Inside eRA, June 7, 2001

Electronic Grant Folders -- On the Way to e-Grant Processing

With a click of the new Grant Folder button, users can now access electronic copies of many of the documents currently filed in the traditional paper Grant Folder. Demonstrated at the recent Enterprise and Extension Systems Workshop and implemented in the May 18 IMPAC II releases for Grants Management, QuickView, Review, Receipt and Referral and ICO, the Grant Folder concept is generating a great deal of enthusiasm in the user community.

In its initial implementation, the Grant Folder includes the following documents: PI grant history (brief live report); PI grant history (detailed live report); current summary statement; prior summary statements; abstract and notice(s) of grant award. NIH is currently conducting several scanning pilots. The majority of NIAID AIDS applications from the last Council round may be viewed through the Grant Folder; your feedback is welcome. There are still internal technical issues related to security and performance that are being researched for a long-term solution to displaying grant images. It is expected that by next summer, the majority of applications received by CSR will be scanned and that response time for retrieving the images will be five seconds or less.

The requirement for the Grant Folder originated in Peer Review, but because of its universal appeal, the folder will be launched in all business areas and made customizable to serve the needs of each business area. Grant Folder access from the QuickView module is illustrated in these two screenshots: the Grant Folder button and the resulting screen. (Please note that the Grant Folder button appears after a QuickView search has been executed.) For its contribution to eliminating paper and increasing staff productivity, the Grant Folder represents an important step in conquering the information management frontier.

First NIH Workshop on Extramural Enterprise and Extension Systems: Instructive and Productive

Over 500 staff members recently had the opportunity to learn more about NIH systems that support extramural research and about exciting opportunities for the near future: e-grants and Grant Folders, e-progress reports, virtual meetings, web-based review and portal technology. Held at the Natcher Conference Center on May 10, the workshop provided an overview of the eRA Project, highlights and demonstrations of IMPAC II and IC extension systems as well as a glimpse of what's to come.

In his opening remarks, Dr. John McGowan, eRA Project Manager, explained FY 2003 eRA plans for capitalizing on new technology to increase the ways in which the community can use functionality in the Commons and IMPAC II to improve productivity and efficiency. The examples of portal technology and the universal module present new paradigms for accessing information and conducting our day-to-day business.

Organized by Dr. Thorsten A. Fjellstedt on behalf of the eRA Project Team, this energizing initial workshop served as a forum for the exchange of information about current capabilities and future technologies. Group Advocates, developers and lead system users were on hand to give demonstrations, answer questions and, most importantly, to elicit feedback from attendees. In her address at the closing plenary session, Dr. Wendy Baldwin, Deputy Director for Extramural Research, emphasized the need for community engagement and participation in the eRA enterprise. "Everyone has to be a change agent in his [or her] own office."

As a result of strong interest expressed by IMPAC II users, the eRA Project Team is actively exploring the technical feasibility of incorporating several extension systems (or selected features) into the enterprise system. Similarly, the very positive user response to portals may serve to accelerate deployment of this new technology. Further details on workshop outcomes will be published in future newsletters.

Special recognition is due to Dr. Fjellstedt, Joseph J. Januszewski (CIT), Paul R. Jordan (NIEHS), Jen de la Cruz for her outstanding poster, Tim Twomey, Felicia Shingler and the entire eRA User Support staff for their contribution to making the workshop a success.

Workshop presentation slides and photographs are available through the eRA website. Video of the plenary sessions may be viewed by NIH staff, courtesy of NIH VideoCasting.

18-Month Implementation Timeline Now Available

The eRA implementation timeline charted out to September 2002 is now available on the project web site. Gantt charts display projected dates for analysis, development and deployment of major eRA initiatives that have been defined and prioritized by the user community.

Dr. Belinda Seto to Serve in Dual Role

Dr. Belinda Seto, Director of the OER Office of Reports and Analysis and Group Advocate for Data Quality, has assumed a second advocacy role on the eRA Project Management Team, that of Group Advocate for OER Requirements. In this capacity, Dr. Seto will collect requirements from OER and will establish an implementation team to advise her on prioritization and to guide and monitor resulting initiatives. All FY 2002 OER requirements should be submitted to Dr. Seto by June 15, accompanied by a justification specifying requesting group, purpose and timeframe.

Moving Your Priorities Forward -- A Team Effort

Meet the team that works for you. Group Advocates, Analysts, Developers, Planning and Evaluation staff work together to meet the needs of the community. As the eRA Project picks up speed, the critical partnership of these key players becomes increasingly important. Their cooperative efforts to move the project forward in accordance with established priorities and timelines are central to eRA's success.

The Group Advocate represents a business or functional area. He/she works directly with the community to identify requirements and establish priorities. The Group Advocate makes decisions at critical points, monitors the project and serves as leader, liaison and spokesperson.

The Analyst is a software engineer with expertise in a business or functional area. He or she works with the Group Advocate to develop implementation plans by translating the business requirements into technical specifications and resource requirements. The Analyst also serves to monitor the progress of the project.

The Development Team programs the modules according to the specifications, tests, implements and monitors the system.

Planning and Evaluation staff members facilitate the project groups, document actions and decisions, monitor the project and communicate issues, decisions and actions through the newsletter, web site and other vehicles.

Look for an article in our next issue on the eRA decision process that defines the involvement and interaction of team members from the introduction of a new requirement to the production implementation of a software solution.

DUNS Numbers: Potential New Identifiers for Grantee Organizations?

At its May 8 meeting, the eRA Project Team endorsed the concept of moving to DUNS numbers -- the Dun & Bradstreet Universal Number System -- as successor to IPF identifiers for NIH grantee organizations. DUNS numbers are currently used to track more that 62 million businesses worldwide; they have become the standard for all US Federal Government electronic commerce transactions. A contractor must have a DUNS number in order to do business with Uncle Sam.

Since the 1960s, the NIH has employed a 7-digit IPF number to identify grantee organizations. As the population of grantee organizations continues to increase, the number of available IPF combinations is becoming limited. Within the year, it will be necessary to move to an 8-digit IPF, a difficult transition involving extensive software implementation changes. The IPF system also lacks the flexibility and universality to serve the NIH grantee community efficiently as the NIH moves forward with participation in the trans-governmental Federal Commons electronic grants administration.

Based on the endorsement of DUNS by the Project Team, the proposal was presented to representatives of the extramural community at the Commons Working Group (CWG) meeting on May 16 for their consideration and comment. For additional information, see the eRA white paper entitled "Proposed Implementation of the DUNS Number as a Unique Identifier for NIH Grantee Organizations".

Committee Management Module Slated for Redesign in New Architecture

The eRA Project Team recently announced that Committee Management (CM) will be the first IMPAC II module to be redesigned using Java 2, Enterprise Edition (J2EE), an N-tiered architecture for the development and implementation of complex business applications for the Internet. "We are very excited to have the opportunity to redesign the Module using the latest web technology," commented Claire Benfer, CM Group Advocate. "After weighing alternatives based on input from many different sources and consideration of the users' needs, we opted to wait for J2EE since it provides the best platform for achieving redesign objectives."

The current CM Module is a client/server application that facilitates the management and maintenance of NIH Federal advisory committees. With 141 chartered committees, the largest number of any Executive Branch agency, and thousands of current and past committee members, CM stores more data in IMPAC II than any other module. The software helps manage the information associated with establishing, amending and rechartering committees, and nominating and appointing members. Other functions include setting up meetings, creating rosters, uploading data, and generating Federal Register notices.

Making the software more user friendly, "flattening" navigation, improving workflow, and integrating CM with other applications are the highest priorities identified by CM users who include Scientific Review and Evaluation (SREA) staff, Grants Technical Assistants (GTAs), IC Committee Management Office staff (IC CMOs), and the Office of Federal Advisory Committee Policy (OFACP). Requirements for the redesign emerged from a survey of the user community; the CM Users Group then ordered these requirements by importance. Developers are currently doing a complete business analysis based on the identified priorities.

Deployment of the redesigned CM Module is dependent on the installation of J2EE and the successful implementation of the Commons using the new architecture. Throughout the development year, minor enhancements and bug fixes will continue to be installed on the client/server version (currently 3.9.5.0) approximately every 60 days.

Steering Committee Approves New Population Tracking Module

On April 19, contingent on funding by the NIH, OD, the eRA Steering Committee approved plans for a new IMPAC II Population Tracking module to comply with a Congressional mandate that the NIH collect data on the inclusion of women and minorities in clinical research.

The plan endorsed by the Steering Committee is the result of more than a year of collaborative effort by the Population Tracking Focus Group. This team, with broad representation from the Office of Extramural Research (OER), the Center for Information Technology (CIT), the Office of Research on Women's Health (ORWH) and the ICs, recently published its recommendations in a Critical Design Review (CDR) document.

A GAO report issued in August 2000 served as impetus for the proposed Population Tracking module. The GAO report concluded that existing NIH COBOL systems were deficient in monitoring the inclusion policy as defined by P.L. 103-43. In response, the ORWH requested a full business re-engineering of Population Tracking and funded the CDR to identify requirements and recommend solutions. Although the NIH pledged to improve inclusion tracking and reporting, no funds were allocated in the FY 2001 eRA budget to build a new system.

In accordance with eRA policy for addressing special requests, Project Manager Dr. John McGowan presented the CDR proposal to the Steering Committee for consideration. He assured members that Population Tracking development would not compromise established eRA priorities. In fact, the programming would serve as groundwork for capabilities that need to exist in the new Commons.

In addition to tracking extramural grants, the new module will be designed to update IMPAC II with population data from NIH contracting and intramural activities. Development efforts are about to commence now that $250,000 in independent funds have been provided to the project.

Data Quality Improvement Contract Awarded to QRC

A contract to address personal identifier data problems in IMPAC II and the NIH Commons has been awarded to QRC, a division of the Macro International Corporation. This award follows Steering Committee approval of spending $6 million over a three-year period to clean up existing People data anomalies and to ensure data integrity in the future. Data quality improvement ranks third on eRA's list of top priorities.

The contract statement of work defines three main tasks. The first is to uncover the data errors and to identify their source. This activity will be most intense during the base year but will continue throughout the life of the contract. The second task, correcting existing data, will consume about one third of contract resources each year. Finally, developing a plan for improvement, i.e., designing an environment that reduces the risk of future data input/update errors, is the contractor's third major task.

The Commons Working Group (CWG) is also seeking ways to improve personal profile data quality. One proposal under discussion is single point of ownership, i.e., the profile is considered personal property and cannot be modified without the owner's approval. See the next issue of Inside eRA for more on the recommendations of the CWG.

The eRA Data Quality Group held its first working meeting with QRC on Friday, June 1. Contact Group Advocate Belinda Seto at setob@od.nih.gov or Project Officer Robert F. Moore at moorerf@od.nih.govfor more information. Also see the April 4 article on data profile issues.

Portal Technology -- The Key to New Paradigms

Endorsed by the eRA Project Team and Steering Committee, and enthusiastically received at the May 10 workshop, portal technology presents exciting new paradigms for the way we use computers in the workplace. With development planned in conjunction with the redesign of the IMPAC II and Commons systems, you can expect to see the benefits in 2003-2004. Portals will enable NIH staff and our partners to access all authorized extramural information and services from a single personalized screen.

Concurrent with the eRA initiative, CIT is developing an NIH "umbrella" portal to provide access to general NIH-wide applications. The CIT portal demonstration was also very well received at the May 10 workshop. The eRA and CIT portal implementations will function together to provide web consistency across the NIH as well as an entry site for extramural staff. eRA is working on the vertical integration for IMPAC II applications and, at the same time, collaborating with CIT to ensure that vertical portals will integrate with the horizontal portals being developed for the entire NIH enterprise.

The upgrade to Oracle 9iAS will provide the foundation and tools for creating a portal environment for eRA. Instead of logging on to multiple systems to perform their tasks, users will be able to access all systems with a single logon. Instead of selecting the appropriate application, database or document to accomplish a specific objective, users will interact with information in user-friendly portlets never seeing or caring about the underlying application or technology. By extension, action and alert systems can be constructed that present a personalized "to do" list with links to the appropriate transaction system.

There is no single definition of portal technology. It is best understood as a collection of capabilities used to present an integrated, role-based view of each user's business world. Oracle 9iAS Portal is completely web-based, requiring only a standard browser. A single log on brings the user to his pre-defined initial screen (often called a "launch pad"). Depending on the user's role (e.g., Help Desk staff, Program Official, SRA), the system delivers different content, different views, different applications and different links from self-contained components (called "portlets"). Authentications are based on network security and directory services such as the NIH Enterprise Directory (NED), which contains a unique ID for each user and identifies the services and facilities authorized for use.

In his presentation on May 10, Mr. Kalpesh Patel of the Oracle Corporation presented, as proof of concept, sample web pages proposed for Program Officials. On the My Home page, one portlet contains favorite links to external web sites; another displays the NIH People Search form. From the collaborative calendar portlet, the user can view a list of meetings by clicking on a particular day. On the My PO Home page, there are several action and alert portlets with personalized lists of items requiring the user's attention (e.g., grants awaiting sign-off). These portlets are tied to the real-time transaction system, enabling the user to extract details, modify the view and perform updates.

The eRA Project Team welcomes feedback on portals. Please email your comments to NIH eRA Support at nihera@od.nih.gov.

Universal Module May Provide Much Needed Flexibility

The concept of a Universal Module (UM) has been proposed to the community as a solution for developing a single enterprise system that will accommodate variation in who initiates, approves, and needs to be informed of key transactions occurring between ICs or research institutions in IMPAC II or the Commons. The UM concept is important to the eRA goal of developing an integrated system able to serve the needs of the decentralized NIH community. Supporting 3-4 layers of authorities, the UM will essentially allow the ICs and partner institutions to have control of assigning rights to their respective staff.

The processing of a 901 Transfer Request can be used to illustrate how a Universal Module can accommodate differing business practices. In the example screen shots, the initiating Institute X has a different chain of approval than the receiving Institute Y. The UM honors the business rules of each institute for 901 processing.

The issue of institutional approval of grant applications prior to submission has been built into the current NIH Commons design, as exemplified in e-SNAP. The Universal Module is in keeping with such an approval hierarchy, and so could also serve the needs of our partner institutions that have multiple and varying layers of approval. This concept is therefore being considered in the design of the new Commons.

The eRA Project Team welcomes feedback on the UM concept. Please email your comments to NIH eRA Support at nihera@od.nih.gov.

New IMPAC II Manuals Now Online

TechView Volume I

With the online publication of TechView Volume I (Version 6.0) this March, the entire IMPAC II community can now access the same OLTP reference manual used by developers and database administrators. The searchable, 1700-page, PDF document is available on the IMPAC II documentation page.

The TechView I manual provides the following documentation on the OLTP production database: 

• the structure and characteristics of the database at a logical and physical level;  
• data model standards;  
• data conversion cross references;  
• IMPAC II reporting concepts;  
• sample access sessions.

TechView Volume II, documentation for the IMPAC II IRDB database, is also available at the same site. The most current version (2.1) was published in December 2000.

You can print the TechView manuals centrally at CIT by clicking on the "View/Print on Demand" link, located just below the Volume 2 description. Note that you will need a CIT account/initials and RACF password to use this function. The discounted rate for printing Volume I during off-peak hours is approximately $35 per copy.

User's Guides for Grants Management and Maintaining Program Class Codes in ICO

The new GM User's Guide Version 1.9.2.0 (May 7, 2001) and the User's Guide for Maintaining Program Class Codes in ICO (May 18, 2001) are available at http://odoerdb2.od.nih.gov/oer/impac/doc/doc.htm.

IMPAC II Training Opportunities

The Human Resource Development Division (HRDD) has scheduled the following IMPAC II courses this summer:

Claire Benfer, Committee Management Group Advocate, is pleased to announce three new CM classes tailored to specific user needs. Please contact Mr. Ajoy Gadhok at 301-402-3384 or gadhoka@od.nih.gov if you are interested in enrolling in one of the classes below.

For more information, visit the HRDD website or contact Mr. Gadhok.

New IMPAC II Releases

In response to user requests for advance notification, new IMPAC II releases will be announced in Inside eRA one month prior to deployment. Following is a list of the upgrades implemented on May 18. Go to the IMPAC II main page for details and links to release notes.

* See next month's Inside eRA for an article on the Common Subproject Module which permits ICO users to enter, validate, edit and delete subprojects