Technology Fabrication Projects Guide

Construct needed technology solutions - building anew, repairing the old, or migrating IT assets to a more capable platform - integrating the old with the new.

This guide defines the key activities, artifacts, and roles that are necessary to prepare integrated technical solutions that meet HS Agency and TANF program requirements. These solutions are the result of individual IT fabrication projects. The projects are coordinated by the IT Evolution Plan. Together, these projects produce the developmental configuration.

Adjunct technical requirements are allocated to the projects from the A-TARS. These technical requirements guide the design and production of each project's products, as well as the engineering and technical management practices performed on the project.

The term fabrication is used rather than the more widely occurring term development. Fabrication stresses a preference for a compositional approach to combining or assembling individual applications or complete Automated Information Systems (AIS's) by buying or adapting existing parts. Maintenance actions, as well as creating one-of-a-kind solutions (or parts), are considered a special case of the overall fabrication approach.

Applications, platforms, or complete AIS's can be derived from preexisting components or packaged solutions. Technology elements can be obtained in several ways, such as commercially (purchased), contractually (built to spec), reusing existing Agency-wide IT resources, or transferring systems from other States. Integration across legacy application systems is considered a part of the fabrication approach. The legacy application system is reengineered to provide services, hidden behind interfaces, in accordance with the Technical Architecture, thereby preserving the investment in existing applications and data.

IT fabrication projects are assumed to be relatively small and execute over a proportionally short timeframe, contributing to one or more goals for a plateau. Each project produces a well-defined technology product that may be used by another project or integrated into the developmental configuration. The possible set of IT products is broad and may include new or updated applications (or portions), databases and files, integrated server, or client platforms, information appliances, networking infrastructure, or other equipment (e.g., UPS network monitors). Life-cycle documentation, such as user, operator or engineering documentation, and training materials, is also considered a technology product.

See the Organization of the IT Planning and Management Guides for the relationship of the processes described in this guide to those of the other guides. Background is provided on the fundamental concepts and principles that apply across the guides. For information on how to customize this guidance, view the Application of the IT Planning and Management Guides pages.

Processes

Circumstances for each project determine the specific mix of activities that must be performed. This includes consideration for the type of product being delivered, the technology being used to produce it, or the approach taken to acquire it. The fundamental types of activities common across the projects are illustrated in the figure and described in the following text.

• Project Management Activities - This set of activities includes practices necessary to plan, monitor, and control an IT project throughout its lifetime.
• Engineering Activities - This set of activities includes technical, life-cycle practices needed to create, modify, or adapt a technology element and its associated documentation to prepare them for use.
• Acquisition Activities - This set of activities includes those life-cycle practices needed to establish, monitor, and terminate a buyer-supplier relationship to acquire an IT product or service.
• Support Activities - This set of activities includes all those life-cycle practices needed to establish a project environment to support the other three sets of activities. This includes configuration management and quality assurance practices.
  

Technology Fabrication Projects Resources - A consolidated set of items that can be used to implement the activities defined in this guide are listed in the consolidated resources.