Detailed planning and infrastructure acquisition

You have qualified the remote site and are ready to figure out the infrastructure:

• Establish a playground to master the technology.
  
  
• Plan production and test infrastructure; order any equipment needed.
  
  
• Plan usage, administration, and support processes.
  
  
• Plan rollout.
  
  

MultiSite playground

A playground is a trivial test environment that you can set up right now using existing equipment to help you better understand the product functionality as you work through planning.

Refer to “Getting started: Setting up a MultiSite playground” on page 291 for a walk-through of a playground setup. Figure 12-11 shows the progression from playground to test to production environments. Once a formal test environment is in place, you can give up the playground.

MultiSite implementation plan

Start with an implementation plan, outlined in Table 12-1. Your schedule will be driven largely by:

• Getting test and production infrastructure in place.

• Coordination with the first project to be rolled out.

Table 12-1. MultiSite implementation plan outline

✓	MultiSite implementation plan
	Establish a MultiSite playground
	Define roles and responsibilities
	Train the rollout team
	Secure any additional test and production equipment
	Define usage models for distributed development
	Define naming conventions across sites
	Update CM requirements and the CM plan
	Establish a test environment
	Validate infrastructure and usage models
	Practice MultiSite workflow
	Implement production infrastructure
	Implement the first MultiSite project (pathfinder project)
	Rollout MultiSite for production use
	Iterate requirements and define next steps

If the hardware and network is not already in place, you will have a hard time forecasting the exact rollout schedule. Wait at least until the infrastructure is online before committing hard dates for the rollout.

And, as with any new process, you do not want to introduce MultiSite three weeks before a major milestone. A common time for a rollout is the Monday after the week after a major milestone.

Distributed CM plan

The distributed CM plan documents the changes in your environment to support MultiSite. Make sure to include the following topics:

• Infrastructure definition— Start with the remote site audit to determine the proper infrastructure requirements for remote site hardware, connectivity between the sites, and the local test configuration.

• Support plan— Determine how this infrastructure is going to be supported. See “Extending the CM organization” on page 254 for a discussion of some of the options.

• Usage model— Work with the project team to determine the appropriate usage model between sites. See “Usage models for distributed development” on page 283 for a description of several models that we have found effective.

• Administration plan— Define backup, restore, and disaster recovery procedures, and maintenance. See “Establish MultiSite administration processes” on page 266 for an outline of administration procedures.

• Rollout plan— Work with the project team on this as well. Determine the first project, how training happens, and when the rollout will occur. See “MultiSite rollout plan” on page 261 for more information on planning a rollout.