PhD Comprehensive Exam - Session 2015/2016 1st semester
This document contains the information related to conducting PhD comprehensive exam for the Information Systems Department at the College of Computer and Information Sciences, King Saud University, to be conducted during the 1st Semester of the academic year 1436/1437 (2015-2016).
The document includes the following sections:
1. Exam Courses
2. Specializations
3. Exam Schedule
4. Course Contents
1. Exam Courses
The PhD. Comprehensive exam written part includes the following depth and breadth courses:
Breadth courses of the exam:
CIS 611 - Information and Knowledge Management
IS 524 - Advanced Information Systems Analysis & Design
IS 533 - Advanced Topics in Databases
Depth courses of the exam:
Every student chooses 2 depth courses among one specialization (see Table 1).
2. Specializations
The following are the specializations of the Information Systems Department and the courses within each one. Every student taking the comprehensive exam should choose two courses within a single specialization for the comprehensive exam.
Table1: Specializations and Electives for the IS PhD. Comprehensive Exam
3. Exam Schedule
Table 2: Exam Schedule
4. Course Contents
CIS 611 - Information and Knowledge Management
Knowledge as a manageable asset. Organizations classes, adaptive systems, information and knowledge environment. Information handling. Organizational setting and technologies used for handling information and knowledge.
IS 524 - Advanced Information Systems Analysis & Design
Foundations for Systems Development, Object-Oriented Analysis & Design: Determining System Requirements, Structuring System Process Requirements, Object-Oriented Analysis & Design with UML notation, Rational Unifed Process Methodolgy, IS Reuse(Design Patterns and Frameworks). IS Service oriented architecture.
IS 533 - Advanced Topics in Databases
Database Systems: Semantic data modeling, Object-oriented databases, Query optimization, Semantic Integrity. Distributed Databases (DDB), Data fragmentation and distributed transparency, Distributed query processing, Concurrence control methods: Serializability in a DDB and the two-phase locking method, Concurrence control based on timestamps, the two-phase COMMIT protocol. Recovery management.
CIS 623 - Data Warehouses and Knowledge Discovery
Advanced topics in deductive, active, temporal and OR DBs, extensible databases, spatial queries and storage structures, time series, data warehouses and knowledge discovery, and databases and the Web (queries on semi-structured data). Modern Trends in Intelligent Information Systems and DBMSs, Deductive Databases and knowledge bases, Temporal Queries and Reasoning, Active Databases, Object-Relational DBMSs.
CIS 621 - Web Content Management
Concepts and techniques in website content representation, organization, presentation, and development with the eXtensible Markup Language (XML). Basic XML syntax, XML vocabulary specification, data modeling, XML style sheets and transformation, and Document Object Model (DOM). Design the Document Type Definitions (DTDs) and XML schemas. Creation and manipulating of XML documents. Advanced topics in manipulating XML data, including standards, namespaces and schemas, XML Transformation Language, and databases in relation to XML.
IS 536 - Information Security Governance
Overview of skills, knowledge, techniques, and tools required by information-technology security professionals. Topics include security and risk management, physical security, access control, cryptography, security architecture and design, security for networks and telecommunications, application security, and legal considerations.
CIS 628 - E-Business Strategies
Different aspects of conducting business over the Internet. Business-to-business and business-to-consumer e-Business models. The history and future of the Internet, Internet infrastructure, website design, Internet security, web server platforms, the components that comprise an e-Business strategy and demonstrate methods strategy. Software tools and protocols for web-based applications, identify the components of e-Business strategies and methods. Integration of e-business applications to back-office.
IS 522 - Enterprise Applications Development
Key concepts and principles involved in the development of enterprise applications. Essential emerging topics such as the service-oriented architectures and enterprise applications integration. Web services technologies and the role they play today in the development and integration of enterprise application. Key technologies, standards, protocols, and platforms being used in the design and implementation of modern enterprise applications.
IS 532 - Advanced Enterprise Resource Planning
Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), organization, business processes, and integration, ERP implementation, Change Management (CM), Customer Relationship management, Supply Chain Management.