BCS / PGD / MIS / SHORT NOTES

Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software.

ERP software is really an integrated suite of software modules which is developed to support the whole range of company functions (e.g., human resources, production, marketing & sales). It helps a manufacturer (typically) or other business manage the important parts of its supply chain, including product planning, parts purchasing, maintaining inventories, interacting with suppliers, providing customer service and tracking orders, and also includes application modules for the supportive aspects of the business such as finance and human resources. ERP modules can be used alone or in combination. An ERP system typically uses a relational database system as its data store and integrating mechanism. Deploying a comprehensive ERP system involves considerable business process analysis, and possibly substantial changes in employee work practices and associated training. Leading ERP products are provided by companies such as SAP.

Benefits:

• The integration of ERP data enables external MIS applications to draw off a consistent and integrated pool of data rather than data “silos”. (You could say that the ERP database is essentially acting as an “operational-level data warehouse” although a data warehouse would need its own data store due to the different emphases between that and the ERP database – management support vs. operational efficiency). Examples of MRS reporting and DSS drawing upon ERP data stores, etc., could be provided to support the above narrative.

• There are also some management functions available from within ERP software modules to “pick up and use”, such as that found with functionally oriented modules such those supporting marketing and sales activities, and also in dedicated management modules such as a Data Warehousing ERP Module. These can directly benefit, with or without tailoring, management activities within a business.

Content Management System (CMS)

As its name implies, a Content Management System (CMS) is a software system for the management of content. They can be used across several contributors, each of which provides content. The content managed includes computer files, image media, audio files, electronic documents and web content. Nowadays, the CMS term is frequently used to refer to system that aids the development of web-based systems, by enabling the web page content to be created and updated (and employing versioning to manage such updates) more easily than without such a facility.

A CMS may include support for the following features:

• Importing and creating of documents and multimedia material

• Identifying the key users and their roles with regard to content management

• The capability to allocate roles and responsibilities to different content types.

• The capability to track and manage several versions of a single content aspect.

• The ability to copy the content to a repository which enables effective access to that content. Increasingly, the provision of a central repository is becoming an inherent part of a CMS.

• Some CMS allow the textual aspect of content to be somewhat independent of its formatting.

Benefits:

• Much easier management of the information within a web-based application system. Having the information, of many different forms, integrated within a central repository and the easier access to that information as a consequence, facilitates management decision making.

• The typical result of employing the CMS is that a company has a web based system that enables effective management support of content - candidates may expand on what they means here, such as more effective management of data currency, data access, etc.,

Business Intelligence (BI) tool.

A Business Intelligence (BI) tool is an “umbrella” term for all software systems that facilitate decision making via enabling data analysis. BI tools typically run on top of a data warehouse (consolidated and consistent pool of management-oriented data drawn from several data sources within a business). Each BI tool may take its own copy of the DW data it needs and in the format it requires for it to function effectively

(i.e., it possesses its own Data Mart). BI tools include OLAP tools, DSS, tools for Data Mining, and even EIS.

Benefits:

• BI tools enable the exploration, either driven by user or by tool, of the data for any patterns or trends that could have implications for the company.

• BI tools enable companies to find out aspects about the company and its environment so that it can take actions to strengthen the company’s position in the marketplace.

• Human data exploration tasks that used to take days can now be a matter of seconds/minutes. BI tools can make tedious tasks less tedious and/or impossible data exploration tasks possible (there must be a suitable data repository base, though, for maximum effectiveness).