Database Programming

Management information systems are those systems that allow managers to make decisions for the successful operation of businesses. Management information systems consist of computer resources, people, and procedures used in the modern business enterprise. The term MIS stands for management information systems. MIS also refers to the organization that develops and maintains most or all of the computer systems in the enterprise so that managers can make decisions. The goal of the MIS organization is to deliver information systems to the various levels of corporate managers. MIS professionals create and support the computer system throughout the company. Trained and educated to work with corporate computer systems, these professionals are responsible in some way for nearly all of the computers, from the largest mainframe to the desktop and portable PCs.

Management information systems can be used as a support to managers to provide a competitive advantage. The system must support the goals of the organization. Most organizations are structured along functional lines, and the typical systems are identified as follows:

Accounting management information systems: All accounting reports are shared by all levels of accounting managers.

Financial management information systems: The financial management information system provides financial information to all financial managers within an organization including the chief financial officer. The chief financial officer analyzes historical and current financial activity, projects future financial needs, and monitors and controls the use of funds over time using the information developed by the MIS department.

Manufacturing management information systems: More than any functional area, operations have been impacted by great advances in technology. As a result, manufacturing operations have changed. For instance, inventories are provided just in time so that great amounts of money are not spent for warehousing huge inventories. In some instances, raw materials are even processed on railroad cars waiting to be sent directly to the factory. Thus there is no need for warehousing.

Marketing management information systems: A marketing management information system supports managerial activity in the area of product development, distribution, pricing decisions, promotional effectiveness, and sales forecasting. More than any other functional area, marketing systems rely on external sources of data. These sources include competition and customers, for example.

Human resources management information systems:Human resources management information systems are concerned with activities related to workers, managers, and other individuals employed by the organization. Because the personnel function relates to all other areas in business, the human resources management information system plays a valuable role in ensuring organizational success. Activities performed by the human resources management information systems include, work-force analysis and planning, hiring, training, and job assignments.

these are some of the advantages of database management systems

1.allows remote login.

2.eases the problem for mobility because of number1(remote login)

3.allows sharing of research and other works.eg like we are doing now(sharing)

3.makes it for the database administrator to monitor user activities.

4.provides necessary security to protect the data stored.eg data encryption.

5. e.t.c

A primary key is a column which uniquely identifies the records in a table. In a broad sense, a primary key is the mixture of a unique key and an index: A column with a primary key is indexed to deliver a faster query, and doesn't allow duplicate values to ensure specific data. Most programmers recommend all tables having a primary key (and only one) to enhance the speed of queries and overall database performance. An example of a primary key may be found in a table named "departments," which might have a column named "department_number" that uniquely identifies each department in the table with a number.

A foreign key is a column (the child column ) in a table which has a corresponding relationship and a dependency on another column (the parent column ) that is usually in a different table. Parent columns can have multiple child columns, but a child column can only have one parent column. The child column is the column with the foreign key; the parent column does not have the foreign key "set" on it, but most databases require the parent column to be indexed. Foreign keys are made to link data across multiple tables. A child column cannot have a record that its parent column does not have. Say a table named "employees" has 20 employees (rows) in it. There are 4 departments in the "departments" table. All 20 employees must belong to a department, so a column in the "employees" table named "department" would point to the primary key in the "departments" table using a foreign key. Now all employees must belong to a department as specified by the "departments" table. If a department isn't specified in the "departments" table, the employee cannot be assigned to it.

A candidate key would be any key which could be used as the primary key, which means that the combination of the columns, or just the single column would create a unique key. You would then need to determine which of these candidate keys would work best as your primary key.