LSTPARK

	Business Case Analysis
	Requirements Analysis
	Technical Blueprint
	Design Software
	Design Database Structures
	Operational Infrastructure
	Testing
	Transition to Production

Technical Blueprint

Description

This task will define the technical architecture for the software. It determines the overall solution, including.

	Technical architecture of solution (System Architecture, Database Architecture, and Infrastructure);
	Recommendations for the sizes and configuration of hardware;
	Database sizing and query performance expectations
	Access control, backup and recovery guidelines

	Steps
	Interview IT decision makers. Used to understand the existing IT infrastructure, and identify any hardware preferences.
	Determine overall architecture. Produce the initial conclusions.
	Feedback initial conclusions. Expect major revisions as the result of this.Because, this is where the size and cost of the project are clearly identified.
	Refine and rework initial conclusions.
	Document and present

Estimating

This task is typically time boxed, because it has a tendency to keep growing. If the effort being expended is much greater than the guideline figures, the task is probably going into too much detail. The following table provides the estimates.

Step	Complex	Medium	Simple
Interview IT decision makers	5	3	1
Determine overall architecture	10	8	6
Feed back initial conclusions	1	1	1
Refine and rework initial conclusions	15	10	5
Document and present	6	6	4

Risks

If the midpoint feedback from the right people does not take place, the initial decisions may be suspect or risky, and further work on them may be inappropriate.

There is a tendency for preoccupation with the hardware architecture (Is it MPP or SMP? Which manufacturer has the best offering? etc.). Typically, this is a red herring, and should be put to one side till the end of this task. In most cases, the capacity headroom issues will indicate the appropriate shortlist of hardware vendors

	Prerequisites
	Overall scope definition for the project
	Documented IT infrastructure

Deliverables

A document identifying

	Hardware sizing and capacity headroom projections
	System and hardware architecture
	Data sizing and performance guidelines
	Data partitioning strategy
	Backup and recovery guidelines
	Database architecture
	Access control guidelines
	Infrastructure architecture