials should be distributed. It also becomes possible for a company to predict the demand of the market based on history, economic statistics, and data from their employees. They can even decide when a product should be produced, and they can do this based on the raw material that is available.

Prototyping Traditionally, physical design has been a paper-and-pencil process. Analysts drew pictures that depicted the layout or structure of outputs, inputs, and files and the flow of dialogue and procedures. This is a time-consuming process that is prone to considerable error and omissions. Frequently, the resulting paper specifications did not prove themselves inadequate, incomplete, or inaccurate until programming started. Today many analysts are turning to prototyping, a modern engineering-based approach to design. A prototype, according to Webster's dictionary, is "an original or model on which something is patterned" and/or "a first full-scale and usually functional form of a new type or design of a construction (as an airplane)." Engineers build prototypes of engines, machines, automobiles, and the like, before building the actual products. Prototyping allows engineers to isolate problems in both requirements and designs. The prototyping approach is an iterative process involving a close working relationship between the designer and the users. This approach has several advantages. - Prototyping encourages and requires active end-user participation. This increases end-user morale and support for the project. End-user morale is enhanced because the system appears real to them. - Iteration and change are natural consequences of systems development-that is endusers tend to change their minds. Prototyping better fits this natural situation since it assumes that a prototype evolves, through iteration, into the required system. - It has often been said that end-users don't fully know their requirements until they see them implemented. If so, prototyping endorses this philosophy. - Prototypes are an active, not passive, model that end-users can see, touch, feel, and experience. Indeed, if a picture such as a DFD is worth a thousand words, then a working model of a system is worth a thousand pictures. - An approved prototype is a working equivalent to a paper design specification, with one exception-errors can be detected much earlier. - Prototyping can increase creativity because it allows for quicker user feedback, which can lead to better solutions. (See the list of disadvantages for ways creativity can be stifled by prototyping.) - Prototyping accelerates several phases of the life cycle, possibly bypassing the programmer. In fact, prototyping consolidates parts of phases that normally occur one after the other.

There are also disadvantages or pitfalls to using the prototyping approach. Prototyping is not without disadvantages. Most of these can be summed up in one statement: Prototyping encourages ill-advised shortcuts through the life cycle. Fortunately, the following pitfalls can all be avoided through proper discipline. - Prototyping encourages a return to the "code, implement, and repair" life cycle that used to dominate information systems. As many companies have learned, systems developed in prototyping languages can present the same maintenance problems that have plagued systems developed in languages such as COBOL. - Prototyping does not negate the need for the survey and study phases. A prototype can just as easily solve the wrong problems and Opportunities as a conventionally developed system. - You cannot completely substitute any prototype for a paper specification. No engineer would prototype an engine without some paper design. Yet many information systems professionals try to prototype without a specification. Prototyping should be used to complement, not replace, other methodologies. The level of detail required of the paper design may be reduced, but it is not eliminated. (In the next section, we'll discuss just how much paper design is needed.) - Numerous design issues are not addressed by prototyping. These issues can inadvertently be forgotten if you are not careful. - Prototyping often leads to premature commitment to a design. In other words, the configuration and procurement phases get shortchanged. - When prototyping, the scope and complexity of the system can quickly expand beyond original plans. This can easily get out of control. - Prototyping can reduce creativity in designs. The very nature of any implementationfor instance, a prototype of a report-can prevent analysts and end-users from looking for better solutions. - Prototypes often suffer from slower performance than their third-generation language counterparts. Building prototypes makes so much sense that you may wonder why we didn't always do it. The reason is simple: The technology wasn't available. Traditional languages such as COBOL, FORTRAN, BASIC, Pascal, and C (often called third-generation languages) don't lend themselves to prototyping. Prototypes must be developed and modified quickly, neither of which is possible with third-generation languages. Consider the prospects of continually modifying the DATA and PROCEDURE divisions of a COBOL program as end-users try to make up their mind what they want and how it should look. Fourth-generation languages (4GLs), applications generators (AGs), and some objectoriented programming languages (OOPLs) are software tools that make building systems a simpler task. They are less procedural than traditional languages. This means the tools specify more of what the system is or what it should do and less of how to do it. In other words, they are not as dependent on specification of logic. Finally, it should also be noted that many computer-assisted systems engineering (CASE) products also contain limited prototyping tools for designing screens and reports. Prototypes can be quickly developed using many of the 4GLs and object-oriented programming languages available today. Prototypes can be built for simple outputs, computer dialogues, key functions, entire subsystems, or even the entire system. Each

prototype system is reviewed by end-users and management, who make recommendations about requirements, methods, and formats. The prototype is then corrected, enhanced, or refined to reflect the new requirements. Prototyping technology makes such revisions in a relatively straightforward manner. The revision and review process continues until the prototype is accepted. At that point, the end-users are accepting both the requirements and the design that fulfills those requirements. Design by prototyping doesn't necessarily fulfill all design requirements. For instance, prototypes don't always address important performance issues and storage constraints. Prototypes rarely incorporate internal controls. These must still be specified by the analyst.