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1) The retail home improvement chain you work for, DIY Discount, has noticed that one of its brands of faucets is not
selling nearly as well as anticipated. What information systems of the business will you use to determine the reason for
the poor sales? Discuss what information you will retrieve from which system. Which of the information systems will be
most important for your analysis? Which of the systems will be least important?

2) A small design agency you are consulting for will be creating client Web sites and wants to purchase a Web server so
they can host the sites themselves. How will you advise them on this purchase?

3) You have just been hired as a security consultant by MegaMalls Inc., a national chain of retail malls, to make sure that
the security of their information systems is up to par. Outline the steps you will take to achieve this.

4) Define operational excellence. How can information systems help achieve it?

5) You work for an auto manufacturer and distributor. How could you use information systems to achieve greater
customer intimacy?

6) What is the difference between information technology and information systems? Describe some of the functions of
information systems.

7) You are a marketing manager for a national movie theater chain. Give an example of data that your department could
use for creating meaningful information. What type of information could that data produce?

8) How does a company's use of information systems affect its corporate strategies? Provide an example.

9) Identify and discuss the major types of information systems that serve the main management groups within a business.
What are the relationships among these systems?

10) Describe the role of IT governance within the firm.

11) Describe at least two benefits of using enterprise systems.

12) What are cross-functional business processes? Give an example.

13) Differentiate between the technical and behavioral definitions of an organization.

14) List three organizational factors that can prevent a firm from fully realizing the benefits of a new information system,
and provide examples for each.

15) The text describes Michael Porter's view of the Internet as somewhat negative. What negative influences does Porter
see? Describe several positive influences the Internet has on business. Do these outweigh the negative influences?

16) Value chain analysis is useful at the business level to highlight specific activities in the business where information
systems are most likely to have a strategic impact. Discuss this model, identify the activities, and describe how the model
can be applied to the concept of information technology.

17) How is the concept of core competency relevant to Smalltown Computer, a local computer repair store that builds
custom computers? Give examples.

18) How is Internet technology useful from a network economics perspective? Give examples.

19) Define and describe a business ecosystem. Give an example of a business ecosystem.

20) Describe in detail the major factors to determine when performing a strategic systems analysis.

21) List and describe the seven major components of IT infrastructure.

22) Explain why standards are so important in information technology? What standards have been important for the
growth of Internet technologies?

23) Distinguish between grid computing, cloud computing, and utility computing.

24) Briefly explain why corporations are increasingly interested in using Unix or Linux for their operating system.

25) Identify and describe five or more of the current trends in contemporary software platforms.

26) What is scalability? Why is it essential to the success of the modern business firm?

27) List at least three conditions that contribute to data redundancy and inconsistency.

28) List and describe three main capabilities or tools of a DBMS.

29) What types of relationships are possible in a relational database? Describe and give an example of each.

30) Identify and describe three basic operations used to extract useful sets of data from a relational database.

31) Describe the ways in which database technologies could be used by an office stationery supply company to achieve
low-cost leadership.

32) Describe the ways in which database technologies could be used by an office stationery supply company to achieve
product differentiation.

33) What makes data mining an important business tool? What types of information does data mining produce? In what
type of circumstance would you advise a company to use data mining?

34) What are the differences between data mining and OLAP? When would you advise a company to use OLAP?

35) How does packet switching work?

36) Describe and explain the idea of "network neutrality." Are you in favor of network neutrality? Why or why not?

37) What are the business advantages of using voice over IP (VoIP) technology?

38) How are RFID systems used in inventory control and supply chain management?

39) What are wireless sensor networks? How do they work and what are they used for?

40) What is Web 3.0, and how do you think Web 3.0 developments could impact businesses?

41) Blogs, wikis, and social networking sites were designed for individuals to communicate with each other. What uses do
businesses have for these tools? Give specific examples.

42) What has made the Google search engine so successful?

43) Discuss the issue of security challenges on the Internet as that issue applies to a global enterprise. List at least 5
Internet security challenges.

44) How can a firms security policies contribute and relate to the six main business objectives? Give examples.

45) Three major concerns of system builders and users are disaster, security, and human error. Of the three, which do you
think is most difficult to deal with? Why?

46) What are the security challenges faced by wireless networks?

47) Why is software quality important to security? What specific steps can an organization take to ensure software
quality?

48) Hackers and their companion viruses are an increasing problem, especially on the Internet. What are the most
important measurers for a firm to take to protect itself from this? Is full protection feasible? Why or why not?

49) What is a digital certificate? How does it work?

50) Define a fault-tolerant computer system and a high-availability computer system. How do they differ? When would
each be used?

51) How is the security of a firms information system and data affected by its people, organization, and technology? Is
the contribution of one of these dimensions any more important than the other? Why?