SupportStep Glossary

This section contains definitions for a number of the terms used throughout SupportStep. Different companies may use different terms to refer to the same thing. The purpose of this section is to describe how the terms are used in SupportStep.

Application support: This refers to the general process of supporting internal business applications. It may also be called production support, systems support, or just support. (If your company sells software or services, you may have external customers as well. The support of the external customers that use software that your company sells does not fall under the heading of application support. Application support refers to internal applications only.)

Business applications (or just applications): These are computer systems that facilitate or automate one or more business processes. These systems can be developed internally, developed with third party resources, or they can be packaged solutions. However, they have a direct connection back to business processes that would otherwise be done manually. For instance, General Ledger Systems, Billing Systems, Marketing Systems, Inventory Systems, and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Systems are all business applications. Computer servers, databases, and facilities are not considered computer applications since they are not associated with specific business processes. They are more typically considered a part of the IT infrastructure since they enable people and applications to perform their functions better. However, they do not automate a business process by themselves. 

Clients: Everyone has customers, and in some companies they are called by different names. In SupportStep, the term "customers" refers to the external customers who purchase the products and services your company produces. SupportStep uses the term "business client" or "client" to refer to the internal customers that are the direct beneficiaries of the services provided by the support team.

Support: The term "support" is the generic name being used to describe the care and feeding of production applications, tools, systems, and processes. There are other terms that might be used in your company, such as "operations", "maintenance” and "baseline." The term "support" is used in SupportStep. 

Support Analyst: This term is used to describe the person or persons responsible for supporting a particular application. The primary support person for an application is called the Primary Support Analyst. The backup is called the Backup Support Analyst. It is possible (and likely) that a person could be the Primary Support Analyst on one or more applications and be a backup on others.

Product info: application support, project management, portfolio management, project office, PMO, program management training, project lifecycle management, program consulting, methodology development, project management training