Page 139 - DCAP208_Management Support Systems

Management Support Systems

Notes Scientific data: Whether in a Swiss nuclear accelerator laboratory counting particles, in
the Canadian forest studying readings from a grizzly bear radio collar, on a South Pole
iceberg gathering data about oceanic activity, or in an American university investigating
human psychology, our society is amassing colossal amounts of scientific data that need
to be analyzed. Unfortunately, we can capture and store more new data faster than we can
analyze the old data already accumulated.

Medical and personal data: From government census to personnel and customer files,
very large collections of information are continuously gathered about individuals and
groups. Governments, companies and organizations such as hospitals, are stockpiling
very important quantities of personal data to help them manage human resources, better
understand a market, or simply assist clientele. Regardless of the privacy issues this type
of data often reveals, this information is collected, used and even shared. When correlated
with other data this information can shed light on customer behaviour and the like.

Surveillance video and pictures: With the amazing collapse of video camera prices, video
cameras are becoming ubiquitous. Video tapes from surveillance cameras are usually
recycled and thus the content is lost. However, there is a tendency today to store the tapes
and even digitize them for future use and analysis.

Satellite sensing: There is a countless number of satellites around the globe: some are
geostationary above a region, and some are orbiting around the Earth, but all are sending
a non-stop stream of data to the surface. NASA, which controls a large number of satellites,
receives more data every second than what all NASA researchers and engineers can cope
with. Many satellite pictures and data are made public as soon as they are received in the
hopes that other researchers can analyze them.
Games: Our society is collecting a tremendous amount of data and statistics about games,
players and athletes. From hockey scores, basketball passes and car-racing lapses, to
swimming times, boxers pushes and chess positions, all the data are stored. Commentators
and journalists are using this information for reporting, but trainers and athletes would
want to exploit this data to improve performance and better understand opponents.

Digital media: The proliferation of cheap scanners, desktop video cameras and digital
cameras is one of the causes of the explosion in digital media repositories. In addition,
many radio stations, television channels and film studios are digitizing their audio and
video collections to improve the management of their multimedia assets. Associations
such as the NHL and the NBA have already started converting their huge game collection
into digital forms.
CAD and Software engineering data: There are a multitude of Computer Assisted Design
(CAD) systems for architects to design buildings or engineers to conceive system
components or circuits. These systems are generating a tremendous amount of data.
Moreover, software engineering is a source of considerable similar data with code, function
libraries, objects, etc., which need powerful tools for management and maintenance.

Virtual Worlds: There are many applications making use of three-dimensional virtual
spaces. These spaces and the objects they contain are described with special languages such
as VRML. Ideally, these virtual spaces are described in such a way that they can share
objects and places. There is a remarkable amount of virtual reality object and space
repositories available. Management of these repositories as well as content-based search
and retrieval from these repositories are still research issues, while the size of the collections
continues to grow.

Text reports and memos (e-mail messages): Most of the communications within and between
companies or research organizations or even private people, are based on reports and

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