UNIT 5

APPLICATION DOMAINS
(Bio-informatics and medical Applications- Business Applications- Law Enforcement and
political Processes- E-commerce- Manufacturing- Education- Entertainment and Agriculture

"Computer science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes.")

Today, opportunities and challenges of available technology can be utilized as strategic and
tactical resources for any organization. Conversely, failure to be current on the latest trends and
to cope up with falcon paced IT development, can lead to ineffective and inefficient management
of enterprise resources.

Bio-Informatics and Medical Applications

Bioinformatics and computational biology involve the use of techniques including applied
mathematics, informatics, statistics, computer science, artificial intelligence, chemistry, and
biochemistry to solve biological problems usually on the molecular level. Research in
computational biology often overlaps with systems biology. Major research efforts in the field
include sequence alignment, gene finding, genome assembly, protein structure alignment, protein
structure prediction, prediction of gene expression and protein-protein interactions, and the
modeling of evolution.

The terms bioinformatics and computational biology are often used interchangeably. However
bioinformatics more properly refers to the creation and advancement of algorithms,
computational and statistical techniques, and theory to solve formal and practical problems
arising from the management and analysis of biological data. Computational biology, on the
other hand, refers to hypothesis-driven investigation of a specific biological problem using
computers, carried out with experimental or simulated data, with the primary goal of discovery
and the advancement of biological knowledge. Put more simply, bioinformatics is concerned
with the information while computational biology is concerned with the hypotheses. A similar
distinction is made by National Institutes of Health in their working definitions of Bioinformatics
and Computational Biology, where it is further emphasized that there is a tight coupling of
developments and knowledge between the more hypothesis-driven research in computational
biology and technique-driven research in bioinformatics. Bioinformatics is also often specified as
an applied subfield of the more general discipline of Biomedical informatics.
A common thread in projects in bioinformatics and computational biology is the use of
mathematical tools to extract useful information from data produced by high-throughput
biological techniques such as genome sequencing. A representative problem in bioinformatics is
the assembly of high-quality genome sequences from fragmentary "shotgun" DNA sequencing.
Other common problems include the study of gene regulation to perform expression profiling
using data from microarrays or mass spectrometry.

Health informatics or medical informatics is the intersection of information science, computer

science and health care. It deals with the resources, devices and methods required to optimize the
acquisition, storage, retrieval and use of information in health and biomedicine. Health
informatics tools include not only computers but also clinical guidelines, formal medical
terminologies, and information and communication systems.

Computer Databases
In any investigative unit, especially units that specialize in pattern crime, unit-level databases can
be utilized for:
1.Case management
2.Identification of trends and patterns
3.Suspect MO files
4.Statistical analysis
5.Major case lead control
6.Equipment inventory
7.Track parolees
as well as many other uses limited only by one's imagination.

The Internet
The internet not only opens us up to a world of information (the life blood of the investigator),
but allows us to see what is going on in other locales, police departments, organizations, etc.
Surveillance photos can be posted for the public to see. Contacts can be developed with members
of other police organizations world-wide and discussions of any subject conducted. Information
can be transmitted, exchanged or obtained. The internet is so wide open that we would do
ourselves a disservice to not learn everything we can about it. And, of course, the internet opens
many new worlds to the criminal. We must stay up with him, if not ahead.

E-Mail
E-mail is a quick, easy and inexpensive way of communicating with others. Pattern and suspect
information, mug and surveillance photos and daily business can be transmitted to and from
large groups of investigators within seconds. Long distance communications are a snap. Any
investigator whose department does not currently provide internet and e-mail access should
strongly encourage them to do so. Any investigator who has access to e-mail but is not familiar
with its use or thinks e-mail is a waste of time should learn its use post haste!

GIS software uses geography and computer-generated maps as an interface for integrating and
accessing massive amounts of location-based information. GIS allows law enforcement and
criminal justice personnel to effectively plan for emergency response, determine mitigation
priorities, analyze historical events, and predict future events. GIS can also be used to get critical
information to emergency responders upon dispatch or while en route to an incident to assist in
tactical planning and response.
Law enforcement agencies face a multitude of tasks and challenges in their daily responsibility
of protecting life and property while keeping the peace in their communities. Virtually every task
and challenge has a geographic component. These tasks require both strategic and tactical
planning in rapidly changing social, economic, and political environments. While law
enforcement agencies collect vast amounts of data, only a very small part of this information can
be absorbed from spreadsheets and database files. GIS provides a visual, spatial means of
displaying data, allowing law enforcement agencies to integrate and leverage their data for more
informed decision making.
GIS is the next step in the evolution of information technology. It is core information and
analysis tool that helps manage not only geographic data but other data sets as well. GIS has
been embraced by professionals in all areas of law enforcement for conducting day-to-day
operations as well as for planning, analysis and decision support.

LAW ENFORCEMENT
The Cyber Law Enforcement Organization is a network of law enforcement officers, who
specialize in cybercrime investigation, training other law enforcement officers and who assist
cybercrime victims online.
Their tipline handles child pornography, cybers talking and missing children tips, as well as tips
for cyber scams and fraud online.
The Cyber Law Enforcement Organization also includes the Legal Eagles group of prosecutors,
defense counsel and legal experts in the field of cybercrime, to help educate and guide the
Internet community on crime prevention and reporting of cybercrimes.
The Cyberlaw Enforcement Organization (CLEO) has four main goals:
To unite police officers worldwide and educate them on cybercrime, cyberlaw, investigative
techniques and how they interact.
To provide investigative assistance to police departments when requested.
To provide online help and education for victims of cyberstalking, cyberharassment, pedophiles,
hacking, and virus attacks, as well as access to support groups and online counseling.
To standardize relations and communications between police departments, Internet Service
Providers , Legal system contacts and victim advocacy groups worldwide.

Law enforcement goes high tech

Law enforcement officers used to wear a gun and a badge. Now some even wear a laser gun to
catch speeders. In the present era, the tools they wear and carry will be even more technical.
"So much has happened over the past 10 years with computers, it's mind-boggling," A law
enforcement Chief David Yurchuck said. "It could nearly do away with paperwork.
"It's changing every day. I have no doubt in the 21st century a lot of crime will be solved by
people sitting at computers."
The patrol cars are all equipped with computers now. In an instant, an officer can check for
stolen cars or property. In the future, everything will be done from cars electronically flashing
data to records officers, Yurchuck said.
"Very little will be done on paper," he said.
There are video cameras that will take pictures if someone runs a red light. It will enter the
pictures into the system, and the vehicle owner can be issued a citation.
"Officers will deal with the owners, whether they are the primary operators of the cars or not.
They are responsible," Yurchuck said.
There may also be a spike system built into the roads that can be activated by the computers in
the patrol cars.
Florida Highway Patrol uses new technology in laser guns used to stop speeders. The gun's
digital display clocks in the speed and distance of vehicles the gun is aimed at. The display
remains on the unit until the trooper shuts it off. It is lighter and more accurate than the older
radar technology.
This is especially useful when the alleged speeder disagrees on the speed they were traveling.
"With the radar, they would say, 'You couldn't have got me speeding, it was the car in front or
the car behind me,'" Trooper Spencer Ross, Law enforcement officer said. "When I show them
the laser and put the object in the cross hairs (of the viewer), there's no escape.
"We don't have to show it to them, but I do it as a courtesy."
The laser is so sensitive that if all the variables are not in place, there is no reading. It won't give
a false reading.
"When you are aiming at a car, trying to get a speed, if another car comes in between, if anything
crosses the beam, there is no reading," Ross said. "If a palm branch waves in front of it, I can't
get a reading."
You have to hold it steady. Any movement and you have to realign it.
"Any mistake by the operator goes in favor of the driver of the car," he said.
Officers must be certified to operate radar before they can operate the laser, but the training and
experience is still important Ross said. He has been doing it every working day for four years, he
said.
When cases come to court, the judges love the laser tickets, Ross said. FHP took some of the
judges out to show them how it works about two years ago.
The laser is an infrared light that can't hurt anyone, he said. It is portable and lighter than the
older radar guns. The laser works from light, while the regular radar guns work from sound, he
said. Officers use what Spencer called "urban camouflage," or parking in a highly visible setting
where they are overlooked. The laser clocked a motorcyclist as traveling 60 mph in a 45 mph
zone on U.S. 41.
The driver said he doesn't normally speed but he had just gotten the bike....
Spencer issued a warning, saying if he saw him speeding again, he would get a ticket.
Sarasota County sheriff's deputies have some high tech tools in their collection, too, said Sgt.
Tim Carney, spokesman for the sheriff's office.
The sheriff's helicopter pilots use an infra red device that works from body heat. In a recent class,
the system monitor showed a dog on the ground from about 200 feet in the air.
In forensics, deputies have used a chemical called Luminal for years. A black light on it shows
blood at crime scenes. In addition to the black fingerprint powder, they also have a luminous
fingerprint powder, Carney said.
They use an iris scanner at Sarasota County Jail.
"If somebody gives a fake ID, and they are already in the data base, it will show them up," he
said. "Not too long ago, a guy who was in the data base gave his brother's name. They caught
him. Supposedly, the iris scan is more exact than fingerprints."

IT in Political Processes
IT enables the delivery of government services as it caters to a large base of people across
different segments and geographical locations. The effective use of IT services in government
administration can greatly enhance existing efficiencies, drive down communication costs, and
increase transparency in the functioning of various departments. It also gives citizens easy access
to tangible benefits, be it through simple applications such as online form filling, bill sourcing
and payments, or complex applications like distance education and tele-medicine. E-governance
approach will, leverage the power of IT to streamline administrative functions and increase
transparency. IT has a vital role to play in all transactions that the government undertakes. It
helps the government cut red-tapism, avoid corruption, and reach citizens directly. E-governance
initiative will help citizens learn about the various policies, processes and help-lines that the
government offers. The governments of Singapore, Canada and Switzerland have implemented
such portals, and set the benchmarks in this regard. With the help of IT, the government can
process citizen to government transactions such as the filing of tax returns, death and birth
registration, land records, etc. A strong technology infrastructure can help central and state
governments deliver a comprehensive set of services to citizens.

Agriculture, power and education are fields where the government makes use of IT to provide
services to citizens. The revenue collection department is in the process of using information
technology for applications such as income tax. Some notable examples:

 A Kolkata-based hospital leverages e-governance for tropical medicine. The hospital

employs tele-medicine to assist doctors in rural areas as they analyse and treat panchayat
residents. This method does away with patients having to travel all the way to Kolkata for
treatment. Patients feel better being examined in their own village. Using tele-medicine,
the hospital is able to dispense its expertise to far-flung districts. The patient goes for an
examination to the local doctor in the panchayat. This doctor is in contact via a voice &
data connection with a doctor at the hospital for tropical medicine. Thus, the panchayat
resident gets the benefit of being treated by both a local doctor and a hospital specialist.
 The Karnataka government’s ‘Bhoomi’ project has led to the computerisation of the
centuries-old system of handwritten rural land records. Through it, the revenue
department has done away with the corruption-ridden system that involved bribing
village accountants to procure land records; records of right, tenancy and cultivation
certificates (RTCs). The project is expected to benefit seventy lakh villagers in 30,000
villages.

A farmer can walk into the nearest taluk office and ask for a computer printout of his land record
certificate for Rs 15. He can also check details of land records on a touch-screen kiosk by
inserting a two-rupee coin. These kiosks, installed at the taluk office, will provide the public with
a convenient interface to the land records centre.

 In Gujarat there are websites where citizens log on and get access to the concerned
government department on issues such as land, water and taxes.
 In Hyderabad, through e-Seva, citizens can view and pay bills for water, electricity and
telephones, besides municipal taxes. They can also avail of birth / death registration
certificates, passport applications, permits / licences, transport department services,
reservations, Internet and B2C services, among other things.
 eChoupal, ITC's unique web-based initiative, offers farmers the information, products
and services they need to enhance productivity, improve farm-gate price realisation, and
cut transaction costs. Farmers can access the latest local and global information on
weather, scientific farming practices, as well as market prices at the village itself through
this web portal-all in Hindi. eChoupal also facilitates the supply of high quality farm
inputs as well as the purchase of commodities at the farm.
The national e-governance plan (2003-07) reflects the strategic intent of the central government
in the right perspective. Many projects are earmarked under this plan, and it is trying to address
the digital divide. The political systems are keener to use IT to disseminate information faster to
farmers, disburse loans, improve education and the health systems in villages, etc. There is a
clear-cut incentive to do it as 60 percent of the vote-bank still lives in rural India.E-governance
should be supported by the will and resources of those who are in governance, be it at the central
or state level. The central government has analysed and appreciated the concept by creating a
separate e-governance department headed by a secretary to trigger e-governance in India. The
World Bank, ADB and UN have been approached, and in response they are generously funding
e-governance projects. In future, education, agriculture, state wide area networks (SWANs) and
Community Information Centre projects will be rolled out backed by a strong public private
participation model (PPP) to achieve long-term sustainability.

The government benefits from reduced duplication of work. In addition, the processes of data
collection, analysis and audit are simplified, and become less tedious. E-governance holds
advantages for the business community too, playing the role of a catalyst and a channel for e-
business, a fact evidenced by developments in the US and Singapore. But perhaps the single-
largest benefit of e-governance is its potential to give birth to an entire web-based economy.

E-COMMERCE

Electronic commerce, commonly known as e-commerce or eCommerce, consists of the buying

and selling of products or services over electronic systems such as the Internet and other
computer networks. The amount of trade conducted electronically has grown dramatically since
the spread of the Internet. A wide variety of commerce is conducted in this way, spurring and
drawing on innovations in electronic funds transfer, supply chain management, Internet
marketing, online transaction processing, electronic data interchange (EDI), inventory
management systems, and automated data collection systems. Modern electronic commerce
typically uses the World Wide Web at least at some point in the transaction's lifecycle, although
it can encompass a wider range of technologies such as e-mail as well. e-commerce is buying
things from the internet but many people are unsure about its reliabilty as there are many
unreputable vendors.

The meaning of "electronic commerce" has changed over the last 30 years. Originally,
"electronic commerce" meant the facilitation of commercial transactions electronically, using
technology such as Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) and Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT).
These were both introduced in the late 1970s, allowing businesses to send commercial
documents like purchase orders or invoices electronically. The growth and acceptance of credit
cards, automated teller machines (ATM) and telephone banking in the 1980s were also forms of
e-commerce. From the 1990s onwards, e-commerce would additionally include enterprise
resource planning systems (ERP), data mining and data warehousing.
E-commerce is a way of doing real-time business transactions via telecommunications networks,
when the customer and the merchant are in different geographical places. Note: Electronic
commerce is a broad concept that includes virtual browsing of goods on sale, selection of goods
to buy, and payment methods. Electronic commerce operates on a
bona fide basis, without prior arrangements between customers and merchants. E-commerce
operates via the Internet using all or any combination of technologies designed to exchange data
(such as EDI or e-mail), to access data (such as shared databases or electronic bulletin boards),
and to capture data (through the use of bar coding and magnetic or optical character readers).

IT in Manufacturing
The 1990s transformed the use of IT in manufacturing. At the start of the decade, IT was
struggling to move a beyond a basic beachhead of core applications: sales order processing,
finance, stock control, warehouse management and some basic production scheduling – often
using in-house developed software or heavily customised packages. Yet at the end of the decade,
many larger companies had ditched their bespoke solutions in favour of a new breed of packages
– business-wide so-called ‘enterprise resource planning’ (ERP) systems from vendors such as
Baan, SAP, Oracle and PeopleSoft.

Not only did these systems automate whole new swathes of business activity within companies –
human resource management and purchasing, for example – but they also came ready equipped
with figurative ‘switches and levers’ enabling business to take a standard package and configure
it to meet its own requirements without the need to customise the actual software. Today, so
endemic have these systems become that many people aren’t even aware of the original meaning
of the acronym ‘ERP’.

Yet ERP systems also acquired something of a reputation – a reputation that has tended to stick.
Buy an ERP system, many companies came to realise, and what you were signing up for was a
lengthy and costly implementation programme, often involving expensive consultants, and a
financial payback that could prove all too elusive.

Famously – or should that be infamously? – analyst firm META Group calculated that the
average ERP implementation took 23 months to complete, had a total cost of ownership of $15
million, and rewarded the business with a negative net present value of $1.5 million. That’s right:
an ROI that was negative, not positive.
A graphical example on a manufacturing process:

Manufacturers as diverse as Whirlpool Corporation, fine china manufacturer Royal Doulton and
America’s Hershey Foods Corporation – famous for its candy bars – all saw tumbling stock
prices as a result of troubled system implementations that disrupted production lines, warehouses
and supply chains.

But should manufacturers continue to be wary of new IT systems – especially small and mid-
sized manufacturing businesses, companies that escaped being caught by ERP salesmen at the
height of the ERP boom, but which now find themselves with legacy systems that are past their
prime?

There’s good news – and even better news. For one thing, not only are today’s ERP systems
cheaper and quicker to implement, but a new generation of implementation methodologies has
evolved to ensure that tomorrow’s large scale IT projects don’t acquire the notoriety of their
predecessors. Lumped together under the term ‘IT governance’, the idea is to manage IT projects
better, get fewer unpleasant surprises, and ensure that the resulting ROI stays very firmly in
positive territory.

Better still, it might not even be necessary to go the whole hog in terms of acquiring one. In other
words, for a manufacturer determined to stick with a 15-year-old IT system that has become
perfectly adapted to the needs of the business, the answer might lie in surrounding it with newer
niche systems to achieve specific pieces of high- ROI functionality – e-commerce, or customer
relationship management, for example – rather than wholesale replacement. A wholesale change
might be a better option – but, crucially, it isn’t necessarily essential.

An important factor to bear in mind, is the ‘mind set’ of the smaller or mid-sized business –
which, are far more likely to operate in ‘break/fix mode’ in respect to IT investments than are
larger companies. Smaller companies are far more likely to regard IT as an asset which must be
fully utilised and not discarded before its time – but are also far less likely to have a senior IT
executive in place to help determine when that time has come, he says. Whereas larger
businesses will have an IT executive on the main board, smaller companies have an ‘IT manager’
who may be two or three levels down, and be far less likely to be able to take a strategic view.

Two areas worth looking at, are process integration – both across the organisation, and with sub-
contractors, suppliers, and customers – and extending the value chain outside the organisation,
through the use of tools such as e-procurement.

These aren’t simply tactical areas of improvement, aimed at cost reduction or inventory
elimination, but possess a significant strategic dimension too. As companies strive to respond to
increases in demand through process excellence and technology enhancements rather than
simply adding production capacity – which would depress their return on capital when the next
economic downturn occurs – common global processes and associated IT solutions are becoming
key enablers across the extended supply chain.

Coupled to today’s quicker-to-implement systems, the results from focusing on such areas can be
impressive. Most obviously, to run the new wave of ‘manufacturing intelligence’ applications
coming from vendors such as Wonderware, Activplant, Parsec Automation and Iconics. By
hooking up devices to report key machinery characteristics like run rate, units per hour, and time
and duration of stoppage, manufacturers can home in on what is really going on, on their factory
floors. Real-time information to drive overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) improvements, in
other words, archived and made available for analysis. Better still, the ROI from such
applications is usually very high: the applications themselves are relatively inexpensive, the
Windows-Windows interfacing is simple – and the bottom line benefit is extra productive
capacity.

The moral is clear. Manufacturers may be wary of engaging in wholesale ERP replacements –
but there are still plenty of other productive IT opportunities on offer.

IT in education
As technological advances are introduced in education, the promise and potential of IT in
enhancing learning is attractive, but the lack of initiative has hampered its progress.

Educational institutions are getting smarter. Technology is changing the way faculties teach and
students learn. It enables one to spend less time setting up learning frameworks and more time on
actual learning. Investing in technology has become an imperative in imparting complete
education and spreading literacy.

The Cause of Literacy

IT is seen as a critical component of the educational experience, creating opportunities for

students. Many software companies are developing educational software to facilitate teaching.

Tata Consultancy Services has devised technological support to accelerate the efforts of the
National Literacy Mission to spread literacy through the Computer-Based Functional Literacy
(CBFL) programme. CBFL relies on the cognitive capabilities of individuals to associate
complex visual patterns representing words in Indian scripts with their meanings as well as
phonetic utterances.

The Centre for Rural Systems and Development, an NGO, has been running a literacy campaign
using CBFL in a village called Inamagaram (Sholavaram) in Tamil Nadu for two years now.
Women who participate in this adult literacy programme are part of a self-help group working
for their empowerment. The literacy levels among them are close to zero. According to the group
facilitator, Suguna, “The women here can’t even travel because they cannot read the bus route
numbers. I wanted the women to be independent at least in trivial matters such as these.”
Suguna, who herself is only a 10th pass, is determined to make this campaign a success.

IT Helps the Deaf & Blind

Computers are used not just for routine teaching, but are also put to use in innovative ways, as in
the case of the Helen Keller Institute for the Deaf and Deaf-Blind (HKIDB).

The educational curriculum at HKIDB aims to develop a student’s literary and academic skills,
including reading and writing, cognitive skills (reasoning, attention to tasks, memory, retention,
cause and effect), motor skills (hand-eye co-ordination), perceptual skills, orientation and
mobility. So far, these skills were taught the old-fashioned way using books or charts in Braille.
Today, computers have become an important part of the educational process at the institute.

Software with attractive visual and auditory features is used to encourage low vision or hearing-
impaired children to work on their residual vision and hearing—larger fonts (type sizes) enable
children suffering from low vision to read comfortably.
A section of HKIDB is pioneering the Computerized Mini Braille Press project, set up in January
2002. Here, the deaf and deaf-blind are trained to use computers and undertake computer-related
programming and designing. This computer training unit-cum-mini Braille press produces a
variety of materials to suit the needs of the deaf-blind, blind and low vision or hearing-impaired
individuals.

The deaf students are trained in graphic design to produce tactile graphic educational material.
The blind that are proficient in Braille help in proofreading.

A newsletter, Deaf-blindness in Asia - A Communication Link is composed and published by the

Braille Press, and is circulated among all centers for the deaf-blind in Asia, Europe and other
parts of the world.

A software called JAWS (Jobs Accessing With Speech) enables the blind (who have normal
hearing) to use computers by listening to the audio interactions; it is also essential for
synthesizing text or commands on screen into Braille, which then appear on the electronic Braille
display board. People who cannot hear, but have normal vision, work on graphics using
CorelDraw, while the printing and packaging jobs are looked after by the deaf-blind.

Technology as an Aid to Learning

This is the issue at the heart of institutional and personal decisions related to the adoption of
technology-infused teaching and learning.

Few would argue that an understanding of computers is necessary in today’s workplace.

Employees are required to do inventive thinking, have digital literacy, communicate effectively,
and work in teams. Acquisition of these skills can be facilitated by technology. The institute uses
simulation games from Harvard (such as Marstat and MarkOps) to teach students the concepts of
marketing strategy and operations. Through these games students put their knowledge into
practice and learn; they are not just learning theory.

Technology, particularly the Internet, is a tool well-suited for learning. Although our
understanding of how we learn has advanced tremendously, the impact of technology on learning
is still lagging. Many institutes are not using computers for anything beyond routine
administration. Even when computing is taught as a subject at primary levels, the courseware
rarely ventures beyond BASIC and the Binary System.

Technology has great potential to enhance student achievement and teacher learning, but only if
sufficient attention is paid to its importance and benefits. Many of the top schools consider IT
infrastructure spending as an expense rather than an investment. Some are oblivious to the
advantages that IT can bring to a school. Only a thorough understanding and an open attitude
will help.