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

2 Agenda The Beginning The Journey The Dream

3 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

4 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

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

6 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

7 Horizontal Integration 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. ACE LDM ACE ConOps ACE BPA

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

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

10 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

11 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

12 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

13 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

14 Information Sharing ACE LDM ISSs NIEM PGA DEs WCO DM ITDS SDS 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)

15 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)

16 Requirements ACE LDM ACE Require- ment ACE Release PDM

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

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

19 Data Transition ACE LDM ACE Release PDM Source System PDM

20 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.

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

22 The Big Picture: Realizing the Dream

23 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

24 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 –…

25 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….

26 Questions? Deborah L. Brooks Principal Technologist Cairo Corporation Phone: