Chapter 10, Problem 1Q

Program Plan Intro

The rank of items in architecture checklist provided in the book.

Program Description Answer

Ranking items in architecture checklist:

1. Initial and total cost of ownership (TCO)
2. Corporate organization and culture
3. Enterprise resource planning (ERP)
4. Security issues
5. Processing options
6. Web integration
7. Corporate portals
8. Legacy system interface requirements
9. Scalability

Explanation of Solution

Given Information: Architecture checklist provided in books is as follows:

1. Corporate organization and culture
2. Enterprise resource planning (ERP)
3. Initial and total cost of ownership (TCO)
4. Security issues
5. Scalability
6. Legacy system interface requirements
7. Processing options
8. Web integration
9. Corporate portals

System analyst must check following list of items before deciding system architecture which can be ranked as below from most important to least important:

• Initial and total cost of ownership (TCO): System analyst must try to get solutions of different questions which helps in finding initial cost and cost which may add up during the development, which is total cost of ownership. This is most important as this will determine total cost and budget of system.
• Corporate organization and culture: System architecture must study day-to-day functions of business and users in order to understand corporate organization and culture. This will help in focusing on operational feasibility which will help in deciding other checklist items.
• Enterprise resource planning (ERP): ERP describes platform: software and hardware environment of system architecture which will decide possibility of scalability and web integration.

Security issues: What security system and policy needs to be implemented.

Scalability: Determining system ability to expand or downsize according to business requirements.

Legacy system interface requirements: One must determine if there is any legacy file system that needs to be part of new system and till what time period it is required. This is required to support processing and web integration.

• Processing options: Before moving to portal design and web integration processing option must be decided: online or batch processing.
• Web integration: System analyst must determine what all applications needs to be integrated with web and which one must support e-commerce.
• Corporate portals: Corporate portals must be included in planning and architecture which becomes entry point of customers, employees, suppliers and others.