ER A U P D ATE

ACERA

November 6th and 7th 2012

Items2

Status Operations and Maintenance

Corrective and Adaptive

Data at Rest

Q&A

November 2012ACERA Brief

Operational Status3

Operations:NARA and the operations and maintenance contractor, IBM, have been

successfully sustaining the ERA instances since award was made in February.

NARA Operations Staff, not the contractor, are now managing annual HW and SW licenses.

Based on a recent survey the overall level of satisfaction for the ERA helpdesk is at approximately 80%.

In addition, the overall user satisfaction results showed an increase in user satisfaction for 8 of the 11 areas questioned.

 November 2012ACERA Brief

Right Sizing Operations4

Problem: The current data center at ABL is at or near capacity. Physical space is limited. Cooling is near capacity. Electrical consumption has increased from an average of 281,922 KWH / month to

373,226 KWH / month. Production equipment is at or near end of life.

Options: Plan for Additional Growth vs. Data Center Consolidation Two of ERA’s TDL’s will support OMB’s Federal Data Center Consolidation Initiative

(FDCCI) Cloud TDL #3 – Will move the bulk of the Test and Development infrastructure into the

cloud, thus freeing up space in the ABL data center and reducing power consumption. Refresh TDL #4 – Phase 1 will reduce 17 racks of equipment to 3 racks, thus freeing space

in the ABL data center and significantly reducing power consumption. Additional phases will ensure that equipment is upgraded/refreshed as appropriate.

November 2012ACERA Brief

Corrections and Adaptations Status

August 2012ISSC Budget Brief

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Enhancements To address the remaining challenges with ERA, the program office and business requirements

group (BRG) members are identifying and prioritizing enhancement tasks. NARA has triggered three (3) technical direction letters (TDLs) based on these desired enhancements.

TDL #1 (completed 9/12) enhances Base search and file download functionality. TDL #2 (in process) will correct performance problems with Base. TDL #3 (in process) will correct errors in and adapt the OPA instance as follows:

Correct a data ingest problem related to the Archival Research Catalogue (ARC). Correct NARA Reference Unit Names within OPA. Analysis and root cause determination of errors that occur when viewing OPA search results of 100 per page. Adapt reports on OPA server storage space, directory listings and files sizes, and usage and access statistics.

 

While a number of potential TDLs are under consideration, NARA has identified the following additional high priority tasks that will further enhance ERA: TDL 1c and 1d: Further Base search and download corrections and adaptations EOP Small Fix TDL: Which will correct a file export problem. EOP to OPA Integration TDL: Which will adapt OPA so that EOP records, including e-mail messages, will be

publicly available.

Overall Status

August 2012ISSC Budget Brief

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Challenges and SuccessesUser satisfaction with the system remains a concern. While there

are positive trends users are not completely happy with ERA.  This is a clear indicator that further system enhancements are needed. NOTE: Overall satisfaction with ERA is at 58% (up from 56% in April)

Successes: The unclassified Congressional Records Instance of ERA (CRI) was successfully

upgraded and established in a secure facility at Archives II. TDL #1 was successfully delivered. All known ERA licenses have been accounted for and annual support agreements

were triggered.

Corrective and Adaptive TDL Table7

November 2012ACERA Brief

FY 12

Corrective and Adaptive TDLs

TDL FY Description Awarded Completed / Projected Date

1a 12 Base Search and Download 5/11/2012 9/30/2012

1b 12 Base Performance Assessment 6/25/2012 10/30/2012

2 12 OPA Small Fixes 8/22/2012 2/12/2013

3 12 Development and Test in Cloud 9/25/2012 3/25/2013

4 12 Tech Refresh - NetApp Storage 9/25/2012 3/25/2013

FY 13

Corrective and Adaptive TDLs (Planned)TDL FY Description Awarded Estimated Date

1c 13 Reserved - Fix Performance N/A 5/15/2013

1d 13 Reserved - Re-establish Download N/A 7/15/2013

tbd 13 EOP Small Fixes N/A 4/15/2013

tbd 13 SE Small Fixes N/A 6/1/2013*

tbd 13 O&M Security and Operational Fixes N/A 8/1/2013

tbd 13 Integration between EOP and OPA - Implement design N/A 9/15/2013

tbd 13 Analyze and design an alternate site to support COOP N/A 4/28/2013

tbd 13 Complete Tech Refresh N/A 9/30/2013

Data at Rest Summary (see Archival Data-at-Rest white paper)

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NARA’s vision of “archival data-at-rest” is to ensure that Federal electronic records that are created and stored in the Cloud can also be archived and made publicly available in the Cloud.

As Federal agencies transition administrative systems and data storage to Cloud environments, increasing volumes of Federal records will be generated in these hosted environments.

As those records age, they will transition from “active” records to “inactive” records (infrequently referenced or changed) and will eventually be either archived or disposed of.

Inactive and archived electronic Federal records will become “data-at-rest”, which must be retained, managed, and preserved in an efficient and cost-effective manner.

Data-at-Rest eliminates the expensive and time consuming process of physical transfer and support (i.e., de-installation, transport, installation, data processing, operations and maintenance, annual support, etc.)

November 2012ACERA Brief

Q&A

August 2012ISSC Budget Brief