E-Business Re-sit exam paper 2007

Notes:

• Students must answer all three questions.
• Exam paper is accompanied by CCC case study - see appendix at the end of paper.
• All marking schemes in this paper are part of the paper and students must see them in the exam.

Question 1

a)       What are B2C, B2B, C2C and C2B? use examples to briefly explain them. (40 marks)

b)       For CCC's B2C relationships, construct a spider diagram. (60 marks)

Marking scheme:

	0-40%	40%-60%	60%-80%	80%-100%
a) 40%	Demonstrate little understanding of the terms.	Elaborates correctly on at least three of the terms.	All four terms are explained correctly and one valid e-Business example is used for each of the terms to indicate good understanding.	and through use of a number of examples student indicates a sound understanding of the terms and awareness of key e-Business players.  Using valid example of a player, B2B is elaborated on also as B2B market places.
b) 60%	Demonstrates little understanding of the environment a business is in.	Student has drawn a simple diagram depicting other businesses and stakeholders in the CCC's environment. The presented case is limited to the case study.	and Spider diagram is comprehensive.  Products and services are also shown on the diagram. The presented case goes beyond the case study and considers most sensible players. Good and clear presentation.	A comprehensive diagram depicting CCC in its environment with all its suppliers, customers, stakeholders.  Presentation and notation are clear.

Question 2

a)       Use simple examples and appropriate diagrammatic techniques and annotations to explain: What is a use case? What is a use case diagram? (40 marks)

b)       Produce a use case diagram for the University Library system, described below. (60 marks)

University Library System

This is a Web-based system for administering loans of books.  Both students and staff may borrow and reserve books.  All users may register online and they are authenticated before they can reserve books and look up the books they have on loan however there is no need for logging in if users want to look up the catalogue.  Only library staff can issue loans.  At the time of issue, admin staff have to make sure that user does not have overdue books in which case the loan would be refused.

Marking scheme:

	0-40%	40%-60%	60%-80%	80%-100%
a) 40%	Little explanation, Explanation is unclear.	Identifies what a use case consists of and what it presents. Uses 4-5 simple and valid examples of use cases to show how a use case diagram is constructed.	and detailed explanation with reference to  aspects of the system, its users and its surrounding environment.	and expands the example diagram to show robustness, modularity and reuse in the system.
b) 60%	Demonstrates little know how in constructing the diagram.	Depicts the main use cases and actors.  Diagram is correct.	Use case diagram depicts the system in its environment.	Diagram  comprehensively shows all potential use cases. Demonstrates good understanding of use of notation.

Question 3

a)       What are the three functional requirements of computing applications?  what is stand-alone? What is client/server? (40 marks)

b)       If we are designing a client-server Web-based solution for CCC, what factors would influence your decisions on client-side and server-side functionalities? (60 marks)

Marking scheme:

	0-40%	40%-60%	60%-80%	80%-100%
a) 40%	Little understanding of functional requirements.	With the aid of a diagram presents the three functional requirements and briefly explains their roles.	and briefly explains stand-alone and client server.	and uses real examples of systems student has used to demonstrate understanding of the differences between stand-alone and client server.
b) 60%	Little understanding of the client-server with very little correct explanation.	Demonstrates some understanding of technological and functionality factors including how the architecture works.	and uses simple examples to demonstrate and elaborate on the factors and provide justification for the assertions.	and uses e-commerce/e-business functional requirements to critically demonstrate how these decisions are made.

Appendix: CCC case study

Cheadle City Council (CCC) case study

Cheadle is a small-sized regional county council.  Like all others, this one provides a great number of services to the city of Cheadle.  These services are comprehensive and they could range from tree and woodland management to travel passes for school children and senior citizens.  A few examples of services are;

• Removal of untaxed vehicles that do not belong to anyone living on the street.
• Provide information with reference to the libraries in the city.
• Provide information about schools in the city and services such as after school care, attendance policy, term times, league tables, etc.
• Provide information about planning, planning policies, planning applications, relevant forms, etc.

There has been a devolutionary trend in the distribution of political and operational power from the central government to the local governments.  This has meant that just like many other councils, CCC has grown dramatically to include comprehensive services to the public. Efforts have been made to match this growth with suitable information systems and business and information management processes.  Nevertheless, gaps seem to have opened up in the way information is distributed and managed within CCC.

Council's interaction with the residents is at the present time one of by telephone and over the counter queries.  An internal site has been established to assist customer service staff with this has been to a certain degree successful.

Some of the problems with the organisation's information management, operational practices and business culture that are currently experienced at CCC are as follows;

• Information is difficult to find - Council's employees are finding it extremely hard to find key documents such as CCC's policies, strategic plans, customer enquiries.
• News is not distributed efficiently - There is a lack of formal new distribution mechanism at CCC.  Most staff receive their information with regard to developments such as changes to policies, availability and development of information and information systems, appointments of key people and new services through word of mouth.  At times information is delivered to operational areas by email.  This is also problematic as it leads to duplication and difficulty in maintenance of information.
• Information is not recorded formally - There seems to be overwhelming reliance on long term serving employees.  Certain people are key in effective running of the business processes because of their long-term experiences and information they keep tacitly.  Employees seem to rely heavily on long-serving members of staff and their knowledge in place of looking up information resources.
• What is published is not well used - Many of the policies and procedures are published in disparate information systems in different departments.  Yet there is evidence to suggest that information is not being used effectively by the staff at the departments.  More over, there is even greater problem of lack of information transparency among the departments.  There are even a number of departmental Websites.  Information on these Websites tend to be unstructured and inconsistent.  User interfaces to the Websites are not intuitive and user friendly.
• Considerable amount of paper is used - Extensive personal paper files that relate to their jobs are maintained by staff.
• There is no official method of communication - A number of differing methods are used to communicate with the employees.  This in turn has created confusion within the organisation.