Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Partner management and programs, etc.
Handling Upgrades to Customization
Always keep in mind that the more one moves away from the base product
through customization and enhancements, the more careful one must be
about handling upgrades. While backward compatibility is possibly
assured at the base product level, one's customizations need not be
assured. Certain efforts might therefore be required to get the existing
customizations back on track. Things that can go wrong include:
Screens that do not work after upgrade (e.g., XML/XSL transfor-
mations used earlier) may be replaced by components embedded
in the browser container
Obsolete APIs that require replacement with new APIs
Data model changes (e.g., primary keys may change) attributes
and internal representation of objects
Support for certain third-party tools may get dropped
A variation of the upgrade problem could be where one might have
added functionality to a particular version of the product, that gets sub-
sumed in the future release of the product (becomes part of the base
product in the new release). How is this best handled? What can one do
today if one thinks that the functionality being handled today may be part
of the product tomorrow? Such functionality should be created in a loosely
coupled fashion so that it can be replaced without too much trouble. For
example, if one needs a warranty details screen, because there is no such
screen in the original product, it should be implemented with minimal
changes to the data model, perhaps through the use of temporary tables.
In case the future release of the product already incorporates an acceptable
warranty feature, one's screen and database changes can be retired easily.
Why Customization Projects Fail
Customization projects, both large and small, have not had a good track
record of success. The larger ERP (enterprise resource planning) custom-
izations have many times run into considerable cost and schedule over-
runs. Smaller companies trying to implement customize products have
