Title: Computer Applications for Business 1
1Computer Applications for Business (1)
- Health Safety Information
- Goals of the course
- Help you get the best out of computers
- And out of the IT staff youll work with
- Objectives to cover business uses of PC
packages - For assisting in business decision-making
- To communicate conclusions and ideas
- This course is for you
- Content depends on what you know already
- Youve almost certainly used computers heavily
- Goal is to glue together Islands of
understanding
2How Well Do This
- Method is to enhance your Business skills by
- Extending expertise with a Word-processing
package - Developing expertise of a Spread-sheet package
- Being able to set up and use a database
- At the end, you will be able to produce reports
in a variety of styles, integrating the
techniques youve learnt - On the way, youll learn some
- Basic Computer Architecture
- Understanding of Operating Systems
3Relevant Topics
- Word Processing
- Setting up and using styles
- Complex layouts
- Simple desktop publishing
- Electronic Mail
- How to make it work for you
- WWW Browser
- Getting information from the Internet
- Optimizing the use of search engines
- Digital Imaging
- Introduction to Databases
- Where theyre useful
- How to set them up
- More on Spreadsheets
- Presenting data clearly
- Selecting graphical displays
- Project Planning
- Concept of critical path
- Gantt and PERT charts
- Internet publishing
- Writing HTML
- Producing and processing surveys
- Unlikely to get hands-on experience with software
for - Accounting
- Customer relationship mgt
4Potential Packages to Study
- Depends on
- Students knowledge base and needs
- If you cant use Microsoft Word already, please
enrol on an ECDL course at the Kenneth Kettle
Building - Well learn about making reports and presenting
facts - How computers are used in Business
- Their contribution to business success
- What professional and managerial staff do with
them - Being selfish which skills will give you an
advantage over your peers?
5College IT Survey 1998
6Another way to look at it
I bet thesehave changedsince 1998
7Getting to know one another
- Mikes Background
-
- Now lets hear about you
8Goals of the Course
- Understanding rather than skills
- Not how to do word-processing etc(which you
can get from ITCS) - Foundation for rest of Computing thread of
Business programme - Basic computer architecture (mainly Intel x86
and IBM 390) - General and PC hardware
- Introduction to Operating Systems
- The impact of computers on Business
- How Managers use Computers
9The Previous Computing Module
Strongly agree
Agree
Disagree
Strongly disagree
We aim to make it more enjoyable this time no
programming
10How Computers fit into Business
- Operations
- Point of Sale systems
- Warehouse control
- Ordering, Logistics
- Accounting
- Production
- Numerically-controlled machines
- Design
- Production control
- Control Management
- Monitoring of Operations and Production
- Decision Support tactical and strategic
11How Important are Computers?
- Most human achievements happened before computers
- Shakespeare, Mozart, Michelangelo
- Even things youd not consider doing without a
computer, like cracking the Enigma code, or
building aircraft - Theyre important now because we are addicted
- Manufacturing and commerce run just in time
- Control is more detailed than previously
- Business is global
- Product life cycles are shorter, demanding fast
decisions - And because were more democratic
- Most of population now has at least one bank
account - Only rich minority used banks 50 years ago
12A Way to Assess Value
- Think how you would survive without computers
- Analyse business processes
- Look how they use computers
- Assess how long the business could continue
without - What are the immediate killers?
- Which processes secure long-term future
- This analysis was used in my Year-2000 seminars
- Focus on short-term issues (specific to Year
2000 none of us believed the problems will take
long to fix) - Look at contribution to revenue short and
mid-term
13Business Processes Priority
- Physical safety (not getting shut down under
HASAW) - Generating Revenue
- Making Product or Service
- Getting paid
- Processing orders
- Satisfying Customers Partners
- Delivering product
- Paying bills
- Handling enquiries
- Staff Morale
- Payroll, working conditions
- Management Information
Distinguish between Urgency and Importance
14Our focus is on Management
- We need to know about production computing,
- But few of us will actually use it ourselves
- Physical safety outsourced to building management
- Point-of-Sale equipment used at fairly junior
levels - As is order-processing, telesales...
- Making product or service often requires very
specialized applications - So do warehousing and logistics systems
- We are likely to use
- Accounting systems, including payroll and
personnel - Financial tracking and forecasting systems
- Management Information and communications
15So what do Managers Use?
- Dont believe everything you read in Dilbert
- But believe a lot of it thats why its in the
Library! - Business success depends on
- Communications
- Formal, including instructions, materials orders
- Informal, such as e-mail
- Interpersonal, such as presentations
- Decision support
- Understand potential costs and benefits
- Determine trends
- React to correct errors and missed opportunities
- Picking key indicators out of a pile of figures
Thisiswhatwellstudy
16Communications
- Formal, such as Electronic Data Interchange
- Many large companies now order only via EDIIf
you want to sell to Boeing interface with their
system - NHS now gets most dentists bills over EDI
- IBM avoids costs of 350M a year by Online
Education - Informal point-to-point, such as e-mail
- IBM Europe funded a large network in 1979 on
basis of faster communication of fixes for
production errors - Informal Broadcast, like the Internet WWW
- Companys Home Page is a high-impact PR resource
- IBM valued Intranet at 1B in 2000-01
- Latest trend is tie-in between WWW and line of
business applications, e.g. on-line ordering
17Decision Support
- Some very esoteric systems
- City trading desk support
- Oil or commodity trading
- Others based on more familiar business models
- Business-case development
- Trend analysis
- Market share
- Profitability
- Technology substitution
- Sometimes the decision is reached and implemented
- More usually you have to convince people
- Present the figures in a way they understand and
believe
The assignmentdoes this
18Lets build a list
- Word Processing
- Electronic Mail
- WWW Browser
- Graphics/Drawing
- Database
- Spreadsheet
- Project Planning
- Accounting
- Desktop publishing
- Internet publishing
- Monitoring real-time events
- Processing surveys
19Convincing People
- Major part of most Business activities
- Creating markets
- Selling things
- Encouraging change and innovation
- Achieved by writing or presenting
- Story must be logical and coherent(even better
if its right!) - Audience must respect person communicating
- Communicator must understand audienceand adapt
to its needs
20Horses for Courses
- No one style is right for everything
- Most businesses have many prescribed styles
- Different styles used for different purposes,for
example, in KAC we have - Definitive documents for validated degrees
- Forms for justifying and hiring external speakers
- Official minutes
- Informal e-mails and intranet postings
- The module assignment is practice at writing a
specific kind of business report - Fairly typical of a business case in a real
company - Ability to follow a prescribed style is a vital
skill
21Or are they donkeys?
22In the beginning...
- 21 June 1948 First stored-program computer ran
(the Manchester University Baby) - Program keyed directly into memory
- Results displayed as dots on a CRT
- When program finished, it stopped
- Next machines used tape or card for I/O
- By 1949, nearly all the basic parts of computer
hardware were there - though in a very primitive state
- But even now, computers are very dumb!
23Data and Information
- We use the word Data describe the raw numbers and
characters that come into the machine, and for
their representation inside it - The purpose of the computer is to turn this raw
data into Information something meaningful - Information can be numbers, pictures, sounds,
graphs or programs the underlying data is just
a pattern of ones and zeros in memory or on disk - Remember
- The data youre working on has to be in memory
- Memory is cleared when you switch off
24Modern Computer Architecture
Processor
Memory
1234567890- QWERTYUIOP ASDFGHJKL ZXCVBNM,./
Output (Information)
Input (Data)
Bus
Other long-term Storage
Disk Storage
- Processor works on data in memory
- Other data flows through the bus
25Practical Sessions
- Wed better agree some terms for what we see
- Terms arent needed to do the work, only to talk
about it! - Examples from standard Windows XP Professional
- Terminology
- Click means press the left mouse button once
- Double-click means press the left button twice
(fairly quickly, and without moving the mouse in
between) - Right-click means press the right mouse button
once - Drag means position the pointer over an object,
then press the left button and hold it down while
you move the pointer to a target location the
object will move too
26The Windows XP Screen
Title Bar
Menu Bar
A window
Minimized Application
Icon on Desktop
Start Button
Task Bar
27Three States of a Window
Click on icon
Maximizedfilling the entire screen
Windowedusing part of the screen
Or double-click the title bar
Minimizedreduced to an entry on the Task Bar
Click the entry to restore to previous state
28Windows Explorer
- The most useful tool on the system
- Gives you a view of how your files are arranged
- Lets you open them
- ..or rename, or delete, or move, or copy
- Press Start, select Programs, slide the pointer
over Windows Explorer and then click - Or use the short-cut
- hold the Windows key down and press E (for
Explorer) - When you open a file, Windows automatically picks
the right application program for you Word,
Excel - Theres no point in closing the Explorer Window
ever!
29Practicals Source of materials
- Well usually get samples fromhttp//cmg.wkac.ac
.uk/courses/samples - You should create a folder for them in My
Documents - If your space is full, create folder on the
C-drive (but youll lose it all when you log
off!) or use a diskette - Now create a BS1904 folder my method is
- Open Windows Explorer (just hold Windows key
down and press E) - In left pane of the Explorer window, click My
Documents - Pull down File menu, slide down to New, then
across to Folder, then click - This creates a New folder, whose name you can
overtype
30Downloading
- Start a Web browser Internet Explorer is easy
just click on the on the Start Menu - Type in the URL (the address youve been given)
- Right-click on what you want, then use File Save
As to load the file to your chosen folder - Next go back to Windows Explorer to use the file
- Dont shut down Internet Explorer youll need it
again - Most files we give you will start if you
double-click on them
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31Summary Computers in Business
- Production the job is using the computer
- Example check-out, order-entry
- Automation the computer does the job
- Example machine tools, telephone exchange
- Management computers control the business
- Started with simple accounting, now involves
complex network of systems, usually centred on a
database - Decision support computers serving
professionals - This is what youre most likely to do with them,
using spreadsheets and project planning tools
32Decision Support Systems
- To address questions like
- How is the business doing?
- What happens if?
- Should we invest in X or Y?
- Usually needs access to operational data
- Ideally the real thing, not an out-of-date
extract - Plus tools to manipulate the data
- Spreadsheets to analyse the numbers
- Word processor or graphics to present results
- Project planner to schedule your proposal
33Questions?