Asper School of Business

9.613 Using Information Technology

Part-Time MBA, December 2001
Instructor: Bob Travica

Class 4
Management of Data,
Information and Knowledge

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 Outline

•Data, Information, Knowledge

•Data, Information, Knowledge - MIS Focus

•Technology for Managing Data/Information

•Managing Information - Life Cycle Metaphor

•Technology for Information Management

•Knowledge Management--separate slides

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Data, Information, Knowledge - Relationships

Data

Information Knowledge

Size, Complexity, Management Cost):

low high

More
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• Data refers to sets of symbols (textual, visual, audio)
that may have some generic meaning or no meaning.

(e.g., “bob” vs “cpc”; “client”)

• Information refers to data with specific meaning.

Usually implies putting data in some context
(sentence, other data).
(e.g., “bob is my friend”, “bob not meaning beans in a
Slavic language”; “cpc is encrypted ‘bob’ ”; “client
device sends requests to the server; database record)

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• Knowledge refers to interconnected information
that signifies what is/will be, why is/will be, and
how to do.

Or, WHAT: semantics (definition), taxonomy

(classification), episodic (description), ontology (all
of this and analysis/synthesis) &
HOW: procedural knowledge--how to do.

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• Relationships between data, information and knowledge
For example,
- data provides building blocks for information and
information does so for knowledge;
- knowledge facilitates creation of information from data;
- new data changes information, new information changes
knowledge

• Fuzzy boundaries between information and knowledge

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Data, Information, Knowledge - MIS Focus Evolution

• In MIS, these 3 usually called information resources

• Point of confusion (!): “information” used in broader sense
to include all 3

1960 1970 1980 1990

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Information Resources - some modern issues

• More vs. less structured information (records vs. documents)

• Hypertext-based structures as pattern of linked data/info

• Data about data -- metadata or information/knowledge

(data dictionary; data definitions in DBMS;
tags in markup languages)

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 Technology for Managing Data/Information

DBMS
Electronic (“Flat”) Files
Paper Files

time

• DBMS models
(hierarchical, network, relational, object)

• Challenges of multimedia data

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 Newer Database Developments

• Data Warehousing

• Data Mining

• Online Analytical Processing (OLAP)

• Grayish area: borderline between information and

knowledge?

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Managing Information - Life Cycle Metaphor

Collect Discard
, (after x cycles)
Create
Store

Filter

Organize Update

Retrieve Use

Transfer,
Share

• Knowledge management uses similar cycle

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 Technology for Information Management

• Databases (organize, store, retrieve)

• Management Information Systems

Decision support systems (knowledge implications)

• Information filtering (reduce size - increase relevance)

• Communication (transfer, create)

• Groupware (create, store, share)

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 Knowledge Management

Note: Check the other set of slides.

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