Significance of the Project
Headspace is an Australian based company that works with young persons who suffer from mental health problems including anxiety, depression. Such health problems are on the increase today especially in New South Wales (NSW) region. Some of the consequences of mental health challenges include suicide. Headspace has therefore been set up to admit and help youth aged between 12 and 25 in overcoming such health problems, which eventually can lead to suicide. The current system is manual and has no facility to help the patients express their problems. A person who visits the hospital may see more than one hospital staff including case workers, medical staff, a general practitioner, a psychiatrist or even a psychologist.
As a result, patients are forced to retell their story every time they visit the institution. This is frustrating and can lead them towards not opening up which can hinder the process to help them overcome health problems. It is therefore important to come up with a system that will enable them to tell their stories only once and the professional at headspace can access it from the platform and enable their assistance and support flow smoothly.
To implement a cloud based system for Headspace that will allow the youth with mental health problems to be able to narrate or submit their situation in order to be helped and supported by the professionals in the institution.
The project will cover Headspace and will include all the functions of the institution. It will provide a platform for youth with the health issues to submit their story and a portal for hospital staff to access such stories and be able to help and assist them in overcoming the challenges.
Significance of the Project
The project is beneficial for both the patients and hospital staff. For the youth with health challenges, they will be provided it will enable them to have an easy of expressing themselves. It will help streamline the operations in Headspace in terms of data gathering and centralization. Staff will be able to access data at any time and be able to support patients effectively.
A cloud system is a set of services such as software applications, IT infrastructure, and storage facilities provided over the Internet by providers for users (Fernando, Loke, & Wenny, 2013). Organizations are increasingly adopting cloud based systems to enhance effectiveness and the efficiency of business procedures. Cloud based services major advantage is that they help businesses reduce on costs as they don’t have to buy the hardware equipment’s associated with new system adoption. Also an organization doesn’t need to have and retain the technical knowledge and expertise required to maintain IT infrastructure (Shaikha Al-Ebrahim, Sabika, & Ahmad, 2013). Cloud based solutions can be deployed either as private cloud applications, public clouds, hybrid clouds which is a mixture of public and private clouds and lastly as community clouds which comprises of an association between one or more organizations (Oujani, 2013). Organizations can subscribe services such as software solutions, access to application platforms and infrastructure storage facilities, all accessed through the Internet (PARANET, 2015). Businesses characteristically deploy cloud based applications in order to enhance cloud- capacity, improve operational functionality and access other on-demand services while at the same time reducing costs of procuring and maintaining IT infrastructure.
Cloud Based Applications
Cloud computing provides business with very many benefits including the following (Shaikha Al-Ebrahim, Sabika, & Ahmad, 2013)
- Increased efficiency – cloud solutions facilitate data storage in one space whereby users can access and perform their roles with effectiveness which increases efficiency in the business.
- Data and information centralization – cloud solutions require that information is stored in one central place. Storing data in one central location means that organization will work with updated data and information to perform their operations.
- Increased organizational throughput – since information is in one central location, authorized staff are able to easily access and perform their procedure which improves business productivity
- Cost reductions – deploying cloud solutions means that an organization will depend on third party services for its IT services infrastructure and saves on the money that would have otherwise been used to procure IT services including hardware costs and maintenance fees(Worlanyo, 2015)
- Regular applications update – since services are hosted by third party providers, they provide services updates on the services that organizations are obtaining from them. Businesses therefore do not need to hassle with getting their systems updated.
Cloud computing also comes with several disadvantages, some of which include the following according to (Silva & Oliveira, 2011):
- System downtime – downtime refers to a period in time where system services are inaccessible (Perlin, 2012). Since cloud solutions are accessed online, if there either hardware failure, software failure, network failure or a natural disaster, the system experiences downtime which is risky for organizations
- Data and information insecurity – cloud solutions are faced with a lot of insecurities including attack by malicious programs and viruses. Cloud applications are also prone to hacker attacks who intrude people to steal, manipulate or get system access.
- Vendor lock in – cloud applications from one vendor are not compatible with other cloud solutions provider.
- System incompatibility – it is complicated to deploy and integrate cloud solutions with other organizational systems (Venkatraman, 2011)
- Additional costs and subscription charges – it is possible for an organization to incur other additional expenses after cloud applications installation
Data Security Considerations
One of the major risks in cloud solutions deployment is data insecurity. Major consideration according to (Worlanyo, 2015) include the following:
- Data privacy – ensures that the information is not revealed to unauthorized users. Headspace is dealing with very sensitive data and therefore needs to ensure the patient data privacy
- Data confidentiality– ensures data is only accessed by authenticated personnel to avoid unauthorized access
- Data integrity– involves the process of ensuring that data is not manipulated in way buy unauthorized persons. To implement data integrity, it is important for Headspace to ensure that third party persons do not access patient’s sensitive data
- Data availability – ensures that organizations have full access to their data and information
- Data security procedures – measures including encryption protocols and VPN networks should be installed to secure datatransmission is secure
System requirements refers to a set of features and description that the proposed system is required to maintain. (Rouse, 2007 ). They can either be hardware or software requirements. Hardware system requirements include all the tangible features the system will need in order to function as intended (Techterms, 2014). On the other hand, software requirements involve all the functionalities of the proposed system and are classified as either functional or non-functional with the FURPS model.
Functional requirements refer to features that describe what the system does hence the primary roles of the proposed system. Non-functional requirements include features that describes how the systems achieves its functions. Both functional and non-functional requirements are explained using the FURPS model
The FURPS model explains the system requirements in terms of either functional or non-functional as outlined below (Getronics, 2003)
- Functional – capabilities, features, security.
- Usability – documentation, help, human factors,
- Reliability – frequency of failure, recoverability, predictability.
- Performance – throughput, response times, accuracy, resource usage, availability
- Supportability – configurability, maintainability, adaptability, internationalization
System methodologies refer to a set of activities that are followed to deploy a new system (CMS, SELECTING A DEVELOPMENT APPROACH , 2008). There are very many system development methodologies including software development life cycle (SDCL).
System development life cycle is a software development procedure that follows a set of phases for developing software (itinfo, 2017). Two types of SDLC approaches include predictive and
Predictive SDLC is software development method that facilitates that the project is structured and all its phases can be determined from the first to the last phase (Alwan, 2015). The development team usually follows the already laid procedures to achieve system deployment.
- Follows a set of laid out already known procedures
- Provides a structured linear development plan
- Easy to estimate
- Better for complex development processes
- Does not easily factor system changes
- Consumes a lot of time for complex systems
- Can fail to produce quality if system requirements are not well- understood
Adaptive SDLC approach accepts the fact and likelihood that a systems development project can change as a result of some factors including change in requirements, management or business priorities (CMS, SELECTING A DEVELOPMENT APPROACH, 2008). In order to factor these changes, the methodology is divided into several iterative phases (Alwan, 2015).
- Provides system quality since it allows phase iterations that help select the best system designs(Owen, 2016)
- Provide facility to accommodate system changes
- Involves a lot of skills and expertise representation during development
- Can consume a lot of time if there are many changes and iterations
- Requires skills expertise in order to select quality designs
- Lack of expertise can affect the deployment processes
The choice between which system development approach to follow largely depends on the kind of project at hand. In the case of headspace, it would be better to follow a predictive SDLC approach. This is because theirs is a better analysis of system objective and requirements.
Conclusion
Emerging technologies including cloud computing have transformed organizational processes. They have enabled efficient and effective business operations which increase productivity and enhance both staff and customer/ client experiences. It is therefore crucial that organization embrace cloud solutions in order to improve on operation efficiency and productivity. The researcher therefore recommends that headspace deploys the health record cloud based system in order to enhance both staff and client experience as well as improve general organizational productivity.
References
Alwan, M. (2015, January 3). What is systems development lifecyle. Retrieved from www.airbrake.io: https://airbrake.io/blog/sdlc/what-is-system-development-life-cycle
CMS. (2008, March 27). SELECTING A DEVELOPMENT APPROACH. Retrieved from www.cms.gov: https://www.cms.gov/Research-Statistics-Data-and-Systems/CMS-Information-Technology/XLC/Downloads/SelectingDevelopmentApproach.pdf
CMS. (2008, March 27). SELECTING A DEVELOPMENT APPROACH . Retrieved from CMS: https://www.cms.gov/Research-Statistics-Data-and-Systems/CMS-Information-Technology/XLC/Downloads/SelectingDevelopmentApproach.pdf
Fernando, N., Loke, S., & Wenny, R. (2013). Mobile cloud computing: A survey. Science Direct , 84-106.
Getronics. (2003, February 21). Software Requirements Specification. Retrieved from ec.europa.eu: https://ec.europa.eu/transport/sites/transport/files/modes/road/social_provisions/doc/tcn_srs_01-00.pdf
itinfo. (2017, October 4). Software Development Methodologies. Retrieved from itinfo.com: https://www.itinfo.am/eng/software-development-methodologies/#chapter13
Oujani, A. (2013, April 24). A Survey of Cloud Computing Simulations and Cloud Testing. Retrieved from www.cse.wustl.edu: https://www.cse.wustl.edu/~jain/cse567-13/ftp/cloud/index.html
Owen, G. (2016, January ). How can I move from a Waterfall approach and learn Agile? Retrieved from Tech Target : https://searchsoftwarequality.techtarget.com/answer/How-can-I-move-from-a-Waterfall-approach-and-learn-Agile
PARANET. (2015, March 25). The three types of Cloud Computing Service Models . Retrieved from https://www.paranet.com: https://www.paranet.com/blog/bid/128267/The-three-types-of-Cloud-Computing-Service-Models
Perlin, M. (2012, September 17). Downtime, Outages and Failures – Understanding Their True Costs. Retrieved from www.evolven.com: https://www.evolven.com/blog/downtime-outages-and-failures-understanding-their-true-costs.html
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Shaikha Al-Ebrahim, M. A.-R., Sabika, B., & Ahmad, I. (2013). Cloud Computing Pricing Models: A Survey. International Journal of Grid and Distributed Computing, 93-106.
Silva, L., & Oliveira, J. L. (2011). Strengths and Weaknesses of Using Cloud Computing. Retrieved from Health Management Org: https://healthmanagement.org/c/imaging/issuearticle/strengths-and-weaknesses-of-using-cloud-computing
Techterms. (2014). System Requirements . Retrieved from techterms.com: https://techterms.com/definition/systemrequirements
Venkatraman, A. (2011, November). Advantages and disadvantages of cloud computing. Retrieved from www.computerweekly.com: https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Advantages-and-disadvantages-of-cloud-computing
Worlanyo, E. (2015, November 30). A Survey of Cloud Computing Security: Issues, Challenges and Solutions. Retrieved from www.cse.wustl.edu: https://www.cse.wustl.edu/~jain/cse570-15/ftp/cld_sec/index.html
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