Monday, May 31, 2010
What do iTunes, Walmart, and eBay have in common?
What are information systems?
Information systems is a fast-moving, vibrant field whose mission is focused on the connections between computers information technology on the one hand and the PEOPLE whose lives are transformed by computers and information technology, people who live and work in organizations and whose needs are served by organizations
What is this mission?
Well it is answered by the following question:
What do iTunes, Walmart, and eBay have in common?
Answer: they transform people’s lives millions of times a day through the use of Information Systems
- iTunes transforms the way you listen to music.; It lets you buy the songs you want for a low price, and it lets you organize and play them however and whenever and wherever you want
- Walmart transforms the way you shop by giving you the high quality, low priced, products you want in a brick-and-mortar store
- EBay, by linking together buyers and sellers has created the world’s largest electronic flea market
As IS professionals we analyze..
- The needs of people like consumers who want high-quality products and services and choices, knowledge workers like accountants, engineers, physicians, architects, managers who make decisions, and all of the people who work to design, build, and distribute products and services
We design solutions that consist of a variety of elements such as
- information. We are going to teach you how to collect, model, represent, store, collect, manipulate and secure information in databases
- Software programs and networks
- That consider the people who are using them they work they do
We build these systems using powerful tools and techniques, like programming languages, web development tools, database management systems
We manage people and projects, the information systems organization and its powerful infrastructure that it used to support the information society that is IS today.
And transform data into information into knowledge, and the way people work, peoples lives, just like Walmart, iTunes and Ebay..
Over the next four years, you’ll take courses and develop knowledge and skill working with different information technologies like networks and programming languages, you’ll learn about organizations and business, you’ll work with data and information in databases, and you’ll learn people skills as it relates to our work.
All these elements combine to form information systems used to provide business solutions that transform our lives.
Careers in Information Systems:
• Programmer analyst
• Systems analyst
• Data Base Administrator
• Data Base Programmer
• Network Analyst
• Network Administrator
• Telecommunications Technician
• Security Manager (LAN & WAN)
• IT Trainer
• Web/Internet Administrator
• Web Designer/Programmer
• Web Security Manager
An Example IS Project
• The Center for Computing Education Research