I had this conversation with my elder sister, Om, who works in a textile company and has an interest in IT.
Me : Hi.
Om : Hi. So what did you learn today?
Me : Today, we had a class on Business Information Systems and we learned about the computer system architecture in any company (could be IT or non-IT).
Om : I didn't quite get you.
Me : What I mean to say is that we studied how computers used in your company(which is a textile company) to facilitate business processes and functions are interconnected to form a system. We studied how that system would be like and how it could be made more efficient and cheap.
Om : That sounds interesting. Could you please elaborate?
Me : Consider yourself. All the work that you do in your company is apparently through your hands, legs, vocal cords, etc. Your brain controls all these parts of your body. But the brain is still something physical. What actually makes you work is your ideas, your communication skills, your attitude and stuff like that, in the various activities you do. Now, since you are working for a textile company, we'll consider your actions in the organization. Your ideas and attitude that reflect in the work you do are aligned to the textile industry, your education and your training, right? So, your initial training and experience in the company were fundamental in defining your activities in the company.
Om : What has this to do with system architecture or even IT for that matter?
Me : The computer works just like you. You work through your body. The computer has hardware like mouse, keyboard, monitor,etc. Your brain is similar to the Central Processing Unit. Your actions in your company are based on the fundamental training you got there. So the actions performed by the computer need a basic platform to execute.This is termed as Operating system. It could be Windows, Linux, etc. Your ideas and ways of execution in different company activities are analogous to computer software applications, which perform different business functions. Software could be word processors, web browsers, ERP, etc. In your company there are many employees like you, each having different functions. So, if we follow the analogy, there are many computers in your company, each having its own hardware and software. As employees communicate with each other for various tasks, computers are also connected. A representation of this interconnection of computers, hardware and software could be termed as system architecture.
Om : What kind of an interconnection are we looking at?
Me : There could be many types and we classify system architecture on the basis of complexity. If all your data regarding customers, employees, etc everything is on a single computer, it is a single tier architecture.
Om : But for a big company like ours, it is not possible to have just one computer have all the data and application software. It would be so inconvenient.
Me : Precisely. that is where you could have a two tier client server architecture. The server is a machine that contains all the data records, be it about customers, sales, employees, their salaries, anything. Different client machines will use relevant data from the server. These client machines will have different applications on them. For example, one client machine could have applications pertaining to employees such as calculation of salary, and it would access only employee data from the server. Another client machine could pertain to just applications related to customers, and so on. These clients and the server are connected by a LAN.
Om : But our company has offices across the country. We would have to change a lot of applications in different machines if there is a single change in company policy. Wouldn't this become too costly?
Me : It certainly would. That is why we have three tier architecture. Here along with a data server, we have an application server which stores the business logic, maybe an ERP application like SAP. Client machines have only the user interface part. So in case of a change in company policy or rule, the change would only be have to made at one place.
Om : Wouldn't connecting so many computers in our offices across the country be expensive as well?
Me : Yes. And that is why a lot of companies go for multi-tier architecture, wherein computers are connected through the Internet. A web server is added to the three tier architecture and the client machines have web browsers. The web server converts the data traffic from the application server to a format that is universally understood by anyone who has a web browser. Applications are web-enabled. And the cost of being on the Internet is much lower than having a private network.
Om : But what about confidential information? How do we ensure security from hackers.
Me : This can be easily done by having firewall servers that block hackers, so that they do not have access to the company data. Thus, we can have low cost secure web based system architecture.
Om : Wow. I 'll certainly have a talk with my boss and ask him about the kind of system architecture we have in our company. Maybe I can learn more and possibly even give inputs to make it more efficient and reduce related costs. Thanks.
Me : You're welcome. Cya.
Me : Hi.
Om : Hi. So what did you learn today?
Me : Today, we had a class on Business Information Systems and we learned about the computer system architecture in any company (could be IT or non-IT).
Om : I didn't quite get you.
Me : What I mean to say is that we studied how computers used in your company(which is a textile company) to facilitate business processes and functions are interconnected to form a system. We studied how that system would be like and how it could be made more efficient and cheap.
Om : That sounds interesting. Could you please elaborate?
Me : Consider yourself. All the work that you do in your company is apparently through your hands, legs, vocal cords, etc. Your brain controls all these parts of your body. But the brain is still something physical. What actually makes you work is your ideas, your communication skills, your attitude and stuff like that, in the various activities you do. Now, since you are working for a textile company, we'll consider your actions in the organization. Your ideas and attitude that reflect in the work you do are aligned to the textile industry, your education and your training, right? So, your initial training and experience in the company were fundamental in defining your activities in the company.
Om : What has this to do with system architecture or even IT for that matter?
Me : The computer works just like you. You work through your body. The computer has hardware like mouse, keyboard, monitor,etc. Your brain is similar to the Central Processing Unit. Your actions in your company are based on the fundamental training you got there. So the actions performed by the computer need a basic platform to execute.This is termed as Operating system. It could be Windows, Linux, etc. Your ideas and ways of execution in different company activities are analogous to computer software applications, which perform different business functions. Software could be word processors, web browsers, ERP, etc. In your company there are many employees like you, each having different functions. So, if we follow the analogy, there are many computers in your company, each having its own hardware and software. As employees communicate with each other for various tasks, computers are also connected. A representation of this interconnection of computers, hardware and software could be termed as system architecture.
Om : What kind of an interconnection are we looking at?
Me : There could be many types and we classify system architecture on the basis of complexity. If all your data regarding customers, employees, etc everything is on a single computer, it is a single tier architecture.
Om : But for a big company like ours, it is not possible to have just one computer have all the data and application software. It would be so inconvenient.
Me : Precisely. that is where you could have a two tier client server architecture. The server is a machine that contains all the data records, be it about customers, sales, employees, their salaries, anything. Different client machines will use relevant data from the server. These client machines will have different applications on them. For example, one client machine could have applications pertaining to employees such as calculation of salary, and it would access only employee data from the server. Another client machine could pertain to just applications related to customers, and so on. These clients and the server are connected by a LAN.
Om : But our company has offices across the country. We would have to change a lot of applications in different machines if there is a single change in company policy. Wouldn't this become too costly?
Me : It certainly would. That is why we have three tier architecture. Here along with a data server, we have an application server which stores the business logic, maybe an ERP application like SAP. Client machines have only the user interface part. So in case of a change in company policy or rule, the change would only be have to made at one place.
Om : Wouldn't connecting so many computers in our offices across the country be expensive as well?
Me : Yes. And that is why a lot of companies go for multi-tier architecture, wherein computers are connected through the Internet. A web server is added to the three tier architecture and the client machines have web browsers. The web server converts the data traffic from the application server to a format that is universally understood by anyone who has a web browser. Applications are web-enabled. And the cost of being on the Internet is much lower than having a private network.
Om : But what about confidential information? How do we ensure security from hackers.
Me : This can be easily done by having firewall servers that block hackers, so that they do not have access to the company data. Thus, we can have low cost secure web based system architecture.
Om : Wow. I 'll certainly have a talk with my boss and ask him about the kind of system architecture we have in our company. Maybe I can learn more and possibly even give inputs to make it more efficient and reduce related costs. Thanks.
Me : You're welcome. Cya.
2 comments:
good, but did the text suddenly go bold ?
Sir, I intentionally made some of the text bold, especially the text which contained explanation of key concepts.
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