Civil Rights
Movements, leaders, victories and the continuing fight for equality.
q2K BHP
Black History Portal
THE BHP WIRE —
HIDDEN TRUTHS
What's New!
Explore the people, places, events, achievements, struggles and stories that shaped our journey.
Movements, leaders, victories and the continuing fight for equality.
Innovation, patents, science, technology and world-changing contributions.
Pioneers, champions, Negro Leagues, records, activism and excellence.
Meet the people whose lives, choices and achievements shaped the journey.
Black towns, communities, institutions and places where history happened.
Moments that changed communities, movements, institutions and the nation.
In August 1908, a white mob attacked Springfield, Illinois’s Black community, destroying homes and businesses and lynching two Black men. National outrage over the violence helped spur the movement that created the NAACP the following year.
MORE →Reflects the personal views, recollections, and perspective of the author, Mike Davis.
This is a personal recollection on the Move fire on May 13, 1985
Decision-making software (DM software) is software for computer applications that help individuals and organisations make choices and take decisions, typically by ranking, prioritizing or choosing from a number of options.
An early example of DM software was described in 1973.[1][2] Before the advent of the World Wide Web, most DM software was spreadsheet-based,[2] with the first web-based DM software appearing in the mid-1990s.[3] Nowadays, many DM software products (mostly web-based) are available[4][5][6][7] – e.g. see the comparison table below.
Most DM software focuses on ranking, prioritizing or choosing from among alternatives characterized on multiple criteria or attributes.[4] Thus most DM software is based on decision analysis, usually multi-criteria decision-making, and so is often referred to as "decision analysis"[5][6] or "multi-criteria decision-making"[4] software – commonly shortened to "decision-making software". Some decision support systems include a DM software component.
DM software can assist decision-makers "at various stages of the decision-making process, including problem exploration and formulation, identification of decision alternatives and solution constraints, structuring of preferences, and tradeoff judgements."[4]
The purpose of DM software is to support the analysis involved at these various stages of the decision-making process, not to replace it. DM software "should be used to support the process, not as the driving or dominating force."[8]
DM software frees users "from the technical implementation details [of the decision-making method employed], allowing them to focus on the fundamental value judgements".[8] Nonetheless, DM software should not be employed blindly. "Before using a software, it is necessary to have a sound knowledge of the adopted methodology and of the decision problem at hand."[9]
As mentioned earlier, most DM software is based on multi-criteria decision making (MCDM). MCDM involves evaluating and combining alternatives' characteristics on two or more criteria or attributes in order to rank, prioritize or choose from among the alternatives.[10]
There is currently a great deal of interest in quantitative methods for decision making. Many decision analysts argue for multi-attribute decision analysis as the gold standard to which other methods should be compared, based on its rigorous axiomatic basis. Some other MCDM methods[8] include:
There are significant differences between these methods[8][10] and, accordingly, the DM software implementing them. Such differences include:
In the process of helping decision-makers to rank, prioritize or choose from among alternatives, DM software products often include a variety of features and tools;[3][4] common examples include:
DM software includes the following notable examples.
| Software | Supported MCDA Methods | Pairwise Comparison | Sensitivity Analysis | Group Evaluation | Web-based | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1000minds | PAPRIKA | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | [4][5][6] |
| Ahoona | WSM, Utility | No | No | Yes | Yes | [11] |
| Altova MetaTeam | WSM | No | No | Yes | Yes | [citation needed] |
| Analytica | MAUT, SMART | No | Yes | No | Yes | [4][5] |
| Criterium DecisionPlus | AHP, SMART | Yes | Yes | No | No | [4] |
| D-Sight | PROMETHEE, UTILITY | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | [4][5] |
| DecideIT | MAUT | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | [4][5] |
| Decision Lens | AHP, ANP | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | [citation needed] |
| Expert Choice | AHP | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | [4][5] |
| Hiview3 | SMART | No | Yes | Yes | No | [4][5] |
| Intelligent Decision System | Evidential Reasoning Approach, Bayesian Inference, Dempster–Shafer theory, Utility | Yes | Yes | Yes | Available on request | [5] |
| Logical Decisions | AHP, MAUT, SMART | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | [4][5][6] |
| PriEsT | AHP | Yes | Yes | No | No | [12] |
| Super Decisions | AHP, Analytic Network Process | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | [13] |
A good summary of the capabilities of various software packages is available in the Decision Analysis Software Survey conducted by the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS). The software packages listed in the survey range from free to commercial or enterprise-level packages.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
Source: Wikipedia. Article content is retrieved live through the MediaWiki API.
Decision-making software (DM software) is software for computer applications that help individuals and organisations make choices and take decisions, typically by ranking, prioritizing or choosing from a number of options. An early example of DM software was described in 1973. Before the advent of the World Wide Web, most DM software was spreadsheet-based, with the first web-based DM software appearing in the mid-1990s. Nowadays, many DM software products (mostly web-based) are available – e.g. see the comparison table below. Most DM software focuses on ranking, prioritizing or choosing from among alternatives characterized on multiple criteria or attributes. Thus most DM software is based on decision analysis, usually multi-criteria decision-making, and so is often referred to as "decision analysis" or "multi-criteria decision-making" software – commonly shortened to "decision-making software". Some decision support systems include a DM software component.
Collaborative decision-making (CDM) software is a software application or module that helps to coordinate and disseminate data and reach consensus among work groups. CDM software coordinates the functions and features required to arrive at timely collective decisions, enabling all relevant stakeholders to participate in the process. The selection of communication tools is very important for high end collaborative efforts. Online collaboration tools have differences, such as the use of internet based managing. Virtual teams often have to discuss, analyze and find solutions to problems through continuous brain storming session collectively. An emerging enhancement in the integration of social networking and business intelligence (BI), has improvised the decision making by directly linking the information on BI systems with collectively gathered inputs from social software. Nowadays all the organizations are dependent on business intelligence (BI) tools so that their employers can make better decisions based on the processed information in tools. The application of social software in business intelligence (BI) to the decision-making process provides a significant opportunity to tie information directly to the decisions made throughout the company.
A decision support system (DSS) is an information system that supports business or organizational decision-making activities. DSSs serve the management, operations and planning levels of an organization (usually mid and higher management) and help people make decisions about problems that may be rapidly changing and not easily specified in advance—i.e., unstructured and semi-structured decision problems. Decision support systems can be either fully computerized or human-powered, or a combination of both. While academics have perceived DSS as a tool to support decision making processes, DSS users see DSS as a tool to facilitate organizational processes. Some authors have extended the definition of DSS to include any system that might support decision making and some DSS include a decision-making software component; Sprague (1980) defines a properly termed DSS as follows: DSS tends to be aimed at the less well structured, underspecified problem that upper level managers typically face; DSS attempts to combine the use of models or analytic techniques with traditional data access and retrieval functions; DSS specifically focuses on features which make them easy to use by non-computer-proficient people in an interactive mode; and DSS emphasizes flexibility and adaptability to accommodate changes in the environment and the decision making approach of the user. DSSs include knowledge-based systems. A properly designed DSS is an interactive software-based system intended to help decision makers compile useful information from a combination of raw data, documents, personal knowledge, and/or business models to identify and solve problems and make decisions. Typical information that a decision support application might gather and present includes: inventories of information assets (including legacy and relational data sources, cubes, data warehouses, and data marts), comparative sales figures between one period and the next, projected revenue figures based on product sales assumptions.
Multiple-criteria decision-making (MCDM) or multiple-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) is a sub-discipline of operations research that explicitly evaluates multiple conflicting criteria in decision making (both in daily life and in settings such as business, government and medicine). It is also known as multi-attribute decision making (MADM), multiple attribute utility theory, multiple attribute value theory, multiple attribute preference theory, and multi-objective decision analysis. Conflicting criteria are typical in evaluating options: cost or price is usually one of the main criteria, and some measure of quality is typically another criterion, easily in conflict with the cost. In purchasing a car, cost, comfort, safety, and fuel economy may be some of the main criteria we consider – it is unusual that the cheapest car is the most comfortable and the safest one. In portfolio management, managers are interested in getting high returns while simultaneously reducing risks; however, the stocks that have the potential of bringing high returns typically carry high risk of losing money. In a service industry, customer satisfaction and the cost of providing service are fundamental conflicting criteria. In their daily lives, people usually weigh multiple criteria implicitly and may be comfortable with the consequences of such decisions that are made based on only intuition. On the other hand, when stakes are high, it is important to properly structure the problem and explicitly evaluate multiple criteria. In making the decision of whether to build a nuclear power plant or not, and where to build it, there are not only very complex issues involving multiple criteria, but there are also multiple parties who are deeply affected by the consequences. Structuring complex problems well and considering multiple criteria explicitly leads to more informed and better decisions. There have been important advances in this field since the start of the modern multiple-criteria decision-making discipline in the early 1960s. A variety of approaches and methods, many implemented by specialized decision-making software, have been developed for their application in an array of disciplines, ranging from politics and business to the environment and energy.
Before the 1921 destruction of Tulsa’s Greenwood District, Black residents had created a remarkable center of business and community life. The district included stores, professional offices, entertainment venues and homes owned by Black citizens. Understanding Greenwood means learning what was built—not only what was burned.
MORE →Shirley Chisholm, elected in 1968.
