A Decision Support System for Course Materials Production and Inventory Management in the National Open University of Nigeria

Abstract

This paper focuses on the design of a Decision Support System for Course Material production and inventory management in the National Open  University of Nigeria. The proposed system has a model base management subsystem which is a component that differentiates Decision Support  Systems from other types of Information Systems. The model base consists of a wide collection of models which include inventory models, production  quantity models and a forecast model. Other components of the system including the data management subsystem, dialog generation and management  subsystem and the users of the system were also discussed. A prototype of the Decision Support System was developed using python  programming and MYSQL database server. Testing and validation was done using sample data of students’ enrolment and user defined inputs for the  forecast, inventory and production modules of the system. The results of the tests show high level of accuracy when compared with those obtained from  manual computations. The design is simple, flexible and can be easily modified to suit the needs of other institutions with multi-item inventory problems.