Applications Inventory and Attributes

Description — The current stage of the application in its defined lifecycle: Proposed (approved for development or evaluation), Active (deployed and in operational use), Deprecated (designated for planned retirement but still operational), or Retired (decommissioned and removed from service).

Benefit(s) — The foundational governance attribute that determines which processes, policies, and governance obligations apply to the application at any given time. Without lifecycle status, the portfolio cannot distinguish between what is running, what is being phased out, and what has already been retired — making every portfolio-level count, cost calculation, and governance report unreliable.

Source — Manually Entered.

Examples — Active (Salesforce CRM, currently in production use), Deprecated (legacy CRM scheduled for retirement Q3 2027), Proposed (new AI analytics platform under evaluation)

Notes — Valid values: Proposed, Active, Deprecated, Retired. Only Active applications generate ongoing cost and operational obligations. Deprecated applications should have a Planned Retirement Date populated. Retired applications are retained for historical record only.

Description — The date on which the application was formally proposed or added to the portfolio pipeline for evaluation, development, or procurement authorization.

Benefit(s) — Enables calculation of time-in-proposal, identification of stalled initiatives that have been in Proposed status longer than governance standards permit, and provides the starting point for full lifecycle duration analysis.

Source — Manually Entered.

Description — The date on which the application was formally approved by the relevant governance body for development, procurement, or deployment.

Benefit(s) — Closes the loop between proposal and approval, enabling governance cycle time analysis and providing the audit trail required to demonstrate that investment authorization followed the organization's defined governance process.

Source — Manually Entered.

Description — The date on which the application was first deployed to its production environment and made available to its intended users — the definitive start of the application's active operational life.

Benefit(s) — Combined with current date, enables calculation of application age — a primary input to technical debt assessment, End-of-Life risk evaluation, and identification of legacy applications whose architecture may predate current standards by many years.

Source — Manually Entered.

Description — The date on which the application formally entered Deprecated status — still operational but officially designated for planned retirement.

Benefit(s) — Marks the beginning of the deprecation window and enables tracking of how long applications remain deprecated before retirement. Applications that stay in Deprecated status for extended periods represent unresolved governance obligations and accumulated technical and financial risk.

Source — Manually Entered.

Description — The date on which the application was formally decommissioned, removed from operational service, and its record closed as Retired in the inventory.

Benefit(s) — Closes the application record with a definitive retirement date, enabling lifecycle duration analysis and providing the organizational record of when the application's operational life ended.

Source — Manually Entered.

Description — The target date by which the application is expected to be retired or reach its end of organizational life, where known and committed.

Benefit(s) — Enables proactive planning for application decommissioning, successor application preparation, data migration, and user transition — all of which require substantial lead time that organizations consistently underestimate when retirement planning begins only after the decision is made.

Source — Manually Entered.