Migrations

Commitment ~ Experience has shown that a fundamental requirement for a successful migration is total commitment from all parties, management, staff, business users and suppliers. Ithaca Solutions guarantees their commitment at all stages and regards their relationship within the project as that of a partner and a catalyst throughout the project.

Inventory ~ One of the essential and more difficult stages is the actual physical assembly of the complete and current inventory in advance of the migration. This stage includes the analysis and understanding of all the component interrelationships at both business and code levels. This information forms the basis for the detailed migration study.

Migration Study ~ The objective of the study phase is to identify in depth all technical migration issues and identify how those issues are to be resolved. There might be a number of potential alternative solutions, the study will highlight these and offer a recommended migration path. All aspects of the migration will be considered not just the inventory but for example operational considerations such as backup, recovery and contingency strategies will all be covered.

Prototype ~ Again experience shows that it is prudent to carry out a pilot or prototype on a small number of representative programs. This will serve to demonstrate the feasibility of the chosen migration path and prove our ability to execute the migration. This stage represents a proof of concept and may also be used to benchmark potential target systems.

Planning ~ Successful transformation depends on proper planning. Ithaca Solutions will work closely with the client to identify and meet the requirements of their project. This stage will cover for example what the project is, most importantly what it is not, deliverables, completion criteria, test planning, risk management, implementation and all aspects of resourcing and managing the project.

Data Preparation ~ Carefully selected and prepared representative test data can save money and time during the testing phase of the migration. We can assist in producing comprehensive manageable unit test data that will exercise the majority of conditions of a program or system. This will build client confidence and avoid costly reruns during full system testing and during implementation itself.

Conversion ~ This phase covers all aspects of actual code conversion, data file consolidation and modelling, database conversion, jobflow conversion, establishing equivalent environmental utilities such as debugging software on the target platform.

Testing ~ This vital phase covers much more than just unit, system and stress testing of the applications following transformation. Testing following migration is unique in that we test for equivalence not business logic which remains unaltered by the process. Data conversion, jobflow, operational procedures, database loads, recovery and contingency illustrate some of the additional environmental areas that will also need coverage.

Implementation ~ The cutover to production is often seen as the final stage, it will involve converting live databases, files and procedures. It often completes a short period of parallel test runs. It is likely that one or two practise runs will be logistically exercised. This phase will execute the implementation plans identified earlier in the planning stage.

Post Migration ~ Important tasks will follow the implementation, often optimisation and tuning is required in certain key areas and importantly some initial technical support to ensure a successful transition. Ithaca Solutions can provide that vital support and insurance. All that remains is to ~