Tools for BBUS 511
The Integrated E-Business

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This page highlights a few good research tools for your project or homework assignments.

Business Databases

Certain databases require that you access through your UW account (the modem pool or an on-campus computer).  If you use another ISP, and are UW faculty, staff, or student, you can access these databases by going through the UW proxy server.

Lexis/Nexis Universe - Want to find financial information about a company? Or perhaps recent news written about them. Lexis holds an extensive array of full-text news (newspapers, wire services, transcripts and newsletters), business literature, industry and company information, legal, biographical and reference resources. Companies literally pay tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars for their services each year. You get this free! You must connect from your UW account or an on-campus computer to successfully connect to this site from here.

Investex - The Investex Group Research Bank Web brings together investment research and industry analysis. It contains research from over 450 investment banks and 150 trade associations as well as fundamental financial information from Moody's Investors Service. This can only be accessed through the UW modem pool or an on-campus computer to successfully connect.   You can also use the UW proxy server.

Popular Business News Journals

Business 2.0 - Ok, this is a really popular rag, rather than having consistent substance.  Despite this, some of the articles are really good.

Red Herring - For High Technology business news and well researched articles on entire high technology industries.

San Jose Mercury - Forget the New York Times. This IS the Mercedes-Benz of daily digital news.

IT Industry Analysts

CIO Magazine - It's free, it's well-written, and it's about IT from a strategic and management perspective.  The research center area absolutely rocks.  If I had one site to recommend to an aspiring IT manager, it would be THIS one.  The Standard runs close behind.

Darwin Magazine - Not far behind CIO magazine is Darwin Magazine.  It's IT lite for business executives.   Frankly, there are very few (almost none) IT techies who know the scoop on every single piece of hardware or software.  For techies and non-techies, here's an easy starting point for understanding the issues.  I still prefer the layout on CIO magazine.

McKinsey Quarterly - The consulting firm runs a free e-journal and this hyperlink takes you to the IT section.

The Standard - A Business IT Journal that advertises itself as "Intelligence for the Internet Economy", and while it's more about industry intelligence, it's about as good as a freebie gets.

Internet World - The interface is a bit clunky, and they engage in a bit more hype, but it is a magazine devoted to the e-business mantra.  The top three magazines have the real stuff, while the rest requires more of a hunting expedition.  In contrast to the other magazines listed here, it has a bit more information on wireless applications.

IT World - It also has a clunkier interface than CIO magazine, and the quality is uneven, but there's real pearls here.   It's a bit more techie, but not so much that it alienates us.  For example, if I want to know how XML is going to affect me, then I want to come here.

Reed Business Information - Reed harnesses the power of information to help business leaders make the best decisions and to help marketers sell to those leaders...so goes their hype.  Nevertheless, they probably have some of the most extensive free information on the web regarding IS information.  They're generally reputable researchers. It includes Wireless Week and Supply Chain Management Review.

Managing Automation Online - This magazine is about "technology for implementing integrated manufacturing and e-business...and its impact on the manufacturing enterprise.

APICS Magazine - The Educational Society for Resource Management is a not-for-profit international educational organization that is a source of knowledge for manufacturing and service industries across the entire supply chain in such areas as materials management, information services, purchasing and quality.  They devote space also to E-Business topics.

The Techie Corner

Case Tools

Database Design Tool - There are various freeware and shareware case tools available for download and I am going to recommend a couple for your perusal.  This is probably the cheapest and easiest fully featured CASE tool.  An entire generation of UWB CSS students have used the fabled "Database Design Tool" in its free trial version.  It's dirt easy...well....nothing is dirt easy, but it's better than using Visio and whatever else is out there.  It also generates your database code, whether in SQL or for other database languages.  The only drawback is that it doesn't conform to UML (unified modeling language).  If you're required to do some UML, then I can only refer you to tools that I haven't yet used.  First, there is CASE - Object Oriented.  It's a free beta and it's designed around Grady Booch's database design methods.  Grady is the big driver of UML and so this tool has to be pretty darn close.

Objecteering Software - The Personal Edition is the entry point to the complete Objecteering/UML product line. Dedicated to UML modeling, this edition, limited for personal usage only, is free of charge!  Available for the Windows or Linux platforms. Objecteering/UML provides a complete, simple to use UML solution to analyze, design, implement, test and deploy software applications.  A friend of mine swears by this product.

Edge Diagrammer - I haven't tried this and you are required to use the free extension pack to create ERD diagrams.  The trial shareware is good for 30 days.  I don't think it can generate database code for creating your database as with the Database Design Tool.  It's simply a superior diagramming tool.  Some CSS students use it and reports its superiority to Visio.  If you're just looking to make some diagrams and charts, I was told that this is the one to get.

Proxy Designer - It's similar to Visio, but in contrast to the prior tools, it's optimized for the Uniform Modeling Language.  If you're required to conform to UML, this might be the tool for you.  It doesn't generate code, but it's also free.

Tech Speak

The Telecomunications Corner - Network and telecom products and news.

Network World Fusion - Latest and greatest in IT network issues.  A bit more from the business perspective than the other sites listed here.

Network Computing - Sponsored by tech web, this is an awesome site for getting the 100 foot view on some current network and IT technologies.

Fiber Optic News - Lightwave online journal gives the latest and greatest on fiber rings and things.

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