Best Practices and Methodology for Electronic Software Distribution and Operating System Provisioning in an On Demand Business

Chapter 3. Electronic Software Distribution Building Site process 73

The output of the test site is a tested software distribution package or

distribution medium that fulfils all the defined criteria and is ready to be

implemented into the production environment. Also, data like the installation

time frame and transmission timeframes are added to the appropriate forms.

򐂰 Interface between overall site and production site

The interface represents the hand over of the preliminary deployment plan,

including activities to perform, data, and forms, to the production environment.

If a distribution medium is required, it is also part of the deliverable to the

production site.

򐂰 Production site

The production site represents the “live client environment”. The software

distribution packages are transferred to the production software distribution

repository. From there, the packages can be distributed to a different depot

server of the client environment.

The output of the production site is a report that depends on the results of the

requests. The report is handed over to the overall site.

Solution recovery strategies

The solution recovery strategy defines the approach to recovering an integrated

business system composed of multiple

endpoints from the failure of any one of

those endpoints. These endpoints may include:

򐂰 Business applications

򐂰 Web services or other business components

򐂰 Business partner systems

򐂰 Other business unit systems

3.4.2 Configure and setup the building site

The purpose of the Configure and Setup the Building Site activity is to prepare

the required building site, which will be used to develop the requested

package/media entity.

Tasks

The following tasks are performed during the Configure and Setup the Building

Site activity:

򐂰 Acquiring source code for package or media development

This is performed by the Solution Architect and assisted by the Team Lead.

The purpose of this task is to acquire the source code file sets required to

build the required package or media.

74 Best Practices & Methodology for Electronic Software Distribution & Operating System Provisioning

The building site personnel will physically transfer the approved source code

files, which are required to build the package to a system, where version

control, license control, and integrity of these files can be maintained. These

files are utilized in the future by the building site staff to develop the required

package or media. The source code files are also scanned using an antivirus

software to ensure that they are not infected by a virus.

򐂰 Setting up package or media development environment

This is performed by the Solution Architect and assisted by the Team Lead.

The purpose of this task is to prepare a systems environment, which can be

used to develop the required package or media.

Each package and media has a target environment defined for which it must

be developed. This target environment constitutes of hardware endpoints or

clients on which the package or media is to be developed, software images

that may reside on the target endpoint or client, and network connectivity

between the source server used to host the source package or media files

and the endpoint or client for which the package or media is being developed.

This task also sets up the packaging tool required for developing the required

package or media.

This task ensures that the required package or media development

environment, which consists of hardware, network, software images, and the

connection to the source code repository and the packaging or media

generation tool is set up and configured in accordance with the requirements

stated in the software distribution plan and change order. A status report is

completed once the desired environment has been set up.

򐂰 Setting up software required for package or media development

This is performed by the Solution Architect.

The purpose of this task is to set up software required for package/media

development.

Prior to the development of any automated installable package or media

development, the solution architect manually installs and uninstalls the

software code file sets on the target software images and endpoints to

examine software installation behavior. The purpose of this installation and

uninstallation is also to fine-tune any future approach that may be required to

develop the package or media from the given source code file sets.

The following is a description of the inputs to and outputs from the configuration

and setup of the building site activity that have not previously been defined in any

other section of this IBM Redbook.