The System Maintenance Guidebook (SMG) is a set of iterative processes for conducting system maintenance activities. Maintenance practice areas and their subordinate processes prescribe a minimal set of criteria that are necessary for project management and quality assurance processes, control, and management of the planning, execution, and documentation of system maintenance activities.

The State of Michigan has a consistent Project Management Methodology (PMM) in place which can be used for all types of projects. The State of Michigan also has a consistent System Engineering Methodology (SEM) that is a companion to the Project Management Methodology.  The SMG is companion to both the PMM and the SEM. Using these methodologies, staff can move comfortably from applications development, to infrastructure roll out, to software selection to even relocating to new buildings using the same approach throughout the organization.

The SMG promotes the belief that the result of maintenance is system reliability and the preservation and/or prolonging the life of system assets. The SMG process model does not presume the use of any particular information systems development strategy (e.g., waterfall, spiral). This process is valid regardless of size, complexity, and criticality of the application being maintained.

The Systems Maintenance Guidebook contains the following topical areas:

Chapter:      1.0 Introduction 

Section:       1.1 Background

Section:       1.2 System Maintenance Definition and Categories

Section:       1.3 System Maintenance Effort

Section:       1.4 Call for Projects

Chapter:      2.0 Release Management

Chapter:      3.0 System Maintenance

Section:       3.1 Initiation and Planning Stage

Section:       3.2 Requirements Definition Stage

Section:       3.3 Design Stage

Section:       3.4 Construction Stage

Section:       3.5 Testing Stage

Section:       3.6 Implementation Stage

System Maintenance Guidebook (SMG)