Extensive performance testing????

During the development of IF there was extensive performance testing done. They have a stateless server architecture with 8 or more application servers running independently....

I'm sorry, we must be talking about a different bank. The biggest lesson to learn from IF is how NOT to organise a major IT project. Any 'extensive' performance testing at the outset obviously came to the conclusion that performance wasn't a priority - why else was a major performance enhancement project initiated in 2002. The Project Management at IF in those early halcyon days of six figure contrator salaries was diabolical, resulting in a software system that was tightly coupled and near impossible to refactor, as well as a database schema that is frankly an embarrassment. Then in 2003 a major refactoring project is initialised. The result? Nine months late delivery, twice the estimated budget, and a whole new architectural tier inserted into the system, making it more complex and slower.

And they do not have 8 application servers. There are three unix boxes running 20 odd instances of the mid-tier codebase, none of which are very well clustered.

Project management has improved at IF over the years, but they're going to run into further problems owing to their database setup. Watch this space.......