Digital Divide

Digital  Divide                                        

The digital divide is the gap between people who have access to computers and have the skills, knowledge and ability to use computers as compared to people who do not have access to computers and also lack the skills and knowledge to use computers.

Factors contributing to digital divide      

Education

Education is a factor that also contributes to digital divide. People who have skills, knowledge and ability to use computers are people who are educated. Illiterate people are the one who did not get a chance to go to school therefore they are the ones who lack skills, knowledge and ability to use computers. The educated people know a lot about computers as compared to people who are uneducated.

(Bridging digital divide)

(The gap)

Location

Rural areas have low levels of connectivity to an internet. People who live in rural areas are more disadvantaged than people who live in urban areas. Urban areas have high levels of connectivity to an internet based on broadband access and wireless hotspot.

Income differences

In terms of income differences, those people with high incomes can afford to buy PC’-s and also be able to install internet connections as compared to people who earn low income who can afford to buy PCs’.

What can be done to bridge digital divide?

When computers are old, companies throw them away instead of donating them. Companies can donate computers to those households who do not have access to computers at home by doing so the gap between people who have access to computers and those who do not can be closed.

Schools should provide training on how to use the internet. This can educate those individuals who lack skills, knowledge and ability to use the internet. Majority of people can be able to use the internet and the gap can be closed.

Links

www.internetworldstats.com/links10.htm

www.close-the-gap.org/

References

Author: Chris Fleetwood

Date: July 2001

Website:dspace.dialpipex.com/town/parade/...

Author: Aoliveira

Date: 2006/07/02

Website: appliedict.wordpres.com

Authors: Angathevar Baskaran and Mammo Muchie.

Year: 2006

Book: Bridging Digital Divide

Publishers: Adonis and Abbey Publishers Ltd

Page: 204, 508 and 579

Written by: Mzwandile Mbokazi

The use of tablets in education

How the use of tablets could improve education in South Africa

We live in an ever-changing world where everything is becoming easier, faster and smaller by the day. This change is fuelled by the advanced technology that are being developed.

In a country where education is at a really poor standard and seems to be getting worse with no effective strategy to correct this, maybe the introduction of tablet PCs could be a way to improve South Africans’ educational experience. Let’s look at how introducing tablets into our educational system could be a solution to the problem.

Tablets are a superior way to illustrate textbooks. Tablets are better than ‘paper technology’ because e-books can include features like images, videos and sound which could help learners learn more effectively. Tablets also allow students to highlight, take notes as well as allow access to a dictionary within the tablet. Tablet PCs also enhance the content because there is use of colour and interactive digital learning tools.

Secondly, it also teaches children to take responsibility by having to take care of their personal tablet PCs and the design of tablets makes students’ learning experience easier because they can have one lightweight device where all their textbooks can be stored instead of 5 to 7 textbooks to carry around. Plus a single tablet would cost much less than those textbooks and school could install school-based wireless networks. According to Mail&Guardian online supplying android-powered tablet PCs at a cost of R1500 or less to South Africa’s 10.8 million students would only take about 11% of the education budget which is 150 billion rand.

Thirdly, a tablet PCs would put countless information at the fingertips’ of the students an option many might not have because not all schools in South Africa have computer labs in addition this information could be accessed at their own will, so they wouldn't have to share a few computers with thousands of other students. Even though internet access for these tablets would be an issue, Wi-Fi connections could be installed in schools.

The introduction of tablet PCs could solve many problems in our educational system but if they will be introduced in the near future is a mystery to many if not all.

Author: Andile Mbele (602247)

Sources:

<!--[if !supportLists]-->1.      <!--[endif]-->http://mg.co.za/article/2013-03-12-tablets-can-permanently-solve-the-crisis-in-education

<!--[if !supportLists]-->2.      <!--[endif]-->http://forum.tabletpcreview.com/news-headlines/249-top-10-benefits-tablet-pc-education.html

<!--[if !supportLists]-->3.      <!--[endif]-->http://mashable.com/2011/05/16/tablets-education/

WHY EVERYONE NEEDS TO KNOW ABOUT INFORMATION SYSTEMS

MY CONTRIBUTION: WHY EVERYONE NEEDS TO KNOW ABOUT INFORMATION SYSTEMS

Everyone needs to know about information systems because they can help everyone to keep a record of their stuff more easily. Businesses need to keep records of financial statements and people needs to keep records of their work (personal use information). This can be done by using computers, tablets, etc. Most of businesses choose to use electronic accounting software programs to capture and organize their records. They use many supporting documents to record information such as sales slips, paid bills, invoices, receipts, deposit slips, etc.

Information systems develop skills for people to become decision makers in business and become innovators and be able to use applications and devices to grow their knowledge and skills.

 

People should know about information systems because they can make a lot of money by using information systems. For instance they can open their businesses, they can trade in the stock market through their personal devices such as laptops, tablets, etc, and they can also use their devices to socialise. All this makes the information systems useful to people.

Information systems can be also serves as central distribution of information. This means when the network is large people want all the logical partitions in their computing environment to be identical. This helps people to save time, effort, and expenses. This information verifies how much information systems are important in the lives of people and businesses.  Also information systems can be regarded as central access of information and a backup of information.

 

Information Systems are important to every people and businesses needs to know about disadvantages of information systems, such as secure information sharing, e.g. data theft on the rise. Also people need to know how to protect their private information in case of fraud, e.g. people can use your personal details to make transactions in your bank, etc. Many companies are forced to improve their network security due to data theft, like other companies may use strategies of others to generate profit. That why companies have to be aware of this kind of crime. This costs companies a lot of money for securing their networks. But doing that can cost them lot of money to do. Therefore information systems play a big role in people’s lives and in business’s operation.

REFERENCES

www.irs.gov (Author: Phishing; Date: 12 April 2013)

www.wiki.answers.com (Author: Crystal; Date: 22 April 2012)

www.pic.dhe.ibm.com (Author: Yoni Tserruya; Date: 11 April 2013)

www.technologyevaluation.com (Author: Technology Evaluation Centre; Date: 12 November 2012)
SIPHELELE MLANGENI( 756662)

Casestudy of an organisation that has archieved breakthroughs in performance of IS, improved customer service, managerial decision making and archieved advantage

A Case study of an organization that has achieved breakthroughs in performance from Information Systems, improved customer service or managerial decision-making or has achieved advantage.

Organizations have wide variety of information that results from the on-going events that take place in the business. Shoprite is one organization that has the largest Central Data Warehouse in South Africa. Information systems support in management, data analysis and decision-making. Shoprite’s information systems provide the most competent business infrastructure as it forever- grows and improves.

Information systems in Shoprite assist starting from the contents and scheduling of advertising in the business to the design of store checkouts. This helps the business archive its objectives. Improving, upgrading and implementing of information systems is continuously undertaken to ensure genuine and prompt alteration of the ever-increasing transaction volumes. They started by replacing the purchasing order management and stock ledger systems with relevant SAP modules. They also computerized the import and export processes. This helped Shoprite to improve in business controlling and managing.

Managers get reports from an app called the Report Manager. Online analytical processing, (OLAP), is the control of information. This process supports decision-making by taking sales transactions and helps the manager decide pricing, reordering, advertising, etc. Data mining is another app used for the gathering of customer information in the order of easily and adequately marking customers and future buyers.

From 1979 until today, Shoprite is moving to the top being the best innovators and strategic company. It would not have made it this far if information systems did not exist.

http://www.shopriteholdings.co.za/pages/1019812640/about-our-company/Information-Technology.asp   (26 April 2013)

http://team4shoprite.blogspot.com/  (18 April 2010)

CONTRIBUTION BY: ZUNGU GRACIOUS NKAIPHO(756780)

WHY SHOULD THE BUSINESS KNOW ABOUT INFORMATION SYSTEM

 Information system is a combination of hardware, software, infrastructure and trained personnel to facilitate planning, control, coordinate and manage the information. There two types of information system that one need to know. PERSONAL INFORMATION SYSTEMS which allows an individual to collect and store his or her information. BUSINESS INFORMATION SYSTEMS is used by a group of organisations and companies to collect and store information.

 It is important for the business to know about information systems because the information will help the business to implement and achieve the goal to generate more profit. Information systems (IS) are an important tool to for the managers in order to achieve a good level of production and serving customers. If the business serves its customers well, generally the customer will respond by buying more of the goods that is produced by the business.

Information systems will also help the business keep connected with its suppliers and the suppliers will generally respond by better supplies, this will lower the cost and improves the profit of the business. Lot of managers operate with information. If a manager does not have valuable information at a right time to make a decision, he/she will end up making poor decisions and the outcome of that will raise the cost and the business will lose its buyers and suppliers. Information system made it easy for the managers to use  time data from the market when making the decision. Using information system managers can immediately  find and solve the problem  

REFERENCES

www.information-management-architect.com/management-information-.                                                                    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information systems                                                                                                                             www.businessdictionary.com/definition/information-system.                                                                                     http://www.empowernetwork.com/bobwick/blog/information-systems-for-smart-business-entrepreneurs/

WRITTEN BY:NDABA STHEMBELE

sibusiso ndaba

                                                THE USE OF SMARTPHONES IN EDUCATION

Smartphones are generally a pda type phone that is equipped with software to help manage a busy schedule. Smartphones also let you make telephone calls and have (apps) like Facebook and twitter which are used to chart with friends and to search for information.

Smartphones play an important role in education as they are mostly used and understood by the majority number of people, smartphones are mostly used by students to do research works because smartphones provide large range of information. Students take notes in class on their smartphones by typing and using a stylus. “The stylus lets students write mathematical formulas that would be tough to replicate even with a specially designed keyboard”. Smartphones have enough space to store information you can store as many notes as you like, in that way they help reduce Harvey baggage of text books. Carrying a smartphone is like carrying all your text books in one device. Smartphones make education more easy because you can consult your lecture via email and get lecture examples online

Smartphones are usually discouraged by educators and professors because they draw students attention away from what is done in class. After all, since smartphones allow you to do anything you want these days, having them in the classroom might be distracting students. Smartphones let students play online games, check texts and even watch TV in the class room. This is extremely distracting students not only ones with the smartphones, but can also become a distraction for other students around them. 

Even though smartphones have some negative effects on student’s education, but they play a very important role in improving education by making education process more convenient and less time consuming when searching for information online you do not need to go to the library.  

REFERENCES

cellphones.about.com : BY LIANO CASSAVOY , Jan 23 2011

www.education.com :BY  TOOD HOFFMAN  May 5 2012

www.teachthought.com : BY TERRY HEICK , Jan 26 2010

CONTRIBUTION BY: SIBUSISO NDABA
editing partner: Gracious Zungu.

WHY DO PEOPLE NEED TO KNOW ABOUT INFORMATION SYSTEMS?

WHY DO PEOPLE NEED TO KNOW ABOUT INFORMATION SYSTEMS?

An information system is a collection of hardware, software, data, people and procedures that are designed to generate information that supports the day to day, short range, long range activities of users in an organization.

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The world we live in relies so much on the use of Information Systems. Information Systems provide the user with information needed to do any task effectively. Computer databases provide data, but Information Systems provide the appropriate data about each user’s tasks in a format best suited to that user. If the person has no knowledge about information systems, operating computers or additional communication options it becomes a bit challenging. Knowing your way around a computer makes you more employable. Not to mention that you will have some enhanced comprehension of the world of e-commerce and how it relates to businesses today <!--[if !vml]--><!--[endif]-->.

It has an impact on each and every person’s life because as people we work with information every day and we need ways to manage this information and the only way to manage this information is through Information Systems. This means that in all places that people are found information Systems exists and that is the reason why people need to know about it.

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It is used in many fields of work. In the business world it assists organisations to make economic decisions, store information and analyse business processes.

 IT HELPS ORGANISATIONS STORE AND ANALYSE INFORMATION

 Many companies no longer manage their data and information manually with registers and hard-copy formats. Through adaption of information systems, companies can make use of sophisticated and comprehensive data bases that can contain all imaginable pieces of data about the company.

 IT HELPS ORGANISATONS MAKE ECONOMIC DECISIONS

The long-term success of a company depends upon adequacy of its strategic plans. An organisation’s management team uses information systems to formulate strategic plans and make decisions for the businesses longevity and prosperity.

Author:Ntshuxeko Matiane

References: http://wiki.answers.com/,  lamp.infosys.deak link.au/?=Infosys,

En.wikipedia.org/wiki/management_information_system.

www.lis.co.jp/english/english.htmc.

Editing partner Andile Mbele.

EFFECTIVENESS OF IS IN BUSINESS

Effectiveness of IS in business

MANAGEMENT INFORMATION SYSTEM

Importance of MIS

Publisher : NEO MAJORO

 Management Information Systems as the center of communication among employees. Uses of MIS, resources employed, Latest technology devices along with their fast internet feature which makes them unique compared to the old technology and how they can benefit MIS.

MIS must be a system that keeps the entire organization informed about the external and internal factors that affect it. It must do so effectively and efficiently. MIS is used to monitor, manage, measure and limit risks that come about from decisions that the managers make. Four main risk managements are feedback control devices, policies, operations and stuff and management.

MIS must adopt the latest technology, devices such as laptops, smartphones and tablets because they are known to have faster internet processors, they will save time and and that will affect organizations positively as the effort for managing  people in work place, technology and data will be less. MIS with aid of the above mentioned devices will  provides the organization with a direction of how to make productive decisions; therefore it  will provides the organizations with the objective systems for storing information in a more advanced way. .

For MIS to be effective it must use the above mentioned devices because the productivity also relies on technology. Those devices are portable and therefore managers can conduct researches even outside the office. Managers research and provide relevant and current information to the users. MIS enable managers to provide the decision makers with information that is summarized and easy to read. MIS is a connection between different departments within an organization, it helps to prevent possible future problem an organization may face and to predict profitability in the future.

The versatility of ever-changing technology improves the communication within organizations and hence enhances the results. Without effective MIS, it would be difficult for deferent departments within an organization to communicate and difficult for decision makers to make decisions because they wouldn’t be easily informed about the internal and external factors within an organization.

References;

1)      http;//www.occ.gov/publications/publications-by-type/comptrollers-handbook/mis.pdf

2)       Management Information Systems, Comptroller’s Comptroller’s Handbook, May 1995.