Database Management System (DBMS) Activities and DBMS Issues:
The main tasks which the user can carryout with a DBMS are as follows:
a. Data collection:
The necessary data is gathered and recorded on a form called a source document that serves as input to the system.
b. Integrity and verification:
The data is examined to assure its consistency and accuracy based on pre-specified rules.
c. Storage:
The data is stored on some medium such as magnetic tape or magnetic disk.
d. Maintenance:
New data is added, existing data is changed, and data no longer needed is deleted for the purpose of keeping the data current.
e. Security:
The data is safeguarded to prevent destruction, damage, or misuse.
f. Organization:
The data is arranged in such a way as to meet the information needs of users.
g. Retrieval:
The data is made available to users. Prior of the computer era, all of these activities were performed by employees manually. Today, people are still required for data collection and verification, but the computer has assumed most of the data management responsibility.
|
Here Comes The Judge With Computer |
| After the court attendant had asked the people to enter into the j courtroom, than all eyes waited for one person, who appeared in | traditional robes, he was judge, but what is that! Placed beside his i table? Wow! That's computer.
Judges are finding computers in court highly functional. Databases provide information about which defendants are to appear before ! the court that day and date including probation history, and pervious convictions. With the machine who "know all", right there . In the court become more truthful. |
DBMS Issues:
Today, data and information are extremely valuable resources in almost all organizations. Since data generally exists in abundance, how to manage them effectively is of paramount concern to MIS professionals. Virtually all issues regarding the effective management of data fall into at least one of the following categories:
a. Excess:
What data should the organization collect in the future? Sometimes organizations carry more data then they should.
b. Access:
In what ways must authorized users access data in order to effectively perform their jobs? This question invokes the timing required to set dada to users when they need it, and also the issue of which users have a right to which data.
c. Organization:
In what ways should data be logically and physically organized to achieve the types of data required by the users?
d. Accuracy:
Which validation, editing, and auditing procedures are necessary in every stage of input, processing, output cycle to ensure that data and information generated from the data are correct?
e. Integrity:
What controls are necessary in each stage of the Input, processing, output, storage, cycle to ensure that data are up-to-date and that changes to specific occurrences of data are made everywhere in the system?
f. Security:
How will data be protected from such possible events as unauthorized access, unauthorized modifications, outright theft, viruses, and unintentional destruction?
g. Privacy:
How will data be safeguarded to protect the rights of individuals to privacy?
h. Cost:
How should data-related costs be controlled?
| Beyond Access (DBMS issues) |
| Most people in the computing industry are too busy running toward the future. But some computer specialists have taken the time to ponder computer needs and even to place them In a sort of hierarchy.
The first need, of course, is access. Without access to computing power, nothing else matters. But once computing power is available I then what? Is that sufficient? Not at all. Once access Is established, the next need for most people is connectivity. Almost everyone wants to be connected to e-mail, chat, m-commerce, e-commerce and other connections to mainframe computers that hold data and application programs. Inherent in connectivity is the next need, the need for data. Data comes in variety of forms, from corporate databases to research services.
So, now that we have taken aim at the three needs, Access, connectivity, and data. Is that enough? No. the final need, obvious once data is available, is security. Is the data we generate and use secure against threats? Can the right people gain the right kind of access?
A user would not be considering the higher needs until the ones below them are met. |
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