Notes

You will be tested on all course material covered in the 12 weeks of the course. This includes chapters covered in
the course, guest speakers, and Powerpoints.
You will not be expected to remember any three letter acronyms.
You will be tested on your understanding of the key concepts covered by the course.

Slightly Longer Answers

•There will be 10 questions.
•Each question is worth 3 marks.
•To earn the maximum of 3 points for the question, your answer must be sufficiently detailed with relevant examples
when asked.
•Point form is acceptable
•Number each answer clearly in your Answer Book.
•Whenever examples are requested, your examples MUST be from HOSPITALITY. Examples from other industries
will be ignored and will not be eligible for marks.
•You will be penalized if your answer is difficult to read and lacks clarity.
Your answer must show understanding of the topic. The questions will be selected from the following:

1. What are the advantages of implementing an ERP system? What are the
disadvantages?
a. Advantages:
i. Single vendor
ii. No worries about interfaces
iii. Consistent look and feel
iv. Consistent data definitions
v. Overall performance
b. Disadvantages:
i. Direct cost
ii. Customization (if handled incorrectly)
iii. Indirect costs
iv. Single vendor lock in
2. What is bandwidth? Give an example of a bandwidth measurement. Why is the
demand for high bandwidth growing in a hotel?
a. Bandwidth: the capacity of a wired or wireless network communications link to
transmit the maximum amount of data from one point to another over a computer
network or internet connection in a given amount of time
b. Bandwidth is measured by the total transfer method – this is a method of
measuring how many megabytes, gigabytes, terabytes or petabytes a network
device transfers in a given time
c. Faster internet speed, better connection, more information being able to be
processed
3. What is special about Big Data? Give examples of how a company would use Big
Data.
a. Data so large and complex it cannot be managed by traditional systems
b. Example
i. Marketing
➢ Creation of 1500 tailored marketing messages by integrating data
from internal systems with social media
ii. Operations
➢ Reducing fuel consumption on deliveries and optimizing delivery
routes
iii. Product development
➢ Text mining the internet to explore customer preferences on a 3
blink turn signal
iv. Human resources
➢ Discovering healthcare trends to lower health care costs
4. What is an algorithm? Describe how an algorithm would be used in machine
learning?
a. Algorithm: a problem-solving method expressed as a finite sequence of steps
b. 4 types of machine learning algorithms
i. Supervised learning
➢ This algorithm consist of a target / outcome variable (or dependent
variable) which is to be predicted from a given set of predictors
(independent variables). Using these set of variables, we generate
a function that map inputs to desired outputs
ii. Unsupervised learning
➢ Using this algorithm, the machine is trained to make specific
decisions. It works this way: the machine is exposed to an
environment where it trains itself continually using trial and error.
This machine learns from past experience and tries to capture the
best possible knowledge to make accurate business decisions
iii. Semi supervised
iv. Reinforcement learning
➢ Using this algorithm, the machine is trained to make specific
decisions. It works this way: the machine is exposed to an
environment where it trains itself continually using trial and error.
This machine learns from past experience and tries to capture the
best possible knowledge to make accurate business decision
5. What is metadata? Give examples. Why do we need metadata?
a. Metadata: data that adds business context to other data. It provides information
authored by business people and/or used by business people. It is in contrast to
technical metadata, which is data used in the storage and structure of the data in
a database or system
b. Examples:
i. Titles and descriptions
ii. Tags and categories
iii. Who created and when
iv. Last modified
v. Access/update privilege
c. Metadata is created and collected because it enables and improves use of that
data.Good metadata can make up for human fallibilities. People forget and
misplace things, and leave research projects taking their knowledge of the
research methodology and the data with them. Metadata ensures that we will be
able find data, use data, and preserve and re-use data in the future.
i. Finding data
ii. Using data
iii. Re-using data
6. What is the purpose of a Data Dictionary? Give examples of what you will find in
the data dictionary about two of the attributes of a loyal guest.
a. The purpose of a data dictionary is to collect descriptions of the data objects or
items in a data model for the benefit of programmers and others who need to
refer to them
b. Two attributes of a loyal guest:
i. Name
ii. Room preferences
7. You are designing a data cube for a Property Management System. Name three
dimensions of the cube. Give examples of questions that use these dimensions.
a. Dimensions
i. Category
ii. Location
iii. Time
● How many double bedroom suites did Marriott's Courtyard sell in
September 2018?
○ Dimension: category (double bedroom), brand (Courtyard), Time
(September)
● How many banquet employees have worked more than 10 years at the
Marriott's 5 star property?
○ Dimension: type of employee (banquet employees), time (10 years),
type of hotel (5 star)
8. What is Hadoop? What does it do? Why is it used?
a. What: Hadoop is an open-source software framework for storing data and
running applications on clusters of commodity hardware.
b. Purpose: It provides massive storage for any kind of data, enormous processing
power and the ability to handle virtually limitless concurrent tasks or jobs
c. Why: Allows for the distributed processing of large data sets across clusters of
computers using simple programming models. It is designed to scale up from
single servers to thousands of machines, each offering local computation and
storage
9. Some hotels are using cloud computing for their POS (Point of Sale). Describe
what this means. What are the advantages? What are the disadvantages?
a. Cloud computing is a method for delivering information technology (IT) services
in which resources are retrieved from the Internet through web-based tools and
applications, as opposed to a direct connection to a server. Rather than keeping
files on a proprietary hard drive or local storage device, cloud-based storage
makes it possible to save them to a remote database. As long as an electronic
device has access to the web, it has access to the data and the software
programs to run it.
b. Advantages:
i. Cloud POS mobility
ii. Less downtime
iii. Offline capabilities
iv. Cost effective
v. Robust security
vi. Easy integration
c. Disadvantages:
i. Downtime (no cloud provider can claim immunity to service outages)
ii. Security and privacy risk
iii. Vulnerability to attacks
iv. Limited control + flexibility (vendor lock in)
10. What are the advantages of implementing a Best of Breed system? What are the
disadvantages?
a. Advantages:
i. Flexible approach to managing system upgrades
ii. Application maintenance
iii. Competitive advantage
b. Disadvantages:
i. Expensive
ii. Risk
iii. Networking complexity
iv. Multiple vendors
v. Strain on IT for support
vi. Potential duplicate entry of data
vii. Data integrity issue
11. What is the difference between active and passive RFID? Give two examples of
how a hotel company could use RFID?
a. Passive RFID systems use tags with no internal power source and instead are
powered by the electromagnetic energy transmitted from an RFID reader.
Passive RFID tags are used for applications such as access control, file tracking,
race timing, supply chain management, smart labels, and more.
b. Active RFID systems use battery-powered RFID tags that continuously broadcast
their own signal. Active RFID tags are commonly used as “beacons” to accurately
track the real-time location of assets or in high-speed environments such as
tolling.
c. Examples
i. Room key
ii. Credit card
iii. Bulk delivery to hotel
12. What is the difference between a Local Area Network (LAN) and a Wide Area
Network (LAN)? Give examples of each.
a. WAN
i. A computer network in a limited geographical area that uses
wireless transmission for communication.
ii. Example: cellular data networks 4G LTE, satellite networks
b. LAN
i. A local area network (LAN) is a group of computers and associated
devices that share a common communications line or wireless link to a
server.
ii. Example: WiFi
13. Companies such as Amazon offer web services. They offer Infrastructure as a
Service, Platform as a Service and Software as a Service. Highlight the
differences between each of these offerings. (NEED HELP)
a. Software-as-a-service (SaaS) is a method of delivering software in which a
vendor hosts the applications and provides them as a service to customers over
a network, typically the Internet.
b. Infrastructure as a service (IaaS) is a form of cloud computing that provides
virtualized computing resources over the internet.
c. Platform as a service (PaaS) is a cloud computing model in which a third-party
provider delivers hardware and software tools -- usually those needed for
application development to users over the internet
14. Why would a company use the Systems Development Lifecycle? What are some
of the reasons that a software system has to be maintained?
a. The company uses to ​structure their framework that consists of sequential
processes by which information systems are developed.
b. Reasons that a software system needs to be maintained
i. understanding the business problem to be solved,
ii. specifying the technical options for the systems
iii. anticipating the problems they are likely to encounter during
development, the greater the chances of success
c. Systems investigation cycle
i. Systems analysis
ii. Systems design
iii. Programming and testing
iv. Implementation
v. Operation and maintenance
15. What is grid computing? What are its advantages? Give an example of its use.
a. Grid computing usually consists of one main computer that distributes information
and tasks to a group of networked computers to accomplish a common goal.
b. Advantages:
i. Can solve larger, more complex problems in shorter periods of time
ii. Easier to collaborate with other organizations
iii. Makes better use of existing hardware
c. Example of use:
i. Drug discovery
ii. Economic forecasting
iii. Back office data processing
iv. Ecommerce
v. Web services
16. What impact has Apple iTunes had on the pirating of music?
a.
17. Moore’s law states that computing power doubles every two years. What has the
impact been of this law? Give examples.
a. Cheaper and better processing
b. Big data can be analysed
c. Faster, smaller, cheaper computers
d. Cloud computing
e. Storage of huge amounts of data
f. Grid computing
g. the amount of data produced worldwide is increasing by 50 percent each year
18. Describe the differences between Online Real Time Processing (OLTP) and End of
Period Processing. When using a POS, give examples of when OLTP would be
used and when End of Period Processing would make more sense.
a. Next, the system processes data in one of two basic ways: batch processing and
online processing.
i. In batch processing, the firm collects data from transactions as they
occur, placing them in groups or ​batches​. The system then prepares and
processes the batches periodically (say, every night).
ii. In online transaction processing (OLTP), business transactions are
processed online as soon as they occur.
➢ For example, when you pay for an item at a store, the system
records the sale by reducing the inventory on hand by one unit,
increasing sales figures for the item by one unit, and increasing
the store's cash position by the amount you paid.
19. Computers are able to learn from large amounts of data by ‘deep learning’. How
could a company use deep learning to help with some HR decisions. Give two
examples and describe the ethical issues involved.
a. TG 4.3
b. Traditional recruiting is typically too slow, and hiring managers often subjectively
choose candidates who are not the best fit for the job.
c. Uses algorithms to learn
20. When data is moved from a relational database to a datacube, it goes through an
Extraction, Transformation and Loading process. Why is each of these steps
necessary?
a. Exact
i. From transactions in the database
b. Transform
i. Scrub the data so it is clean
ii. Store by dimension for querying
iii. Consolidate: include totals for speed
c. Load
i. Move data into data warehouse