Kent Institute: Data Structures and Algorithms Inventory System Report

This report presents an inventory system designed for a company dealing with household and food items. It explores the use of variables, including static and automatic variables, and keywords essential for efficient stock management. The system supports crucial operations such as searching, sorting, and record-keeping, ensuring consistency in supply and segregation of operations. The report details an algorithm for product data capture and emphasizes the need for a single server and a unified database for streamlined operations. The system aims to improve revenue through automated processes, accurate records, and customer-centric features like voucher discounts. The report also highlights the advantages of technology in inventory management, particularly in large stores and warehouses, and its positive impact on revenue growth. The report references several sources, including academic papers and patent applications, to support its findings.

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Data Structure and Algorithms
By (Name)
Name of Class/Course
Professor Name
Name of School/University
City and State
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Introduction
An inventory refers to a complete list of items and the all the related information about the items.
From before, stock was kept manually through the help of books, but this was found to be
extremely strenuous and inefficient and that’s why with the advancement of technology new
systems were created to automate the process and are known as inventory systems (Mountz,
M.C., Enright, 2019). They have so many advantages as compared to the manual systems such as
accuracy, speed and efficiency. For example, when searching for a particular item, one just needs
to enter the code or the name and the results are returned immediately.
Inventory systems give a shopkeeper a big control over the stock and puts them in a better
position to avoid surprises like running out of a product without notice. The way they are
designed, they allow the business owner to monitor the amount of stock and get notified when
the levels drop too low. Inventory systems are very advantageous when it comes to revenue
growth due to the automation of most processes and elimination of human errors.
a)
Variables

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Variable are data types used in information storage in programs. For the case of inventory
systems, variables are useful in capturing stock’s data to enable proper and efficient stock
management. Inventory management system uses the following variables (A.H.M.B. and Haug,
A., 2017).
Static variables.
They are varied use in creation of columns and rows when developing the system. The main
reason why static variables are used is because the columns and rows remain unchanged for long
period of time and therefore the need to use variables that don’t change quickly (Axsäter, 1990).
Columns are used to store basic information such as the name of the item, type, date of purchase,
and then the quantity received in the store on that day. The rows are then used to store the rest of
the information.
Automatic variable.
The variables are the ones used by compiler controls when the system is running. Since they are
usually monitored by the compiler control, they don’t have a lot of side effect. In the inventory
system, they are used for the automatic updating of policy (Kuti, 2008). They greatly help
shopkeepers in automatic update of details.

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Keys
They refer to the keywords that programmers use in the various languages of programming.
Most programming languages actually share keywords. They can take various forms for example
they can be used as parameters or as commands. In this system, they are very useful especially
during arrangement to determine different categories where the products will be placed. When
using C language to develop the inventory management system, 'if,' 'while”, and 'return' are
very common keywords especially when a certain condition has to be met before a program
proceeds to the next step (Smith and Agrawal, 2000). For instance, if one needs to log in to the
system, he/she will be required to provide the correct username and passwords otherwise they
will be denied access.
Ranges
Range is used to refer to the interval between bounds in arrays. For this kind of system system,
programmers take a very great care about fields as they are a very critical component used in
various instances like for example in the arrangement of goods. The system can help in
determining which goods to go to which shelf as well as for household goods too.

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b)
The inventory management system supports the following operations that are used to meet the
needs of the shopkeeper who is the user.
Searching for Items.
This is one of the things that have greatly revolutionized stock management as a whole. The
business owner now does not have to manually go from one shelf to another if they are looking
for a specific product (Çetinkaya and Lee, 2000). With the help of a search algorithm found in
the system, he/she will just need to provide the needed details about the product and the system
will do the automatic serach for him or her within a very short time. This has helped very much
in saving time that would have been used to do the manual search.
Sorting.
Sorting is also another very important aspect when it comes to stock management. For example,
a shopkeeper may want to sort the products to know which ones are about to expire, go out of
stock or according to price. The stock inventory system should have the algorithms to help the
shopkeeper achieve this easily and within the shortest time possible (Roy, P.C., Deb, K. and Islam,
M.M., 2018).

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Record Keeping
Basically, one of the core functions of any inventory system is to help the user to keep an
accurate record of all the items in the store. It should an updated list of all the goods available,
where they are stored and all the related information about the goods (Gupta, N. and Choubey,
R.K., 2019).
When a system is being developed the developer has some structure in writing and some
purposes which must be accomplished also, these are some of the purposes that accompany an
inventory system.
Consistency in supply
This Inventory system will help the store keeper to ensure that every commodity is available in
the store to avoid shortages of supply of those items as the user is able to monitor the movement
of the items every time a transaction is done (Christopher, M., 2016). The storekeeper is also
able to know the expected date of supply of items as per the communication given by the
supplier is kept in record for further follow up.
Operations’ segregations
The inventory system is also able to segregate operations very nicely, like there is an option of
sorting newly items that have just entered the store to the user to keep a clear record that he or
she can account to.
Voucher discounts allowance.

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Customers are always the target of any system when being developed and the inventory system
is designed such a way that is able to allow customers get discount once they buy goods form the
store. This motivates the customers and, mostly attracts new customers and retain the already
existing ones and the end results is that the revenue of the company will go high automatically
which is a big gain to both the customers and the company using the inventory system to keep
their records (Augustine, V.W. and Lucas, T., 2018)
c)
Algorithm is a step by step instruction of how a program is expected to be programmed by the
programmers. Several factors are put into considerations when one is developing an algorithm
for any program. One has to have a good knowledge of all the products that are to be stored so
that all the information will be captured during the development stage of the system (Friedman,
J., 2018).
An example of an algorithm could be as follows.
 Have knowledge about the product (f)
 Identify the ID of the item. (i)
 Provide the name of the product. (n)
 Give the date of entry. (e)
 Exit from the store date. (ed)
 Fix the item’s price. (p)
 Capture the manufacturer’s details. (m)
 Obtain the expiry date. (d)

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Algorithms are key to any design and implementation of any program and any organization must
follow those steps in order to create the program without much difficulties. When an algorithm is
well structured and documented, any programmer can easily implement the algorithm to a real
application or program. For example in separation of raw materials in the store, the algorithm
should provide all the details that will facilitate smooth and accurate separation of the raw
materials and other related information such as product’s name and the company of origin.
d.)
The systems should have one server.
Server is key when it comes to system operations because all the requests are sent to be server
which responds to the user and if the user gets the required information, he or she is satisfied
otherwise sends another request. When the server is not responding can lead to delays in the
whole operation and this can be result when the two systems merged are hosted in different
servers (Simpkins, 2018).
Some may suggest that the servers be mirrored to depend on each other to host the two systems
but that will have challenges because if one server goes down the rest of the system cannot
function but with one server it can be supported from the cloud or from other big servers to
ensure consistency and efficiency.
Have same database.
Query responds are obtained from the database hosted by the server and if the server is one the
database is good to one for the two systems but in different tables. Having the sane database

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makes easy for the user to query the database and get instant replies from the server without
much delay (Kharatishvili, 2017).
Conclusion
Technology is really advancing in this 21st century and every industry sector is trying anything
possible to make a positive impact in terms of technology. Stores department is not left behind
neither. These inventory systems really help to facilitate operations in big stores like warehouses
and these big selling shops. With these inventory systems, their revenue usually increases per
year according to the financial reports prepared annually.

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References
Ching, P.L., and Wu, J.A., 2019, April. An Assessment of FIFO and LIFO Policies for
Perishable Inventory Systems Using the System Dynamics Approach. In 2019 IEEE 6th
International Conference on Industrial Engineering and Applications (I.C.I.E.A.) (pp.
251-255). IEEE.
Holm, L., and Laakso, L.M., 2016. Dali server update. Nucleic acids research, 44(W1),
pp.W351-W355.Xu, G., and Xu, Y., 2016. G.P.S.: Theory, Algorithms, and Applications.
Springer.
Christopher, M., 2016. Logistics & supply chain management. Pearson UK.
Friedman, J., 2018. An algorithm for finding best matches in logarithmic expected time (No.
SLAC-PUB-1549). SLAC National Accelerator Lab., Menlo Park, CA (United States).
Mountz, M.C., Enright, J.J., Durham, J.W., Decker, M.H., Schechter, J.H., Wurman, P.R., and
Nice, E.B., Amazon Technologies Inc, 2019. Inventory system with efficient operator
handling of inventory items. U.S. Patent Application 16/381,978.
Münster, A.H.M.B., and Haug, A., 2017. Design variables and constraints in fashion store
design processes. International Journal of Retail and Distribution Management, 45(2),
pp.122-142.
Mountz, M.C., Enright, J.J., Durham, J.W., Decker, M.H., Schechter, J.H., Wurman, P.R., and
Nice, E.B., Amazon Technologies, Inc., 2018. Inventory system with efficient operator
handling of inventory items. U.S. Patent Application 15/791,332.

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Augustine, V.W. and Lucas, T., 2018. Decision support system of discount pricing analysis using
method of elimination et choix traduisant la realite (ELECTRE). Computer Science, 19.
Simpkins, R.A., Seitz, M.E. and Liu, Z., Cisco Technology Inc, 2018. Common internet file
system proxy authentication of multiple servers. U.S. Patent 9,866,556.
Kharatishvili, T., Jung, H., Richardson, A.S. and Verbitski, A.O., Amazon Technologies Inc,
2017. Replicated database startup for common database storage. U.S. Patent Application
15/478,162.
Axsäter, S. (1990). Modelling Emergency Lateral Transshipments in Inventory Systems. Management
Science, 36(11), pp.1329-1338.
Çetinkaya, S. and Lee, C. (2000). Stock Replenishment and Shipment Scheduling for Vendor-Managed
Inventory Systems. Management Science, 46(2), pp.217-232.
Kuti, É. (2008). http://competitio.unideb.hu/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/VII-
2/03_bogel_papp.pdf. Competitio, 7(2), pp.71-86.
Smith, S. and Agrawal, N. (2000). Management of Multi-Item Retail Inventory Systems with Demand
Substitution. Operations Research, 48(1), pp.50-64.
Gupta, N. and Choubey, R.K., 2019. MEDICAL RECORD KEEPING; AN UPDATE. International Journal of
Medical and Biomedical Studies, 3(7).
Roy, P.C., Deb, K. and Islam, M.M., 2018. An efficient nondominated sorting algorithm for large number of
fronts. IEEE transactions on cybernetics, 49(3), pp.859-869.