This unit examines the theory of business systems design and implementation. It covers issues relating to the design of the various system components like the application architecture, user and system interfaces, the database and the system controls. Although the accent will be on the traditional approach to design, issues relating to the object-oriented approach to design will also be covered. Students will learn to design a database using data modelling techniques of entity-relationship diagrams and normalisation. A relational database will be built from the data model using Microsoft Access. Throughout the unit there is a practical emphasis on systems design through a series of laboratory exercises.