Information

Pardon the long interregnum: In the last 6 months or so since the last installment of the articlets, I have completed my dissertation, defended it successfully, gotten promotion at work(does not feel like it), started a private blog, caused trouble with a blog on educause, presented at the MD Digital Government summit, attended a very boring and ill named Architectural summit at Palm Springs, sat on the IEEE TC obituary and got bored!

Ok, so now I'm back to completing the six articlets I promised.

Information is the ultimate expected result of any set of activities on data. The complexity of these activities may vary widely. From a mathematical point of view, if y=f(x). y is information, and x is data, then f() is a given process or set of processes (or activities) that when applied to data (x) results in information. using the mathematical analogy, we can observe that f(x) could be a simple linear function , the simplest of which is y =x. That is there are cases when data equals information. In practice though, that is not always the case.


There has been many attempts in the past to define information, and the following will be stated to highlight the point:

The Unabridge English Dictionary (dictionary.reference.com) version 1.1 has the following definition " Knowledge communicated or received concerning a particular fact or circumstance; news..."

Another suggestion from the same source " important or useful facts obtained as output from a computer by means of processing input data with a program. "

Synonym of the word include intelligence, knowledge, wisdom...


The WordNet includes the following definition " a collection of facts from which conclusions may be drawn"

The Kernerman English Multilingua Dictionary (Beta Version) has a rather succinct definition " Facts told or knowledge gained or given".

All organizations place premium on information, not data (except in cases where there is confusion about what these mean). People do the same. Information is the important component of the whole knowledge industry. Everything else is a side show.

Information is the result or output of data processing! The primary purpose of modern computer and communication systems is the generation(derivation) and manipulation of information. Information systems are thus the aggregation of resources for achieving the purpose of information generation and manipulation.