Textbook and other Resources

• Readings for class on 1/25/96 These are available on my public directory. The path is ~rk2x/public. The files you should copy over are Word documents and are titled final.doc and techpaper.doc. Review the document titled final.doc. It provides a nice overview of the work we did with Grant Thornton.

• Clyde Holsapple and Andrew Whinston, Decision Support Systems: A Knowledge-based Approach , PWS-Kent, 1996. This is the prescribed text for this class. Unfortunately, there is no single book that provides a reasonably complete and thorough introduction to the subject of decision support systems. I expect students to use the library, online resources (see below) and locate and read books and articles that specifically address their interest. I will also supply supplemental readings in class, and provide pointers to the literature. This literature search will particularly help students with ideas for projects which are an important component of the course. I particularly encourage students to examine issues of a journal called Interfaces in the Hunt Library which publishes articles on decision support systems which have been developed and implemented in both the private and public sectors.

• An excellent compilation of decision support systems resources is maintained by my colleague Hemant Bhargava.

• Dan Powers at the University of Iowa maintains a comprehensive dss resources page

• A good entry point into the industry perspective on for decision support systems, on line analytical processing and executive information systems is maintained by Michael Carnell. This list also discusses specific software products and vendors of client-server decision support systems.

• I would like all students to read Information Week. It is an excellent trade magazine that covers a range of information systems issues that frame any acquistion or deployment of decision support systems. In particular, check out the article simulation modeling tools.

• Decision Support Systems journal is a leading publication in this area. Several interesting articles in this journal discuss decision support applications.