SUGGESTED SCHEDULE The outline below suggests the basic tasks that must be undertaken each year. Completion of the system proposed in this plan and its general availability in all congressional offices will require several years. The schedule for the project will be significantly affected by the time required to 1) upgrade the workstations in House and Senate offices 2) develop and implement new data coding standards and procedures 3) develop all the required capabilities in the new retrieval system and 4) provide adequate security.
Nevertheless, the nature of technology in use within the House and Senate and the support agencies allows for an iterative development cycle that permits the release of new features and files as soon as they are available. This means that congressional staff will be able to use each new capability as early as possible, assuming they have a workstation that will support the system, without having to wait for the entire plan to be complete.
1996
- Charter and establish the Working Group.
- Share and review current development plans.
- Establish priorities for 1996.
- Gather user requirements.
- Establish data standards.
- Establish guidelines for data coordination and system integration.
- Approve specific development work.
- Place emphasis on rapid prototyping, iterative development, early production use and testing.
1997
- Collect user feedback.
- Establish priorities for 1997
- Continue development work.
- Establish integrated, synchronized databases.
- Begin retirement of legacy systems.
1998
- Continue retirement of legacy systems.
- Collect user feedback.
- Establish priorities for 1998
- Continue development.
At this point items 2-4 repeat themselves.
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