• When loading import xml in config wizard then no error msg
• Rollback of of MetaMart Instances is broken with error message
• Variable is undefined: ‘z793c0cfc31′
• Bitty browser prevents user from adding more content to portal
• Text falls outside of menu in Data mart
• Cannot search for items containing chinese characters
• Importing domain fails on dimensions
• ‘Live records’ edit screen doesn’t render properly when language is set to dutch
• Dimensions linked to wrong dimension element during meta mart import
• In live pareto graph the selection of Dim.CI Category is extremely slow.
• Collector should handle getutcdate() in historical collections
• Collector should do historical collections of non metamart metrics

Also note that from version 4.3 on we have changed our version numbering procedure:

• 4.3 is a major new version
• 4.3.0.1 is a patch release on 4.3
• 4.3.0.2 is a second patch release on 4.3
• 4.3.1 will be the first feature set
• 4.3.1.1 will be a patch release on 4.3.1
• 4.3.2 will be the second feature set, etc.

1. Service levels

KPIs may be used to measure (quality of) service levels of IT services such as network, applications, storage, email, etc. Examples of service levels are availability, performance, service failures, customer satisfaction, and (customer) support levels.

2. Finance

KPIs may be used to measure and monitor the financials of IT. Examples of finacial KPIs are costs of support, cost of units of IT services, cost of innovation, budget variances, Return on Investment (ROI), and asset value.

3. Maintenance and support

KPIs may be used to measure and monitor work related to keep existing IT services running as required by the business. Examples of KPIs in this category are workload (on e.g. incidents and changes), size of overdue work, and size of to-do queues.

4. Innovation

KPIs may be used to monitor IT innovation i.e. the delivery of new services in programs and projects . Examples of KPIs are budget and time variances, Return on Investment and Net Present Value, and resource utilization.

5. Security

KPIs may be used to measure IT security based on KPI such as detected intrusions and attacks, cost of patch management, latency in virus and spyware updates, and stopped and unstopped email spam.

6. Business to IT benchmarks

KPIs may be used to measure and benchmark business to IT ratios such as percentage of IT Budget to Total Revenues, percentage of outsourced labor and percentage of IT time invested in investment/innovation.

7. Human resources

KPIs may be used to manage the human capital in IT. Examples of KPIs in this category are average time and costs to recruit, absence rate, employee satisfaction, percentage of overtime and staff turnover.

8. (Out)sourcing

KPIs may be used to manage and control (out)sourcing based on costs, service levels, customer/supplier satisfaction.

9. Software development and quality assurance

KPIs may be used to measure quality of software development. Examples of KPIs in this category are number of defects in production, percentage of overdue software requirements, and percentage of work used for fixing bugs.

10. Compliancy

KPIs may be used to control compliance for e.g. Sarbanes Oxley and ISO 27002 (information security). KPIs in this category are used to verify compliance.”

This top 10 was brought to you by Mirror42 with usage data taken from KPI Library

Royal Dutch Shell will spend nearly $4 billion during the next five years on outsourcing contracts with AT&T, T-Systems and EDS. The petroleum giant awarded $1.6 billion to AT&T, $1 billion to T-Systems and $1 billion to EDS.

An amazing outsourcing deal. Surprisingly enough, Shell has gone with a multi-vendor outsourcing strategy rather then naming one of the MSP to take the lead and manage the others on behalf of Shell.

Now it is up to Shell to implement a framework that allows them to keep a tight contol on the entire supply chain. After all, the service is a sum of its components: The SAP environment managed by T-Systems -> over the network managed by AT&T -> to the desktops managed by EDS. My advise to Shell:

• A common set of KPI definitions and control framework for the IT supply chain
• A role and web-based information hub where all suppliers will participate
• Agreement on what KPI information the suppliers will share, how they will share and how often they will share.
• An audit trail on the reliability of this information

Such an information hub should allow Shell to monitor the costs & quality of services, and drive improvements across the entire IT supply chain. The result: there is an incentive for all vendors not only to focus on their own component, but also on the entire value chain.

If anyone at Shell is reading this and thinks this make sense…. We are Dutch & Direct too and we believe we can be of help in implementing a control framework for your outsourcing contracts.

Highlights

Save portal tab as PDF

This new feature allows saving a portal tab (dashboard) as a PDF document. This PDF document can be send by email for example.

Constants

Constants allow defining metrics that have a constant value, for example costs of people or other resources. These constants can be then used in formulas to calculate KPIs

Templates

Currently templates of domains and KPIs structures are stored in XML files. These XML files are for example used to generate KPI structures based on extracted Metamart instances from external data repositories. This new template feature will allow maintaining template structures in the Designer, and using these templates by applying them to create new structures in the Designer.

Option “top” instances in group-by portlets

In dashboard portlets that show dimension instances such as, for example, a pareto graph of open changes per workgroup, it is possible to show automatically the workgroups that have assigned the most changes.

Password encryption

Password encryption is enforced in prefs.inc, datasources and LDAP integration for security reasons.

Search box integrated in list

The search box is integrated in each list of items, making it easier to search and select items.

Meta Mart and metric maintenance enhancements

Several enhancements have been included to improve the maintenance of Meta Marts and metrics.

License registration

This new features allows on-line registration of the license.

Ability to design KPIs without target

This enhancement allows defining Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) without target. KPIs without target are not consolidated in the index of the domain (e.g. process, workgroup, SLA), but are available on the scorecards.

KPI Library available as templates

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) as available on www.kpilibrary.com are available as templates in Mirror42. This allows using a predefined set of KPIs for a large range of IT domains.

Furthermore numerous smaller enhancements have been implemented.

• Submit your KPIs to be included in the library
• Score KPIs to rate the importance of KPIs
• Bookmark KPIs to build your personal KPI lists
• Comment on KPIs to give your opinion

It is the objective of the KPI Library to be the single source for KPIs driven by its community members. The community decides which KPIs are best-rated and most-used.

Solved issues in 4.1.7:

• Performance issues with generate metrics
• Ability to sort on multiple columns
• Restriction on records in portlets set to 10000 instead of 1000
• Prevent double records for measurement - dimension combinations
• Prevent double records for measurements
• Change % and gap values were not correctly calculated for negative indexes and values
• Change % and gap values for controls did not take the control direction into account
• Check for javascript and cookies support before logging in
• Timeout error popup not only in monitors and portals, but also in other parts of the application
• Instances list not url encoded in pivot bar, pivot pie and pareto graph
• Better error messages when starting the application
• Create with template scrambles text when using Cyrillic characters
• Create with template fails with timeout when the database contains a lot of metrics
• Problem when copying Russian metrics to a formula
• Search for metrics sometimes returns “access denied”

Solved issues in 4.1.6:

• portals with live data and timeout do not seem to look at the commandtimeout parameter
• measurement dimensions can not be shown. Also other frames with tabs fail to show.
• installation pack does not have STARTPAGE constant in prefs.inc.sql
• metrics screen does not show metamart query on Datasource tab
• formulas with metric names with trailing spaces are parsed incorrectly
• metamart explorer does not show details of selections, functions, dimensions, fields and joins properly
• Create with template not stable with large number of services, workgroups and/or sla’s
• Performance bad in perf-metrics.asp on Oracle with large number of metrics and metricdimensions
• Not all dimensions were tested in test metamart
• Incorrectly reported missing element instances
• First record in details selection was not checked whether numeric or not
• Export of metric values result in very large xml files
• Default date to in search metric value was today, now today + 1 month
• Import metric values will introduce duplicates if time not equal to “00:00:00″
• user.asp saves user names in lower case. This restriction has been removed
• scripttimeout not present in testmetamart.asp
• input validation was not implemented on all url parameters and web form fields
• output validation was not implemented on all texts written to the browser
• now an audit log will be created in the logs directory
• restructure directories to have a dedicated web directory