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I am currently performing documentary root canal work on the System
Maintenance Procedures (SMP) for a software development team that's dealing
with multiple validated systems (one of which is honking huge, with
multiple applications and application types,--data collection, data
transfer, and user interfaces,--some of which vary by production line).
I asked our Software Quality Engineer (SQE--basically QA for the internal
development crowd, rather than the marketable product itself) about
required content/formatting, and got a list of categories that need to be
included. Upon pressing for a more comprehensive definition of what these
categories mean, and what they should contain (to clarify scope, at least),
I found he could only give a general idea, since he'd drawn the list from
someone else.
I am using my "root canal" to identify gaps in the existing doc, but that
is hard to do without a clear definition of what these categories mean. I
appeal to anyone on this list who may be familiar with these categories to
help me flesh out a clearer idea of what belongs in each. Some are
obvious, but I know I got very different descriptions of a few of them from
the various IM folks I interact with. (e.g., for "Contingency Plan" I heard
things ranging from 'what to do if we get hit by a hurricane and the
hardware is destroyed' to 'what to do if the network server goes down' to
'what to do if the barcode reader or printer breaks')
Here is the list:
Configuration Management
System Administration
Security Administration
System Backup and Restore
Archive and Recovery
Application Help/Support
Contingency Plan
Documentation Control
System Monitoring
Training
Thank you in advance for any illumination you can offer.
Shauna Iannone
--------------------------------------------
"I drank what?" - Socrates ;)
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