Software support and maintenance 

I started FoCul as Industrial Engineer that was frustrated by a lack of suitable IT systems, an IT end user.

As a consequence we have tended to adopt a view held by many end users that having the latest version of software and support contracts was a luxury.

Experience over more than 10 years has shown me that trying to save money in this way is often a false economy. I say this for several reasons :

  • New versions of software often make it possible or faster to develop new applications. Notes 8.5 is a good example of this.
  • Literally thousands of bugs have been fixed between versions 6 and 8 of Notes ( although admittedly some have been created as well )
  • As an Engineer I used to focus on the functionality of an application much more than how it looked. Modern looking interfaces give users much more confidence in the application - 10 year old applications look 10 years old.
  • Over a period your IT infrastructure changes quite significantly. Things that work with Internet Explorer 5 may not work with IE 6, IE 7 and IE8. Similarly Office 2003 and 2007 have differences. Even the size and shape of monitors / laptop screens are changing quite radically. All of these things affect how well your application works.
  • Software applications are complex systems and not every interaction can be foreseen. While we do are absolute best to make the software robust and future proof it will inevitably need some support at some point. this support may be from a key user or developer inside your organisation but it may need to come from us.

In conclusion, I have come to understand that you need to consider the whole life costs of your applications.
  • For applications that will need continual enhancement you will need to set aside at least 20% of the initial project costs for recurring support and enhancements.
  • For applications that will not be enhanced in any way but which are business critical you should set aside around 10% for periodic audits of the systems to ensure that they are functioning correctly.
  • For applications which just need to run and which are not business critical you should set aside a contingency to deal with unforeseen problems. This should be 5 - 10 %.

Sean Cull, CEng