Existing life-cycles for the development of traditional information systems are shown to be inadequate for addressing expert system requirements. A life cycle for expert systems is constructed, outlining the tasks and activities to be performed at each stage of system development. The life cycle highlights the role of alternative development paradigms and the importance of social and organizational characteristics in system transfer to users. The operationalization of the ltfe­ cycle is illustrated through a case study, describing the their functionality, include project definition, require­ ments determination, logical design, physical design. testing and implementation activities’.2 The life-cycle approach rests on one fundamental assumption—that system requirements are well- defined and temporally static, at least in the short term3. This assumption has proved to be incompatible with the computing trends witnessed in the 1980s. As the usage of information technology permeated to more decision-oriented applications, an alternative development strategy called prototyping was proposed. development process and major architectural compo­ Prototyping, which prescribes iteration as nents of an expert system that configures air- conditioning units. Several important issues encoun­ tered in transferring the system from test to production mode and in system evaluation are highlighted. Such a life-cycle approach can enhance project management for expert systems.