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THE SYSTEMS DEVELOPMENT LIFE CYCLE

➢ Support
• The role of IT professionals does not end with delivery of the new system. They must support the
system and ensure that users can operate it satisfactorily.
• Support includes two main responsibilities: maintenance and user help.
• Maintenance consists of postimplementation debugging and updating (making changes and
additions), including adding features that were originally desired but later postponed so budget and
time limits could be met.
• Debugging is the correction of bugs or problems in programs that were not discovered during tests.
• Updating is revising the system to comply with changing business needs that occur after the
implementation phase.
• For example, if a company collects personal data for market analysis, managers might want to use
the new IS to collect more data, which might require new fields in the databases.