Bardens Bakery System Investigation - Research Paper Example

Assignment-Barden's Bakery system Investigation Answer to PART SSADM Products Section C: The external entities involved are the following: 1. Barden Ltd caters to the requirements of its own retail shops which constitutes 60% of their production. 2. The wholesale customers are also rendered service and it constitutes 40% of their production. Section D: 1. Level 2 DFD for the function "Prepare routes and assemble orders" Section E: The 'prepare routes' assembles the invoices of the wholesale customers and the delivery notes for own shops into route sets together with a route chit giving details of the delivery route. The route set is forwarded to the 'assembled orders' where the orders are assembled by route set in the despatch room. Section F: The user interviewed here is the front sales office supervisor and the front sales office staff concerned with handling the system to take order. Section G: The problems/requirements of the functional areas are as follows: Front sales office staff: As the system can process one customer per day, these orders cause difficulties resulting in underproduction and overproduction of bakery products, shortfalls on deliveries, disruption of the front sales office and incorrect information being input to the MicroVax accounting system. The software package which runs on the PC are rudimentary and slow I use. The software does not provide all the information that is needed and cannot handle more than one order per day per customer. Managing Director's office-accounts clerk: The computer is operated by the accounts clerk. The accounting software is not fully utilized because so much information about the company's operations is currently unobtainable. Managing Director's office-personal use: It is used in order to obtain the company financial information. Answer to section: Interview plans and write-ups: We have interviewed the front sales office supervisor an got the following: Question: On how does the company check for incorrect orders Answer: A print out is made of customers order and then checked to try and make sure mistakes do not happen. Question: How do customers pay (is it cash in hand) Answer: Customers pay daily, weekly and fortnightly and it depends on the actual customer. Question: Following on from any possible incorrect orders: If an order is received in the afternoon say, then the order would be raised manually, i.e. input by hand. Answer: There is a lot of paperwork associated with this process. Lots of problems with this current system, therefore there it is hoped that new information system can solve [there could be human errors in the 'manual order' process]. Question: How does the delivery process work Answer: Each delivery is dispatched the following day. Answer to Part 2 - SYNOPSIS AND EVALUATION Answer to section 1: The purpose of functional decomposition is to iteratively break down the description of the system into finer detail which creates a set of charts in which one process on a given chart is explained in greater detail on another chart. Each process may consist of several sub processes. Each sub processes may also be broken down into smaller units. Decomposition continues until you have reached the point where no sub process can logically be broken down any further. A good Functional Decomposition helps the analysis in several ways: The simplicity of the structure and representation aids in understanding the breakdown of functions and processes. Specifying the precise requirements and features for each function becomes easier because the functions and processes are broken down into smaller units. The partitioning and independence of the functions localizes errors and minimizes system faults. It allows the customer to view and discuss the organization in a form that can be dealt with, i.e., as a collection of functions, rather than as a continuous process. The process of decomposing the functional requirements is as follows: Decomposition Diagrams: A decomposition diagram or hierarchy chart: shows the top-down, functional decomposition of a system Numbering Scheme Decomposition of DFD's Functional decomposition Act of going from one single system to many component processes Repetitive procedure Lowest level is called a primitive DFD Level-N Diagrams A DFD that is the result of n nested decompositions of a series of sub processes from a process on a level-0 diagram Context Diagram A data flow diagram (DFD) of the scope of an organizational system that shows the system boundaries, external entities that interact with the system and the major information flows between the entities and the system Shows the context into which the business process fits Shows the overall business process as just one process Shows all the outside entities that receive information from or contribute information to the system. Level 0 Diagram A data flow diagrams (DFD) that represents a system's major processes, data flows and data stores at a higher level Shows all the processes that comprise the overall system Shows how information moves from and to each process Adds data stores Level 1 Diagrams Shows all the processes that comprise a single process on the level 0 diagram Shows how information moves from and to each of these processes Shows in more detail the content of higher level process Level 1 diagrams may not be needed for all level 0 processes Level 2 Diagrams Shows all processes that comprise a single process on the level 1 diagram Shows how information moves from and to each of these processes Level 2 diagrams may not be needed for all level 1 processes Correctly numbering each process helps the user understand where the process fits into the overall system Rules for stopping decomposition When each process has been reduced to a single decision, calculation or database operation For an example, the main function of BARDEN order processing system is to cater to its retail shops and wholesale customers. The below diagram mentions the entire breakdown to the activities of the BARDEN Bakery system. The above process starts with the primary function of the company and breaks down to the services it provides and the granular level of decomposition is shown to give a picture of all the processes involved and sub processes that are carried on. Answer to section 2: The preparation for the interview demanded a lot of knowledge of the back ground of the company processes and it required a detailed study of the various processes which are carried on. The inflows, outflows and the various data structures, for example the databases involved. The overall conduct was good. Working within a team led to the identification of facts and better understanding the penetrations of the system and the decision as to how many data flows are involved. The organization of the micro level processes and their data structures is the primary objective to store the data and its retrieval in correct form. The interview was good. It gave us an insight of the entire process flow and its storage and retrieval procedures. This assignment was a great source to get an insight of the entire supply chain and its resource planning and utilization. The finer process breakdown is taken into account for any system to know the ground level activity for that process and its final integration to meet the common goal to render service and yield profits. Read More