I’ll try and make shorter than the last!

System requirements gathering should preference quantitative methods and values over qualitative simply because they much more easily measured and compared. It is also easier to develop information systems if there are clear objectives available as opposed to esoteric and generalised ones. However, it’s important not to get lost in the development of the system as it can be easy to lose focus on the system’s main user – the client. Therefore, it’s important to maintain a ‘users point of view’ when developing the system.

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The first two weeks of FIT2001 entailed the nature and contexts of Systems Analysis and Design. The role of the systems analyst was discussed, as well as the methologies and tools used in the analysis of systems.

One thing that I had reinforced was the distinct definitions between a system, an information system and information technology. The terms information system and information technology get muddled up too easily, even though there is a difference, albeit subtle, between the two. A system is an interconnected chain of processes that can have inputs and outputs. There are several rules governing the nature of a system: in that it is greater than the sum of its parts, it can be divided into autonomous sub-systems, it interacts with the surrounding environment and it needs management and control protocols in place. Information Systems are IT-based systems that process some kind of input into usable information as output. These systems do not need to be exclusively composed of information technologies, but often do form a part of it (for example, the nature of the legal system means that a large amount of paper work still needs to fit within the processes of the information system).

This subject looks at the first two stages of what is known as the SDLC (Systems Development Life Cycle) - that is, the Analysis and Design of the (information) system. It is useful to think that each of the points on the life cycle represent processes - each with input and output leading from each other in sequence. Thus, there is usable output from each point in the life cycle. This is known as a ‘deliverable’, the final deliverable being the finished information system.

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Friedman (1988) postulated that businesses had no responsibility to anyone but their shareholders. He justified this by stating that managers are employed by their owners, the shareholders, to increase profits therefore increasing shareholder value. Essentially, this viewpoint only takes into account of one of many stakeholders in the stakeholder model. In this model, the needs of various groups that are affected by the company’s operation are taken into consideration equally as a fiduciary duty and that no stakeholder would suffer undue cost without equal compensation (Evan & Freeman, 1995). However, using Freeman’s model of stakeholder CSR, Goodpaster (1991) determined that this model could be further broken down into two distinct forms being the strategic and the multifidicuary stakeholder models (the latter being most similar to the Freeman description).

These models represent the broad spectrum of viewpoints on CSR. But which model best represents the manner that corporations act in practice? And is there a correct and proper way to behave as a good corporate citizen? The short answer is no, as attempting to apply one template unilaterally across all companies is destined to fail. Using the political analogy represented earlier, there is no one universally accepted political ideology. Each organisation must devise a suitable strategy to CSR to suit the environment which they operate in. In particular, they must also work within the guidelines and legislation, as defined by the respective government.

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I’d made the move from Ubuntu 7.04 Server so that I’d be able to use Virtualmin’s GPL install script (because I was lazy) to install all the dependencies needed to host virtual servers. The main reason for this was that I have had so many issues setting up a mail server such that it never really worked at all.

Now it does (try it out - joseph@voodooed.net)!

However, using Virtualmin hasn’t been the smoothest of rides. As you’d expect from a preconfigured package like Virtualmin/Webmin, there were going to be teething issues integrating it with my setup. I think I annoyed the hell out of the friendly people over at the Virtualmin help forums with these selection of issues:

• the (apparent) inability to jail/chroot users to their public_html directory or immediate sub-directory
• not having the php5-mysql package installed with the script - meaing that while MySQL was installed, it wasn’t talking to PHP thus not allowing WordPress (this blogging software) to be installed
• mail login names being rather unwieldy (username.domainname)
• handling Virtualmin behind a NAT router (and the server having to handle both internal and external IP requests)

It seems to be running smoothly now, though (apart from a few extant issues, which are not showstoppers). Since installing this, I’ve (re-)virtualised my domain controller VM. This threw up another lot of issues. Having not checked versions, I’d unwittingly installed Version 1.5.0 of VirtualBox. This machine had been operating on Version 1.3.0. There had been significant changes in how the software deals with what is known as ‘Host Interface Networking’ - where a computer can be given several IPs to listen on (via a bridge) and route IP traffic to virtual network adapaters. These virtual adapters (or ‘tap’ interfaces) are then linked to a virtual machine.

There had also been a new virtual network device (and hence driver) installed into the guest OS. The old device had a static IP set, but the OS had detected the new virtual device and installed appropriate drivers for it. Unknown to me was that it had done so, and using terminal server (and ping) to the expected IP failed. Even forcing the tap interface to an IP didn’t work (as the tap inteface is presumably a Layer 1/2 thing). However, a probe across the home network discovered a device at 10.0.0.2 which was not on my registry. An RDP connection to this IP yielded my server. As it turns out, when this device driver was installed, it had reverted back to DHCP and pulled the next available IP address rather than the fixed server address. This was promptly fixed.

Now with these all out of the way, Joseph can seriously get down to some serious web design/business development.

Ciao!

Just a quick wrap-up of my results to date:

=D

I’m starting to think that, as I own a 8800GTX graphics card which is a DX10 card, that it was an issue relating to DirectX 9. This seems farfetched; but after several emails to EA Tech Support have come to nought, any seemingly logical solution will do me fine.

The move has been quite pleasant - I’m yet to experience the issues that everyone else seems to have been getting. In part, I suppose that every single component of this computer is new and been designed with Vista in mind. PC World reckons that level of problems with Vista is proportional to the age of the hardware - seems logical enough for me. I did previously install Vista onto my old P4 2.8 / Radeon 9600XT box and had several issues with it - one notable one being the inability to run Firefox. This box has since been relegated to being a server (the one that hosts this site that you’re reading).

The desktop UI is pleasant to use, and the improved Windows Explorer makes navigating through the previously tedious My Documents / Pictures etc folders easier. It also makes jumping between folder heirarchies very nice. Aero is slick to use, especially with hardware capable of dealing with the extra overhead that it was reasonably produce. Still, it’s obviously been plagarised from the Mac

Currently in my 4th day with Vista, and loving it!

Still contemplating that Mac mini though….$818 (with Education discount). So…tempting.