Fig. 15.1.4 Step 4—end user cycle of awareness.

The System of Record

In order to illustrate the insidious nature of step 4, suppose a spreadsheet is created with
people's salaries on it. Anyone can create a spreadsheet, and you can put any data you
want into the spreadsheet. Now, on the spreadsheet I put an entry for Bill Inmon's salary.
I put into the spreadsheet that Bill Inmon makes $1,000,000 a month.

The spreadsheet looks good. It comes from the computer. It has a lot of information on
the spreadsheet. The salaries all look to be OK. However, when we come to Bill Inmon,
the spreadsheet says that Bill Inmon makes $1,000,000 a month. That information is
inaccurate. If management were to act on this information, they might make some very
incorrect conclusions about Bill Inmon, because in fact, Bill Inmon DOES NOT make a
million dollars a month.

When the discovery is made that the data are incorrect, the end user has just discovered
the need for what is known as the “system of record.”

The system of record in computer systems is the designated guarantee that the data that
have been accessed are certified—guaranteed—to be accurate. It is possible for there to
be errors in the data found in the system of record. But if there are errors in the system of
record, the errors have arrived there by means of passing through rigorous audits and
checks. Stated differently, the system of record is the best data that are available, and
every effort possible has been made to insure the accuracy of the data. If there are errors
in the system of record, there aren’t many, and those errors that are found are subject to
correction when found to be inaccurate.

Fig. 15.1.5 shows the system of record data.

Chapter 15.1: The System of Record