Question

Question 1

Why does an organisation need to prepare systems documentation?

Explain two reasons accountants need to be familiar with systems documentation techniques.

  

Question 2

The following data elements comprise the conceptual level schema for a database:

billing address cost

credit limit customer name customer number description invoice number item number price quantity on hand quantity sold shipping address terms

You are required to create the schema tables. Specify the primary key(s), foreign key(s), and other data for each table.

           

Question 3

Describe the information that can be obtained from each of these forms of systems documentation:

(a)            Business process diagram

(b)            Context diagram

(c)            Physical data flow diagram

(d)            Logical data flow diagram

(e)            Systems flowchart

Answer 1

The collection of documents that describes the requirements, capabilities, limitations, design, operation, and maintenance of a system, such as a communications, computing, or information processing system.

Effective system documentation should possess the following characteristics:

1. It must be clearly stated in the language that is easily understood.

2. It should be possible to refer to other documents.

3. It should contain everything needed, so that those who are reading it carefully understand the system.

4. It should be accessible to those for whom it is intended.

5. When the system gets modified it should be easy to update the documentation.

Purpose of System Documentation:

The formal system documentation fulfills the following objectives:

1. To provide the necessary information to develop training programme for operators and users.

2. To create a vehicle of information to provide evidence of progress in the development process and to monitor the process.

3. To make conversion of a system from one machine to another machine easier.

4. To make system modification and implementation easier.

5. To narrow down the communication gaps among users, designers and management.

6. To provide a means to determine in advance what will occur and when.

Contents of System Documentation:

The report on the system design should contain the following elements:

1. An overview of the entire project describing the general purpose of the system with the relevant information.

2. Documentation for every input and output used in the system. Each document should accompany each design and explain the purpose and use of each form.

3. Documentation of every file of the system, creating and update sequences of the file should be there.

4. System flowchart describing the series of steps used in the processing of data.

5. A financial analysis of the proposed and existing systems, providing present and future costs with potential cost savings.

For the smooth operation of the system, it is essential that the users understand the system fully, and are aware of what is expected of him to make it work successfully.

1. The documentation should include a sample of each input document and instructions for using it.

2. It should also indicate operating schedules.

3. User’s documentation should cover files layout and file relation details.

4. The documentation for user should explain in non-technical terms all aspects of the system from users’ point of view.

5. It should also explain how the system will operate once it is fully installed.

6. It should include a sample of each output report with necessary explanation.

7. It should state the input document coding procedure, and also the coding structure for various fields and related tables.

8. Limitations of system should also be highlighted.

2. Documentation for Management:

It includes systems’ proposals covering the followings:

i. Functional Design—Functional requirements.

ii. Resources required.

iii. Cost benefits analysis.

iv. Development schedule.

v. Concepts, architectural design.

It's like a plan or a blueprint. A database schema is the collection of relationschemas for a whole database. A table is a structure with a bunch of rows (aka "tuples"), each of which has the attributes defined by the schema. Tables might also have indexes on them to aid in looking up values on certain columns.

Business Process Model and Notation (BPMN) is a standard for business process modeling that provides a graphical notation for specifying business processes in a Business Process Diagram (BPD), based on a flowcharting technique very similar to activity diagrams from Unified Modeling Language (UML).

A context diagram, sometimes called a level 0 data-flow diagram, is drawn in order to define and clarify the boundaries of the software system. It identifies the flows of information between the system and external entities.

• Logical Data Flow Diagram
  • Focuses on the Business and How it Operates
  • Describe Business Events, Data Required, Data Produced
• Physical Data Flow Diagram
  • Shows How the System Will be Implemented
    • Hardware, Software, Files, People
    • System flowcharts are a way of displaying how data flows in a system and how decisions are made to control events. To illustrate this, symbols are used. They are connected together to show what happens to data and where it goes. The basic ones include: Symbols used in flow charts.