Application Managed Services

Performance Management Services include activities to ensure that the applications, associated databases, and environments operate at peak efficiency.

• Avocette will provide ongoing monitoring of the applications environments to ensure that issues are identified and Resolved proactively.
• Avocette will create and maintain thresholds and automated alerts to aid delivery of performance management services.
• Avocette will make ongoing improvements in the design and operations to improve stability, reliability, response times and other operational parameters.

The primary support areas from the agreement include but are not limited to;

• Proactively manage storage, processing capacity, software licenses and other capacities.
• Resource capacity is correct for the current and projected levels of resource usage.
• Sized appropriately to meet current and future business requirements
• Monitor baseline capacity.
• Collect detailed information concerning resource usage levels.
• Developing responses to both short-term and long-term events.
• Developing plans to address new capacity requirements.
• Developing and updating alert thresholds as needed.
• Providing the Social Sector with on-going recommendations on capacity changes.
• Monitoring and documenting the usage levels of licensed Applications and making recommendations.
• Informing the Social Sector of potential capacity shortfalls.

This service includes activities to ensure the required service level pertaining to application availability will be met or bettered.

• Avocette will identify actual or potential availability concerns and report them to the client.
• Avocette will ensure backup and recovery jobs are in place for the application environment(s) and any associated database(s) and that they are tested on a periodic basis.
• Avocette will proactively make recommendations to the client regarding application upgrades as and when appropriate based on the application performance metrics and the desired outcomes.

Avocette will provide change management services, including the management of all changes respecting or relating to any application from the submission of a change request by the client through to implementation of the change.

• Avocette will perform an initial review of the change request and provide the client with a change approval document before implementing the change.
• Software patches and maintenance releases which are activities associated with implementing patches or updates to an application supporting the environment(s) or database(s) to maintain the application currency and supportability, address security or other vulnerabilities, and ensure compatibility with changes in the operating environment.
• The management of the additional complexities of grouping multiple changes into a release and deploying those changes into the Production environment.

Avocette will provide Application Environment and Database Administration Services to maintain the integrity of databases associated with the Applications.

• The database environment remains healthy and issues are addressed.
• Potential issues that affect performance are scheduled in quarterly reorganizations and/or tuning.
• Daily proactive database monitoring, tuning, and corrective action.
• Identify databases that require reorganization and scheduling such work to be completed during quarterly database reorganization.
• Monitor servers hosting databases and perform performance analysis.
• Tuning of the database.
• Analyze daily jobs to assess database performance.
• Monitor and clean up disk space.
• Update database performance and tuning log.
• Update statistical reports for trend analysis.
• Change database passwords associated with generic user identifications used for database administration daily.
• Oracle ETL (extraction, transformation, and loading) support.
• A monthly summary database performance and tuning log.
• Monthly summaries of trend analyses.
• Quarterly database reorganization.
• Database reorganization each quarter for all Applications that have associated databases, including both production and test databases.
• Confirm which databases need reorganization or maintenance.
• Provide a database reorganization report to the Province.
• Ensure that all security and audit requirements and recommendations are implemented and maintained.
• Activities to ensure databases are configured correctly. Track configuration changes for audit purposes.
• Creation of new environments and databases as required.
• Manage and secure access to applications environment and associated databases.
• Grant appropriate system access.
• Grant read-only access to production databases.

Disaster recovery and business continuity services include activities associated with planning and preparing for a disaster that may threaten the continued operation of the Social Sector’s Applications and business critical computing environments. They also include activities to respond to a disaster or emergency, should one occur.

Disaster recovery and business continuity services SP will provide to the Province include the following:

DRP Testing
Avocette will perform annual Disaster Recovery Process testing if required to ensure the backup and recovery procedures are working correctly.

Application Maintenance Services include Corrective Maintenance and Preventative Maintenance as broad maintenance categories. 

Corrective Maintenance

Corrective Maintenance modifies a licensed or custom-programmed Application after delivery of the Application.

Corrective Maintenance Services include:

• Programming, configuring applications, maintaining databases associated with the applications
• Performing user interface design
• Maintaining existing integrations between applications
• Application testing, technical writing, creating, updating, and executing maintenance schedules
• Performing root cause analysis and problem management
• Reusing and updating code documentation
• Managing physical design Artifacts
• Application deployment, including:
• Reusing and updating operations guides
• Providing deployment packages and scripts for the applicable tests in the Staging, and Production environments

Preventative Maintenance

Preventative Maintenance detects latent faults in the applications and supporting databases and corrects those faults.

Avocette will provide, but are not limited to the following activities:

• Developing a detailed application maintenance plan, including maintenance schedule, deliverables, process steps, decision points for approvals, and systems employed to ensure effective application maintenance.
• Sustaining the vitality of each application by implementing the modifications required to reflect changes to interfaces and the operating environments.
• Evaluating the impact of upgrades on applications, but not the effort required to remediate the applications.
• Code restructuring, re-modularization, elimination of code flaws, development and enforcement of code standards, optimization, and the work that is done to ensure applications continue to function and meet baseline acceptance criteria.

Testing Services include activities associated with finding defects within applications as well as verifying whether applications operate as expected. Some of the testing services offered by Avocette include:

Test Planning and Preparation

Test planning and preparation includes reviewing requirements and design specifications to qualify and quantify the types of testing required.

Test Data Management

Identifying and creating new test data, both transactional and referential in order to complete the testing of these new functions.

Product Testing

Product testing consists of a variety of tests that validate the changes and that the application meets the functional, non-functional and technical requirements.

Functional Testing

Functional testing is a component of product testing that bases its test cases on the design specifications of the application under test.

System Testing

System testing should focus on any target requirements that can be traced directly to use cases (or business functions), and business rules.

Security Testing

Application security testing focuses on three (3) key areas of Application security:

Integration/End-to-End Testing

Integration testing is the phase in software testing in which application components and other related applications (upstream/downstream transactions) are integrated, combined and tested as a group

Performance Testing

Performance testing is a broad category of tests that are used to validate and verify the performance related Application requirements and architecture design components.

Load Testing

Load testing measures subject the Application-under-test to varying workloads to evaluate the Application’s ability to continue to function properly under these different workloads.

Volume Testing

Volume Testing subjects the Application-under-test to large amounts of data to determine the limits at which the software will fail. 

Regression Testing

Regression testing is any type of application testing that seeks to uncover new errors, or regressions, in existing functionality after changes have been made to an Application, such as functional Enhancements, patches or configuration changes.

Test and Defect Reporting

Test and defect reporting is a sub-set of application project delivery status reporting that involves the active monitoring and measurement of testing related key performance indicators. 

Application Support Services provided by SP will fulfil Service Requests and resolve interruptions in service to the Province’s clients and customers as quickly as possible and identify fixes or workarounds when required. 

Help Desk Application Support Model

Help Desk tier 2 support responds to Incidents when other underlying infrastructure components are not at fault or when the root cause is not readily understood.

Help Desk tier 2 support responds to Incidents that cannot be fulfilled by Help Desk tier 1.5 support, performs triage of such Incidents and responds to and Resolves them if possible, or routes them to other appropriate providers of Help Desk tier 2 support or Help Desk tier 3 support.

Application Support Services / Help Desk Services

Each Application requires Application Support – Level 1, Application Support – Level 2, or Application Support – Level 3. Appendix B2 to this Schedule B identifies each Application as a Level 1 Support Application, a Level 2 Support Application or a Level 3 Support Application.

To ensure that applications are fully supported, Avocette provides Transition Services which include both the transitioning-in and transitioning-out of applications.  Avocette will perform Transition Services that provide efficient and effective transition-in and transition-out processes to ensure that risks are properly managed and the desired outcomes for Transition Services are met.

Transition-In Services

Transition-In Services will be provided between the Effective Date and the Handover Date in accordance with the Transition Plan. Transition-In Services involve Avocette acquiring all knowledge, access, materials and any additional information required to enable Avocette to successfully provide all AMM Services to the Province as of the Handover Date.

Transition-Out Services

Transition-Out Services will be provided near the end of the Term or earlier termination of this Agreement. Transition-Out Services involve Avocette providing the Province or a designate of the Province with all knowledge, access, materials and any additional information required for a new contractor to provide all Services to the Province. Avocette will provide Transition-Out Services in accordance with the Transition Plan.

Transition – Desired Outcomes

Avocette will provide efficient and effective Transition-In Services and processes and Transition-Out Services and processes that ensure risks are properly managed and the Province’s following desired outcomes for Transition Services are realized.