Datawarehouse

1. Data warehouses
A data warehouse is a database that collects data from different data
sources. Data is gathered from sources such as transaction data from a
series of retail outlets. This data can then be used for analysis. The data
in a data warehouse is historical and read only. It provides a ‘snap shot’
of business operations at a given point in time. The data is subject
oriented and organises only key business information. Data warehouses
facilitate decision support system applications such as trend reports (e.g.,
the items with the most sales in a particular area within the last two
years), exception reports, and reports that show actual performance
versus goals.
Group decision support systems (GDSS)
A group decision support system is an information system that assists
users in making decisions by facilitating group collaboration. Participants
use a common computer or network to enable collaboration supporting
integrated systems thinking for complex decision making. A GDSS
includes features such as presentation material, commenting and
brainstorming, voting and evaluation of decisions. A GDSS helps to
improve the efficiency and effectiveness in the decision making process.
The use of a GDSS is an emerging trend rather than a common practice in
business.
Intelligent Decision Support Systems
The area of Intelligent Decision Support Systems (IDSS) is interdisciplinary in
nature, bridging Artificial Intelligence, Decision Science and Information
Systems. Our research on IDSS focuses mainly on theoretical methods for
multiple-criteria decision-making and application of intelligent technologies,
such as expert systems, fuzzy logic systems and genetic algorithms. We are
particularly interested in intelligent support to decision-making under
uncertainty, based on the Dempster-Shafer evidence theory and fuzzy logic,
and multiple objective optimisation by evolutionary computing. An important
objective of our research is the application of those methods for the
development of software tools for decision support.