Disability

Introduction

Disability is a restriction or lack of ability to perform an activity in the manner or within the range considered normal for a human being. It describes a functional limitation or activity restriction caused by impairment. Disabilities are descriptions of disturbances in function at the level of the person.

Input and Output devices for disability

• MATHS workstation
• Screen magnification software programs
• Keyboard
• Keyguards
• Headphones
• Mouse
• Screen reader
• Voice output

Physiological factors for designing the input and output devices

Some people with limited range of motion, including some with arthritis in their hands, might prefer a smaller keyboard that requires minimal reach to access the keys [4].

Keyguard should be provided for those people who with cerebral palsy have difficulty controlling their muscles enough to hit one key on the keyboard [4].

The universal language need to be taught to make it easy for blind and partially sighted people to understand mathematics [2]. The MATH workstation (provides usable access for blind and partially sighted people reading and manipulating mathematical expressions [3]) should speak the people language, with words, phrases and concepts familiar to the people rather than the system-oriented terms [5].

People who have the visual impairment, the larger monitor may be needed in order to improve their access to the Internet by using the computer [4].

The designer should use the resizable font on web page so that the font size can be changed to bigger, helping the students to read [4].

Screen reader programs should be used together with earphones to reduce the noise in the area where the programs are being used and it will maintain the privacy of the person with a visual impairment who is accessing the Internet [4].

With the help of word prediction software, a list of possible words appears on the computer screen after typing in a few letters to help students who have difficulty processing information or intellectual deficit [4]. It provides error prevention features so students will not type the wrong words [5].

People who still have difficulty getting words into the computer might benefit from speech recognition or voice input software. These programs convert speech to computer text [4]. The program should always keep the students informed about what is going on through appropriate feedback within reasonable time [5].

The colour blind colour should be avoided to use for the people who have the colour blind for their eyesight.

To help the people who have the hearing impairments, the alternative format like transcript can be provided. The headphones should be given if they want to crack up the volume so they can hear [4].

Conclusion

The input and output devices should provide for interaction with the environment which people lives and works from the aspect of effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction.

References

1. Dpa, http://www.dpa.org.sg/definition_disability.htm
2. Reha, http://www.papenmeier.de/reha/research/mathe.htm
3. Helen Cahill and John McCarthy, http://www.rit.edu/~easi/itd/itdv01n4/article4.htm
4. Dr Marilyn, http://www.thearclink.org/forlibrarians/default.htm
5. Sven Fuchs, http://www.red-eye-reduction.com/assets/511_ScreenReaders.pdf

Impacts to introduce a new IT system into a large work organization

Introduction

The enterprise with better IT capabilities can achieve higher productivity and have greater insights into and control over their business, resulting in substantially higher revenue growth. In order to attain this purpose, introduction of a new IT system is necessary. However, there is the impacts will occur for the organization [1].

Organizational impacts

• The users will feel unfamiliar in the using the IT system. For the impacts of organization, it must depend on the amount of users. If there is more users, more resources are required to provide training. The difficulty of learning the new system depends on the complexity of the system as well.
  
  
• In the organization, the users may quickly lose interest to learn the new IT system because the users may not receive help for the learning problems encountered. The users may not understand the problems encountered and so cannot ask the right question to other users in the group [2].
  
  
• The business process will be improved because new IT system will improve productivity and quality efficiently. IT creates new opportunities for innovation in products and services [4].
  
  
• The new IT system can provide an attractive work environment, motivate the employees by means of job enrichment and support the basic values of organisational culture such as service responsiveness and quality [3].
  
  
• From the aspect of organization culture, newer types of IT such as electronic mail and groupware are creating significant changes in the way that information flows around group ware and between them and their customers and suppliers. It can hasten the development of more open and innovative cultures. The new systems may fail to become accepted by their users because the systems developers have not been culturally sensitive to the department or group ware in which the new systems are to be used [4].
  
  
• IT is dramatically changing the nature of professional work. To let users become effective, it not only requires traditional skills of organizing, thinking, writing but also knowing how best to use the power of IT for researching sources, accessing information, connecting to experts, communicating ideas and results, and packaging the knowledge (asset) for reuse [4].

Approaches to handle the impacts

• The trainer need to determine what the users know and does not know and to offer appropriate help based on that knowledge. This allows the trainer to be responsive to the needs of the users. The knowledge can be gained only with careful interaction with users [2].
  
  
• Highly interactive learning materials are required for users’ training because it is far more responsive to individual user needs [2].
  
  
• Use the interactive interfaces for the new IT system that will increase interest of users because interaction maintains interest. It resembles a conversation with both people talking frequently. Hence highly interactive learning units are conversationally interactive [2].
  
  
• Looking for problems that associated with learning and use the unit with many users, making improvements based on information gathered by the computer and professional evaluators [2].
  
  
• The users can be engaged in on-line experimentation. The program watches closely to see if the users is looking for the right data, and is drawing reasonable conclusions. Help is offered as necessary, but every user will make the discovery [2].
  
  
• The simulations can be used to interact with users, analyzing users' responses and deciding what to do next [2].
  
  
• Initiating personal use of IT into every day work. This should include use of decision support tools, groupware, knowledge management solutions and exploiting the Internet [4].
  
  
• Ensuring that new systems are customized change proof. Many new systems are developed around existing customized structures and responsibilities. Since these change very rapidly, new systems should be built with orgacustomizedxibility and change in mind [4].
  
  
• The users are required to combine the knowledge and skills of general management with their own discipline and IT [4]. In others word, becoming people with technical skills able to work in user areas doing a line job, but adept at developing and implementing IT application ideas [5].
  
  
• Enough times must be given to let the users get familiar to the new IT system. After a period of times, they will be able to use the system.

Conclusion

A stable and robust IT infrastructure with new implemented IT system to support operations and excellent IT management practices is important in achieving the superior results because better IT makes a quantifiable, positive difference on business performance [1]. The proper management organisational approaches should be taken to minimise the bad impacts.

References

1. Microsoft, http://download.microsoft.com/download/C/B/C/CBCE1905-5454-4F2A-9C77-6A6B5452249C/KeystoneSummary.pdf
2. Alfred Bork, http://www.ics.uci.edu/~bork/model.htm
3. Prof.dr.Lucica Matei, http://unpan1.un.org/intradoc/groups/public/documents/UNTC/UNPAN009309.pdf
4. David Skyme Associates, http://www.skyrme.com/insights/5itorg.htm
5. David Skyme Associates, http://www.skyrme.com/insights/6hybrid.htm

Introduction to VRML (Virtual Reality Markup Language)

3D

In everyday lives, people are used to manipulate objects in three spatial dimensions so three 3D on the Web seem obvious. In their opinions, 3D interface and interactivity design will provide them with the most comfortable and natural interaction environment.

The 3D may be useful if the following basic objectives are met:

Visualization of Complex Data

• Besides three-dimension data, 3D can also be used to create visualization of more complex data or relationships such as 3D tree diagram.

Creating a Sense of Place

• 3D is appropriate to create a sense of being in allocation as well.

Modeling Real Physical Interaction

• For Web 3D, simulations of real physical places and interactions are also a good candidates.
• Modeling a real building or creating an interactive virtual physicals experiment is good examples of the possibilities of this kind of interactive 3D environments.

Virtual Spaces

Generally, users will communicate with the following virtual spaces:

Simulation Spaces

• 3D environments that are created with the goal of making users feel like they are in a physical space. These spaces should make users feel like they are “there.” The following picture is a good example.

Communication Spaces

• 3D environments for communication.
• Transfer data from sender to receiver, not to provide a sense of place or facilitate the analysis of data.

Information Spaces

• 3D projections of sets of data with the purpose of representing ideas instead of places.
• People are experimenting with the new ways of representing data all the time, and information spaces that seem like simulation spaces might be desirable for some applications.
• Create an information spaces to help people understand data and ideas, not to give them a feeling of “being there.”

Online Games

Nowadays, games from any genre can become online games to play over Internet after the modification. Yahoo Games is the good instance. Normally, the publisher will build a user community to maximize the number of players and the amount of time. Within this community, a player can create an identity that is very different from his real-world persona. No matter how low his status might be in the real world, he can achieve fame the recognition within this virtual world. The features of online games are:

Allow for dropouts

• Players come and go suddenly in online games. Their connection can be broken.For example, the games cannot grind to a halt for 20 players if one of them suddenly disappears.

Keep the gamers’ screens synchronized

• Adopted when the amount of time it takes information to be transmitted over the wires especially in multiplayer games.
• Everyone sees the same time, especially when some have faster Internet connections than others.
  

Create a gathering area outside the game space

• People can exchange conversation, strategies, and items of value within the game.
• Enable chat capability during the game.

Develop world rules that help build community

• It can prevent a minority of idiots from spoiling the game for the majority of the users.

VRML

Virtual Reality Markup Language or VRML is a platform and browser independent language like HTML that enable 3D virtual worlds and supports many types of media, including sound, graphic, text, animation, video and interactivity. It immerses audience from in an entirely different world. They can move around in and interact with. Besides the online games, it is also used in a variety of application areas such as engineering and visualization, multimedia presentations, entertainment and education titles, web pages and shared virtual worlds. VRML is used on Internet, Intranet and local clients systems. The features of VRML are:

Supports many types of media

• For example, sound, graphics, text animation, video, and interactivity.

Scene changes in real-time

• By moving forward to approach the objects, the objects in the world become larger.

Require a fair amount of programming

• Providing 3-D, interactivity, animation and a lot of interesting effects.

Need a browser with VRML capabilities

• Many different browsers are available like Live3D and Intervista’s WorldView. With these browsers, users can navigate the world at his own pleasure, examining the world from whatever angle he wants.
• Look different depending on what browser is being used.

From the aspect of lighting and color

• Just as HTML pages look different when running on two different browsers.

Comparing with HTML, VRML has the extra dimension. The added dimension makes users can go inside, behind, around the scene. It can bring the advantages but also present some disadvantages.

Advantages of VRML

Users have more freedom to control

• All those 3D effects can be done in real-time. It presents infinite ways to view the animation, all at the viewer’s discretion.
• Users can view the scene from any angle (if they can effectively navigate), so they are not stuck viewing the same image every time.

The ability of third dimension to obscure items and hide items behind other items

• It can do something tricky on HTML pages. This enables user plays some interesting hide-and-seek games.

Achieve the realism

• Moving a user through an architectural structure gives them a much better feeling of spatial relationships for the building than pictures do.

The remote visualization of data

• This might take the form of a VR world that mimics the environment a remote-controlled vehicle is operating in, or it might even act as mock-ups of design.

Disadvantages of VRML

Moving mouse in 3D can be difficult

• Trying to manipulate a 3D model in 2D will make the input devices like the mouse become two-dimensional

Difficult to determine the depth on monitor

• 2D monitor is not the best output device to help the viewer to move around the world and understand the relative positions of objects.

The connection speed is slow and bandwidth-heavy

• Bandwidth severely limits the complexity of animation that can realistically present on the Web.

The details of VRML worlds are purposely kept simple

• Because of the huge calculation for processor is involved to calculate how the scene looks as user move. The more complex the scene, the more it taxes the processor.

Conclusion

Since the simulation has enormous potential in industrial and entertainment fields, simulation and 3D will dominate the entertainment and science forefronts well into the next Century. The future of Simulation and 3D are promising.

References

1. Laura Lemay’ Web Workshop, 3D Graphics and VRML 2.0 by Laura Lemay, Justin Couch, Kelly Murdock, Sams Net.
2. Animation on the Web by Sean Wagstate, Peachpit Press.
3. Game Design: The Art & Business of creating games by Bob Bates, Prima Tech’s Game Development.

IT and Engineering Project Management

Introduction

Project is an achievement of a specific objective, which involves a series of activities and asks which consume resources. It must be completed within a set specification, having definite start and end dates. Project management is the art of directing and coordinating human and material resources throughout the life of a project by using modern management techniques to achieve predetermined objectives of scope, cost, time, quality and participant satisfaction.

IT Project Management

IT project management is a further endeavor of project management practices to deal with the special challenges of managing an IT project. One of the examples of IT project management is software project management. Software is an intellectual product as opposed to a physical product. Intellectual products are intangible and largely invisible. Both of the software and the procedures for creating the software are difficult to experience with all of our high bandwidth human senses. It is very challenging to make the products and processes of software development more visible. Software development has few routine activities and includes a significant design component which requires creativity and innovation. The greatest strength of software is its flexibility which may become its greatest liability if it is not managed carefully. It is deceptively easy to make a change to software.

Engineering Project Management

Engineering project management involves different skills from those needed for the technical engineering work and the understanding of how the project is progressing and adjust the resources available in response. Engineering is the development of cost effective solutions to practical problems through the application of scientific knowledge. It emphasizes the design of solutions, usually tangible artifacts. It also involves the systematic application of analytical techniques grounded in science and mathematics, both to analyze the problem and to guide design choices in creating a solution. Good engineering project demands a wider definition of cost-effectiveness, involving wise use of all resources and minimizing any negative impacts of a particular solution. Engineering has a wider concern with improvements to human life through technological advance. There are two key outputs from any engineering project such as the engineered artifact itself and the knowledge and experience gained in producing it.

References:

1. N.J.Smith (2002). Engineering Project Management., Library of Congress, page 1 – 15, Blackwell Science Ltd.
   Eddie Burris, http://www.bit.umkc.edu/burris/pl/project%2Dmanagement/
2. Steve Easterbrook, Bashar Nuseibeh, http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~campbell/340/05w/readings/FoRE-chapter03-v8.pdf

The Management of Data Security

The importance of the management of data, its security and its impact on data security

Data security is a growing concern for many enterprises. It is the means of ensuring that data is kept safe from corruption and the access to data is suitably controlled. Hence, it helps to ensure privacy, protecting personal data [1].

Without the good management of data from the aspect of security, the important data may lose. It needs to spend time and effort to collect and reproduce the data. From the aspect of business, financial information like accounts and tax details or employee information like payroll and personnel files could be difficult to replace as well. Besides, it can be very expensive and time-consuming to replace the data that is lost. For the projects in progress like the new product designs could be delayed as the work need to be redone. To make matter worst, the sales, distribution and the reputation of the business could be directly affected [2]. The firms could lose thousands or even millions of dollar.

The virus can also damage the business by making documents stored on computers unusable. It can remain hidden in a computer system, triggered by a date or a certain combination of keys being pressed [3]. A virus can make the lost of data in a customer database such as customer names, contact details and information. Thus, the contact between the suppliers and customers will become more difficult. It delays in making purchase orders and taking customer orders [2]. With the weak security protection for the data, the hacker can easily make the alternations of data in faster way without physically visit the place where the data is stored and shows no clear evidence that changes has been made [3]. Any individual who suffers damage as the result of a hack or virus is entitled to compensation if the company is unable to prove that it had taken appropriate technical and organizational measures to secure the data [4].

Confidential communication like medical information or bank account details could end up being sent to the wrong person. What is more, the information falling into the wrong hands could assist the criminals [3].

In a nutshell, the eradication procedures to prevent the attack of virus and hacker are needed. Data security or information security in general can help in this protection.

How security policy plays an important role in ensuring IT Security.

A security policy is a plan of action for tackling security issues or a set of regulations for maintaining a certain level of security [5]. As a set of rules and practices, it governs how an organization manages and protects its assets which can include facilities, equipment, infrastructure or information. IT security focuses on the protection of computer systems or software, network connectivity and sensitive or confidential information [6].

The IT security policy takes account of common risks to the data. It will allow staff to understand and adopt appropriate security measures, creating a security-conscious culture. The IT security policy covers both external threats such as viruses and internal threats such as the theft of data [2].

To ensure the IT security, the policy provides [2] [6]:

• Secure login identification for using IT systems by defining password requirements and lockout parameters.
• Logical access controls, limiting access to information and restricting access to the level needed for each job.
• Confidentiality rules for customer and business information.
• Plans for business continuity management.
• Prohibit the browsing of websites likely to contain offensive material and virus.
• Prohibit the use of email to send or receive the offensive material, virus and sensitive commercial information.
• Prohibit the use of business email and web facilities for private use.
• Configuration on the use of Internet Protocol Security (IPsec) to encrypt data in transit over the network.
• Standard setting for Windows Firewall for all the computers within a domain.
• Smart cards requirement to be used for logon and multi-factor authentication.
• Trusts between domains.
• Control for disk quotas for users.

References

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_security
2. http://www.businesslink.gov.uk/bdotg/action/detail?type=RESOURCES&itemId=1073791301
3. http://www.stdavidscollege.co.uk/IT/New%20BusCom%20Website/Theory/Office%20Environment/importance_of_the_security_of_da.htm
4. http://www.itsecurity.com/archive/asktecs/mar2502.htm
5. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Security_policy
6. http://www.windowsecurity.com/articles/Understanding-Roles-Server-2003-Security-Policies.html

Roles of DA and DBA

Data Administrator (DA) is the mediator on the managerial and policy side and concerned with the data needs and data flows throughout the entire organization [1]. Normally, the reasonably size organization will have a Database Administrator (DBA) to maintain the database for its business processes. He is the mediators who handle the technical side and mainly concerned with the day to day operational aspects of database systems [1].

Here are the details of the roles and responsibilities of DA and DBA [1] [2] [3].

DA

• Specifying data standards across databases.
• Establishing policies for data usage, security, authorization and data flows into and out of the organization.
• Assisting the application development process by identifying data resources in the organization.
• Arbitrating the sharing of data across departments.
• Increasing the return on an organization's data investment.
• Conduct data definition sessions with users.
• Assist Database Administration in creating physical tables from logical models.
• Perform business requirements gathering.
• Identifying and cataloging the data required by business users.
• Producing conceptual and logical data models to accurately depict the relationship among data elements for business processes.
• Creating an enterprise data model that incorporates all of the data used by all of the organization’s business processes.
• Setting data policies for the organization.
• Identifying data owners and stewards.
• Setting standards for control and usage of data.

DBA

• Installing and configuring the DBMS.
• Assisting in the implementation of information systems.
• Monitoring the performance of the database and tuning the DBMS for optimal performance.
• Maintaining documentation including recording all changes to the database and DBMS.
• Ensuring data integrity is maintained and appropriate backups are made.
• Define required parameters for database definition.
• Analyze data volume and space requirements.
• Perform database tuning and parameter enhancements.
• Execute database backups and recoveries.
• Monitor database space requirements.
• Verify integrity of data in databases.
• Coordinate the transformation of logical structures to properly performing physical structures.
• Creating database objects, including databases, tables, views, and program structures.
• Altering the structure of database objects.
• Accessing the system catalog.
• Reading and modifying data in tables.
• Creating and accessing user-defined functions and data types.
• Running stored procedures.
• Starting and stopping databases and associated database objects.
• Setting and modifying DBMS parameters and specifications.
• Running database utilities such as LOAD, RECOVER, and REORG.

Only authorized users should have the access to prevent security breaches and improper data modification. It is the responsibility of the DBA to ensure that data is available only to authorized users by working with the internal security features of the DBMS in the form of SQL GRANT and REVOKE statements, as well as with any group-authorization features of the DBMS. Database security can be enforced by creating the views that can block access to sensitive data for end users as well [3].

The DA and DBA must understand and be capable of implementing any aspect of security that impacts access to databases. The coordination of Data Administration and Database Administration skills, talents, roles and responsibilities will enable an organization to realize the implementation of security. If the DBA and DA do not put the appropriate procedures in place, the final responsibility for the security failure may lie with them.

References

1. http://cisnet.baruch.cuny.edu/holowczak/classes/3400/security/#databaseadmin
2. http://www.tdan.com/i002fe07.htm
3. http://www.dbazine.com/ofinterest/oi-articles/dba-4