You have a new Business Register – Now What You have a new Business Register – Now What? Presented to International Roundtable on Business Survey Frames– Wiesbaden Group on Business Registers Eddie Salyers Eddie.Joe.Salyers@Census.GOV 301-763-2638
Background New Business Register Fall 2002 Complete Redesign Oracle
Expanded and New Work Quality Assurance User Support and Training “Re” redesign System Upgrades Security New Functionality
Quality Assurance Most at time of update New Register Administrative Records prior to loading Survey data at data capture Edits to check for inconsistencies New Register Compare old to new Validate all links Month to Month Comparisons
User Support Business Register User’s Group The Business Register Users Group (BRUG) is a forum that provides opportunities to: Inquire about the content and structure of the Business Register. Get answers to processing and sampling issues related to Business Register data. Gain access to the latest Business Register enhancements.
User Support Business Register User’s Group Objectives Educate Inform Explore Communicate
User Support Training Fundamentals 2 Days BR Roles and uses Concepts and definitions Company Structure Administrative Records Economic Census and Company Organization Survey
User Support Training Interactive System New Routines New Staff 1 Day Classes of 1 to 15 as requested Hands on New Routines New Staff
Re-redesign Modifications based on initial production Issues Complexity Performance
Re-redesign Proposed fixes Simplify structure of links Links tables designed to identify all possible combinations resulting in flexible but complex system Simplified structure based on how links actually used Change required updates to hundreds of software routines Project approved but discontinued due to lack of time
Re-redesign Proposed fixes Denormalize Denormalization is the process of attempting to optimize the performance of a database by adding redundant data. (Wikipedia) Combine data frequently used in searches to improve performance Project Completed Successfully Search time decreased from 10 minutes to seconds
System Upgrades Old system “frozen” Oracle Frequent updates Many include security patches Conversion from VMS to Linux/Blade Time consuming / unexpected problems
Security New security requirements VA lost laptop Removal of all SSNs from BR
New Functionality Planned development not completed Creating multiple establishment companies Large Company Review tools New demands / opportunities Company reporting summary Summary of locations by industry
Conclusion User support critical to success and challenging QA New opportunities for software tools New demands Security Technology
Conclusion New system paid off More efficient processing Better customer service New development opportunities available Improved usability