Form 2 & Form 2A - Major and
Non-major Natural Gas Pipeline Annual Report

April 8, 2009 - Technical Notice: The IP address of the forms service has changed. The direct IP address is now 204.87.16.28, and the DNS entry to use for that address should be eforms1.ferc.gov. Please note that rimsweb2.ferc.gov is no longer a valid DNS entry and should not be used. If forms users are having difficulty communicating please check the FERC Address setting in the software as well as the corporate firewall settings to ensure eforms1.ferc.gov (or the new IP address) is being used.

Note: This also applies to Fom 3-Q - Comprehensive Quarterly Financial and Operating Report

Electronic Submission Software - Overview

Both Form 2 and 2A are handled by the same submission software. There is only one Form 2/2A Submission System. This also applies to Form 3-Q.

If you have not registered with FERC to use this software, you must email FERC Online Support at ferconlinesupport@ferc.gov for a PIN (personal identification number) for filing purposes. Your email must contain your name, email address, exact legal company name, address, phone and fax numbers. You will receive your PIN by return email.

Note: The Form 2/2A Software has been tested and will function correctly with Windows XP, Windows 2000, Windows 95 & Windows 98. The application has been updated to be compatible with text cut from Office 2000 documents and pasted into Footnotes and Notes to the Financials.

Installation Manual
The Form 2/2A Submission System Installation Manual is available for viewing and/or printing by your Web Browser. For anyone who is going to use the software, it is very important to read and understand those documents. In most cases, download, install, and operation are extremely simple and there are no problems. However, if your facility restricts Internet access via firewalls or proxies, certain additional options (inside the program) may need to be set before the program will work correctly. Also, if your facility uses Microsoft Windows NT, and if the NT settings have been set up to be very restrictive (e.g. a person is not allowed to install software on their own machine), other steps will be necessary. For example, if people do not have rights to install software on their machine, your IT department will have to 'unlock' the machine, allow the person to install the Form 2/2A software, and then 'lock' it back afterwards.

The first person to run the software will still need to download the database from FERC (the Installation Manual describes this in more detail). When that person downloads the database, it is highly recommended to place it on a network or shared drive so that multiple users could access it at the same time. If others install the software, they do not need to download the database again and again - they should simply 'point' to the same network location where the database was downloaded the first time. The system is fully multi-user capable. Even if only a single person will be editing the data, we recommend a network drive so that your system backup procedures will include the Form 2/2A database as well.

Internet Communications Problems
You will know when your workstation has Internet communication issues when; (a) long waits while checking for updates (b) unable to submit the Form 2/2A Filing, (c) unable to receive FERC software updates.

The Form 2/2A Submission System (F2SS) uses HTTP (to get the list of respondents for initial creation of your database - you only use this once), FTP Receive (to check for and deliver F2SS software updates) and FTP Send to submit your filing. These common Internet Communication Protocols may be blocked by your Internet Firewall for security reasons. This will require intervention by your computer or network support personnel. To assist in diagnosing this problem, we make available an Internet Communications Test Application - which you can download and run on your workstation just as you did the Form 2/2A Submission Software. Please see a description of this application below under Forms Communications Test Application.

The easiest and most effective solution is to ask your Firewall Administrator to install a rule in the Firewall permitting HTTP Send/Receive and FTP Send/Receive from IP 208.207.43.25. This presents a minimal security risk since all communication requests are issued by the Client (your workstation). In other words, in all instances, the FERC software on your workstation "requests" files from the FERC Forms Server. The FERC Forms Server does not "push" unsolicited information to your workstation. The FERC Forms Server (as well as all computer systems at FERC) are continuously monitored for virus "infection".

Form Communications Test Application
The FERC Forms Applications use the Internet to download the Form Submission Software (FSS), provide updates to the software on the user's workstation, and allow submission of forms data to the FERC via the Internet. Forms Submission Systems (FSS) include Form 1, Form 423, Form 6, Form 2/2A, and others that are currently in development.

To accomplish the above the user's PC communicates with an Internet server at the FERC which is dedicated to supporting the FSS. The FSS uses Internet communication protocols called HTTP and FTP.

Most respondent workstations are connected to a company network that uses Firewall technology to protect and isolate the network from the Internet. Occasionally, the company's Firewall is configured to prevent applications from communicating with foreign servers over the Internet. In these cases, the FERC Form Submission Software cannot communicate with the FERC Forms Server to obtain software updates, for transmission/submission of completed Forms, and, in the case of Forms Data Viewer software, the download of requested database information.

The Internet Test Application, which can be downloaded from the FERC Forms site via your Internet browser, is used to test Internet Communications from your workstation to the FERC Forms Server to determine compatibility with FSS. It is not a requirement to use this application, you will get the same results with the Form Submission Software. However, a number of respondents find it easier to let their network support personnel use this software to test the communications functionality without having to download the entire Form Submission software. When you run this software, it just displays a screen with a checkbox beside each type of communication mode used by the Forms software, and indicates whether each one passed or failed. The software also produces a log file of its activity for review and diagnostic purposes.