Question

Charlie and Suzanne have been hard at work on the PPI software project. They recently completed the systems analysis phase. They are now anxiously anticipating the transition to the systems design phase and are discussing the different approaches to systems design. Suzanne comments to Charlie, "You know, I always preferred the structured systems analysis approach over the object-oriented approach. I suppose now you are going to try to persuade me that object-oriented design is better than structured design. So tell me Charlie, why do you prefer object-oriented design?"

• If you were Charlie, how would you answer Suzanne?
• If you were Suzanne, how would you defend the use of the traditional approach to systems design?
• Which systems design approach do you prefer? Justify your answer.
• Which systems design approach would you recommend for this project? Why?

Answer 1

1. I would answer by providing the necessary considerations behind the use of the OOP paradigm. The consideration that it provides unprecedented flexibility, especially to a team of developers that can simultaneously work on developing the systems as various different parts than designing the system as a whole. This means modularity can be utilized where code can be reused wherever and whenever through the use of inheritance and polymorphism concepts. OOP takes the entire process and molds it like a real-world object where the different functionality is designed once and can be reused multiple times. This makes it not only easier to go back and correct the bugs, but also makes it highly parallel in terms of development time since the best use of capacity can be made in this implementation.

2. As Suzzane I would argue that the teams would have a better understanding of the current paradigm and even though the concepts can be learned, the consideration for the current project to be completed within the schedule is higher. The fact that the learning curve for LOOP can be steep provides us with the necessary considerations to stick to the current systems design philosophy rather than upgrading. It also allows us a faster program when we compare it with the similar implementation in OOP terms, because OOP approach might be finished quicker, but performing the best that he software can then need to be optimized, which is not a problem with the systems approach since the system is tested as a whole from the very beginning.

3. I would prefer the OOP approach because it makes the best use of the company’s capacity. It also makes it easier to reuse the code even in future projects, we can just take functionality from any previous project we have done and with minor tweaks, we can make it into new software, collectively saving time in the later stages as a result.

4. For this project, however, I would prefer to stick with a systems approach because of the inherent need for the finished software to be able to handle a large data set and for it to run as fast as possible. Even though enterprise-level systems have the best hardware available, the fact that we can do more with the same would be a high asset to the company as a result. We need to consider that if the company’s current systems do not make use of OOP, there would be a large deficit in terms of tangible output if we start training the employees to try this newer approach. While we can mold anything into an OOP system, the fact that it works best with actual systems that can be replicated in the real world also provides a good argument for using a systems approach for this project.

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