Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Information systems development methodologies and practice'

Information systems are getting more and more multimedia-based as well as network-based. This evolution, as well as an increased rate of change, put new demands on methods and competencies required for developing future information systems. In this work, we give an overview of the different types of information systems and methods for information systems development, especially with respect to multimedia aspects. Multimedia systems development is discussed particularly with respect to the dual processes of software engineering and content development. Possible future directions are pointed out, in which information systems development seems to become an even more multidisciplinary effort. As a result we present a list of competencies required for multimedia information systems development as well as possible research areas of interest. These research areas cover the following issues regarding the development of multimedia information systems: project management, conceptual modelling, content maintenance, requirement treatment and development approaches.

The purpose of this work is to identify possible elements of infology in some systems development methodologies. To reach the aim two objectives were identified: to gain an understanding of the concept of infology and secondly to study different kinds of methodologies and analyse them to find out possible elements of infology. In order to reach the aim of this work a literature study was performed. Four methodologies were chosen for the analysis and the selection represented a wide range of different methodologies. They were: Soft Systems Methodology (SSM), Effective Technical and Human Implementation of Computer based Systems (ETHICS), Structured Systems Analysis and Design Method (SSADM) and Yourdon Systems Method (YSM). The infological approach has been characterised and the fundamental characteristic of infology is the distinction between data and information. A consequence from this distinction is that the users of the intended information system should participate in the developing process in order to understand the complex and dynamic relations in an organisation and information system. The results of this work have shown that the soft methodologies (SSM and ETHICS) have a high degree of infology and the more hard methodologies (SSADM and YSM) have a low degree of infology.

The use of systems development methods are, by many, seen as the way to solve development problems, decrease development time, and improve the quality of software systems. Despite this, little is known about how development methods are actually used in the software industry. The aim of this project is to investigate how a widespread development method is implemented and used in an organisational setting.

The result of this project is a case study description of how Volvo Information Technology implements, adapts, and uses the commercial development method Rational Unified Process® (RUP®) in combination with other methods. The implementation is centrally administered and done incrementally over several years in order to build competence in the organisation. RUP is also adapted to the specific situation of the organisation, each division, each development project, and even adapted by individual developers.

Have you ever been frustrated with that IT system at work that does not behave the way you expect it to? Or had problems with using the features on your new mobile phone? When systems and appliances do not support us in what we are doing, and do not behave the way we expect them to, then usability is neglected. Poor usability may be frustrating and irritating when trying out your mobile phone, but in a critical work situation poor usability may be disastrous.

In this thesis, user-centred systems design (UCSD) is advocated as an approach for facilitating the development of usable interactive systems. Systems that suit their intended use and users do not just “emerge”. They are the result of a UCSD process and a user-centred attitude during the development. This means in short that the real users and their needs, goals, context of use, abilities and limitations, drive the development – in contrast to technology-driven development. We define UCSD as: a process focusing on usability throughout the entire development process and further throughout the system life cycle. I argue that this definition along with a set of key principles do help organisations and individual projects in the process of developing usable interactive systems. The key principles include the necessity of having an explicit focus on users and making sure that users are actively involved in the process.

The thesis provides knowledge and insights gained from real-life situations about what UCSD is and how it can be put into practice. The most significant results are: the proposal of a clear definition of UCSD and a set of key principles encompassing UCSD; a process for usability design and the usability designer role. Furthermore, design cases from different domains are provided as examples and illustrations.

Over the past ten years, the explosion of the Internet and Web-based application has been attracting very much attention not only in business environments but also government organisations around the world. Many long vision government organisations in developed countries such as USA, Germany, UK, and Australia, are implementing Internet and Web based Information System (WIS) applications in their business processes to be able to enhance and meet to their objectives towards their citizens in this rapidly changing globalised business environment. However, most of the governments developing (i.e. Thailand) and under-developed (mostly in Africa) countries still remain partially or completely off-line.

Web-based Information System refers to moving business processes from paper-based to a fully electronic environment over the Internet. Research shows that every government organization (federal, state or local) that wants to provide the best customer service to the customers (citizens) must transform its strategy and business processes from traditional system (paper -based) to a Web-based Information System (electronic-based). In addition, the Web based Information System model is a system, which heavily relies on electronic features such as computer, local area and wide area network system, internet, intranet, extranet system, web based interface model, and other related software applications and hardware tools.

This project presents a study of developing a Web-based information system (WIS) to improve the effectiveness of management in Thailand Local Government. Therefore, this project is mainly concerned with the current poor performance in the delivery of public service within Thailand Local Government. Currently, one of the most important causes of inefficient performance and ineffective public service delivery is in the area of information system management. The problem is identified as that existing system relies on traditional paper based processing and communication tools, which produce very slow service delivery, inefficient performance, and are challenging to coordinate across the organization. Ideally, the WIS may be the key to solve the problem of traditional paper based management. That is to say the purpose of this study is to show that a WIS application model may be developed and successfully implemented in order to manage all business processes more effectively and efficiently within a local government environment in Thailand. Therefore, a Web-based information system model has been designed, developed and implemented to help to solve the problem. There are no previous and specific applications of WIS in any local governments in Thailand at the time of this study.

So the objective of this study was to develop an application model of a web-based information system in a local government environment. The main research question is whether a Web-based information system (WIS) application model can improve significantly the efficiency and effectiveness of administrative service delivery performances in local government. Therefore this project attempts to solve the current problem of inefficient performance and ineffective service delivery.

Local governments are dealing with hundreds of different and very complex interrelated business processes and services. Similarly WIS is a huge area and developing an application model requires focusing on a more specific field. Therefore, as the financial business activities are the core business processes in any local governments, this project specifies the area of study by focusing on the improvement of the effectiveness of financial activities, and efficiency of financial processes. For example, collecting revenue data, managing council rate, levy, consent fee data, and produce effective results for the users. All of other business activities and processes in other departments use the financial data as the primary data to perform their business operations.

Initially, the proposed WIS model had been designed and developed in a general form, and then modified during later stages of the study in order to make it more suitable and fit within the local technology and environment of Thailand Local Government. In addition to that to be able to make this research project more specific, realistic and applicable, Takhli City Municipality Council in Thailand has been selected as the research case study. The developed research model can also be easily implemented to the other local government in Thailand in the near future as they have very similar if not the same business activities in their business operations.

In more details, this project has been completed in eight stages as follows:

• Identifying the common business process related problem in local governments. In this stage involve 1st phase of focus group interview. The key management people (middle and upper managers) have been interviewed from a number of local governments in Thailand in order to figure out and have drawn up a context map in relation to the common problems of these organizations.
• Selecting Takhli City Municipality Council as research model case. Since there are more than 5,000 local governments in Thailand, which are located in different geographical locations, it is practically not possible to conduct research for all of them. Therefore to make this research project more practical and applicable, Takhli City Municipality Council was selected as a case model of this research. The reason for this decision is that this organization was already planning to implement a one stop service policy, which WIS may be able to provide the functions to support that policy.
• Identifying the core business processes of Takhli City Municipality Council. Specific and very carefully crafted, open-ended question based face-to-face interviews were conducted with the heads of each department in order to find out the most core business process function (the common one) of entities department. In this stage, financial activities were identified as the core business process function.
• Drawing up the existing working process flowchart of core business function (financial activities) of Takhli City Municipality Council. To realize this, second phase of focus group interview were performed with all staff employed in the financial departments. The questionnaire surveys were also conducted in parallel.
• Designing and developing WIS model. In this stage, the user need to analysis, interface design and web interface application construction were performed.
• Testing and adjusting the model. In this stage, testing and adjusting the developed model is performed in order to make sure that the WIS model is working properly and fits the needs and expectations of the organization.
• Implementing the model. In this stage, the implemented WIS model was demonstrated to all staff in the finance department of Takhli City Municipality Council. Staff training was also conducted in order to make sure that all staff know how to use the system properly.
• Benchmarking (evaluating) the model. In this stage, the interview, observations, questionnaire and recording were conducted in order to get feedback from the implemented system. Data interpretation and analysis were also performed in this stage in order to evaluate the reliability and validity of WIS model.

The research found that the developed Web Based Information System Model met the organisation's expectation by means of efficiency and effectiveness of financial processes in terms of significantly reducing the error rate; speeding up the operations, providing real-time customer service, reducing cost of administration and service cycle time. The "Web Based Information System Model" is able to improve the efficiency of revenue collection administration in terms of faster service delivery by generating a quick response to customers' enquires. The model enables effective revenue collection with the capacity of recording necessary revenue's data, retrieving information quickly, and sharing data through a secure intranet system.

The expected contribution of this project to the Takhli City Municipality Council and other government organizations is to improve the business (financial) processes dramatically in the sense of revenue collection by reducing cost, saving time and enabling to provide superior real-time customer service. The result shows that, the model can also be easily implemented into other departments within this organization; even to other local government organizations as well due to the flexibility, simplicity and adaptability of the developed model. However, other factors related to local politics, political support, the type of organization and its culture, users knowledge of IT, the endowment of the organization can be impacted upon the attempt to adopting the model successfully.

Finally, a WIS application model has been developed and successfully implemented in order to manage all business processes (particularly financial processes in this study) in a secure networking environment. It may be said that the developed WIS application model for the effective and efficient management of local government in Thailand is one of the first studies in this field.