Here’s list of criteria (prioritized) we use to evaluate solutions/services to assess them from operational operational perspective. For this to make sense in your environment you should select only those that apply, add missing items and review priorities.
| Domain | Check | Priority |
|---|---|---|
| Security | TLS (or other type of encryption) support | High |
| Security | HTTP to HTTPS redirection support | Low |
| Security | Account lock-out policies | Medium |
| Security | Password complexity policies | Medium |
| Security | LDAP/AD support for user authentication | Medium |
| Security | LDAP/AD support for user authorization | Low |
| Compliance | Groups supported (to manage permissions for multiple users) | High |
| Compliance | Roles supported (to manage permissions for multiple users/groups) | Low |
| Compliance | Groups complies with naming convention established | Medium |
| Audit | Logging to remote destination (Syslog) | Medium |
| Audit | Ability to reproduce user’s actions from the logs | Low |
| Availability | Clustered / HA design | Medium |
| Reliability | Backup process | High |
| Reliability | Incremental backup process | Medium |
| Scalability | Horizontal (adding more nodes) | Medium |
| Scalability | Vertical (adding more resources within a node) | High |
| Maintenance | Non-disruptive backups | High |
| Maintenance | Non-disruptive upgrades | Low |
| Maintenance | Non-disruptive integrity/consistency checks | Medium |
| Maintenance | Administrative task automation through CLI or open API | Medium |
| Maintenance | Support by Vendor | High |
| Maintenance | Support SLA | Medium |
| Maintenance | Community size | Medium |
| Maintenance | Documentation availability and completeness | High |
| Maintenance | Training/Certification available for service/solution | Low |
| Maintenance | Standard monitoring interfaces (such as SNMP) supported | Low |
| Vendor lock-in | Relative use of open/proprietary technologies | Medium |
| Vendor lock-in | Data migration path to at least 1 other vendor is available | High |
| Vendor lock-in | Number of business-critical features missing in other’s vendors solutions | Medium |
| Life-cycle | Product road-map visibility | Low |
| Life-cycle | Data archival/retrieval process | Medium |
| Life-cycle | Vendor reputation / reliability | Medium |
| Life-cycle | Solution disposal / de-commission strategy | Low |