Project Management Assists. Project management is the killer of all IT development. Whitemarsh over the years has been developing database-centric project management methodologies, estimating models and guides to assess overall project quality. Many of these assists are naturally contained within and displayed through UltraTree-based SFR (Single File Recursion) and BOM (Bill of Materials) models, and so they are.
Whitemarsh's standalone project management system that enables both the estimation of the duration of a business information systems, and also a complete delivers-based methodology for engineering your database project methodology and also the amount of effort that is required.
While this is completed and documented, it is an integral component of the Whitemarsh Enterprise Management System, The Metabase. It is being factored out so that it is a standalone EXE that can be directly used for the project management of Clarion projects.
Recently, Whitemarsh was tasked with creating a new application for a client that was called, RMS (Records Management System). Not data records, but the business records of a project that involves various sized teams, projects, and events. Some of these end up in invoices for contracted work, others are just a record of an accomplished project including what was required to be delivered.
Once the data model is determined, the likly quantity of columns exists, along with the set of procedures required to create, update and delete the data.
Surfaced too are the types, kinds, and quantities of business rules.
Each of these business rule types can be "guestimated" as to complexity, and the like. Doing highlevel outlines of your procedure logic enables you to know the quantity of procedures and procedure routines.
The comes the determination of the duration of creating these various products. And that's where your knowledge of your Clarion performance is employed. What you do is "count, multiply, and sum." Once done you have hours and then weeks of effort.
All these are loaded ito the Project Management database and allocated to your staff including serial, parallel paths and the creation of the critical path. As your work is accomplished, it's likely that new requirements are uncovered which with the acceptance of the client, you update the project management database an your resulting estimates.
Did these changes happen to this Records Management System. Yes, for sure. But because of the quality of the database design, all the changes resulted in the addition of fewer than less than 10% more database tables, and for each, three procedures and about the same quantity of procedue routines. Development increased by no more than 10% as well. The Client was very happy with the result and has indicated that becuase of this Records Management System, the work of all these volunteers can be quantified, justified, and acknowledged for their real worth.
