Financial services provider Old Mutual has used an
application testing tool to ensure itsmigration to Windows Vistaacross
15,000 desktops runs smoothly.
The company used ChangeBASE's AOK automated application
compatibility testing tool for the
Vista roll-out, which will take place in April.
"Migrating legacy applications to a new operating system is
always a challenge, especially in a large company where the range
of such applications is usually wide," said Mark Briston, IT
director at Old Mutual.
"We are dealing with a core set of 250 applications, including
off-the-shelf and bespoke varieties, so our original compatibility
testing timeframe was planned to be around nine months."
But Briston added, "For various reasons, the nine-month testing
period had to be shortened significantly and the project needed to
find tools that would save time, reduce testing effort and not
require extensive training of project staff.
"After a day with ChangeBASE consultants, our project staff were
able the use AOK confidently and accurately."
Overnight, ChangeBASE developed a utility to convert WSE files
to MSI format. Within two days, three core legacy applications had
been tested and remediation started on them.
After three days, the project team were able to take over the
toolset and continue the testing on their own.
Within a month, all 250 applications had been tested, resulting
in a major time and cost saving for the project, and allowing
applications needing remediation to be identified and dealt with
quickly.