My impressions on the Course

   After I said a few things about myself I guess it's a good time to express some of my thoughts regarding the course. To be honest I did not know what was it all about but just because of the title "Computer Information Systems" I was already excited about it; I love computers and knowledge/Information.

   And of course I was on the right track because since day one I am really excited not just from the teaching material but also about by your teaching style, the organization/structure of the course (slides, tech reports) and in general I have learned many things already.
    Due to my close relationship with business (my parents are pharmacist and owners and I also had my few entrepreneurial years before I attend Chapman) and my computer background, I naturally know a lot of the material. But on the other hand even these few classes, have greatly assisted in connecting numerous ideas and processes that were scattered in my head. For example the idea of Information Systems connects numerous things regarding my understanding of databases, business networking, customer service and customer satisfaction, profitability through information systems. The Virtual Company is an idea that I am trying to implement for some time now (We are in the process of creating an online store that will sell the best products/deals in electronics from the online market, interesting commercial/business news and technology news in Greece) and the information that you have provided has clarified numerous aspects and assisted in my own planning. In other terms I will know how to do things better when this course is done.
    I have no doubt about the convenience of IS/IT (you preached about them the first day of class) and about their contribution in the present and the future of businesses, services and societies as a whole.

   I ll honestly say after this class has started, I am creating a database of our customers and our customers' customers and soon we will construct a facebook-like site to promote networking, advertisement and create value for everyone in the network. (You emphasized a lot on the significance of this and you are right)

    Also around the summer,  I want to come up with a complete IS/IT proposal, train my team,  implement a nice IS package solution and market it.

    I love win-win situations and IS is one of them! Also I am going to paraphrase Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google, who referring in cloud computing, mentioned that all these years humans are mostly serving computers; development, errors, etc. It's about time that computers will actually do what we really need and serve humanity) I believe that IS are IT are very relative to this approach.

Learning about me

Programming Background:

I have worked on C++ and Fortran back in 2000 when I was in Physics school mostly to evaluate expressions.
I am currently taking Java and C#( visual programming) in Chapman and I am very excited with both languages.

Web Design:

About a year now, me and a team of a few more people are constructing websites for a variety of businesses (many hotels) or individuals. We are using html, javascripts, flash, java, Google API and we are continuously progressing on the quality of our work, while doing lots of research and trying to keep up with the continuously evolving market.
Here are a few of our sites: (They are all Greek Sites)
http://www.dionysoshotel.gr/
http://www.sklavenitiscarpets.gr/
http://kiklamino.com/
http://www.serkos.gr/
http://www.ofotografos.com/new/
http://www.pamemetram.gr/
In general I do a little bit of everything on the technical part; coding, graphic design, and of course a lot on the business part (advertisement, networking, planning, finances etc)
The last two months we are also offering online advertisement to all of our customers, including facebook, twitter, Utube channels, myspace, orkut, blogs and of course Google adds.

Computer Background:

  Probably you wouldn't be wrong if you called me a computer geek. Computers have been a hobby since I was 8 years old (I am 29 now) . I've been putting together my computers and repaired hundreds of computers over the years, handling hardware or software issues, for friends or for some extra cash.

Excel and Access:

I've been using excel for years now and in my daily life too, for statistics, expenses, organization on my businesses, for my classes, assignments and wherever I can consider it could be helpful.
As far as access I haven't used it for a couple of years now but at some point I was pretty good at it.

The Internet

Since the earliest years of the internet I fell in love with the idea, networking for personal relationships or exchange of information, I really believed in it. Kinda funny I also believed in Google a lot and was from the first few thousands that registered for a g-mail account, when it became open to the public. Saying that, Google is probably one of my favorite companies and I am trying to follow up with their continuous contributions.

Information Technology in a modern business environment

   Technology can be the cause and driver of forming business strategies. Specifically, IT can provide a competitive advantage and assist towards meeting a variety of enterprise objectives through collecting and organizing information and knowledge; what is called a strategic information system.

 

 

   In a really competitive global environment we can recognize the necessity for an organization to absorb and use most of these strategies to be prosperous. In addition middle of the road approaches, including unclear strategies are destined to fail.

The essential Role of IT in implementing those strategies.

IT business solutions can assist in:

• locking customers and suppliers 
• delaying competitors from entering the market
• leveraging investment in IT to develop products or services not possible without IT include IT components in products in order to make substituting competing products difficult to produce.
• Focusing products and services on a particular market or geographic segment

An essential element for an organization's success is to provide Customer Value by
tracking Individual preferences, follow market trends and provide quality customer services to every customer.
Without doubt the Internet and Intranets can be proven valuable to further produce Customer Value, extended networking opportunities, but also can provide valuable Knowledge-Management Networks to be used internally by the organization.
     
      The Value Chain refers to the view that each Primary (manufacturing or delivering products) or Support (supporting day-to-day activities) is to be viewed as a chain that each step should add value to its end products or services. To accomplish so every organization must first prioritize its objectives.

    

     The implementation of Smartphones in business is part of a complete IT solution since a smartphone is also a pocket-size laptop, ideal for any type of network connectivity. Also Smartphones are used to better monitor the business' day-to-day operations, a reason to often be hated by employees. 


Due to the complicated Cross-functional process of modern businesses, an example of which can be seen below,

IS can greatly assist in updating every different department and employee of the organization with the most recent information->keeping everyone on the same page.

    Probably one of the most interesting models of a modern business is that of a Virtual Company that uses IT as its basis.

A virtual Company is using the Internet, Intranets and Extranets to link to business partners, so it creates an inter-enterprise information system to link customers, suppliers, subcontractors and competitors. (Flexible and adaptable virtual workgroups)

   As previously mentioned the model of managing knowledge is consider the cutting edge for developing a healthy and continuously adapting organization. Managing Knowledge refers to the creation of network channels between every level and employee of an organization to share problems, ideas, processes, best practices and fixes. Knowledge Management Systems are a major strategic use of IT and make knowledge broadly available to everyone whenever is needed.





    

Cybernetic Systems

  Necessity is the mother of invention. Many sophisticated systems have been developed under the circumstances which were eventually used for the market or societal needs. Some of those systems suffer from what is known as brittleness, meaning that some of those are designed to work on specific scenarios but not in many others.
   One of the critical issues regardless IS and healthcare is that through intranet server technology the patients' data is entered, verified, stored once and at-once and is now accessible from all the hospital who participate in the IS network. Due to possibility of failure multiple backups are recommended in IS.
   A Cybernetic system (stems from the Greek kybernētēs, steersman, governor, pilot, or rudder — the same root as government) is a self-monitoring, self-regulating complex system that uses feedback and control.
Feedback consists of data about the performance of the system and control involves monitoring and evaluating the feedback to determine whether a system is moving towards the achievement of its goal, then making requisite changes.
   Cybernetic systems are all around us. An every day example would be while driving on a road with curves:
-Input: visual images
-Processing: steering wheel; gas pedal; brakes
-Outpout: moving along the road
-Feedback: deviating out of your lane of traffic
-Control: turning the steering wheel.

A business may be viewed as a Cybernetic System:

 A Business is an open system that interacts with other systems in the environment. It is also an adaptive system that it can change itself or its environment in order to survive.

Major components of an information system: people, hardware, software, data and networks. These components perform input, processing, output, storage and control activities. 

Information systems are cybernetic systems themselves

Overview of the course, Business Intelligence, IS and IT

Business intelligence (BI) refers to computer-based techniques used in spotting, digging-out, and analyzing business data, such as sales revenue by products and/or departments, or by associated costs and incomes.

BI is a highly paid job and relates to drawing useful information from your business, customers, competitors and markets.

Data->Information->Knowledge

Creating emotional bonds is the secret of doing business well!

An organized combination of:

1. People
2. Hardware
3. Software
4. Communications/networking
5. Data resources
6. Policies and procedures

that stores, retrieves, transforms and disseminates information in an organization is an IS

Effectiveness is the essential part of IS; secondly work for efficiency.

Effectiveness

–       Support business strategies

–       Enable business processes

–       Enhance organizational structure and culture

–       Increase the customer and business value

.

 

IS are a never ending cycle, while both IS and IT systems cannot be considered stable. 

Interesting Tech News Report: 

Google Translate: truly the new version of Google translate is not a only miracle of server technology, but also a live translator that can voice translate from and in English, German, Italian, French and Spanish. It can translate long sentences, which if have a basic grammar structure, with minimum errors. With a smart-phone an earpiece and some typing skills one can probably communicate decent enough in any of those languages. (Of course, if one has some understanding and skills on the pronunciation since Google Translate still can't pronounce words accurately)

Tuesday 1 February 2011 - First Day of Class

   I was excited to discover in more detail what this course is all about. In the age of information I am sure I will appreciate the understanding of the many aspects of information systems and how they can empower an organization. In general I am an advanced computer user and I use the internet for seeking technology, business and other interesting information to contribute to my work but also for fun. No questions asked I'll enjoy this class.
       Relative to the material that was presented today I'll post the first internet router:

   Also here are some of the interesting TLAs (Three Letter Acronyms) we mentioned:

PDF (Portable document Format)
HTML (Hypertext Markup Language)
URL (Universal Resource Locator)
USB (Universal Serial Bus)
FTP (File Transfer Protocol)
TCP (Transmission Control Protocol)
IP (Internet Protocol)
DNS (Domain Name Server)

IETF (Internet Engineering Task Force)