Management information systems may be described as tools that help managers organize and make decisions from their data. More simply, effective MIS aids communication. Unsurprisingly, it’s still true that people generally accomplish more together than they are doing apart, and the old concept of collaboration and communication continues to be at the core of business. Management information systems strive to efficiently collect, format, and communicate information to a good type of people. A number of software packages and applications designed to assist you collaborate more and communicate better are described in a while in the chapter. First, it’s important to own a solid understanding of computing hardware, since these are the tools of processing and communication used in management information systems.
Key Components of Computing Hardware Tools
Computer hardware could be a term to spot the tools that we typically see when staring at someone’s desk: the pc itself, the monitor, the input devices like the keyboard, disk drive, CD-ROM and DVD-ROM, the mouse, and so on. There are the components inside the pc that store and process the information that’s entered into the systems.
There are every kind of computers that range from mainframe computers to handhelds. Mainframe computers are large computers that are mainly utilized by companies to manage bulk data processing—they are very powerful and extremely expensive. Handhelds, or personal digital assistants (PDAs), are small, increasingly inexpensive, portable devices that allow the regular consumer to attach to calendars, e-mail accounts, phone books, telephones, games, cameras, and far more.
Software
The real power and use of what the pc can do, however, is largely a function of the software that’s installed into these various systems. the foremost fundamental of the software functions is that the operating system OS that runs the pc. samples of the OS include Windows XP, Windows 2000, Linux, Mac OC, and Unix.
These provide different processes through which we operate and work on our computer systems.
The software directs the pc to perform very specific tasks such as creating a financial spreadsheet/statement/model, preparing a slide presentation, or writing a document on a data processing program.
Specific applications software include programs like Microsoft’s Word (word processing), PowerPoint (presentations), and Excel (financial spreadsheets).
Managing the hardware and software that are employed in any business could be a difficult task because it requires understanding the functions of every and understanding their purposes.
