Re: Internet Architecture Project - PLEASE HELP?

["etymes -at- lts -dot- com" <etymes -at- lts -dot- com>]

Anthony::

You've been given an assignment that most of us would really love to get 
our teeth into.  It's a huge job and there will be lots of 
dissatisfaction enroute to the final version, but when it's done you'll 
have the satisfaction of having created a document that captures the 
state of your company's network at a particular point in time.  What the 
document will then become is a well used reference for quite a while.  

The outline and approach suggested by Andrew Plato is very good. 
However I am concerned about getting agreement from the engineers about 
timely information and storing it in an agreed-upon place, which you 
apparently call a document repository.  I'm also concerned about using a 
single person as the point of contact though whom you reach the engineers.  

As you get past the outline stage, the single hardest task for you is 
going to be keeping up to date on changes made to the system.  Unless 
your engineers are unusual, they are likely to keep making changes 
without necessarily documenting them, or at least putting the 
documentation in a place where you know to look.  See if you can get 
some agreement from the engineers about documenting their changes and 
letting you know via either your document repository or email.  

The problem with funneling all your requests for information through the 
single point of contact is that this approach usually creates 
bottlenecks.  It also can creates accuracy and completeness problems 
unless this contact person is and remains thorough and totally reliable.  

<They also have no standards, style sheets,...>

In the interests of thoroughness, if you can establish your document 
repository as an accessible directory, you can put a ReadMe file there 
which contains a form or at least guidelines that spells out what you 
need.  Most engineers know enough to recognize a ReadMe as containing 
important information and will open it out of curiosity.  If you 
correctly phrase questions in that file, you should get most of the 
information you need.  

At this point, I would agree with Andrew about not imposing standards or 
style sheets on your engineers - simply getting information out of them 
is going to be daunting enough.

A project this big is likely to have a lot of visibility within your 
company, and your manager is probably going to need to be able to 
explain how you're doing. If you don't already have a weekly reporting 
mechanism in place between you and your manager, start one now and make 
sure that it's something your manager reads on a regular basis.  Your 
manager will be able to track your progress and report upwards, and 
he/she may be able to resolve some of the problems you raise.

Enjoy this project - it's one a number of us would enjoy doing.

Elna Tymes
Los Trancos Systems