Network Topology

The Bead Bar is company that has three divisions: (1) studios, (2) franchises, and (3) Bead Bar on Board. The studio division oversees the company's six bead bar studios. Along with the original, there are now two studios in New York City, one on Long Island, one in Washington, D.C., and one in Boston, Massachusetts. The franchise division sells a complete beading supply package to businesses that want to open their own bead studio. The division is responsible for fulfilling franchisees' supply requirements. The company still uses paper-based forms. The Bead Bar is now large enough that the paper-based system is inefficient and has caused some problems, including lost orders, incorrect invoicing, and fulfillment delays

Information systems allow globalization. If the Bead Bar were to establish a website where people could purchase beading products, they could end up with larger profits. People from all over the world can purchase beading products easily and conveniently because the role of information allows the possibility to convert currencies and languages over the Internet. Information systems also allow each franchise to interact with each other or clients conveniently, as well, via email and/or teleconference, etc. Also, information systems allow for networking so that each franchise can share information with each other in a short amount of time. Information systems could also stop the Bead Bar from losing business. Since the Bead Bar is growing and yet still using a paper-based system, they will run into organization problems. The loss of orders, incorrect invoices, and delayed fulfillments will definitely cause unhappy customers.? These unhappy customers will then tell others about their less than satisfactory service they received with the Bead Bar. Thus, giving the Bead Bar a bad reputation. Information systems allow a more organized and efficient way to handle customer orders, in a timely manner none-the-less. Information systems will also make it easier to handle finances and accounting, as well.

DBMSs perform many functions for the business community. One of these functions is to manage data storage. Databases can hold a large amount of data, for companies. Companies use DBMSs to store all information on their customers, and their suppliers, as well. Databases can also manage inventory, which is essential to companies, so that they know when to order new products. This will allow companies to know which products are used most, or in retail, which product are best sellers. It will also be able to tell one which products are not selling enough to make a profit. This will tell the person who orders inventory what not to order again in the future. DBMSs also allow us to access this data relatively quickly, which is important. People want things done quickly, and they want their information retrieved quickly and DBMSs allows this to happen. Databases are imperative to the business community. I can only imagine that as businesses receive more and more information, they will need more and/or bigger DBMSs.

Since the Bead Bar is going to be global they should use an enterprise DBMS. This will allow Bead Bar executives to hold a large amount of various data, provide security so that data cannot be compromised, and allow other Bead Bar executives to access the database and view data that they need to be aware of. The Bead Bar should use a distributed enterprise database since they have 5 franchises (especially if they plan to build more) and are about to start an online store. A distribute enterprise database is more reliable, and much faster than a centralized database. They will also permit each store to automatically know the prices that the main store sets. The local databases report their sales, inventory levels, and so on to the main store, which then sends price changes and the like to each database.

The Bead Bar should use a relational model database. The relational model is flexible and much easier to use than the network model (otherwise, I