Saturday, September 4, 2010

Week 6 - Chapter 5 Architectures

1. What is information architecture and what is information infrastructure and how do they differ and how do they relate to each other?

Information architecture: Consists of how to store files and where.
Information infrastructure: Consists of how the architecture works. How reliable and flexible it is, is important.
Differ-
Architecture: Is how the system will be used in the organisation. It includes all the systems and file paths involved in storing files.
Infrastructure: The way in which the files are stored and ensures that is runs well.
Relate-
Architecture relies on infrastructure as infrastructure ensures works behind the scenes to ensure that the files are stored properly and that the system is working well and is up to date with minimum error.

Below shows a link of how different infromation architecture looks like
http://www.prescientdigital.com/articles/strategic-design/design-ii-structure-comes-before-design

Below is an image showing how an information infrastucture on a national scale looks like




2. Describe how an organisation can implement solid information architecture
List and describe the five requirement characteristics of infrastructure architecture.

Implement solid information architecture-
By creating a blog site which enables employees and employers to create and distribute information within and amongst different sections of the organisation. This will be an easy and less time effective way to send messages and updates around the organisation.
Five requirement characteristics-
1. Flexibility – must meet all types of business changes. It is designed to include the ability to handle multiple currencies and languages, even if the company is not yet operating overseas.
2. Scalability – is how well a system can adjust to increased demands. Capacity planning determines the future IT infrastructure necessities for new equipment and additional network capacity.
3. Reliability – ensures all systems are functioning correctly and providing accurate information.
4. Availability – addresses when systems can be accessed by employees and customers. High availability refers to a system or component that is continuously operational for a desirably long length of time.
5. Performance – measures how quickly a system performs a certain process or transaction in terms of efficiency IT metrics of both speed and throughput.


3. Describe the business value in deploying service oriented architecture

A SOA will allow organisations to become integrated with other businesses which makes working together easier. It also ensures that IT systems can adapt quickly and rapidly to support business needs. Using Meta data, they can re use systems many times which makes development cheaper and flexible.


4. What is an event?

It is an event example which the flow of program is determined by events such as sensor outputs, the amounts of clicks per page or messages etc.


5. What is a service?

A service cab be a business task, such as checking a potential customer's credit rating. They are similar to software products.


6. What emerging technologies can companies use to increase performance and utilise their infrastructure more effectively?
-Virtualisation- enables division of recourses of a computer into different environments.
-Loose Coupling- services joined together on demand to create complex services.
-Grid computing- collection of dispersed computing, storage and network resources, used to improve quality of service.

Below is an example of a virtualisation desktop using Mac





Below is an image of how grid computing works

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