The Operations and Support Discipline

The goal of the operations and support discipline is exactly as the name implies, to operate and support your software. Operations and support can be very complex endeavors, that need processes defined for them. During the construction phase, and perhaps as early as the elaboration phase, you will need to develop operations and support plans, documents, and training manuals (some of this effort is currently included in the RUP's implementation discipline). During the transition phase, you will continue to develop these artifacts, reworking them based on the results of testing, and you will train your operations and support staff to effectively work with your software. During the production phase, your operations staff will keep your software running, performing necessary backups and batch jobs as needed, and your support staff will work with your user community in working with your software. This will also occur during the retirement phase as you turn down the legacy system.