This article talks about how the Laurens Electric Cooperative implemented the Geographic Information System (GIS) and improved productivity and increased efficiency among all their service vehicles and personnel. LEC is a non-profit member –owned utility company with 5000 customers. In 2004, the company equipped its 120 trucks with laptops embedded with GIS mobile software. This software is updated two or three times a week.
Saving Lineman Time: With the installation of GIS technology, the crewmen can easily find customers by name or ID. The zoom and pan technology enables locating pieces of equipment such as transformers and substations. Using the digital maps help linemen locate grid numbers, roads or customers. It also saves valuable time in repairs since all the information is at their fingertips. When the company first installed the computers it met with resistance from some of the crew members. This was mostly due to the “old tool mentality”. After the company had training sessions the crewmen realized the value of such a system.
Minimizing Outages: This digital mapping saves time and becomes invaluable during storms. The GIS software helps the crews identify problems and get an individual, substation or subdivision back on-line, quickly. By seeing where exactly the problem area is visually on a map, the field crews can make better decisions in terms of how to restore power.
If the need arises the GIS can be updated continuously. It keeps management informed of the location, of all their crews and dispatches them to specific locations.
Increasing Dispatch Efficiency: The mobile software effectively handles outage situations and improves the efficiency of dispatch. The interactive maps of the electrical system helps linemen find ways to deal with a power outage before they arrive at a location, thus increasing efficiency. This eliminates down time and the problem can be fixed much quickly. It also keeps management informed of the specific location where the job and the crew is.
In the past four years, LEC has continually updated and improved its GIS software and capabilities. LEC is now looking to partner with another system integrator that supports the electrical community and is exploring the possibility of investing in global positioning system technology.
Mobile GIS Improves Productivity in the Field; Transmission & Distribution World; Nov 2007; 59, 11; Retrived on May 15 from ABI/INFORM Global
Saturday, May 17, 2008
Friday, May 16, 2008
Can Information System Make Your Doctor Better?
Q1. What problems are hospitals and physicians encountering in diagnosing diseases and prescription medications? What management, organization, and technology factors are responsible for these problems?
Ans: Physicians encounter problems of misdiagnosing and wrong medications to their patients in hospitals, nursing homes and doctor’s office. As reported by the National Academy of Science’s Institute of Medicine that, each year more than 1.5 million Americans are injured by drug errors and estimation of more than 7,000 Americans die because of inappropriate prescriptions. Erroneous charges are incurred to patients for faulty medication bills amounting about $3.5 billion annually.
Human factor is the key responsible for these problems because of their handwriting, memory lapses, fatigue and distractions. The proliferation of medications also raises confusions and complexity for doctors in proper prescriptions.
Q3. What obstacles prevent computer systems from improving the medical industry? How can these obstacles be removed?
Ans: Computer systems like CPOE and DDS have proven to be very effective at hospitals; enhancing activities by saving time and people lives. The obstacles that prevent computer systems from improving the medical industry are:
1) The resistance from doctors to change the traditional way of treatment, due to the complexity of the system.
2) Simple glitches in the system increase the likelihood of ordering wrong medications by scattering patient data and drug ordering forms. The program needs to be well designed.
3) Lack of gearing these systems towards the nurse, who actually has the greater impact.
4) Rigidity of such a system over the traditional paperwork also obstruct from improving the medical industry.
The obstacles can be overcome if: effective communication among the medical staff is achieved. They also need to learn more about the system and trust it. Finally, the system must be designed to have thorough pertinent information regarding each patient.
Ans: Physicians encounter problems of misdiagnosing and wrong medications to their patients in hospitals, nursing homes and doctor’s office. As reported by the National Academy of Science’s Institute of Medicine that, each year more than 1.5 million Americans are injured by drug errors and estimation of more than 7,000 Americans die because of inappropriate prescriptions. Erroneous charges are incurred to patients for faulty medication bills amounting about $3.5 billion annually.
Human factor is the key responsible for these problems because of their handwriting, memory lapses, fatigue and distractions. The proliferation of medications also raises confusions and complexity for doctors in proper prescriptions.
Q3. What obstacles prevent computer systems from improving the medical industry? How can these obstacles be removed?
Ans: Computer systems like CPOE and DDS have proven to be very effective at hospitals; enhancing activities by saving time and people lives. The obstacles that prevent computer systems from improving the medical industry are:
1) The resistance from doctors to change the traditional way of treatment, due to the complexity of the system.
2) Simple glitches in the system increase the likelihood of ordering wrong medications by scattering patient data and drug ordering forms. The program needs to be well designed.
3) Lack of gearing these systems towards the nurse, who actually has the greater impact.
4) Rigidity of such a system over the traditional paperwork also obstruct from improving the medical industry.
The obstacles can be overcome if: effective communication among the medical staff is achieved. They also need to learn more about the system and trust it. Finally, the system must be designed to have thorough pertinent information regarding each patient.
Sunday, May 11, 2008
The Top 10 Most Significant Ecommerce Developments
This article clearly shows how the ecommerce had brought different developments in today’s way of doing business. There are lots of companies who are part of the ecommerce trend in the businesses. As in chapter 10 as well as in previous chapter, we use examples of companies like Google, eBay and others. This article shows the impact of such business on the overall operation of business.
The Software& Information Industry Association (SIIA) had unveiled a list of the top most significant ecommerce developments during the past decade on the 10th anniversary of the Framework for Global Electronic Commerce. From events to products to websites, the SIIA’s list of significant ecommerce developments of the past 10 years encompasses a wide range of innovations. This list was compiled and ranked by panel of policy and industry expert who were selected by SIIA’s staff.
Google (September 1998): The search engine is now used by 30% of internet users for services including maps, blogs and video.
Broadband Penetration of U.S. Internet Users Reached 50 % (June 2004): It took broadband 4 years to reach 50% of the population. By the end fo 2007, the number will reach an estimated 90%.
eBay Auctions(September 1997): After the growth of eBay, thousands of people quit their jobs and now earn money exclusively through online auctions.
Amazon.com (May 1997): The template for online stores, Amazon gained tremendous popularity through its ease of use and selection, and heralded the important role of ecommerce in the U.S.
Google Ad Words (2000): This was the beginning of keywords ads, which now represents 40% of the market share of online advertising.
Open Standards HTML 4.0 (released 1997): The World Wide Wed Consortium, which is not controlled by any company or government, oversees HTML standards. The opne standards allow entire industries to grow as benefit to everyone.
Wi-Fi 802.11 (Launched 1997): The Internet went from home and office into the worlds as Internet users were able to connect anywhere without cables and wires.
User-Generated Content (Youtube 2005): Youtube may have started with shaky, amateurish videos, but it is not an integral part of 2008 presidential campaign, the center pf copyright battles, and a place where anyone and everyone can express themselves.
iTunes (2001): In a world of pirated music and CD sales in decline, iTunes popularized the sale of legal music downloads, which has now generated more than $2 billion.
Blackberry (1999): This all-in-one communication device took the business world by storm, delivering Web in the palm of person’s hand.
These are the major companies that have and will be talked about when it comes to the evolution of technology. It’s so amazing to see the impact of such revolutionary in the development of e-commerce.
Scott Koerwer
Information Today; Sep 2007; 24, 8; ABI/INFORM Global
Saturday, May 10, 2008
Can eBay Continue Growing?
Q1. What is eBay’s business model and business strategy? How successful has it been?
Ans: The business model of eBay is a web-based automated auction service, founded in 1995 by Pierre Omidyar and Jeff Skoll. eBay earns its revenue mainly from fees and commissions, associated with its trading services; basically through transmitting of information. The company itself holds no inventory and is not responsible for shipping.
The company’s growth strategy focuses on expansion and continuing innovations, to enhance the variety of products on its sites. It assists buyers and sellers trade high-end goods and chattel; fine arts, automobiles, jewelry to clothing, consumer electronics and house wares.
The company has been successful and profitable attracting more than 200 million users by 2006. eBay now employs more than 8,000 full-time workers and has operations in 32 countries, including services in Mexico and eight South American countries. In 2005, the eBay users listed 1.8 billion items for auction; resulting in $40 billion worth of goods. In 2006, it was expected to be surpassed by 2 billion.
Q2. What are the problems that eBay is currently facing?
Ans: eBay is currently facing several problems:
a) With the increased seller fees, the growth rate in the United States and Germany had been slowed, though the losses were covered by the rapid growth in France and Italy.
b) eBay had trouble penetrating the real estate, travel, new car sales and expensive collectibles market.
c) Increasing competition in the auction site obstructs eBay from monitoring its compliance with diverse laws and regulations as it expands internationally.
d) eBay failed in ensuring a secured trade environment with fraud protection.
e) The company’s customer service department struggles with the task of satisfying online buyers and sellers.
Sunday, May 4, 2008
SHEILDING WEB SERVICE FROM ATTACK
Web services are almost irresistible. By nature, they allow one system to find and interact with another, with little or no human intervention. Yet, the very virtues that make web services compelling; their use of trusted protocols and their use of multiple intermediaries make them a potential access for criminals. Ultimately, the recognition that we need to tackle is the Web services' vulnerabilities as part of a growing awareness that security must be addressed in the code of applications, not just through firewalls and gateways.
The common reasons for vulnerabilities are the mistaken belief that applications are exposed only to internal personnel rather than the world at large. Web services frequently pass messages through several intermediaries before they reach their final destination, undercutting technologies such as SSL, which secures connections only across the open Internet.
A high percentage of Web services interact with databases. SOAP and XML make it easy to disguise malicious payloads, opening new avenues for buffer-overflow attacks, targeting an enterprise's most vital systems. Other common Web service exploits include XML parser attacks, in which an infinite string leads to a denial of service, and XML external entity attacks, in which a request points to an invalid file, resulting in an error that may cause the Web service to give out information it shouldn't disclose.
Defensive Measures: Although Web services raise risks, organizations need not fall victim to security breaches if they take proactive measures. That means the biggest defense comes from ensuring code works, preferably before it's ever exposed to the Net. Although plenty of coders use blacklists to prevent well-known types of malicious routines from being executed, the more prudent approach is to employ white lists, for example; a field that asks for a Social Security number will accept only a positive value that has nine digits.
Security professionals should also take careful inventory of every service that's exposed to the Internet, preferably through an audit carried out by someone external to the IT department. That approach can be particularly effective in identifying services left behind by a previous generation of developers. Whether the services are already in place or not yet deployed, each one needs to be thoroughly tested using a variety of methods: 1) scan every port of every IP address and carefully query each service that responds, 2) looking to see whether UDDI servers, WSDLs and/or other self-describing mechanisms are giving up information that could aid an attacker.
Thus this article is closely related to both the chapter 7 (Telecommunication, the internet and wireless) and chapter 8 (Securing Information System). Technology has brought tremendous positive changes in terms of a variety of systems but has also raised major concerns over security. It is for sure, that the more we innovate there will always be someone better working to destroy it.
Dan Goodin, InfoWorld, San Mateo: Nov 27, 2006. Volume 28, Issue 48; pg. 29, 3 pgs
The common reasons for vulnerabilities are the mistaken belief that applications are exposed only to internal personnel rather than the world at large. Web services frequently pass messages through several intermediaries before they reach their final destination, undercutting technologies such as SSL, which secures connections only across the open Internet.
A high percentage of Web services interact with databases. SOAP and XML make it easy to disguise malicious payloads, opening new avenues for buffer-overflow attacks, targeting an enterprise's most vital systems. Other common Web service exploits include XML parser attacks, in which an infinite string leads to a denial of service, and XML external entity attacks, in which a request points to an invalid file, resulting in an error that may cause the Web service to give out information it shouldn't disclose.
Defensive Measures: Although Web services raise risks, organizations need not fall victim to security breaches if they take proactive measures. That means the biggest defense comes from ensuring code works, preferably before it's ever exposed to the Net. Although plenty of coders use blacklists to prevent well-known types of malicious routines from being executed, the more prudent approach is to employ white lists, for example; a field that asks for a Social Security number will accept only a positive value that has nine digits.
Security professionals should also take careful inventory of every service that's exposed to the Internet, preferably through an audit carried out by someone external to the IT department. That approach can be particularly effective in identifying services left behind by a previous generation of developers. Whether the services are already in place or not yet deployed, each one needs to be thoroughly tested using a variety of methods: 1) scan every port of every IP address and carefully query each service that responds, 2) looking to see whether UDDI servers, WSDLs and/or other self-describing mechanisms are giving up information that could aid an attacker.
Thus this article is closely related to both the chapter 7 (Telecommunication, the internet and wireless) and chapter 8 (Securing Information System). Technology has brought tremendous positive changes in terms of a variety of systems but has also raised major concerns over security. It is for sure, that the more we innovate there will always be someone better working to destroy it.
Dan Goodin, InfoWorld, San Mateo: Nov 27, 2006. Volume 28, Issue 48; pg. 29, 3 pgs
Saturday, May 3, 2008
A stolen Laptop at the Department of Veterans Affairs: The Worst Data Theft Ever?
Q1. List and describe the security weakness at the department of Veterans Affairs.
Ans: The department of Veterans Affairs has several security problems in the areas indicated:
· Not Encrypted Records: Most noteworthy is that all the information data including names, social security numbers, health records and financial records were not encrypted. This makes any outsider easy access to sensitive information.
· Lack of Proper Rules: There are no established rules and regulations in regards to handling and managing the data systems. Among these is the relaxed feeling about this private and sensitive information allowing employees to take the office software and other accessories to their home.
· Cost Savings: The department is too overly concentrated on savings than implementing a secure IT environment. Their resistance to undergo change for a centralized management of IT programs and activities has further weakened the overall enforcement.
· CIO and Chief Information Security Officer lack direct authority to implement regulations.
The above drawbacks clearly show prominent weakness in their security system. This indeed can be rectified.
Q3. How effectively did the VA deal with these problems?
Ans: The VA did not deal with the problems effectively from the start. When the incident occurred, the superior did not tell the Inspector Generals Office and they did not inform the respective authorities. As matter of fact, Jim Nicholson, the secretary of VA learned about this after 13 days. Also, law enforcement was not informed until 2 weeks after it was discovered.
This delayed a thorough investigation to help solve the case. If the respective authorities were informed immediately it would have prevented this dilemma. Seeing the chain of events unfold it is quite obvious of their inability to handle the problem.
Ans: The department of Veterans Affairs has several security problems in the areas indicated:
· Not Encrypted Records: Most noteworthy is that all the information data including names, social security numbers, health records and financial records were not encrypted. This makes any outsider easy access to sensitive information.
· Lack of Proper Rules: There are no established rules and regulations in regards to handling and managing the data systems. Among these is the relaxed feeling about this private and sensitive information allowing employees to take the office software and other accessories to their home.
· Cost Savings: The department is too overly concentrated on savings than implementing a secure IT environment. Their resistance to undergo change for a centralized management of IT programs and activities has further weakened the overall enforcement.
· CIO and Chief Information Security Officer lack direct authority to implement regulations.
The above drawbacks clearly show prominent weakness in their security system. This indeed can be rectified.
Q3. How effectively did the VA deal with these problems?
Ans: The VA did not deal with the problems effectively from the start. When the incident occurred, the superior did not tell the Inspector Generals Office and they did not inform the respective authorities. As matter of fact, Jim Nicholson, the secretary of VA learned about this after 13 days. Also, law enforcement was not informed until 2 weeks after it was discovered.
This delayed a thorough investigation to help solve the case. If the respective authorities were informed immediately it would have prevented this dilemma. Seeing the chain of events unfold it is quite obvious of their inability to handle the problem.
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