Cairo Corporation An Inc 500 Company

The Dream of a Common Language: Extending the Role of the Logical Data Model DAMA-NCR Meeting January 10, 2006 Deborah L. Brooks Cairo Corporation An Inc 500 Company ISO9001:2000 CERTIFIED 8(a) ۰SDB ۰WOB ۰GSA ۰GSA STARS

Agenda • The Beginning • The Journey • The Dream

Background Automated Commercial Environment (ACE) Program • First focus of the Customs & Border Protection (CBP) Modernization Initiative • Supports CBP’s priority mission by: • Assisting in targeting high-risk cargo • Improving previous measures against the threat of terrorists and terrorist weapons • Expediting legitimate trade

The Beginning • The ACE Logical Data Model (LDM) • Representation of the information needs for cargo-related business operations • Foundation for physical database design for ACE releases • Contains: • 50 Subject Areas • 925 Entities • 10084 Attributes

Impressive, but is it right? • Desired LDM characteristics: • Complete • Correct • Consistent • Integrity • Aligned • Integrated

The Journey • ACE LDM Validation Goals • Confirmation of existing entities, attributes and relationships • Identification of: • Missing entities, attributes and relationships • Incorrect relationships • Redundant entities, attributes and relationships • Unused / irrelevant entities and attributes

Horizontal Integration ACE ConOps ACE LDM ACE BPA • Notes: • ACE Concept of Operations (ConOps) contains high-level business process flows. • ACE Business Process Architecture (BPA) is currently under development. The CBP • Enterprise Business Process Architecture (EBPA) and ACE Release Business • Processes (BPs) were used as a proxy for ACE BPA.

DHS CDM CBP ECDM Vertical Alignment – Top Down ACE LDM • New Acronyms: • Department of Homeland Security (DHS) • Enterprise Conceptual Data Model (ECDM)

Vertical Alignment – Bottom Up ACE LDM ACE Release PDM • New Acronyms: • Physical Data Model (PDM)

Benefits • Cross-validation of other architecture artifacts (ECDM, BPA) • (Identification of process overlaps across ACE releases) • Easy identification of implementation timeframe through color-coding of ACE LDM entities by ACE Release • Positioned to support federal information-sharing initiatives such as the Federal Enterprise Architecture (FEA) Data Reference Model (DRM) at either a logical or physical level

Information Sharing • Extended the links to the ACE LDM for: • Information Sharing Stakeholders • Mapped ACE LDM to external organizations • Indicated if organization is a Consumer of data from ACE or Provider of data to ACE • Standard Trade data interface

International Trade Data Set Standard Data Set • Collection, use and dissemination of trade and transport data • Supports the international trade process and U.S. border regulations and enforcement responsibilities • Contains 1060 standardized data elements representing the harmonization of 8900 agency data elements from 21 Participating Government Agencies

International Trade Data Set Standard Data Set Links • Participating Government Agency Data Elements • World Customs Organization Trade Data Model • Parallel data harmonization effort • Facilitates the exchange of information between government agencies that regulate international trade • National Information Exchange Model (NIEM) • NIEM 0.2 Pilot • New International Trade domain

NIEM ITDS SDS WCO DM PGA DEs Information Sharing ACE LDM ISSs • New Acronyms: • Information Sharing Stakeholders (ISSs) • International Trade Data Set (ITDS) Standard Data Set (SDS) • Participating Government Agency (PGA) Data Elements (DEs) • World Customs Organization (WCO) • National Information Exchange Model (NIEM)

Benefits • Traceability of WCO and PGA synonyms to ACE LDM attributes to ACE Release PDM attributes • Identification of all ACE information-sharing stakeholders, including those PGAs participating in ITDS, and the definition of Communities of Interest (COIs)

Requirements ACE LDM ACE Require- ment ACE Release PDM

Benefits • Traceability of requirements to ACE releases • Confirm scope of release implementation for data (and process)

Data Transition • Associate source system data structure to target ACE Release data structure • Use ACE LDM as common denominator

Data Transition ACE LDM Source System PDM ACE Release PDM

Benefits • Ensure transition of data to same logical concept • Reduced complexity of mapping effort; map each source system data structure once to ACE LDM regardless of how many ACE releases are involved • Same principle applies for one-way data conversion or ongoing data exchange. Target data structure can be a PDM, LDM, COTS, Interface parameter, etc.

ACE LDM Source System PDM ACE Release PDM Data Transition – Data Quality Business Rule Quality Objective Quality Assess- ment

The Big Picture: Realizing the Dream

LDM Role Extension • Uses the ACE LDM a a fulcrum to to support • Information sharing • Data Transition • Requirements Traceability • in addition to more traditional role of depicting business data requirements and driving physical database design • ACE LDM moves from an architecture artifact to an active, integral role in the management of information in the CBP enterprise

Technical Implementation • Most links are documented in Telelogic’s System Architect (SA); Business Rules, Quality Objectives and Assessments are in MS Access • Added new SA Definition Types: • Business Organization • Validation Reference • ConOps Scenario Step • Business Process Definition • Use Case • EBPA Process • ECDM Conceptual Entity • PGA Alias • …

What’s Next • TBD, but could include: • NIEM Mapping for full ACE LDM content • Additional taxonomies to support information sharing at a federal level • Leverage ACE LDM for Data Governance activities such as definition of data stewards and owners, data security and privacy requirements, data retention requirements, etc. • Limited only by our imagination….

Questions? Deborah L. Brooks Principal Technologist Cairo Corporation Phone: 703 667-4920 E-mail: dbrooks@cairocorp.com

Cairo Corporation An Inc 500 Company