Page 578 - Using MIS

546 Glossary

One-of-a-kind application Software that is developed for Parallel installation A type of system conversion in which
a specific, unique need, usually for a single company’s the new system runs in parallel with the old one and the
requirements. 131 results of the two are reconciled for consistency. Parallel
One-to-many (1:N) relationships Relationships involving installation is expensive because the organization incurs
two entity types in which an instance of one type can relate the costs of running both systems, but it is the safest form of
to many instances of the second type, but an instance of the installation. 476
second type can relate to at most one instance of the first. Pay per click Revenue model in which advertisers display
For example, in most businesses, the relationship between ads to potential customers for free and pay only when the
Department and Employee is 1:N. A department may relate customer clicks. 309
to many employees, but an employee relates to at most one Payload The program codes of a virus that causes unwanted
department. 181 or hurtful actions, such as deleting programs or data, or
Online analytical processing (OLAP) A dynamic type of even worse, modifying data in ways that are undetected by
reporting system that provides the ability to sum, count, the user. 407
average, and perform other simple arithmetic operations PC virtualization Synonym for desktop virtualization. 129
on groups of data. Such reports are dynamic because us- Peering Exchanging information between telecommunica-
ers can change the format of the reports while viewing tion providers without charging an access fee. 217
them. 356
People As part of the five-component framework, one of the
Open source (1) Source code that is available for a commu- five fundamental components of an information system; in-
nity to access. (2) A collaborative effort by which software cludes those who operate and service the computers, those
developers create a product such as Linux; the develop- who maintain the data, those who support the networks,
ers often volunteer their time. In most cases, the jointly and those who use the system. Information exists only in
developed product can be used without paying a license the minds of people. 11
fee. 134
Perimeter firewall A firewall that sits outside the organi-
Operating system (OS) A computer program that controls zational network; it is the first device that Internet traffic
the computer’s resources: It manages the contents of main encounters. 406
memory, processes keystrokes and mouse movements,
sends signals to the display monitor, reads and writes disk Personal computers Classic computing devices that are
files, and controls the processing of other programs. 125 used by individuals. Examples of PCs include laptop or
desktop computers. 116
Operational decisions Decisions that concern the day-to-
day activities of an organization. 42 Personal identification number (PIN) A form of authenti-
cation whereby the user supplies a number that only he or
Oracle Database A popular, enterprise-class DBMS product she knows. 404
from Oracle Corporation. 170
Petabyte (PB) 1,024 TB. 118
Organizational feasibility Whether an information system
fits within an organization’s customer, culture, and legal Phased installation A type of system conversion in which the
requirements. 472 new system is installed in pieces across the organization(s).
Once a given piece works, then the organization installs and
Outsourcing The process of hiring another organization to tests another piece of the system, until the entire system has
perform a service. Outsourcing is done to save costs, to gain been installed. 476
expertise, and to free up management time. 438
Phisher An individual or organization that spoofs legitimate
Over the Internet When applied to cloud computing, the companies in an attempt to illegally capture personal data,
provisioning of worldwide servers over the Internet. 209 such as credit card numbers, email accounts, and driver’s
Packet A formatted message that passes through networks. 217 license numbers. 393
Packet sniffers A program that captures network traffic. 240 Phishing A technique for obtaining unauthorized data that
Packet-filtering firewall A firewall that examines each uses pretexting via email. The phisher pretends to be a legit-
packet and determines whether to let the packet pass. To imate company and sends an email requesting confidential
make this decision, it examines the source address, the des- data, such as account numbers, Social Security numbers,
tination addresses, and other data. 406 account passwords, and so forth. 393
Paired programming The situation in which two computer Pig Query language used with Hadoop. 366
programmers share the same computer and develop a com- Pilot installation A type of system conversion in which
puter program together. 487 the organization implements the entire system on a