MULTIPLE CHOICE

1. Developing an information system is similar to building a house because you

have to
a. start with a basic idea of what is needed
b. create simple drawings of what is needed and allow the customer to
provide feedback
c. develop a detailed set of blueprints
d. actually build the project, often with some changes directed by the
customer
e. all of the above

2. The four phases of the Systems Development Life Cycle are _____.
a. analysis, gathering, modeling, and diagramming
b. construction, installation, testing, and converting
c. initiating, planning, controlling, and implementing
d. planning, analysis, design, and implementation
e. system request, feasibility, staffing, and construction

3. The project plan is the document that is used to _____.

a. describe how the project team will go about developing the proposed
system
b. outline the tasks to be addressed in developing the proposed system and
develop a time estimate for each task.
c. outline the technical, economic, and organizational feasibility of the
proposed system
d. summarize the business need and explain how the proposed system
supports that need and creates value
e. all of the above

4. In which phase of the SDLC is the project plan developed?

a. analysis
b. design
c. implementation
d. planning
e. reconstruction

5. Iterative and Incremental development means that

a. the team is using a prototyping methodology
b. the system will be developed through versions
c. the system will be developed in phases
d. the system will undergo continuous testing and refinement
e. the team is using an agile methodology
6. In order to approve a system request, the approval committee must know
a. all of the details of the ultimate system to be developed.
b. the high level functionality of the system.
c. what the screens and reports will look like in the final system.
d. who the end users of the system will be and exactly how they will use it in
their jobs.
e. all of the above.

7. Which of the following factors could be included in a technical risk assessment?

a. Cost of a new Web server
b. Cost of hiring a Webmaster
c. No previous experience with Java within the IS department
d. Some fear of job loss among order entry department personnel
e. All of the above

8. The calculation that measures the amount of money an organization receives in

return for the money it spends is called the _____.
a. cash flow
b. net present value
c. total investment
d. tangible costs
e. return on investment

9. If end users feel fearful or threatened by a proposed new system, this factor
should be included as a part of the _____.
a. economic feasibility assessment
b. organizational feasibility assessment
c. system proposal
d. system request
e. technical feasibility assessment

10. The most significant challenge to project managers is _____.

a. lack of project management training
b. no one really understands how to manage a complex systems development
project
c. the lack of tools that can assist in controlling project progress
d. unrealistic schedule demands by project sponsors
e. all of the above

11. Adding people to a project team in order to speed up total development time
_____.
a. is a standard task in timeboxing
b. is a useful way to meet a tight deadline
c. may actually increase total development time
d. simplifies communication within the team
 e. none of the above

12. Unlike traditional Work Breakdown Structures (WBS), evolutionary WBSs are
a. organized in a standard manner across all projects
b. created in an iterative and incremental manner
c. designed so one can compare the current project to past projects
d. all of the above
e. none of the above

13. _______ is an example of functional requirements.

a. The system should work with any web browser
b. The system should load any web page within 3 seconds
c. Customers should be able to see their orders after authentication
d. The system should comply with the company’s policy of buying all PCs and
servers from Dell
e. The system should be able to search all available inventory in order to
determine whether a product can be made by a given date

14. The most comprehensive and complete deliverable of the analysis phase is _____.
a. project work plan
b. system proposal
c. behavioral models for the to-be system
d. functional models for the to-be system
e. structural models for the to-be system

15. The information gathering technique that enables the analyst to collect facts and
opinions from a wide range of geographically dispersed people quickly and with
the least expense is the _____.
a. document analysis
b. interview
c. JAD session
d. observation
e. questionnaire

16. Which of the following diagramming symbols represents an actor in a use case
diagram?

a
.

b
.
 c.

d
.
e.

17. Which of the following diagramming symbols represents a use case in a use case
diagram?

a.

b
.

c.

d
.
e.

18. The importance level of a use case increases for all of the following
characteristics of the use case EXCEPT _____.
a. the use case represents an important business process
b. the use case supports revenue generation
c. the technology is proven
d. the functionality is complex
e. the functionality is time-critical

19. The correct sequence of the major steps in creating use case diagrams is _____.
a. identify the major use cases, expand the major use cases, confirm the
major use cases, create the use-case diagram
b. identify the major use cases, expand the major use cases, create the use-case
diagram, confirm the major use cases
c. create the use-case diagram, identify the major use cases, expand the major
use cases, confirm the major use cases
d. create the use-case diagram, identify the major use cases, confirm the major
use cases, expand the major use cases
e. identify the major use cases, confirm the major use cases, expand the major
use cases, create the use-case diagram
20. An analyst depicts the static view of an information system with _____.
a. use-case models
b. structural models
c. behavioral models
d. interaction diagrams
e. statechart diagrams

21. Which of the following objects would be most likely to be destroyed at some
point in time in a sequence diagram?
a. customer
b. order
c. order item
d. invoice
e. shopping cart

22. The focus in a sequence diagram is on __________________

a. How actors interact with objects to realize a given use case
b. Messages sent by actors to other objects
c. when an object is being created
d. when messages are being destroyed
e. time ordering of messages being passed between objects

23. Which of the following will be converted to methods in later phases of the SDLC?
a. attributes
b. operations
c. classes
d. objects
e. abstract classes

24. “A-part-of” or “has-parts” relationships represent _____ relationships.

a. generalization
b. association
c. aggregation
d. subsetting
e. vague

25. One way to identify objects for the class diagram is to scan the use case
descriptions for ____.
a. relationships
b. object lists
c. patterns
d. nouns
e. verbs
TRUE OR FALSE

1. Familiarity with the application and technology are major factors considered
under economic feasibility.

2. Cost benefit analysis identifies the financial costs and benefits associated with a
systems project.

3. To identify the costs and benefits related to the computer technology for a
project the systems analyst should rely on the business users.

4. A 20% increase in sales volume is a tangible benefit that can be included in a

cost-benefit analysis.

5. Economic feasibility is determined by identifying costs and benefits associated

with the system, assigning values to them, and then calculating the cash flow and
return on investment for the project.

6. The champion is a high-level IS executive who initiates the system request

and supports the project by providing time, resources, and political support
within the organization by communicating the importance of the system to
other organizational decision makers.

7. Natalie has been asked by her project manager to list the possible intangible
benefits for a new system. Her list will include reduced expenses for the
company.

8. ROI calculations do not consider the present value of future money.

9. Calculating the break-even point helps in understanding how long it will take
before the system creates real value for the organization.

10. When planning a systems project, overly optimistic timetables are the cause of
project completion delays.

11. To complete a 20 person-month project in 10 months, a team should have 4

full-time staff members assigned to the project.

12. Timeboxing is a popular technique which sets a fixed deadline for a project and
delivers the system by that deadline no matter what, even if functionality needs to
be reduced.

13. A functional lead manages a group of programmers and technical staff

members.
14. According to leading experts in software development, the margin of error when
estimating project costs is 100% and the margin of error in project scheduling
time is 25%.

15. Benchmarking refers to studying how other organizations perform a business

process so you can learn how your organization can do it better.

16. Observation is a powerful tool for gathering information about the As-Is system
and may be necessary because managers often do not remember how they work
and how they allocate their time.

17. Because it is important not to disrupt the normal business function, joint
application design (JAD) sessions should be held at a location easily
accessible to the participants’ office staffs, and attendees should be those
most easily released from regular duties and least likely to be missed.

18. Jessica has asked the users to generate a list of problems with the current system
and to prioritize the problems in order of importance. Jessica then generated all
the possible causes for the problems, starting with the most important. Jessica is
identifying improvement opportunities through root cause analysis.

19. A use case that describes functionality that is complex and risky would be given a
high importance level.

20. The primary actor is the person or thing that starts the execution of a use case.

21. An actor in a use case must be a person.

22. A formal way of representing how a business system interacts with its
environment is termed a use case.

23. As Felix is documenting an order entry system, he discovers that someone

can call up to place an order that is not a customer. In this case, the Take
Order use case will use the Create Customer use case to capture the
customer information, and then the order will be taken. This is an example of
the extend relationship between use cases.

24. The destruction of temporary objects is shown on sequence diagrams with an X at

the end of the lifeline.

25. A message with the information [aStudent exists] will be sent only when this
condition is true.

26. The first step in drawing a communication diagram is to identify which

objects and associations between the objects participate in the
communication.
 27. An activity in a behavioral state diagram represents the movement of an
object from one state to another.

28. The symbol for a class in a class diagram contains the name of the class, a list of
the attributes, and a list of operations.

29. Age is an example of a derived attribute in a class since it can be computed from
the date-of-birth attribute and the current date.

30. When classes share a many-to-many relationship, it is common to create a(n)

association class that has its own attributes and methods.

SHORT ANSWER

1. Indicate the four phases of the waterfall approach and

mention its advantages and disadvantages.
With Waterfall Methodology, the analysts and users proceed in sequence from one
phase to the next. The four phases of the waterfall development are planning,
analysis, design and implementation. The two key advantages of the structured design
waterfall approach are that it identifies system requirements long before programming
begins and it minimizes changes to the requirements as the project proceeds. The two
key disadvantages are that the design must be completely specified before
programming beings and that long time elapses between the completion of the system
proposal in the analysis phase and the delivery of the system.

2. Briefly summarize the purpose of the planning phase in

SDLC. Explain why it exists and what it contributes to
the completion of the system.
The planning phase is the fundamental process of understanding why an information
system should be built and determining how the project team will go about building
it. Planning phase has two steps: One is to complete a feasibility analysis and having
the approval committee decide if the project should be undertaken and the second is
to decide on a project plan once the project has been given a go ahead.

3. Briefly explain what the creators of the Unified

Modeling Language (UML) mean by use-case driven,
architecture centric, and iterative and incremental.
The unified process is a use case driven architecture centric and iterative and
incremental. The Unified process is a two dimensional systems development process
described by a set of phases and work flows. The phases are inception, elaborated,
construction and transition. The workflows include business, modeling, requirements,
analysis, design implementation, test deployment, project management, configuration
and change management and environment.
 4. Briefly describe the benefits of Object-Oriented
Systems Analysis and Design (OOSAD)
Concepts in the object oriented approach enable analysts to break a complex system
into smaller, more manageable modules, work on the modules individually, and easily
piece the modules back together to form an information system. This modularity
makes system development easier to grasp, easier to share among members of a
project team, and easier to communicate to users, who are needed to provide
requirements and confirm how well the system meets the requirements throughout the
SDLC.

5. Economic feasibility includes an assessment of

financial impacts in four categories. What are these four
financial categories and how are values assigned to
each?
st
1 task of the economic feasibility analysis is to identify the kinds of costs and
benefits the system will have. Costs and benefits can be broken down into four
categories 1) Development costs, 2) Operational Costs, 3) Tangible Benefits, 4)
Intangibles. Development costs are those tangible expenses incurred during the
construction of the system. Operational costs are those tangible costs required to
operate the system. Tangible Benefits are revenues and cost saving and Intangible
costs are increased sales, reduction in staff and reduction in inventory.

6. There are two methods for estimating the time required

to build a system: industry standards based on the
planning phase time and the more complex three-step
process. Compare and contrast the two methods. What
are the advantages and disadvantages for each?
Two methods for estimating the time required to build a system are the Planning
Phase approach and the Function Point Approach. The industry standards say that
15% of its effort in the planning phase, 20% in analysis phase, 35% in design phase
and 30% in the implementation phase. Function point approach is more reliable three
step process. 1st the PM estimates the size of the project in terms of the number of
lines of the code the new system will require. This size estimate is then converted into
the amount of effort required to develop the system in terms of number of person
months. The estimated effort is then converted into an estimated schedule time in
terms of the number of months from start to finish. Planning Phase has limitation in
its approach because it can be difficult to take into account the specifics of the
project.

7. A project manager has three options to take when a

schedule date has been missed. What are the basic
assumptions the project manager can make? What
changes to the schedule should the manager make for
 each assumption? What is the level of risk for each
assumption?
If the project manager Do not change Schedule High Risk
assumes the rest of the
project is simpler than the
part that was late and is
also simpler that believed
when the original
scheduled estimates were
made, PM can make up
time.
If PM assumes the rest of Increase the entire Moderate Risk
the project is simpler than schedule by the total
the part that was late and is amount of time that the
no more complex that the project is behind by
original estimates
assumed. PM cant make up
lost time but will not lose
time on the rest of the
project
If PM assumes that the rest Increase the entire Low Risk
of the project is as schedule by the percentage
complex as the part that of weeks that the PM was
was late, then all the behind by.
scheduled dates in the
future underestimates the
real time requiredby the
same percentage as the part
that was late

8. Describe three classic planning mistakes. What would

be a solution for each?
Classic Planning Mistakes are:
Overly optimistic Schedule – PM shouldn’t inflate time estimates; instead explicitly
schedule slack time at the end of each phase to account for the variability in
estimates.
Failing to Monitor the Schedule – Require team members to report progress honestly
every week.
Failing to update the Schedule – Immediately review the schedule and inform the
project sponsor of the new end date or use timeboxing.
Adding people to late project – Review Schedule, use timeboxing and throw away
bug filled code.
 9. Explain the consequences of a project manager
allowing the scope of a project to gradually increase.
Why does 'scope creep' occur?
Scope Creep happens when new requirements are added to the project after the
original project scope was defined and frozen. After the project behinds it becomes
increasingly difficult to address changing requirements. The ramifications of change
become more extensive, the focus is removed from original goals, and there is at least
some impact on cost and schedule. Therefore the PM plays a critical role in managing
this change to keep scope creep to a minimum.

10. In the CD Selections case, the project leader was faced

with a situation in which there was no existing system
to study. When the system under development is a new
system (as in the CD Selections case), what analysis
strategy would you recommend?
Feasibility Analysis will be important in the case of the CD example. It will allow the
users to see what the technical, economical and organization feasibility is for the
whole system. It will allow them to answer most important questions like, Can they
build it? Should they build it? And if they build it, will users come?

11. Write a complete use case description for the

interaction that a student would have with your college
or university’s class registration system.
Use Case Name – Register ID – 15 Importance Level – High
Primary Actor – Student Use Case Type – Detail , Essential
Stakeholders & Interests:
Student – Wants to Register
School – Make sure all students are registered without over flowing class limits.
Brief Description – This use case describes how a student can register as for a class at
a university
Trigger: Student calls registrar office to register for a class.
Type: External
Realtionships:
Assocation: Student
Include: Make Payment Arrangements
Extend: Create New Student
Normal Flow of Events:
1). The student contacts the registrar to register for class
2). The Registrar takes down his/her student info
3) Validate against student database.
4) Execute makes payment arrangements use case.
5) Registrar asks student if he/she wants to add/drop a class
If the student wants to register – Follow new class subflow
If the student wants to drop a class – Follow drop class subflow.
6) Provide results to the student.
Subflows:
New Class – Tell student about the possible class times that are available and add the
student to the specified class
Drop Class – Drop the class the student has specified
Alternate/Exceptional Flows:
Registrar creates a new student

12. Distinguish between the extend and include

relationships in use case diagrams. When would you
use each of these relationships?
An extended relationship represents the extension of the functionality of the use case
to incorporate optional behavior. An included relationship represents the mandatory
inclusion of another use case. The include relationship enables functional
decomposition, the breaking up of a complex use case into several simpler ones.

13. List and briefly describe the four major steps in writing
effective use-case descriptions and use-case diagrams.
Guidelines for writing effective use case descriptions are:
Write each set in the form of subject verb direct object (and sometimes preposition
indirect object)
Make sure it is clear how the initiator of the step is.
Write the steps from the perspective of the independent observer.
Write each step at about the same level of abstraction.
Ensure the use case has sensible set of steps
Apply the KISS principle liberally
Write repeating instructions after the set of steps to be repeated.

14. Define what a structural model is. Why should a

systems analyst create one? Why is the creation of a
structural model iterative?
A structural model is a formal way of representing the objects that are used and
created by business system. It illustrates people, places or things about which
information is captured and how they are related to each other. One of the primary
purposes of the structural model is to create a vocabulary that can be used by the
analysts and the users. Structural models represents the things, ideas or concepts that
is, the objects contained in the domain of the problem. They also allow the
representation of the relationship between things, ideas or concepts. The structural
model is drawn using an iterative process in which the model becomes more detailed
and less conceptual over time.

15. Define the following terms: class, attribute, and

operation. Give examples of each.
Class is the main building block of a class diagram; it stores and manages information
in the system. During analysis, classes refer to the people, places, events and things
about which the system will capture information. Attributes are properties of class
about which we want to capture information. Operations are actions or functions that
a class can perform.