Decision Support System

SYNOPSIS
DSS Development
1. General idea of design and development process approaches:
a. Traditional systems analysis and design, SDLC approach.
b. An iterative, speedy prototyping
c. Managers can develop their own personal DSS
2. Investigate alternative designs along with the development process approaches
a. Building effective DSS is important matter
b. Choose an approach that increases the chances of benefits of DSS
c. Building a DSS is a difficult task since different employees have different job responsibilities and take different decisions.
3. Decision oriented Design Approach
a. Pre design description and diagnosis of decision making functions
b. Diagnosis of current decision making is to be prepared
c. Determine how decisions are currently made
4. Decision orientation is the key
a. Specify changes in decision process
b. Flow chart the process
c. Specify what specific improvements in the decision performance are to be made
5. Diagnostic Steps
a. Collect data on present decision making
b. Use interviews, observations or pervious records.
c. Establish a logical description of the same
d. Specify a norm as to how a decision should be made
6. Decision process audit plan
a. What will be audited and by whom?
b. Examine and diagram the process?
c. Observe and collect data?
d. Evaluate performance
e. Reporting and recommendations are done accordingly
1

Decision Support System

7. Reaching a diagnosis
a. Focus on identifying what is assumed by the decision makers during decision making b. How can decision making be improved?
8. Conduct a feasibility study consisting the following facet of DSS
a. Issues
b. Objectives
c. DSS scope and target users
d. Anticipated DSS Impact
e. Major alternatives
f. Conclusions
g. Build versus buy verdict
9. If build, then choose a DSS Development approach
a. SDLC approach
b. A Rapid prototyping approach
10. Step in SDLC Approach
a. Confirm user requirement
b. Systems Analysis
c. System Design
d. Programming
e. Testing
f. Implementation
g. Use and evaluation
11. SDLC major concerns
a. Project plans must be carefully prepared
b. Determine the needs of the potential users
c. Identify the outputs that accomplish those needs
d. User Requirements agreed upon the first stage of the process are hard to change
12. Steps in rapid prototyping process
a. Identify user requirement
b. Develop a first iteration DSS prototype
c. Evolve and modify the next DSS prototype
2

Decision Support System

d. Test and return to step 3 if needed
e. Full Scale implementation
13. How is a prototype developed?
a. Analyst develops a prototype
b. Users use the prototype and react
c. Missing features are added later
d. Once approved the prototype is expanded
e. Rapid application development
14. End – User DSS Development
a. Puts the responsibility of building and managing a DSS on the manager who built it b. Advantages:
i. Fast ii. Lower Cost iii. Person who wants computer support will be involved in building it.
15. End User Development Concerns:
a. End users may select an inappropriate software product
b. Errors during end user DSS Development are common
c. Unnecessary databases are sometimes developed by the end user for their DSS.
d. Databases maybe badly constructed difficult to maintain
16. DSS Project Management:
a. Assign DSS Project Manager
b. Tasks include diagnosis, feasibility study and the scope of the project
c. The larger the scope of the project the vital is to receive widespread agreement and sponsorship of the project.
17. DSS Project Management:
a. Once the project is approved then a methodology and project plan needs to be approved b. In House development and technical tools need to be resolved
c. Deliverables are important for monitoring the progress of the project
d. Some large scale DSS are built with teams of 2-3 people or with larger group of
10 or more.
e. 1-2 people may work on a prototype.
3

Decision Support System

18. DSS Project participants:
a. DSS Project Manager
b. Executive Sponsor
c. Potential DSS Users
d. Technical Support Staff
e. Data Quality Analyst
19. Matching DSS and development approaches:
a. Model Driven and knowledge driven built using rapid prototyping
b. Data Driven and document driven built using SDLC
c. Communication Driven and Group DSS first purchased then installed.
20. Systems Development cycle:
a. Phases:
i. Planning ii. Analysis iii. Design iv. Implementation
b. Cyclical
c. Can return to other phase
21. Tools Portion
a. Computer aided software design tools
i. Upper CASE: Creates systems diagrams ii. Lower CASE: Manages diagrams and code iii. Integrated CASE: Combination
b. RAD Design tools
i. UML Modeling ii. Analysis and design software iii. Code debugging methods
c. Testing and quality assurance tools
22. DSS Development Methodology
a. Prototyping
b. Interactive Design
c. Evolutionary Development
d. Focal point out process
4

Decision Support System

23. DSS Prototyping
a. Short Steps in this are:
i. Planning ii. Analysis iii. Design iv. Prototype
b. Immediate stakeholder feedback
c. Iterative
d. In development of prototyping
e. Control mechanism
24. DSS Prototyping
a. Advantages:
i. Low Expenditure ii. User and Management involvement iii. Short intervals between interactions iv. Improving user understanding of the system
b. Disadvantages:
i. Changing requirement effects ii. Problem may get lost iii. Reduction in quality iv. High Uncertainty
v. Poorly tested
An elastic and swift method of developing DSS:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.

Decision oriented diagnosis and definition of requirements
Feasibility analysis of data warehouse and business intelligence support system
Investigate current data
Create a plan of how will the historical data be organized
Create tables and relations and move data into tables form external systems
Create demonstration DSS for a small group of targeted users.
Have targeted users test the capabilities and provide feedback
If justified, incrementally enlarge the DSS project and run the steps.

5

Decision Support System

Unified process of developing DSS:
Jacobson, Booch, and Rambaugh launched in 1999 the Unified Software Development
Process (USDP) as a software engineering process standard. It has three basic axioms:
1. Use Case and risk driven: It employs use Cases to capturing client requirements and predicating software construction on the analysis of risk.
2. Architecture Centric: Developing software systems is to develop and evolve a system architecture. 3. Iterative and Incremental: That is we split the project into smaller sub projects that deliver system functionality in chunks leading to a fully functional system.
It has 4 main phases and one iteration workflows for each phase:
1. Inception
2. Elaboration
3. Construction
4. Transition
5. Iteration:
a. Requirement
b. Analysis
c. Design
d. Implementation
e. Test
DSS unified Development Framework (DSS – UNIDEF):
It is structured into three layers:
1. Methodology: Contains 4 main phases and one iteration workflows for each phase:
a. Inception
b. Elaboration
c. Construction
d. Transition
e. Iteration:
i. Requirement ii. Analysis iii. Design iv. Implementation
v. Test
2. Modeling: here is UML. It can be used to communicate with developers, project clients, with automated tools that create parts of the system.
6

Decision Support System

3. Implementation: In this layer is the prototyping techniques, DSS Tools and DSS
Generators.
SOFTWARE:
They are basically of three types:
1. System Software: a set of one or more programs, designed to control the operation of the computer system. Without this, the application packages cannot run on the computer system. They are of three types:
a. System Management software or the operating system: is a group of system programmes that help in operation of the computer by telling it how to interpret the commands, process the inputs and outputs and manage the data. It is the software that makes the computer ready to use. It is designed to serve two basic purpose:
i. Control the allocation and use of the computer system’s resources among various users and tasks. ii. Provide an interface between the computer hardware and programmer that simplifies the creation, coding, debugging and maintenance of the applications programmers.
The most common OS for PC’s is DOS. An OS performs the following functions: iii. Communication link between the computer system and the user iv. Interpretation of commands, instructions and other data entered by the user
v. Management of different file systems by storing and transporting files from various storage devices vi. Memory Management by allocating primary memory and other storage devices to the system programmes, user programmes and data. b. System Development Software or programming language: It is used to communicate with the computer which understands only machine language, that is the language of 0 and 1. They are the various methods of writing computer instructions. The instructions adhere to particular set of protocols for each language. There were different generations of this language:
i. First Generation: Machine Language ii. Second Generation: Assembly Language. iii. Third Generation: High Level Language. A compiler is used to translate the programme into machine language.
7

Decision Support System

iv. Fourth generation languages: Very High level Languages. They use language translators and use very less lines of code because they rely on objects of code that are reusable.
Language Translator: It takes as input some programmes in one language, called source code, and produces after translation the equivalent machine language programme called object code. They are categorized into two types:
Compilers: translates programme from high level language to machine language.
It takes as input some programmes in one language, called source code, and produces after translation the equivalent machine language programme called object code.
Interpreters: It converts high level language programme into machine language.
It reads in source code and directly produces the output that the source code would produce if it were compiled and executed immediately.
c. Utility software: It expands the performance of the OS by adding functions that are not part of the original OS. They perform jobs such as trouble shooting hardware, file conversions, defragmenting, data compression etc.
2. Application Software: This software is collection of programs that actually process data to generate information under various applications. Example: payroll Program,
Tally etc.
3. Procedures: Which are operating instructions for the people who will us an “IS”.
Examples: Instructions to fill out a paper form or using a software package.
Software to assist financial decision:
1. System Software
a. DOS
b. UNIX
c. LINUX
d. Windows
2. Application Software
a. Tally
b. Ex Munimji
3. Utilities
a. MS Office
b. Excel
4. Procedures:
a. Instructions to fill out paper sheets
8

Decision Support System

b. Manuals of accounting package
Software to assist marketing decision:
1. System Software
a. Windows based environment
b. DOS Based Environment
c. UNIX LINUX based environment
2. Application Software
a. Sales CTRL
b. CALLPAN
3. Utilities
a. MS Access
b. MS Powerpoint
c. MS Word
4. Procedures:
a. Software help module
b. Instructions to fill out paper forms
Software to assist productive decision:
1. System Software
a. IRIX
b. Window Based Environment
c. REDHAT LINUX
2. Application Software
a. CORAL DRAW
b. MAYA
c. PHOTO SHOP
3. Utilities
a. MS Office
b. Star office
4. Procedure
a. Online Help
b. Hand Manuals of the packages

9

Decision Support System

HARDWARE
They are physical and tangible devices. Example: computer and its peripherals.
A brief list of components forming part of the configuration of the computer system:
1. Monitor: Shows us what the computer is doing with the help of a “Cathode Ray Tube”.
2. Keyboard: Used to enter, manipulate, store and to take the print out or soft copies of the data.
3. Mouse or light pen: An electronic pointing device that moves as an onscreen pointer, enabling the user to select items and choose options.
4. Central processing Unit: The heart and brain of the computer. It comprises of a hard disk, the motherboard, and floppy disk drive.
5. Processor: a part of the motherboard. The speed of the processor and the quality of the motherboard are independent.
6. Floppy Disk Drive: accepts magnetically coated floppy diskette, so as to enable the computer to read data from other computers, or write data on floppies for backup or exchange of data.
7. CD ROM or DVD ROM: used to store large amount of data.
8. Cabinet: External cover which assembles CPU, FDD, CDD, Motherboard and other electronic and electrical requirements of the system.
9. Random Access memory: A temporary storage device, to store software and necessary programs in accordance with the needs of the system operator.
Some additional peripherals of the computer:
1. Speakers: required to play the computer’s audio output.
2. Sub Woofers: Adds deep bass to the computer’s audio output.
3. Printer: produces output on paper which is also called a hard copy.
4. Modem: can either be internal or external and is used for extracting information through the World Wide Web.
5. Microphone: Accepts voice input that is converted into text from is or used to operate the computer.
INPUT
OUTPUT
STORAGE
Keyboard
Speaker
Floppy Diskette
Mouse
Floppy Diskette
Hard Disk
Floppy Diskette
CD/DVD
CD
CD/DVD
Printer
Modem
Monitor
Micro Phone

10

Decision Support System

Some Input Devices:
1. MICR (Magnetic Ink Character Recognition): used to identify magnetic coded numbers which are printed on demand drafts, cheques, etc to avoid duplicate or manipulation of demand drafts and cheques.
2. OMR( Optical mark Reading and Recognition): A special feature that helps evaluate, specially designed answer sheets of competitive examinations.
3. OCR (Optical Character recognition): Used to identify special characters printed with magnetic ink and also to identify special characters printed on secret sheets.
Hardware requirement in Developing Marketing Decision:
1. Computer
2. Printer
3. Mouse
4. Floppy Drive
5. CD-ROM
6. Paper for Hard Copy
7. Magnetic Disk
8. Floppy
9. Pen Drive
Hardware requirement in making productive Decision:
1. Silicon graphic Interface
2. Graphic User Interface
3. Other hardware components like printer, CD Rom etc.

---------------------------------------------------------********----------------------------------------------------

11