Screening Exam Questions for Fall 2013
Each question has subsections and each subsection is followed by a number in parentheses;
this has been provided to guide you on the relative importance of the subsection to
overall answer. For example if the number in parentheses is (50) that means that the
weight of this subsection for the question is 50%.
Question 1
Choose one agile software development method discussed in IST303, such as the Pilone & Miles method,
XP, Scrum.... Choose a non-agile software development method, such as waterfall, SDLC, spiral... (Do
not choose RUP or open source for either method.)
1. Compare and contrast the two methods in terms of their overall principles: goals, values, aims,
assumptions.... (35)
2. Compare and contrast the two methods in terms of their specific practices: estimation, planning,
testing, coding, user involvement, project management.... (35)
3. Answer the following questions:
a. What strengths do the approaches have? (10)
b. What weaknesses? (10)
c. For what kinds of software development might you prefer each? (10)
Question 2
A CIO 100 Award is an acknowledged mark of IT excellence. In 2013, CIO magazine recognized CIOs
who are designing innovation processes and IT operating models for speed. The award winners will get
credibility from one place only: transforming their IT vision into operational reality with respect to a
quicker way to get things done.
Imagine that you were asked to provide expert advice on how the judges’ should assess candidate
performances. Therefore, please write an essay with your advice, drawing on 5 IT Management ideas,
such as but not limited to: Business Agility, IT Flexibility, IT Architecture, Talent Management, and
Vendor Management. Where possible, please provide acknowledgment of articles, authors, or experts that
speak to the issues you raise.
Your essay will be assessed as follows:


Overall understanding of “designing innovation processes and IT operating models for speed”
(25)
Successful demonstration of applying 5 IT management concepts that link to this theme (50)
1

Specific criteria that could be used in assessing CIO performance along these 5 dimensions (25)
Question 3
You have been asked to design a database system for BoardwalkBikes, a company that rents bicycles to
tourists for use while on vacation at the New Jersey shore. Matt and Megan run BoardwalkBikes and
keep track of their bicycles, customers, and sales using spreadsheets. As you can imagine, this is quite
cumbersome and is susceptible to errors. In addition, BoardwalkBikes has been growing and is now
located in several seashore cities. Matt and Megan need a database system to help them manage their
growing business.
First and foremost, they need to become more organized with the day-to-day financial operations of their
business. However, being young, optimistic, and well-educated they expect their business to keep
growing and have many ideas as to how to facilitate that. For instance, they would like to have a daily
summary of the types of bicycles that were the most popular rentals. They will use this information to
determine the types of bikes they should keep in stock now and when planning for each summer season,
that is, they are very interested in real-time and historic trend analysis.
In addition to facilitating trend analysis, they would like to use this information to help them increase the
rentals of unpopular bike types through the use of discounts that they will advertise through various social
media outlets, for example, Facebook, Twitter, and Yelp.
Design a database for this project.
1. Draw the detailed ER diagram (data model) for your database. There should be at least four (4)
entities with their relations. Clearly describe and explain all the symbols you use for your ER
diagram. (25)
2. Working from your data model, draw the database design for your database that shows the database
tables. Again, clearly describe and explain all the symbols you use for your database design (25).
3. Explain the difference between your ER diagram (part 1 above) and your final database design (part 2
above). (10)
(Question continues on page 2)
4. Describe at least one stored procedure for this project in detail (10), and use pseudo-code to show
what the stored procedure would do (10). Explain why using a stored procedure would be a good idea
(10).
5. As a savvy database designer, you suspect that BoardwalkBikes will want to do data mining later on
to better identify specific customers. What type of “Big Data” from social networks would you
recommend they look at? How would it be used concurrently with your database? (10)
2
Question 4
1. You are hired by a campus radio club that wants to transmit radio programs over the air to students on
weekends. In order to transmit content, the club is considering the purchase of one of three hardware
devices. The boxes for these devices read as follows: 1) ASK on-off keying, 2) FSK binary, and 3)
PSK with 2-4-8 constellation. Explain to the team:
a. What each of these is? (15)
b. The advantages and/or disadvantages of each? (15)
c. Which device you would prefer and why? (10)
2. Answer the following questions:
a. What is the difference between a bridge and a router? (15)
b. How is a LAN switch better than a LAN Hub? (15)
3. Answer the following questions:
a. What is the principle of frequency reuse in the context of a cellular network? (15)
b. How does that impact the process of handoff? (15)
Question 5
Mobile Technology, Business Analytics, Cloud Computing and Social Business are creating new business
possibilities. All of these fast-moving trends are emerging so fast that many organizations are having a
hard time keeping up. Therefore, shifting the organization into the forefront of these trends will require
the highest level of IT leadership
Choose one of the above emerging technologies (Mobile Technology, Business Analytics, Cloud
Computing and Social Business) and explain its role within an enterprise environment. (10)
Select 3 out of 5 strategic management patterns from the list below and analyze how IT leaders can act
effectively and enable organizations to capitalize on the strategic potential of the emerging technologies
that you selected. (30 for each pattern analysis)
IT Strategic Management Patterns:





Avoiding the Alignment Trap in IT
Measuring the business Value of IT Investments
Reinvention of the Theory of the Business
Establish IT credibility
Risk Management Practices
3
4