" Once it has been decided, by management, to pursue the ALE option we need to design a potential ALE solution..."

To do this, the ALE team needs to perform the following steps in the development environment:

1. Develop standards & procedures early:

	Naming standards: Logical systems, reduced message types, custom object types, custom function modules; and
	Change management procedures: Determine how you are going to manage the various clients and their different configurations. Define a process for configuration changes.

2. Document the various settings, per scenario, that are required to implement the solution. These include:

	Message types and fields;
	Filter objects;
	Serialization;
	Push Vs Pull;
	Immediate Vs background processing;
	Conversion rules;
	Centrally managed on which system?; and
	...

3. Future flexibility must be catered for in the design. This is especially important when considering the organization structure as certain scenarios require certain control data to be in synch across the various clients. This is difficult to change once implemented...

4. Audit requirements for transaction scenarios must be noted and designed for. Consider archiving, audit message types.

5. Consider the potential technical impact of the proposed ALE solution ito disk & processor utilization, network usage, dialog & background processing. Archiving strategy as well as disaster recovery planning

6. Sign-off the design together with the business.

Other considerations

ALE migration to production strategy and timing.

	ALE Naming Standards - Set the standards for all configuration.
	ALE Design Document - Details business process, functional impact, technical impact boundaries, workflow requirements, timing of jobs, ...
	ALE Change Management Procedure - Schematic diagram of up to date client configuration status, configuration change request procedure, ALE configuration checksheet.
	ALE Configuration Sign-Off Procedure - Agree on the process to follow during QA and Production phases of the project. During production, transactions cannot be posted to test the correctness of the solution...
	ALE Migration Strategy - How are you going to put the various clients into production, timing, implications on business processes.