Re: metrics for determining health of an AS/400's IT department

[oliver.wenzel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]

Hello,


>I would like to quickly and easily take the temperature of an IT 
department using some simple measurements on an AS/400.

>I am looking for quick methods of determining some simple things, such as 
how organized (or messy) a system is.

>For example, if the company uses Robot Scheduler, one measurement is how 
many jobs are scheduled?

>If the company uses a menuing system, how many menu options exist?

>Could you please suggest a few additional mesurements that would indicate 
the tidiness of an AS/400?

>The measurements should be simple to determine their values, and should 
be used in most AS/400 shops.

I don't think your "metrics" are well chosen. They just measure the 
complexity of applications run on the AS400.
I would look after the following stuff:

  - lots of user profiles, many unused/expired ones?
  - lots of objects in private possesion in production libraries
  - are programs and sources in sync (each program has a source in a 
defined library?)
  - tools for promoting objects in development to production status?
  - SOP's for doing stuff (creating user profiles, backup's etc.)
  - regular backups available (some stuff has to be stored for several 
years)

Many of these points can't be checked easily or put into metrics, but, 
IMO, they really define the healthiness
of an AS400 operations. 

Regards,

Oliver