Page 51 - DCAP304_DCAP515_SOFTWARE_PROJECT_MANAGEMENT

Unit 2: Step Wise Project Planning

Notes

Defining the Data

Defining the data is comparable to functionality, and should be employed in conjunction with
functionality. The process is probable to capture what users expect to see in a system. The intention
is not to make the business users, data modelers. The purpose is to get the business users to
verbalize their requirements for information in a structured manner. Ask the users what are the
people, places and thing they want to keep track of. In this case, the focus is on nouns.

This way will not capture data that may be required to technically make the system work. For
example, it will not capture things like transaction log files, archive files, SQL script files, etc.
Post workshop, the Project Manager will need to sit with a data modeler to sort out what else is
required. The hardest part is to stop doing a data model. Keep the focus on where the data is to
come from, and recognize what is new, where the interfaces are likely to be, is existing data
suitable, is the data currently captured, etc.

Data Definition Example

Name Description
Companies Details of the company including address, overseas offices, and up to ten contacts
Licenses Licenses for all software and hardware used in the organisation. Include contracts,
correspondence, quotes and any other related documents. Does not include manuals
Renewal dates Dates the license is due for renewal and the cost of the renewal.
Etc.

Technical Structure Definition

This procedure of scope definition can be useful for describing scope where the project is focused
on infrastructure. It can also be valuable in a situation where an existing system is being modified.
The output can be either a table, or a diagram. A table might just list the components to be
customized and the modification. The structure diagram might recognize the whole system and
highlight which components are being modified and how they are being modified. It may also
be appropriate to indicate the purpose of each component; however it will probably be vague at
this stage of development.

Example: The ‘outputs HTML’ module takes information retrieved from the database
and inserts it into an .asp document for output to the server. It also updates a transaction log with
the database information and time of the output. If an error occurs in retrieving data from the
database, an error log is updated and an error page sent to the server.

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