Closure Report

Project Summary

Background

This project has been initiated to upgrade the University's installation of Worktribe to the latest version 2.5, this incorporates applying the hot fix of 2.3, upon the advice from Worktribe it has been agreed that the upgrade to 2.4  is now out of scope.

Instead the approach will be to bypass the upgrade to 2.4 and bring forward the upgrade to 2.5 instead.  The upgrade to version 2.5 is required for GDPR compliance which comes into force on the 25th May 2018.

The supplier (Worktribe) will be supplying UoE with change logs and release notes to allow a thorough test plan to be developed.

The upgrade work will be undertaken by Worktribe working in conjunction with IS Apps resources for data feeds between Worktribe and other applications; HR, VRS and E-Fin.

Scope

The scope of this project is to upgrade the University’s installation of Worktribe; initially applying the hotfix to v2.3 and v2.5, ensuring that it continues to operate as expected including:

• Testing of processes adopted by the University
• Testing of the Interfaces presenting data to Worktribe from Finance, HR, and VRS 
• Testing of the outgoing interfaces to eFinancials 
• Testing of the external reporting solution (and the Worktribe BI Extract)
• Testing of additional and/or enhanced functionality to the system
• Upgrading WIKI pages and/or User Guidance 

Potentially updating automated test scripts if this approach is pursued

Deemed out of Scope:

• The upgrade to version 2.4 prior to 2.5 was deemed out of scope on the guidance from the supplier (Worktribe) that the 2.4 upgrade could be bypassed.  The guidance also assured that there would be  minimal impact to the upgrade process.  Thus allowing us to progress with the upgrade of 2.5 which was essential for GDPR compliance. 

Analysis of Resource Usage:

Staff Usage Estimate: 30 days

Staff Usage Actual: 42.5 days

Staff Usage Variance: 70%

Outcome

The implementation of the hotfix was successful which resulted in resolving bugs identified within 2.3.

The upgrade to 2.5 and deployment of the hotfix for 2.3 were also completed successfully and the current version in the LIVE environment is Wortribe 2.5. This means that the UoE are now at the latest version of the Worktribe application, which was essential for GDPR compliance.

Explanation for variance

There are a number of reasons for the variance in timescales and budget which have been summarised below:

• Timescales for UAT took longer due to the following:
  • The volume of changes between 2.3 to 2.5 documented in the development build and change logs were significant so the development of the test plan took longer than planned
  • Due to the volume of the changes and detail within the Test Plan, UAT was extended to ensure that a full test was completed and UAT was signed off prior to Deployment into LIVE
  • There were a number of staff on annual leave during UAT which had to be factored into for signing off the upgrade
• There were delays with completing testing of the interface between Worktribe and E-fin which resulted in delaying deployment by a week
• Data interface sign off from Finance, RIS and IS Apps took longer to sign off based upon a number of dependencies and issues that arose as part of FIN118:
  • FIN118 decomissioned the E-Fin 4.1 DEV environment which therefore resulted us not being able to test the data feeds within DEV prior to progressing to TEST
  • The data within E-Fin 4.1 (TEST) was three years out of date and a data refresh was not available based upon the guidance from Development Technology, therefore testing was done against e-fin 5 but the project went LIVE with E-Fin 4.1
• The "Actuals" job was not transferring data back to Worktribe from E-Fin which was only discovered during the testing of the Hotfix and a PICCL was raised to extend the project timescales to allow time to investigate the issue (please see link to PICCL 3 below)
• The estimated funding for resource was over budget due to having to involve Development Technology and Software Development to undertake work with re-pointing the interfaces to the new servers, updating documentation and troubleshooting issues. (The additional funding is outlined in PICCL 7 - see below)
• There were further issues once the upgrade to 2.5 was deployed into LIVE; the password for the APIuser account had to be changed as part of the upgrade, in order to strengthen the password.
  • It was not known that this account was used for BI Query integration (RIS) and for data feeds from Worktribe and E-fin (Applications Management) - the password therefore had to be amended in the config file for LIVE.

PICCL 3 Extension of milestones to rectify Actuals from E-Fin to Worktribe issue

PICCL 7 has also been raised for the additional budget that was required

Key Learning Points

• The data in LIVE is refreshed into the DEV and TEST environment
• The data within the interfaces should be accurate for testing in each environment
• Business end to end processes to be defined and tested against UAT; UAT timescales within planning should accurately reflect the effort required
• Communication and user guidance should be prepared and circulated in advance of the deployment date; due to the functionality changes there was extra effort required to prepare user guidance between RSO and RSG to advise the business community of new pre and post award functionality within Worktribe
• The project team should be extended to include representatives from the schools
• All future upgrade dates should be confirmed by the business community to avoid critical deadlines i.e. grant deadlines
• A review of the purpose of the APIuser account should be undertaken and determine whether there should be multiple accounts or assign ownership to someone to manage the account
• Any dependencies on other projects need to be identified and risk assessment undertaken to mitigate slippage on projected budget and delivery timescales

Outstanding Issues

JIRA Log:

There is one outstanding Jira that will be transferred into RIS006 - Worktribe Upgrade v3

Please see link below

https://www.jira.is.ed.ac.uk/projects/RIS004

Risk Log:

There are no outstanding risks within the project.