Authoritative
Identify the source of truth for each record and who is responsible for keeping it current.
VSS Business Solutions
Technology Documentation & Standards
Create useful operating records that support troubleshooting, security, continuity, vendor coordination, onboarding, and management decisions.
Documentation should help someone operate the environment
Maintain the information required to understand ownership, dependencies, access, configuration, and recovery.
Useful documentation is current enough to support a real decision or incident. VSS can organize inventories, network diagrams, service records, administrative access ownership, vendor contacts, licensing, warranties, procedures, recovery information, standards, and known exceptions.
Sensitive records must be stored with appropriate access control. The public website, ordinary email, and unprotected shared documents are not appropriate repositories for passwords or confidential system information.
Common documentation areas
- Users, devices, servers, networks, locations, applications, and cloud services
- Vendors, contracts, support contacts, account ownership, and renewal dates
- Network diagrams, addressing, connectivity, public services, and dependencies
- Administrative roles, recovery methods, access approvals, and credential ownership
- Backup, continuity, recovery, escalation, onboarding, and offboarding procedures
- Technology standards, approved exceptions, lifecycle, and project records
Documentation principles
The format should be maintainable and appropriate to the client environment.
Protected
Separate confidential access information from general diagrams, inventories, and procedures.
Usable
Write for the person who must troubleshoot, recover, approve, replace, or explain the system.
Establish a usable technology record.
Identify the systems, locations, vendors, access records, procedures, and management questions the documentation must support.