The end of 2021 marked the completion of the fourth full year of having a Quality Assurance office and the third full year of having a Change Advisory Board. As these areas continue to mature, the QA team will continue to provide the standards, guidelines, and tools to help campus partners benefit from high-quality products and services.
During 2021, the QA team expanded its footprint by working with 10 distinct academic and business units, which is an increase of 3 vs. 2020. The QA team and partner units utilizing outlined processes and tools were able to create 345 test cases. In addition, 1,374 test cases were executed, covering multiple hardware and software configurations. Finally, 459 defects (bugs) were discovered, which was key to reduce adverse effects for user groups.
Two notable projects involve the Pharmacy Scheduler and Healthy Tigers applications to support the Clinical Affairs and Outreach Administration. A new software licensing and asset management application was built and deployed to support campus partners for these two important topics. The QA team also supported a homegrown application build to support the alumni of the department of aerospace engineering.
2021 marked the third full year of having a Change Advisory Board (CAB) representing OIT teams, as well as campus units, such as Student Affairs, the Provost Office and Alumni and Development. The year was also the first full year of utilizing ServiceNow as the preferred platform for change management. The primary goal of change management is to monitor hardware and software changes to help ensure the University is technologically efficient, reliable, and secure. A total of 3,493 production changes were implemented throughout the year, which represents a 105% increase over 2020.
Some notable change requests include the implementation of a web application firewall (WAF) for Banner SSB, migrating from the Nuance Auto Attendant service to the XMedius OpenText voice mail system, installing a dedicated AWS/Amazon link, and the decommissioning of the older Cisco AnyConnect VPN software. In addition to planned change requests, 63 emergency changes were also implemented. Most of these changes were needed to maintain the most current security and version profiles. These include critical patches to Banner modules (Financial Aid, DegreeWorks, etc.), addressing gaps for various applications, and managing the Log4j vulnerability.
Last Updated: March 30, 2022
| QA Numbers at a Glance |
|---|
| 3,493 total changes reviewed by the Change Advisory Board |
| 105% increase in the number of changes discussed over 2019 |
| 18 projects completed with quality assurance participation |
| 1,374 tests executed to confirm functionality |
| 459 defects found and resolved prior to going live, due to testing |
