BA 370 Business Systems Analysis - Course Syllabus

Prereqs: BA 272 or equivalent, BA 213, BA 271, BA 275, junior standing

Dr. René F. Reitsma
Associate Professor
Department of Accounting, Finance and Information Management
College of Business
Office: Bexell 432
Tel.: 541-737-6162
E-mail: reitsmar@bus.oregonstate.edu

Reitsma classes and office hours

Course Objectives and Outcomes

BA 370  Business Systems Analysis  comprises an introduction to the foundations, technology and applications of Management Information Systems (MIS). The course emphasizes 'systems thinking;' i.e., the conceptualization of information systems as structured configurations of elements behaving collectively to serve the information needs of an organization.

As part of this course you will, in small teams, research a specific MIS topic and present and discuss your results to class and in a report. You will also work on a small, real-world database design and development project.

Upon completion of this course you should be able to:

• Conceptualize information systems as Systems of Information; i.e., be able to apply standard concepts of Systems and Information Theory to real-world management information systems.
• Have an understanding of basic Information Theoretical concepts.

• Conceptualize information systems as complexes of hardware and software technologies and represent these complexes in system theoretical terms.
• Provide a brief overview of programming languages, their categories and current trends.
• Understand the relationships, both historical and current, between the use of information systems and business productivity.
• Provide an overview of information successes and failures and their causes.
• Communicate some  the difficulties of measuring (assessing) information system impacts.

• Convert between various number counting systems (decimal, binary, octal, hexadecimal, etc.) and perform basic arithmetic operations in these systems.
• Understand the architecture of the world-wide web, its basic components and some of its governing protocols.
  
• Explain the relational data model, its normal forms and its various integrity constraints.
  
• Design, build and test a (small) relational database suited to support a real-world information need.
• Provide an overview of the information systems development process.
• Explain the history, principles and current trends of Open Source Software.
  
• Be able to provide overviews and comments on a variety of special information systems topics such as Open Source Software, MIS career perspectives, the role of operating systems, etc.
• Research, report and lead a class discussion on a special MIS topic.

 

Course components

• Lectures (MIS and database topics).
• Team topic research, report and presentation projects.

  Teams of three (3) people sign up for a small research, report and presentation project (topics and presentation/report dates are listed in the table below under the Presentations, Reports & Homework column.)

  Form a team and determine your preference for four (4) presentation topics. Email the names of team members and first, second, third and fourth choice by Friday Oct. 7, 5:00 PM. First come, first served. Only one email per team, please!!

• Team database design and development project.

  Teams of three (3) people will each design and develop a database for a project formulated for this course. (The needs analysis and further system design efforts will take place in BA371).

  Form a database team and email the names of your team members by Monday Oct. 31, 5:00PM. Only one email per team!!

  Database design report and implementions due by Friday Dec 2, 5:00 PM.

• Exams: 
• Midterm exam: Monday Oct. 31 (in class).
• Final exam: Thursday Dec. 8, 6:00 PM
  

• Homework:
  

• All material in the literature and discussed in class (including the material presented and discussed as part of the team research, report and presentation projects!!) is considered exam material.

Course Schedule (presentations, guest lectures, deadlines, homework, deliveries and exams in italics)

 

Date	MIS Topic	Database	Presentations, Reports & Homework	Texts
Week 1
Sep. 26	Welcome & Syllabus
Sep. 28	Information Systems			Thomas Schneider's Information Theory Primer
Sep. 30	Information Systems			Stair & Reynolds, Principles of Information Systems (Special COB/MIS edition), Ch. 1. System Definition David Slaven's Entropy Page
Week 2
Oct. 3	Productivity paradox			Stair & Reynolds, Ch. 2. Gibbs (1994) Software's Chronic Crisis; Scientific American, Sep., 86-95. Anthes, G. (2004) Model Mania: ComputerWorld; March 8; pp. 41-45. Brynjolfsson & Hitt (1998) Beyond the Productivity Paradox; Communications of the ACM, 41, 49-65.
Oct. 5	Productivity paradox			Kraemer & Dedrick (2001) The Productivity Paradox: Is it Resolved? Is There a New One? What Does it All Mean for Managers?; CRITO, Feb.
Oct. 7	Binary systems		Special Topic Presentation Team Formation Due	Stair & Reynolds, Ch. 3.
Week 3
Oct. 10	Binary systems
Oct. 12	Software: Operating System & Applications		Homework Assignment 1 Due	Stair & Reynolds, Ch. 4. Thibodeau (2003) Far From Legacy, but Far More Challenged; ComputerWorld, July 7, 4-6.
Oct. 14	How to Choose? Options, Choices, Risks and Cost for Setting up a College-wide Information Infrastructure. Guest lecture by Alan Sprague, COB Systems Administrator			ComputerWorld Special Report: Linux Goes Global; July 2005; pp. 31-40.
Week 4
Oct. 17	Software: Programming languages			Stair & Reynolds, Ch. 4. Prechelt (2000) An Empirical Comparison of Seven Programming Languages; IEEE Computer, 33, 23-29.
Oct. 19		DBMS Intro; Relational model & normal form		Kroenke (2004) Database Concepts; Ch. 1, Ch 2.
Oct. 21		DBMS Intro; Relational model & normal form
Week 5
Oct. 24		Group Database Project(s) Introduction
Oct. 26		Structured Query Language (SQL)	Homework Assignment 2 Due	Kroenke, Ch. 3.
Oct. 28			HTTP* presentation paper Oracle & PeopleSoft* presentation paper
Week 6
Oct. 31	MidTerm Exam (example questions)	class project team formation
Nov. 2	Guest Lecture by Greg Thomas (Pink Elephant previously: Software Association of Oregon): MIS Career Paths			ComputerWorld, 2005 Career Planning Guide.
Nov. 4			PHP/ASP* presentation paper J2EE / .NET* presentation paper
Week 7
Nov.  7		Data Modeling and DB Design Class Project		Kroenke, Ch. 4.
Nov.  9			Business Intelligence* presentation paper W3C* presentation paper	ComputerWorld Special Report: The Future of BI: June 2004; pp. 37-45. ComputerWorld Special Report: Smarter BI: September 2005.
Nov. 11	Telecom/Networks (Prof. Raja)			Stair & Reynolds, Ch. 6.
Week 8
Nov.  14	Open Source Software			Stair & Reynolds, Ch. 4, p.176-180. Petreley, N. (2004) Why Free Beer Trumps Free Speech. ComputerWorld, Marc. 8, p. 39. Greenemeier, L. (2004) In Search of Open Source Experts. InformationWeek, Nov. 8. Not so Fast, Linux; BusinessWeek, November 2004.
Nov. 16	Open Source Software (Feature Film: Revolution OS: J.T.S. Moore; Wonderview Productions) (no instructor)
Nov.  18	Database class project (no instructor)			Kroenke, Ch. 5
Week 9
Nov. 21			XML & Web Services* presentation paper RFIDs* presentation paper	Bosak, J., Bray, T. (1999) XML and the Second-Generation Web. ComputerWorld, Special Report: Web Services Hurdles; August, 2004; pp 33-41. ComputerWorld Special Report: RFID Reality Check; December 2004; pp. 31-38.
Nov.  23		Database administration	Homework Assignment 3 Due	Kroenke,  Ch. 6.
Nov.  25	Thanksgiving
Week 10
Nov. 28			Digital Libraries & Knowledge Mgt.* presentation paper
Nov. 30			Linux overview and demo* presentation paper OSS Business Models* presentation paper
Dec. 2	Q & A	DB class project delivery
Week 11
Dec 8, 6:00- 7:50 PM @ BXL 321	Final exam (test questions)
			* Topic taken

Important Dates

• Friday Oct. 7, 5:00PM: Form your MIS Special Topic team and determine your preference for four (4) presentation topics. Email the names of team members and first, second, third and fourth choice.
• Friday Oct. 14: Guest Lecture by Alan Sprague (COB).
• Monday Oct. 24: Introduction database/class project(s).
• Wednesday Oct 26: Guest Lecture by TBA

• Monday Oct. 31: MidTerm Exam.

• Monday Oct. 31, 5:00PM: Form database team and email names of team members.

• Friday Nov. 11: Guest lecture by Dr. Raja (COB).

• Friday Dec. 2, 5:00 PM: Database design report and implementions due.
• Thursday Dec. 8, 6:00 PM: Final Exam @ BXL321.  

Grading Scheme

Course Component	Grade Contribution
MidTerm Exam	20%
Team research, report and presentation project	20% (10% for presentation and report each)
Team research, report and presentation project peer evaluation	5%
Database design project	20%
Database design project peer evaluation	5%
Homework	10% (3.3,% + 3.3% + 3.4%)
Final Exam	20%

The following number-to-letter grade scale will be used:

!!! Deadlines, exam dates, submission dates and presentation dates stated in this syllabus are firm and will not be altered to accommodate the schedules of individual students !!!

Students who have been approved for accommodations through Services for Students with Disabilities (SSD), who have any emergency medical information the instructor should know about, or who need special arrangements in the event of evacuation, should contact the instructor as early as possible. Providing accommodations is a collaborative effort between the student, the instructor and SSD. Students not approved for accommodations through SSD but who belive they are eligible for accommodations should contact SSD immediately at 737-4098.

Reitsma classes and office hours