| 2.
Change
Control
In my last article I
talked about some basic principals to help avoid computer outages and
minimize their impact. To summarize:
-
Buy and
maintain standard hardware and have spare computers of the same type.
-
Standardize
on a software suite for your company that is the basis for all machines.
-
Limit user
privileges to avoid user induced deviations from the standard package.
This
time, I’d like to talk a little about change control. Imagine a car you
want to take on a 2000 mile trip on the highway. Would you opt to have a
cutting edge, untested engine installed in your car while you’re on the
road with 1500 miles to go? Probably not!
That’s
exactly what change control is supposed to avoid. The principal is simple:
Thoroughly test prior to production installation.
Because you have a standardized hardware and software environment,
you now have the opportunity to test new software and configurations
thoroughly before you install them on the production computers.
You
want to introduce a lifecycle process that, in simple steps, manages the
installation of new components in your environment. What you want to look
for are things like:
-
Does it
break any of the existing features?
-
Does it
work as expected after it is installed?
-
What is the
correct procedure for the installation and configuration in your
environment?
-
How can the
installation be simplified?
-
How can it
be protected?
(read
on ...)
Copyright (c) 2008 by In Scope-Solutions,
Inc.
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