course: refresher course on intranet applications with java
venue: academic staff college, jntu kukkatpally, hyderabad
TCP/IP
Transmission Control Protocol / Internet Protocol
• Rajesh Kulkarni
TCP/IP & OSI
• In OSI reference model terminology -the TCP/IP protocol suite covers the network and transport layers.
• TCP/IP can be used on many data-link layers (can support many network hardware implementations).
Internet Protocol
The IP in TCP/IP
• IP is the network layer
• packet delivery service (host-to-host).
• translation between different data-link protocols.
IP Datagrams
• IP provides connectionless, unreliable delivery of IP datagrams.
• Connectionless: each datagram is independent of all others.
• Unreliable: there is no guarantee that datagrams are delivered correctly or even delivered at all.
IP Addresses
• IP addresses are not the same as the underlying data-link (MAC) addresses.
Why ?
IP Addresses
• IP is a network layer - it must be capable of providing communication between hosts on different kinds of networks (different data-link implementations).
• The address must include information about what network the receiving host is on. This is what makes routing feasible.
IP Addresses
• IP addresses are logical addresses (not physical)
• 32 bits.
• Includes a network ID and a host ID.
• Every host must have a unique IP address.
• IP addresses are assigned by a central authority (American Registry for Internet Numbers for North America).
The four formats of IP Addresses
Class A
128 possible network IDs
over 4 million host IDs per network ID
Network and Host IDs
• A Network ID is assigned to an organization by a global authority.
• Host IDs are assigned locally by a system administrator.
• Both the Network ID and the Host ID are used for routing.
IP Addresses
• IP Addresses are usually shown in dotted decimal notation:
1.2.3.4 00000001 00000010 00000011 00000100
• cs.rpi.edu is 128.213.1.1
10000000 11010101 00000001 00000001
Host and Network Addresses
• A single network interface is assigned a single IP address called the host address.
• A host may have multiple interfaces, and therefore multiple host addresses.
• Hosts that share a network all have the same IP network address (the network ID).
Subnet Addresses
• An organization can subdivide it’s host address space into groups called subnets.
• The subnet ID is generally used to group hosts based on the physical network topology.
Subnetting
Subnetting
• Subnets can simplify routing.
• IP subnet broadcasts have a hostID of all 1s.
• It is possible to have a single wire network with multiple subnets.
Mapping IP Addresses to Hardware Addresses
• IP Addresses are not recognized by hardware.
• If we know the IP address of a host, how do we find out the hardware address ?
• The process of finding the hardware address of a host given the IP address is called
Address Resolution
Reverse Address Resolution
• The process of finding out the IP address of a host given a hardware address is called
Reverse Address Resolution
• Reverse address resolution is needed by diskless workstations when booting (which used to be quite common).
ARP
• The Address Resolution Protocol is used by a sending host when it knows the IP address of the destination but needs the Ethernet (or whatever) address.
• ARP is a broadcast protocol - every host on the network receives the request.
• Each host checks the request against it’s IP address - the right one responds.
ARP (cont.)
• ARP does not need to be done every time an IP datagram is sent - hosts remember the hardware addresses of each other.
• Part of the ARP protocol specifies that the receiving host should also remember the IP and hardware addresses of the sending host.
ARP conversation
RARP conversation
Services provided by IP
• Connectionless Delivery (each datagram is treated individually).
• Unreliable (delivery is not guaranteed).
• Fragmentation / Reassembly (based on hardware MTU).
• Routing.
• Error detection.
IP Datagram
IP Datagram Fragmentation
• Each fragment (packet) has the same structure as the IP datagram.
• IP specifies that datagram reassembly is done only at the destination (not on a hop-by-hop basis).
• If any of the fragments are lost - the entire datagram is discarded (and an ICMP message is sent to the sender).
IP Flow Control & Error Detection
• If packets arrive too fast - the receiver discards excessive packets and sends an ICMP message to the sender (SOURCE QUENCH).
• If an error is found (header checksum problem) the packet is discarded and an ICMP message is sent to the sender.
ICMP
Internet Control Message Protocol
• ICMP is a protocol used for exchanging control messages.
• ICMP uses IP to deliver messages.
• ICMP messages are usually generated and processed by the IP software, not the user process.
ICMP Message Types
• Echo Request
• Echo Response
• Destination Unreachable
• Redirect
• Time Exceeded
• Redirect (route change)
• there are more ...
IP/BYE-BYE
• IP/BYE-BYE is a lecture protocol used to signal the class that we have just finished our discussion of IP - the network layer of TCP/IP.
• The appropriate response to an IP/BYE-BYE request is immediate applause, although simply opening your eyes is enough (known as a WAKEUP response).
Transport Layer & TCP/IP
Q: We know that IP is the network layer - so TCP must be the transport layer, right ?
A: No… well, almost.
TCP is only part of the TCP/IP transport layer - the other part is UDP (User Datagram Protocol).
UDP User Datagram Protocol
• UDP is a transport protocol
• communication between processes
• UDP uses IP to deliver datagrams to the right host.
• UDP uses ports to provide communication services to individual processes.
Ports
• TCP/IP uses an abstract destination point called a protocol port.
• Ports are identified by a positive integer.
• Operating systems provide some mechanism that processes use to specify a port.
Ports
UDP
• Datagram Delivery
• Connectionless
• Unreliable
• Minimal
TCP
Transmission Control Protocol
• TCP is an alternative transport layer protocol supported by TCP/IP.
• TCP provides:
• Connection-oriented
• Reliable
• Full-duplex
• Byte-Stream
Connection-Oriented
• Connection oriented means that a virtual connection is established before any user data is transferred.
• If the connection cannot be established - the user program is notified (finds out).
• If the connection is ever interrupted - the user program(s) is finds out there is a problem.
Reliable
• Reliable means that every transmission of data is acknowledged by the receiver.
• If the sender does not receive acknowledgement within a specified amount of time, the sender retransmits the data.
Byte Stream
• Stream means that the connection is treated as a stream of bytes.
• The user application does not need to package data in individual datagrams (as with UDP).
Buffering
• TCP is responsible for buffering data and determining when it is time to send a datagram.
• It is possible for an application to tell TCP to send the data it has buffered without waiting for a buffer to fill up.
Full Duplex
• TCP provides transfer in both directions (over a single virtual connection).
• To the application program these appear as 2 unrelated data streams, although TCP can piggyback control and data communication by providing control information (such as an ACK) along with user data.
TCP Ports
• Interprocess communication via TCP is achieved with the use of ports (just like UDP).
• UDP ports have no relation to TCP ports (different name spaces).
TCP Segments
• The chunk of data that TCP asks IP to deliver is called a TCP segment.
• Each segment contains:
• data bytes from the byte stream
• control information that identifies the data bytes
TCP Segment Format
Addressing in TCP/IP
• Each TCP/IP address includes:
• Internet Address
• Protocol (UDP or TCP)
• Port Number
TCP vs. UDP
Q: Which protocol is better ?
A: It depends on the application.
TCP provides a connection-oriented, reliable, byte stream service (lots of overhead).
UDP offers minimal datagram delivery service (as little overhead as possible).
TCP/IP Summary
• IP: network layer protocol
• unreliable datagram delivery between hosts.
• UDP: transport layer protocol
• unreliable datagram delivery between processes.
• TCP: transport layer protocol
• reliable, byte-stream delivery between processes.
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Intranet
topic: intranet
course:refresher course on intranet applications with java at jntu kukkatpally, hyderabad
audience: professors from jntu, engineering colleges.
venue: academic staff college jntu hyderabad
What is an Intranet?
What is an Intranet?
• A private network; a LAN or WAN.
• A website on a private network, often called a Corporate Portal.
What can an Intranet display?
• Practically anything!
– documents
– forms
– charts and graphs
– pictures & scanned images
– databases
– downloadable files
What can an Intranet display?
• Relatively static information
– benefits descriptions
– policies & procedures
– forms
– org charts
– newsletters
– document templates
– facility locations & maps
What can an Intranet display?
• Somewhat dynamic information
– phone & staff lists
– internal job postings
– driver signup lists
– run or line schedules
– turn-by-turn route directions
– project summaries and schedules
What can an Intranet display?
• Highly dynamic information
– daily performance metrics (rollout, attendance, stock levels, etc.)
– vehicle status & location
– on-board equipment monitoring alerts
– individual employee data (sick leave & vacation accrual, etc.)
How do I sell the idea?
• Operations:
– better, faster access to data
• Finance:
– Web-based reporting & OLAP tools allow users to query across all enterprise databases
• Information Services:
– reduced desktop support costs for browser-based applications
– a central source for user self-help (online training, User Guides, FAQs)
How do I sell the idea?
• Management:
– faster, easier access to all enterprise data for local, remote and mobile users
– reduced employee training costs due to a single, unified application interface
• All areas:
– post the material and the answers that people ask for over and over
How do I build an Intranet?
• The free, 10-minute, no-excuses Intranet
–
• The cheap, D-I-Y Intranet
–
• The scalable, Enterprise solution
–
How do I build an Intranet?
• The free, 10-minute, no-excuses Intranet
– Intranets.com, eGroups.com
• The cheap, D-I-Y Intranet
– a server, an HTML editor, and an Intern
• The scalable, Enterprise solution
– Xerox DocuSource, Plumtree, Hummingbird, WebUpdate or the like
A free intranets.com Intranet
AC Transit’s D-I-Y Intranet
How do I get users to visit?
• Start with a handful of things staff are always looking for:
– phone lists & org charts
– benefits info and health plan contacts
– internal job postings
• For some of these, make the Intranet the only place to get them
• Always, always keep it current
How will I know it’s a success?
• When you no longer have to explain what an Intranet is
• When you don’t have to go looking for content, it finds you
• When it’s the first place people look for information!
Driving the Intranet
Is your intranet
business positive?
Is your intranet business positive?
Intranets can be a very effective strategic resource within an organisation
An intranet can be a key business tool for achieving corporate goals
The reality, however, is that many intranets are not currently delivering on this ideal
This can be fixed
By using appropriate techniques and approaches, an intranet can be made business positive
History of the intranet
Most intranets have grown organically
With no overall strategy or direction, individual additions have been made ad-hoc
Common intranet problems:
• Unstructured, and inconsistent
• Out-of-date, inaccurate and incomplete
• Content authoring processes not working
• Information is hard to find
• Not widely used by staff
Bringing it into focus
The first step to building a better intranet is determining a strategic plan
This must be driven by staff needs
The organisation also has requirements that
must be met
Intranets are not a technology problem
Much more important are people and processes
Improving intranet design
There are a number of techniques that can be used to improve the design and structure of an intranet:
information architecture
usability
content writing
indexing
Beyond usable
A good intranet is usable: information is easy to find, the intranet is well-structured, and consistent
This is not enough
An intranet can be perfectly designed, but if the content is not right, it is entirely useless
An intranet must be useful: it meets the real needs of staff throughout the organisation
There are a range of practical techniques for ensuring this
Intranet goals
Intranet goals
Many intranets were established with a single goal:
“Deliver information effectively and efficiently to all staff”
Most intranets have now met this goal, and yet are still not delivering real benefits
An intranet must meet wider business goals to be effective
These must be aligned with corporate strategies
Good goals are a strategic “land grab”
Possible intranet goals
Better communication
Improve productivity
Better decision making
Enable feedback
Facilitate business processes
Meet budget
Reduce need for support
Reduce paper consumption
Reduce e-mail overload
Enhance collaboration
Support knowledge sharing
Build corporate identity
Create a single culture
Improve distribution of news
Support systems integration
Align with organisational strategy
Facilitate change management
More intranet goals
Provide a reference tool for staff
Achieve business improvements
Provide best practice information
Support geographically isolated staff
Support skills sharing
Support networking
Improve public image
Help staff to do their jobs
Support staff orientation
Improve information accessibility
Support training
Provide social environment
Become a focus for organisational systems
Act as an archive
Support business processes
Metrics & measures
Metrics are a way of defining what the intranet will achieve, and whether it met those goals
Also known as:
• Measures
• Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)
Often, but not always, numerical
Increasingly important in an environment of tight budgets
Key part of “Balanced Scorecard”
Benefits of metrics
Allows:
Targets to be set
Success to be assessed
ROI to be estimated
Ongoing viability to be tracked
Lessons to be learnt
Some sample metrics
System usage
Number of users
Information quality
Information currency
User feedback
Maintenance costs
Staff efficiency
Printing costs
Distributed authoring
Process efficiency
Transaction costs
Product sales
Customer satisfaction
Consistency of advice
Call handling time
Success stories, anecdotes
Staff morale
Cultural change
Staff learning
Guidelines & tips
Business-focused metrics are best
Determine a baseline
Automate measures
Measure the right things
Less, not more
Recognise the impact on staff
Re-evaluate measures every 6-12 months
Identifying staff needs
Identifying needs
An intranet will only be used if it meets actual
staff needs
It must also match organisational goals and strategies
Don’t ask staff what they need
Even if they want to, they can’t describe what they actually use and need
Use structured investigation methods
Structured techniques
Reviewing the existing environment
Expert site review
Focus groups & surveys
Usage & search statistics
Stakeholder interviews
Workplace observation
Process & knowledge mapping
Beyond surveys & focus groups
There are two traditional investigation methods:
Focus groups
• unstructured
• often does not reach consensus
• can be dominated by a few vocal members
Surveys
• staff will tell you what you want hear
• results don’t match reality
• difficult to create, time-consuming to analyse
Stakeholder interviews
Conduct stakeholder interviews with actual users
Focus on jobs, not intranet, with questions like:
• What are the main activities that make up your job?
• Who do you communicate most frequently with?
• What information do you use during a normal working day?
• Where do you obtain this information from?
• How do you find out about what’s happening in the organisation?
This is a simple form of knowledge mapping
Can be the first time staff are actually listened to
Workplace observation
Involves going ‘out into the field’, and watching staff conduct their normal activities
It is a holistic approach that can identify many issues and needs
Need to spend enough time to ‘blend in’
Must be done ethically
Very effective in a ‘front line’ environment, such as call centres, branches, etc.
Bringing it all together
Bringing it all together
Having a set of business-focused goals ensures that the intranet is positioned as a strategic asset
Goals also clarifies the direction to take
Taking a step back, and spending the time to understand staff needs is always enlightening
In this way, the intranet is driven from the ‘top down’ and the ‘bottom up’
This is much more effective than ‘sitting in a room and thinking hard about the intranet’
Bringing it all together (cont)
Maintaining an intranet is not enough
Improving structure, design & content of a site can be pointless if the site is not delivering the resources that staff need
There are thousands of ‘good ideas’ for an intranet
By understanding staff needs and intranet goals, priorities can be set, and resources applied effectively
This ensures that the intranet is business positive
Australian KM, CM & intranet groups
groups.yahoo.com/group/intranet-peers
A peer group of hands-on intranet managers in the public sector. Online list and forums in a major capital city every quarter.
groups.yahoo.com/group/NSW-KM-Forum-Announce
Announce list for NSW KM Forum meetings held in Sydney, 1st Thursday of each month
groups.yahoo.com/group/act-km
Australian mailing list for knowledge management
Questions?
Visit www.steptwo.com.au for more content management and intranet whitepapers
What’s Wrong with Intranets:
Users’ perspective
Users can’t find what they need (information architecture problem)
• “How come I didn’t know your department was developing a product similar to ours?”
• “Why couldn’t we find any relevant case studies to show that important prospect?”
• “Why do our sales and support staff keep giving our customers inconsistent information?”
What’s Wrong with Intranets:
Owners’ perspectives
Owners are overwhelmed (enterprise management problem)
• Content management pressures
• Resource allocation
• Technology selection
• Challenge of creating a unified intranet in a highly distributed environment
Users’ Problems
+ Owners’ Problems
= Enterprise IA (EIA)
The EIA Framework
Seven issues
• EIA governance: how the work and staff are structured
• EIA services: how work gets done in an enterprise environment
• EIA staffing: who handles strategic and tactical efforts
• EIA funding model: how it gets paid for
• EIA marketing and communications: how it gets adopted by the enterprise
• EIA workflow: how it gets maintained
• EIA design and timing: what gets created and when
EIA Governance:
Questions
What sort of individuals or group should be responsible for the EIA?
Where should they be located within the organization? How should they address strategic issues? Tactical issues?
Can they get their work done with carrots, sticks, or both as they try to work with somewhat autonomous business units?
EIA Governance:
A separate business unit 1/2
Logical outgrowth of
• Web or portal team
• Design or branding group
• E-services, e-business or e-commerce unit
Goals
• Ensure that IA is primary goal of the unit
• Retain organizational learning
• Avoid political baggage
• Maintain independence
EIA Governance:
A separate business unit 2/2
Ambitious, fool-hardy, unrealistic? Necessary!
• Models of successful new organizational efforts often start as separate entities
• Alternatives (none especially attractive)
• Be a part of IT or information services
• Be a part of marketing and communications
• Be a part of each business unit
EIA Governance:
Balancing strategic and tactical
Strategic: Model on Board of Directors
• 5-7 representatives of key constituencies
• Track record with successes, mistakes with organization’s prior centralization efforts
• Mix of visionaries, people who understand money
Tactical: Start with staff who “do stuff”
• Extend as necessary by outsourcing
• Enables logical planning of hiring and use of consultants and contractors
EIA Governance:
Board of directors 1/2
Goals
• Understand the strategic role of information architecture within the enterprise
• Promote information architecture services as a permanent part of the enterprise’s infrastructure
• Align the group and its services with those goals
• Ensure the group’s financial and political viability
• Help develop the group’s policies
• Support the group’s management
Makeup
• Draw first from effective leaders
• Then from major units that would be strategic partners
EIA Governance:
Board of directors 2/2
Qualities
• Experience and duration in the enterprise
• Wide visibility and extensive network
• Can draw on institutional memories and experiences
• Track record of involvement with successful initiatives
• Entrepreneurial (can read and write a business plan)
• Experienced with centralization efforts
• Does not shy away from political situations
• Can “sell” a new concept and find internal funding
• Is like the people you need to “sell” to
• Has experience with consulting operations
• Has experience negotiating with vendors
EIA Services:
Questions
What should a team responsible for EIA actually do?
How do their “services” fit with work that happens within business units? Or with outside contractors and consultants?
What kind of people should manage these efforts?
How do IA generalists and specialists fit together?
EIA Services:
From overwhelming to digestible
EIA Services:
Modular service plan
Avoid “monolithic” approach: “Hi, we’re the EIA team and we’re here to help… and we’re going to centralize all of your information…”
Break IA and CM into digestible, non-threatening tasks and sell those
• Allows you to divide and conquer clients…
• …and helps you understand IA challenges better (e.g., applying metadata in a centralized environment)
EIA Services:
Potential service offerings 1/2
User-oriented
• Persona and scenario development
• User testing and task analysis
• Search and server log analysis
Content-oriented
• Content inventory and analysis
• Content evaluation and assessment
• Content model design
• Content development policy (creation, maintenance)
• Content weeding, ROT removal, and archiving
• Content management tool (acquisition, maintenance)
• Metadata development
• Metadata maintenance
• Manual tagging
• Automated categorization and classification
EIA Services:
Potential service offerings 2/2
Context-oriented
• Business metrics development and analysis
• Internal marketing strategy and implementation
• Stakeholder and decision-maker interviews
• Business rules development (for best bets, content models, etc.)
Production/Maintenance
• Template design and application
• Training
• Policy/procedure/standards development and acceptance
• Publicity of new/changed content
• Tool analysis/acquisition (CMS, search, portal)
• Quality control and editing
• Link checking
• HTML validation
• Liaison with visual design staff, IT staff, vendors
EIA Services:
Assessing departmental IA needs
EIA Services:
Basic & premium levels
EIA Services:
Phased demand for IA services
EIA Staffing:
Questions
Who should be involved: in-house, consultant, contractor? What type of specialization should the staff have?
Should they be centralized or located within business units or both?
EIA Staffing:
Tactical team 1/4
Goals
• Delivers IA services to the enterprise in content, users, and context areas
• Implements the strategic team’s policies
• Works directly with clients to understand their needs and develop new services to meet those needs
EIA Staffing:
Tactical team 2/4
Make-up driven by “market demand,” existing resources
“Vertical” IA generalists: split between EIA project enterprise business units
“Horizontal” IA specialists: “consultants” for both groups of generalists
• Tools (e.g., search, portal, CMS)
• Metrics
• Evaluation
• Metadata development
• XML and other markup languages
EIA Staffing:
Tactical team 3/4
EIA Staffing:
Tactical team 4/4
Qualities for member of tactical team
• Entrepreneurial mindset
• Ability to consult (i.e., do work and justify IA and navigate difficult political environments)
• Willingness to acknowledge ignorance and seek help
• Ability to communicate with people from other fields
• Sensitivity to users’ needs
• …and know about IA and related fields
EIA Staffing:
Team Structure 1/2
EIA Staffing:
Team structure 2/2
EIA Funding Model:
Questions
How should this group be funded?
How should other expenses (e.g., software licenses) be covered? Charge-back fees for individual services? Flat “tax” paid by business units? Covered by general administration's tab? Some hybrid thereof?
Should certain services be performed gratis, while others require payment?
EIA Funding Model:
Looking for inspiration
Study the successes/failures of the enterprise’s other centrally funded services
Possible plan
• Initially: “tax” on business units and/or “seed capital” from senior management
• Ultimately: self-funding (models: IT, HR, special projects)
Key: funding should be from central group (e.g., senior management) or self-funded; else too much dependency on business units
EIA Funding Model:
Ensuring independence
Potential models already in existence in the enterprise
• Charge-back
• Tax on business units
• Money from general fund
• Hybrids
Charge-back model is attractive
• Increasing perceived value of IA by charging fees
• Compares well with duplicated expenses incurred by business units
EIA Funding Model:
Diversify revenue streams
EIA Marketing & Communications:
Questions
How to position this work and the group that supports it: IA? User Experience? Web Design? How do these terms affect the scope of the work/charter of the group?
How does a plan like this get “sold,” and to whom?
Whose support is needed, and what tactics are useful in convincing them to support EIA work?
How to prioritize which business units around the enterprise to work with?
EIA Marketing & Communications:
Positioning the EIA initiative
Approaching “clients”
• No carrot or stick
• Offer services and consulting that save money, reduce tedium
Branding: choose the term that is
• Hottest
• Has least baggage
• Steps on fewest toes
EIA Marketing & Communications:
Selling IA
Concrete
• We can make work easier and save money for individual business units
• We can improve the user experience and build brand loyalty among customers, organizational loyalty among employees
• We can minimize the enterprise’s habit of purchasing redundant licenses and services
EIA Marketing & Communications:
One unit at a time
Start with low-hanging fruit
• Killer content
• Plentiful or influential users
• Strategic value (business context)
Determine current status of the “client”
• What are they doing now?
• What expertise is in-house?
• What relevant tools do they own (extend licenses)?
• Are they enlightened?
EIA Marketing & Communications:
Illustrating the concept
Select an initial model for centralized approach that’s familiar, accessible
Staff directory often the best
• Serves all enterprise users
• Useful, highly structured content which may have significant metadata, searching and browsing capabilities
• Has high value in context of the enterprise’s daily operations
EIA Design/Timing:
Questions
An EIA design is an overwhelmingly large undertaking; how might it be broken into more digestible pieces?
How should they be sequence: what makes sense to take on now, later, or perhaps not at all?
EIA Design/Timing:
Modular, phased
EIA Design/Timing:
3-6 years, not months
Use early successes as models
Anticipate greater centralization among and within business units over time
Support different levels of centralization concurrently (Neanderthals coexist with Space Agers)
EIA Workflow:
Questions
How does the content authoring and publishing process work now?
Who and how many are involved?
How can the group support that work, and determine the best mix of centralized and autonomous responsibilities within that workflow?
EIA Workflow:
Deconstruct, then assign
Determine roles, then responsibilities among local and central units
Strive for evolution toward centralization
EIA Framework:
Summary
Entrepreneurial
• Services marketed to internal clients
• Goal of self-sustainability
Modular
• Specific services, not full package
• Logical migration path
Phased
• Projects that are low hanging fruit
• Selective roll-out
course:refresher course on intranet applications with java at jntu kukkatpally, hyderabad
audience: professors from jntu, engineering colleges.
venue: academic staff college jntu hyderabad
What is an Intranet?
What is an Intranet?
• A private network; a LAN or WAN.
• A website on a private network, often called a Corporate Portal.
What can an Intranet display?
• Practically anything!
– documents
– forms
– charts and graphs
– pictures & scanned images
– databases
– downloadable files
What can an Intranet display?
• Relatively static information
– benefits descriptions
– policies & procedures
– forms
– org charts
– newsletters
– document templates
– facility locations & maps
What can an Intranet display?
• Somewhat dynamic information
– phone & staff lists
– internal job postings
– driver signup lists
– run or line schedules
– turn-by-turn route directions
– project summaries and schedules
What can an Intranet display?
• Highly dynamic information
– daily performance metrics (rollout, attendance, stock levels, etc.)
– vehicle status & location
– on-board equipment monitoring alerts
– individual employee data (sick leave & vacation accrual, etc.)
How do I sell the idea?
• Operations:
– better, faster access to data
• Finance:
– Web-based reporting & OLAP tools allow users to query across all enterprise databases
• Information Services:
– reduced desktop support costs for browser-based applications
– a central source for user self-help (online training, User Guides, FAQs)
How do I sell the idea?
• Management:
– faster, easier access to all enterprise data for local, remote and mobile users
– reduced employee training costs due to a single, unified application interface
• All areas:
– post the material and the answers that people ask for over and over
How do I build an Intranet?
• The free, 10-minute, no-excuses Intranet
–
• The cheap, D-I-Y Intranet
–
• The scalable, Enterprise solution
–
How do I build an Intranet?
• The free, 10-minute, no-excuses Intranet
– Intranets.com, eGroups.com
• The cheap, D-I-Y Intranet
– a server, an HTML editor, and an Intern
• The scalable, Enterprise solution
– Xerox DocuSource, Plumtree, Hummingbird, WebUpdate or the like
A free intranets.com Intranet
AC Transit’s D-I-Y Intranet
How do I get users to visit?
• Start with a handful of things staff are always looking for:
– phone lists & org charts
– benefits info and health plan contacts
– internal job postings
• For some of these, make the Intranet the only place to get them
• Always, always keep it current
How will I know it’s a success?
• When you no longer have to explain what an Intranet is
• When you don’t have to go looking for content, it finds you
• When it’s the first place people look for information!
Driving the Intranet
Is your intranet
business positive?
Is your intranet business positive?
Intranets can be a very effective strategic resource within an organisation
An intranet can be a key business tool for achieving corporate goals
The reality, however, is that many intranets are not currently delivering on this ideal
This can be fixed
By using appropriate techniques and approaches, an intranet can be made business positive
History of the intranet
Most intranets have grown organically
With no overall strategy or direction, individual additions have been made ad-hoc
Common intranet problems:
• Unstructured, and inconsistent
• Out-of-date, inaccurate and incomplete
• Content authoring processes not working
• Information is hard to find
• Not widely used by staff
Bringing it into focus
The first step to building a better intranet is determining a strategic plan
This must be driven by staff needs
The organisation also has requirements that
must be met
Intranets are not a technology problem
Much more important are people and processes
Improving intranet design
There are a number of techniques that can be used to improve the design and structure of an intranet:
information architecture
usability
content writing
indexing
Beyond usable
A good intranet is usable: information is easy to find, the intranet is well-structured, and consistent
This is not enough
An intranet can be perfectly designed, but if the content is not right, it is entirely useless
An intranet must be useful: it meets the real needs of staff throughout the organisation
There are a range of practical techniques for ensuring this
Intranet goals
Intranet goals
Many intranets were established with a single goal:
“Deliver information effectively and efficiently to all staff”
Most intranets have now met this goal, and yet are still not delivering real benefits
An intranet must meet wider business goals to be effective
These must be aligned with corporate strategies
Good goals are a strategic “land grab”
Possible intranet goals
Better communication
Improve productivity
Better decision making
Enable feedback
Facilitate business processes
Meet budget
Reduce need for support
Reduce paper consumption
Reduce e-mail overload
Enhance collaboration
Support knowledge sharing
Build corporate identity
Create a single culture
Improve distribution of news
Support systems integration
Align with organisational strategy
Facilitate change management
More intranet goals
Provide a reference tool for staff
Achieve business improvements
Provide best practice information
Support geographically isolated staff
Support skills sharing
Support networking
Improve public image
Help staff to do their jobs
Support staff orientation
Improve information accessibility
Support training
Provide social environment
Become a focus for organisational systems
Act as an archive
Support business processes
Metrics & measures
Metrics are a way of defining what the intranet will achieve, and whether it met those goals
Also known as:
• Measures
• Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)
Often, but not always, numerical
Increasingly important in an environment of tight budgets
Key part of “Balanced Scorecard”
Benefits of metrics
Allows:
Targets to be set
Success to be assessed
ROI to be estimated
Ongoing viability to be tracked
Lessons to be learnt
Some sample metrics
System usage
Number of users
Information quality
Information currency
User feedback
Maintenance costs
Staff efficiency
Printing costs
Distributed authoring
Process efficiency
Transaction costs
Product sales
Customer satisfaction
Consistency of advice
Call handling time
Success stories, anecdotes
Staff morale
Cultural change
Staff learning
Guidelines & tips
Business-focused metrics are best
Determine a baseline
Automate measures
Measure the right things
Less, not more
Recognise the impact on staff
Re-evaluate measures every 6-12 months
Identifying staff needs
Identifying needs
An intranet will only be used if it meets actual
staff needs
It must also match organisational goals and strategies
Don’t ask staff what they need
Even if they want to, they can’t describe what they actually use and need
Use structured investigation methods
Structured techniques
Reviewing the existing environment
Expert site review
Focus groups & surveys
Usage & search statistics
Stakeholder interviews
Workplace observation
Process & knowledge mapping
Beyond surveys & focus groups
There are two traditional investigation methods:
Focus groups
• unstructured
• often does not reach consensus
• can be dominated by a few vocal members
Surveys
• staff will tell you what you want hear
• results don’t match reality
• difficult to create, time-consuming to analyse
Stakeholder interviews
Conduct stakeholder interviews with actual users
Focus on jobs, not intranet, with questions like:
• What are the main activities that make up your job?
• Who do you communicate most frequently with?
• What information do you use during a normal working day?
• Where do you obtain this information from?
• How do you find out about what’s happening in the organisation?
This is a simple form of knowledge mapping
Can be the first time staff are actually listened to
Workplace observation
Involves going ‘out into the field’, and watching staff conduct their normal activities
It is a holistic approach that can identify many issues and needs
Need to spend enough time to ‘blend in’
Must be done ethically
Very effective in a ‘front line’ environment, such as call centres, branches, etc.
Bringing it all together
Bringing it all together
Having a set of business-focused goals ensures that the intranet is positioned as a strategic asset
Goals also clarifies the direction to take
Taking a step back, and spending the time to understand staff needs is always enlightening
In this way, the intranet is driven from the ‘top down’ and the ‘bottom up’
This is much more effective than ‘sitting in a room and thinking hard about the intranet’
Bringing it all together (cont)
Maintaining an intranet is not enough
Improving structure, design & content of a site can be pointless if the site is not delivering the resources that staff need
There are thousands of ‘good ideas’ for an intranet
By understanding staff needs and intranet goals, priorities can be set, and resources applied effectively
This ensures that the intranet is business positive
Australian KM, CM & intranet groups
groups.yahoo.com/group/intranet-peers
A peer group of hands-on intranet managers in the public sector. Online list and forums in a major capital city every quarter.
groups.yahoo.com/group/NSW-KM-Forum-Announce
Announce list for NSW KM Forum meetings held in Sydney, 1st Thursday of each month
groups.yahoo.com/group/act-km
Australian mailing list for knowledge management
Questions?
Visit www.steptwo.com.au for more content management and intranet whitepapers
What’s Wrong with Intranets:
Users’ perspective
Users can’t find what they need (information architecture problem)
• “How come I didn’t know your department was developing a product similar to ours?”
• “Why couldn’t we find any relevant case studies to show that important prospect?”
• “Why do our sales and support staff keep giving our customers inconsistent information?”
What’s Wrong with Intranets:
Owners’ perspectives
Owners are overwhelmed (enterprise management problem)
• Content management pressures
• Resource allocation
• Technology selection
• Challenge of creating a unified intranet in a highly distributed environment
Users’ Problems
+ Owners’ Problems
= Enterprise IA (EIA)
The EIA Framework
Seven issues
• EIA governance: how the work and staff are structured
• EIA services: how work gets done in an enterprise environment
• EIA staffing: who handles strategic and tactical efforts
• EIA funding model: how it gets paid for
• EIA marketing and communications: how it gets adopted by the enterprise
• EIA workflow: how it gets maintained
• EIA design and timing: what gets created and when
EIA Governance:
Questions
What sort of individuals or group should be responsible for the EIA?
Where should they be located within the organization? How should they address strategic issues? Tactical issues?
Can they get their work done with carrots, sticks, or both as they try to work with somewhat autonomous business units?
EIA Governance:
A separate business unit 1/2
Logical outgrowth of
• Web or portal team
• Design or branding group
• E-services, e-business or e-commerce unit
Goals
• Ensure that IA is primary goal of the unit
• Retain organizational learning
• Avoid political baggage
• Maintain independence
EIA Governance:
A separate business unit 2/2
Ambitious, fool-hardy, unrealistic? Necessary!
• Models of successful new organizational efforts often start as separate entities
• Alternatives (none especially attractive)
• Be a part of IT or information services
• Be a part of marketing and communications
• Be a part of each business unit
EIA Governance:
Balancing strategic and tactical
Strategic: Model on Board of Directors
• 5-7 representatives of key constituencies
• Track record with successes, mistakes with organization’s prior centralization efforts
• Mix of visionaries, people who understand money
Tactical: Start with staff who “do stuff”
• Extend as necessary by outsourcing
• Enables logical planning of hiring and use of consultants and contractors
EIA Governance:
Board of directors 1/2
Goals
• Understand the strategic role of information architecture within the enterprise
• Promote information architecture services as a permanent part of the enterprise’s infrastructure
• Align the group and its services with those goals
• Ensure the group’s financial and political viability
• Help develop the group’s policies
• Support the group’s management
Makeup
• Draw first from effective leaders
• Then from major units that would be strategic partners
EIA Governance:
Board of directors 2/2
Qualities
• Experience and duration in the enterprise
• Wide visibility and extensive network
• Can draw on institutional memories and experiences
• Track record of involvement with successful initiatives
• Entrepreneurial (can read and write a business plan)
• Experienced with centralization efforts
• Does not shy away from political situations
• Can “sell” a new concept and find internal funding
• Is like the people you need to “sell” to
• Has experience with consulting operations
• Has experience negotiating with vendors
EIA Services:
Questions
What should a team responsible for EIA actually do?
How do their “services” fit with work that happens within business units? Or with outside contractors and consultants?
What kind of people should manage these efforts?
How do IA generalists and specialists fit together?
EIA Services:
From overwhelming to digestible
EIA Services:
Modular service plan
Avoid “monolithic” approach: “Hi, we’re the EIA team and we’re here to help… and we’re going to centralize all of your information…”
Break IA and CM into digestible, non-threatening tasks and sell those
• Allows you to divide and conquer clients…
• …and helps you understand IA challenges better (e.g., applying metadata in a centralized environment)
EIA Services:
Potential service offerings 1/2
User-oriented
• Persona and scenario development
• User testing and task analysis
• Search and server log analysis
Content-oriented
• Content inventory and analysis
• Content evaluation and assessment
• Content model design
• Content development policy (creation, maintenance)
• Content weeding, ROT removal, and archiving
• Content management tool (acquisition, maintenance)
• Metadata development
• Metadata maintenance
• Manual tagging
• Automated categorization and classification
EIA Services:
Potential service offerings 2/2
Context-oriented
• Business metrics development and analysis
• Internal marketing strategy and implementation
• Stakeholder and decision-maker interviews
• Business rules development (for best bets, content models, etc.)
Production/Maintenance
• Template design and application
• Training
• Policy/procedure/standards development and acceptance
• Publicity of new/changed content
• Tool analysis/acquisition (CMS, search, portal)
• Quality control and editing
• Link checking
• HTML validation
• Liaison with visual design staff, IT staff, vendors
EIA Services:
Assessing departmental IA needs
EIA Services:
Basic & premium levels
EIA Services:
Phased demand for IA services
EIA Staffing:
Questions
Who should be involved: in-house, consultant, contractor? What type of specialization should the staff have?
Should they be centralized or located within business units or both?
EIA Staffing:
Tactical team 1/4
Goals
• Delivers IA services to the enterprise in content, users, and context areas
• Implements the strategic team’s policies
• Works directly with clients to understand their needs and develop new services to meet those needs
EIA Staffing:
Tactical team 2/4
Make-up driven by “market demand,” existing resources
“Vertical” IA generalists: split between EIA project enterprise business units
“Horizontal” IA specialists: “consultants” for both groups of generalists
• Tools (e.g., search, portal, CMS)
• Metrics
• Evaluation
• Metadata development
• XML and other markup languages
EIA Staffing:
Tactical team 3/4
EIA Staffing:
Tactical team 4/4
Qualities for member of tactical team
• Entrepreneurial mindset
• Ability to consult (i.e., do work and justify IA and navigate difficult political environments)
• Willingness to acknowledge ignorance and seek help
• Ability to communicate with people from other fields
• Sensitivity to users’ needs
• …and know about IA and related fields
EIA Staffing:
Team Structure 1/2
EIA Staffing:
Team structure 2/2
EIA Funding Model:
Questions
How should this group be funded?
How should other expenses (e.g., software licenses) be covered? Charge-back fees for individual services? Flat “tax” paid by business units? Covered by general administration's tab? Some hybrid thereof?
Should certain services be performed gratis, while others require payment?
EIA Funding Model:
Looking for inspiration
Study the successes/failures of the enterprise’s other centrally funded services
Possible plan
• Initially: “tax” on business units and/or “seed capital” from senior management
• Ultimately: self-funding (models: IT, HR, special projects)
Key: funding should be from central group (e.g., senior management) or self-funded; else too much dependency on business units
EIA Funding Model:
Ensuring independence
Potential models already in existence in the enterprise
• Charge-back
• Tax on business units
• Money from general fund
• Hybrids
Charge-back model is attractive
• Increasing perceived value of IA by charging fees
• Compares well with duplicated expenses incurred by business units
EIA Funding Model:
Diversify revenue streams
EIA Marketing & Communications:
Questions
How to position this work and the group that supports it: IA? User Experience? Web Design? How do these terms affect the scope of the work/charter of the group?
How does a plan like this get “sold,” and to whom?
Whose support is needed, and what tactics are useful in convincing them to support EIA work?
How to prioritize which business units around the enterprise to work with?
EIA Marketing & Communications:
Positioning the EIA initiative
Approaching “clients”
• No carrot or stick
• Offer services and consulting that save money, reduce tedium
Branding: choose the term that is
• Hottest
• Has least baggage
• Steps on fewest toes
EIA Marketing & Communications:
Selling IA
Concrete
• We can make work easier and save money for individual business units
• We can improve the user experience and build brand loyalty among customers, organizational loyalty among employees
• We can minimize the enterprise’s habit of purchasing redundant licenses and services
EIA Marketing & Communications:
One unit at a time
Start with low-hanging fruit
• Killer content
• Plentiful or influential users
• Strategic value (business context)
Determine current status of the “client”
• What are they doing now?
• What expertise is in-house?
• What relevant tools do they own (extend licenses)?
• Are they enlightened?
EIA Marketing & Communications:
Illustrating the concept
Select an initial model for centralized approach that’s familiar, accessible
Staff directory often the best
• Serves all enterprise users
• Useful, highly structured content which may have significant metadata, searching and browsing capabilities
• Has high value in context of the enterprise’s daily operations
EIA Design/Timing:
Questions
An EIA design is an overwhelmingly large undertaking; how might it be broken into more digestible pieces?
How should they be sequence: what makes sense to take on now, later, or perhaps not at all?
EIA Design/Timing:
Modular, phased
EIA Design/Timing:
3-6 years, not months
Use early successes as models
Anticipate greater centralization among and within business units over time
Support different levels of centralization concurrently (Neanderthals coexist with Space Agers)
EIA Workflow:
Questions
How does the content authoring and publishing process work now?
Who and how many are involved?
How can the group support that work, and determine the best mix of centralized and autonomous responsibilities within that workflow?
EIA Workflow:
Deconstruct, then assign
Determine roles, then responsibilities among local and central units
Strive for evolution toward centralization
EIA Framework:
Summary
Entrepreneurial
• Services marketed to internal clients
• Goal of self-sustainability
Modular
• Specific services, not full package
• Logical migration path
Phased
• Projects that are low hanging fruit
• Selective roll-out
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