Overview
The goal of systems design is to build a system that satisfies business requirements.
A successful system must be effective, reliable, and maintainable:
• A system is effective if it supports business requirements and meets user needs.
• A system is reliable if it handles input errors, processing errors, hardware failures,
or human mistakes. A good design will anticipate errors, detect them as early as
possible, make it easy to correct them, and prevent them from damaging the
system itself.
• A system is maintainable if it is flexible, scalable, and easily modified. Changes
might be needed to correct problems, adapt to user requirements, or take advantage of new technology.
Although each project is different, design considerations usually involve users, data, and
system architecture.