Chapter 11 - Database Management Systems, Management Information Systems, Decision Support Systems

Abstract

The chapter discusses several major types of applications systems including database management systems (DBMS), management information systems (MIS), and decision support systems (DSS). Each of these plays an important part in managing the huge amounts of information that businesses must process quickly and accurately. A business's data is one of its most precious resources. It is important to keep that data current and in a form that is easy to update, access, and associate with related data items. A database is ordinarily a large collection of data. Some businesses view the collection of all their operating information as a single database, while others have separate databases devoted to different types of information. The DBMS creates the database, keeps it up-to-date, and provides ready access to authorized users. DBMS also provide extensive security measures to prevent unauthorized access. They make it convenient for expressing relationships between related data items and facilitate the design of user applications systems.