information systems planning. 1111 1111 2222 2222 distributed systems architecture information...
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Information Systems Planning
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2222 Distributed Systems Architecture
Information Systems Planning
Paradox of IS Planning
Most organization's survival now depends on IT Planning of its effective use is a matter of
organizational life and death IT is changing so fast
Is it useless to do IS planning?
A variety of approaches, tools and mechanisms available for IS planning No best way to do it.
Mindset for Planning
Traditional view Determining what decisions to make in the future
A better view Developing a view of the future that guides
decision making today
Difference : strategy making instead of planning Strategy: stating the direction in which you want to
go and how you intend to get there
Types of Planning
Horizon Focus Issues Primary Responsibility
3 - 5 years
Strategic Vision, architecture, business goals
Senior management, CIO
1 - 2 years
Tactical Resource allocation, project selection
Middle management, IS line partners, Steering committees
6 month -1 year
Operational Project management, meeting time and budget targets
IS professionals, Line managers, partners
Why Planning Is So Difficult? (1) Business goals and systems plans need to align
Strategic systems plans need to align with business goals and support those objectives
Will be difficult if CIO is not part of senior management
Technologies are rapidly changing Continuous planning based on monitoring and
experimenting new technologies Advanced technology groups
Why Planning Is So Difficult? (2) Companies need portfolios rather than projects
Evaluation on more than their individual merit How they fit into other projects and how they balance
the portfolio of projects
Infrastructure development is difficult to fund Often done under the auspices of a large application
project Challenge: develop improved applications and
improve infrastructure over time Mainframe C/S ERP Web application Web Services
Why Planning Is So Difficult? (3) Responsibility Needs to be Joint
Systems planning has become business planning, not just a technology issue
It is better done by a full partnership of C-level officers
Other planning issues Top-down Vs. bottom-up
Radical change Vs. continuous Planning culture in which the systems planning must
fit
Tradition Strategy Making
Assumptions: The future can be
predicted Time is available to
do these 3 parts IS supports and
follows the business Top management
knows best (broadest view of firm)
Company: like an "Army"
Business Strategy
•Business decision•Objectives and direction•Change
System Strategy
•Business-based•Demand-oriented•Application-focused
IT Strategy
•Activity-based•Supply-oriented•Technology-focused
Supportsbusiness
DirectionFor IS
Infrastructure and services
Needs and priorities
Step 1Where is the business going and why?
Step 2What is required?
Step 3How can it be delivered?
A World of Rapid Change (1)
Today, due to the Internet and other technological advances, these assumptions no longer hold true: The future cannot be predicted
Discontinuous change Who predicted Internet, Amazon, eBay etc.?
Time is not available for the sequence Never enough time in Internet Age IT implementation planning needs to go ahead of
business strategizing
A World of Rapid Change (2)
IS does not JUST support the business anymore
Top management may not know best Inside out Vs. outside
in approach
An organization is not like an army Industrial era metaphor
no longer always applies Core
Front LineSuppliers Partners
and
Customer
Today's Sense-and-Response Approach (1)
Let strategies unfold rather than plan them: A sense-and-respond
approach when predictions are risky Sense a new opportunity
and immediately respond by testing it
Myriad of small experiments
Time
TimeStrategic envelop
Old-era strategyOne big choice, long commitment
New-era strategyMany small choices, short commitments
Case Example: Microsoft
Abandoned proprietary network despite big investment when it did not capture enough customers
Moved on to buying Internet companies as well as aligning with Sun to promote Java
Over time, they moved into a variety of technologies: Web, Cable news, Digital movies, Cable modems, Handheld
OS, Video server, Music, Xbox, .Net, Search engines... Not all strategies came from top management
e.g. first server came from a rebel's unofficial project Getting its fingers into every pie that might become
important
Today's Sense-and-Response Approach (2) Formulate strategy closest to the action:
Close contact with the market Employees who interact daily with customers, suppliers
and partners (organizational edges) Employees who are closest to the future should
become prime strategists. In the Internet Age, this means younger employees
Today's Sense-and-Response Approach (3) Guide strategy-making with a “strategic
envelope": Having a myriad of potential corporate strategies
being tested in parallel could lead to anarchy without a central guiding mechanism
Top management set the parameters for the experiments, and then continually manage that context Experiment by territory (as Microsoft did) Strategic conversation Meet regularly with the experimenters
Today's Sense-and-Response Approach (4) Be at the Table
IS executives should be actively involved in business strategizing
The IS function needs to be strategy-oriented CIO need to make their departments credible and
outsource most operational work Test the Future
Need to test potential futures before the business is ready for them (thinking ahead of the business) Provide funding for experiments Work with research organizations Have an emerging technologies group
Today's Sense-and-Response Approach (5) Put the Infrastructure in Place:
Moving quickly in Internet commerce means having the right IT infrastructure in place.
IT experiments are recommended to include those that test painful infrastructure issues Create and maintain common, consistent data
definitions Create and instill mobile commercial standards among
handheld devices Implement e-commerce security and privacy measures Determine operational platforms (ERP, Supply Chain
Management …)
Stages of Growth (1)
Richard Nolan et al observed four stages in the introduction and assimilations of a new technology Early Successes
Increased interest and experimentation Contagion
Interest grows rapidly; growth is uncontrolled; learning period for the field
Control Efforts begun toward cost reduction and standardization
Integration Dominant design mastered; setting the stage for newer
technology
Stages of Growth (2)O
rgan
izat
iona
l Lea
rnin
g
Time1960 1980 1995 2010
DP Era
Micro Era
Network Era
Technological discontinuity
Stage 1:Initiation
Stage 2:Contagion
Stage 3:Control
Stage 4:Integration and Stage 1 of Micro Era
Stage 2:Contagion
Stage 3:Control
Stage 4:Integration and Stage 1 of Network Era
Stage 2:Contagion
Stage 3:Control
Stage 4:Integration
Stages of Growth (3)
The importance of the theory is understanding where a technology or company resides on the organizational learning curve e.g. Web Service is currently in Stage 2, too much
control at the learning and experimentation stage can kill off new uses of technology
Management principles differ from stage to stage
Different technologies are in different stages at any point in time
Competitive Forces Model (1) Michael Porter's Five Forces Model
A model that determines the relative attractiveness (competition) of an industry.
Five forces Bargaining power of customers and buyers
High when buyers have many choices of whom to buy from, and low when the choices are few.
Bargaining power of suppliers High when buyers have few choices of whom to buy
from, and low when there are many choices.
Competitive Forces Model (2)
Threat of substitute products or services Low if there are very few alternatives to replace the
product or service. Switching costs
Costs that can make customers reluctant to switch to another product or service.
Threat of new entrants High when it is easy for competitors to enter the market
The intensity of rivalry among competitors High when the industry is less attractive.
Competitive Forces Model (3)
Industry Industry CompetitorsCompetitors
Rivalry among Rivalry among existing firmsexisting firms
SuppliersSuppliersSuppliersSuppliers Customers and Customers and BuyersBuyersCustomers and Customers and BuyersBuyers
Potential Potential EntrantsEntrantsPotential Potential EntrantsEntrants
SubstitutesSubstitutesSubstitutesSubstitutes
Bargaining power of buyersBargaining power of buyers
Threat of substitute products or Threat of substitute products or servicesservices
Bargaining power of Bargaining power of supplierssuppliers
Threat of new entrantsThreat of new entrants
How will the business react How will the business react to threats (and to threats (and opportunities)?opportunities)?
Competitive Forces Model (4)
Industry Industry CompetitorsCompetitors
Rivalry among Rivalry among existing firmsexisting firms
SuppliersSuppliersSuppliersSuppliers
Potential Potential EntrantsEntrantsPotential Potential EntrantsEntrants
SubstitutesSubstitutesSubstitutesSubstitutes
Bargaining power of buyersBargaining power of buyers
Threat of substitute products or Threat of substitute products or servicesservices
Bargaining power of Bargaining power of supplierssuppliers
Threat of new entrantsThreat of new entrants
Customers and Customers and BuyersBuyersCustomers and Customers and BuyersBuyers
The strategy and actions an organization adopts The strategy and actions an organization adopts dependdepend upon its upon its perceptions of itself and these threats.perceptions of itself and these threats.The strategy and actions an organization adopts The strategy and actions an organization adopts dependdepend upon its upon its perceptions of itself and these threats.perceptions of itself and these threats.
Porter’s strategies:Porter’s strategies:• Product differentiation (non-duplicable product or service)Product differentiation (non-duplicable product or service)• Low-cost producer Low-cost producer • Market niche (market segment or geographical market)Market niche (market segment or geographical market)
Porter’s strategies:Porter’s strategies:• Product differentiation (non-duplicable product or service)Product differentiation (non-duplicable product or service)• Low-cost producer Low-cost producer • Market niche (market segment or geographical market)Market niche (market segment or geographical market)
Five Forces Analysis of the Internet The Internet tends to dampen the profitability of
industries Increases the bargaining power of buyers Decreases barriers to entry Increases the bargaining power of suppliers Increases the threat of substitute products and
services Intensifies rivalry among competitors
Success depends on offering distinct value Firms should focus on their strategic position in an
industry and how they will maintain profitability
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2222 Distributed Systems Architecture
Information Systems Planning
Definition: IT Architecture VS. IT
Infrastructure An IT architecture is a blueprint showing how the parts will interact and interrelate. System, information, departments... Multiplicity of structures and views
An IT infrastructure is the implementation of an architecture. processors, software, databases, electronic links, data
centers, standards, skills, electronic processes... We now tend to divide computing into applications and
infrastructures
The Evolution of Distributed Systems Mainframes: with dumb terminals Minicomputers moved computing into
departments The master-slave computing model persisted and
processing was mainly centralized Microcomputer moved processing power into
desktop, briefcase and handhelds Client/server computing
Internet: a globally distributed system Interesting twist: power returning to a type of
centralized processing with networks of servers
Four Attributes of Distributed Systems The degree to which a system is distributed
can be determined by answering four questions:
1. Where is the processing done?
2. How are the processors and other devices interconnected?
3. Where is the information stored?
4. What rules or standards are used?
Distributed Processing
Limited processing power of a single node VS. increasing application demands Balance the load and improve overall performance Let machines handle the work they do best
Interoperability: information exchange between heterogeneous computing platforms Protocols Two-way message passing between user applications
Connectivity Among Processors Data exchanges through electronic
communication links TCP/IP Ethernet, ATM, FDDI, Frame relay...
Planned Redundancy for reliability Two or more independent paths between two
nodes to provide automatic alternate routing Topology and reliability of the Internet
Distributed Databases
Two distributed database schemes Divide a database and distribute its portions
throughout a system without duplicating the data Transparent user access
Store the same data at several different locations, with one site containing the master file Synchronization issue E.g. edge servers
System-wide Rules
Rules governing communication between nodes, security, data accessibility, program and file transfers, and common operating procedures Open standards after 1990s
OSI Reference Model SQL API: standardized interface TCP/IP Open source
Internet---A Scale-free Network (1) Internet is not designed, but evolved Internet is a scale-free network
Scale-free networks are very common and a very important category of real networks.
Scale-free networks are the direct result of self-organized growth Growth: networks continuously expand by the addition of
new nodes Special type of growth called preferential attachment
Preferential Attachment : The attachment is NOT uniform A node is linked with higher probability to a node that already
has a large number of links
Internet---A Scale-free Network (2)
Five nodes with most linksFirst neighbors of red nodes
27% reach
60% reach
Random/
Internet---A Scale-free Network (3)Poisson distribution
Exponential Network
Power-law distribution
Scale-free Network
P(k)~k-γ
Internet---Topological Robustness Topological robustness: the Internet is robust
in the presence of random failures. At any given time hundreds of routers are down
but the performance is not impacted It will function even if we remove randomly 80% of
the nodes.
Theoretical and experimental investigations show that scale-free networks are topologically robust
Internet---Vulnerability to Targeted Attacks Scale-free networks such as Internet are
vulnerable to attacks. If a malicious attack could simultaneously remove
5% of hubs (the highly connected nodes) the network would disintegrate
Internet---Virus
Scale-free networks like internet are vulnerable to spreading viruses Hubs are passing them massively to the
connected multiple nodes.
This suggests immunizing hubs.
When to Distribute Computing Responsibilities (1) The decision of distributing computing
responsibilities is rather managerial than technical People deciding how their portion of business
operates should also decide how they use IT
When to Distribute Computing Responsibilities (2) Systems responsibilities can be distributed
unless the following are true: Are the operations interdependent?
For interdependent, their planning, development, resources, and operations must be centrally coordinated
Are the businesses really homogenous? Processing may be distributed, but planning and hardware
selection should be centralized Does the corporate culture support decentralization?
Corporate culture might centralize finance, HR, and systems planning
An Organizational Framework
Systems may be needed for all 7 levels
Inter-organizational links can occur at all six internal levels
The current hot levels Level1: inter-enterprise
computing Leve5: where business
processes resideIndividualIndividual
Work Group or TeamWork Group or Team
Department or ProcessDepartment or Process
Plant or SitePlant or Site
Country or RegionCountry or Region
EnterpriseEnterprise
Business EcosystemBusiness Ecosystem1
2
3
4
5
6
7
A Technical Framework (1)
The SUMURU architecture developed in 1982, has stood the test of time. It provides a clear conceptual framework for
understanding various components of a distributed architecture.
A Technical Framework (2)
A Technical Framework (3)
Processors Services
Single-user systems (SU) Terminal access
Multiple-user systems (MU) File transfer
Remote utility systems (RU) Computer mail
Networks Standards
Local network (LN) Operating system
Remote network (RN) Communications protocols
Database systems