Production Process
At the very highest level, the ASI production process consists of six
readily identifiable process phases that are followed for each release
cycle, each of which are generally described below. We believe that our
adherence to these steps and the inclusion of all the different CTE
teams regardless of the size or timeframe associated with any
release is a key to our success and keeping our customers for life by
ensuring a reliable and upgradeable product base. We also hold
innovation as a core principle and review our process as part of each
release to see how we can improve the process or shorten our time to
market while maintaining a consistent level of quality.
Phase One - Idea Generation
The idea generation phase is fueled by recommendations and requests
for software enhancements from the iMIS
Community, as well as direction from our research and development
efforts. Our Product Management team carefully reviews all requests to
assess the priority and need of the proposed enhancement against the
overall product strategy and vision, market needs and customer impact.
Once the list of proposed enhancements is refined and verified, it is
sent to the Development team for further definition.
Phase Two - Scope Definition
Our Development team assesses the feasibility of the proposed list of
enhancements and any other areas identified for any given release. In
conjunction with our Business Analysis team, the Development team works
to define the scope for each release as well as preliminary planning and
estimation of effort.
Phase Three - Requirements Analysis
Once the scope has been defined and agreed upon, the specifics of
each release and the fundamental goal for each identified feature is
formed. Our Business Analysis team specifies high level requirements and
use cases, derives more detailed requirements as necessary, and
generates
click through models in collaboration with Engineering designers to gain
confidence in the validity of the original core concepts.
Phase Four - Design/Implementation
From the requirements analysis, the Engineering team builds and
integrates specified software components for each release. The design
includes prototyping as necessary, documenting designs and
revisiting and refining the original baseline of scope when nescessary.
The team then implements code in accordance with approved baseline and
designs and conducts integrated testing for each feature.
Phase Five - Formal Test/Documentation
All work from the design/implementation phase is submitted to our
Quality Assurance and Information Development teams for validation and
approval. Our Quality Assurance team conducts quality assurance/control
and release documentation for each feature-complete software component.
Testing includes feature level functional testing and verification of
fixes for all reworked issues. When all feature sets have completed
feature level functional testing and rework, they also conduct
regression testing. The Information Development team prepares all
required release documents for the release and each individual feature.
Once these steps are complete, each release is submitted for a Product
Readiness Review.
Phase Six - Final Review/Deployment
Once a release has passed all testing, our Product Management team
leads an ASI-internal use evaluation, conducts any beta or Release
Candidate program assessments, and determines final release date for
General Availability.
