Customer: MCI Telecommunications/Worldcom
(Fairfield Technologies, prime contractor)
Goal: Provide technical leadership to plan and implement a comprehensive yet practical and cost-effective Year 2000 (Y2K) testing program MCI Local Services
Application:
Provide Y2K testing support for entire MCI Local division’s application inventory, All business and technical functions required to provide telephone and telecommunications service, including:
- Service ordering and provisioning
- Status reporting
- Traffic
- Billing
- Equipment inventory
- Support systems
Challenges: Stringent time deadlines, very high risk and visible project, very diverse and fast moving technical environment
FTI’s Approach:
Provide senior testing support for the Division’s Year 2000 (Y2K) Program Management Office (PMO). Specific responsibilities included:
- Develop Y2K Testing Infrastructure For All Telephony Applications – Planned and developed a comprehensive set of plans, guidance, and tools to support all Local Systems applications throughout the Y2K evaluation, remediation, testing, and implementation process. Reviewed corporate-wide and division-specific Y2K testing approaches and recommended improvements, where appropriate. Identified, evaluated, recommended, and supported automated tool use. Supported Y2K risk mitigation and contingency planning efforts. Provided senior-level Y2K testing advice to PMO and division personnel.
- Support Application-Specific Y2K Testing – Provided support for all division applications (service ordering, provisioning, traffic, billing, equipment inventory, etc.) in the areas of Y2K test planning, application test case development and execution, compliance documentation preparation and delivery. Task required extensive functional knowledge of telecommunications operations.
- Provide Y2K And Testing Information Support – Authored and conducted division-wide briefings on Y2K awareness, testing procedures, industry “best practices”, and process re-engineering and re-use. Authored technical memos and white papers on Y2K- and testing-related topics, as required.
Products Used:
SQA TeamTest, proprietary data management tools, scripting, Microsoft Access database. The division utilized a highly distributed technical environment, using mainframe, mid-range and desktop systems, both client/server and mainframe architectures, and applications using a variety of DBMS and GUI products.
Used a variety of “best practices” software testing methods, including:
- Functional testing techniques – Functionality testing, usability testing, consistency testing
- System testing techniques – Boundary condition testing, error condition testing, regression testing, system validation testing
- Structural testing techniques – Performance testing, stress testing, recovery testing, security testing, standards compliance testing
- Interactive techniques – Design and code walkthroughs and peer reviews
Benefits:
- Maintain division operational performance
- Minimize potential Y2K-related legal, financial, and technical risks
Delivery: On time, within budget.