Information Technology & Systems

SUMMARY: Information is data that has been processed into a form that is meaningful to the user. An information system (IS) is an organized combination of people, hardware, software, communications network, and data resources that collects, transforms and disseminates information in an organization. Information systems and technologies have become a vital component of businesses and organizations. People rely on information systems to communicate with each other using a variety of physical devices (hardware), information processing instructions and procedures (software), communication channels (networks), and stored data (data resources). Information can be classified into facts, opinions, concepts, procedures, processes, principles, primary information, and secondary information. Apart from this, it can also be classified into several types based on its nature, usage, creation, application, structure, and form.

The transmission of information between one person and another, takes place with the help of the communications system. Summarization and message routing are the two methods that increase the sending and receiving efficiency of the system.

Individuals tend to exercise discretion over the content or distribution of information by message delay, message modification or filtering, inference or uncertainty absorption, and presentation bias.

The benefits of information in organizations include – it helps in management control, it helps in decision-making, and it helps to build models, backgrounds, and motivation. Quality of information is also a vital issue.

The term 'quality'is subjective in nature and hence its parameters should be clearly defined in order to judge the quality of information. The various parameters of quality are validity, consistency, reliability, impartiality, and age.

Errors and bias occur as a result of giving too much importance and preference to the quantity of information rather than the quality. An IS accepts data resources as input and processes it and delivers information products as output.

Information systems consist of people resources (end users and IS specialists), hardware resources (machines and media), software (programs and procedures), data (data and knowledge bases), and networks (communications media and network support) to perform input, processing, output, storage, and control activities that convert data resources into information products.