Electronic Submission of Massachusetts Crash Reports Dave Krasnow e

Introduction Dave Krasnow Software Development Manager EDS Massachusetts Registry of Motor Vehicles (Registry)

Project Background Registry Collects Data on Motor Vehicle Crashes 280,000 Crash Reports per Year –130,000 from Law Enforcement Officers –150,000 from Operators Mass Highway Department Primary User of Data for Safety Related Projects

Project History Prior System was 20 Years Old Location Data was unreliable Each State Collected Different Data Paper Form was sent via US Mail only Registry Clerk entered data from Paper Form (except narrative and diagram)

Crash Data System Federal funding was obtained to replace the old system New Paper Form based on MMUCC New Application for Collecting Data Locations Validated Electronic Submission

Birth of Electronic Submission At least eight RMS Vendors Supplying Software to Law Enforcement Agencies Prevented us from developing Crash Software and distributing Instead we needed a standard format for Data Exchange that RMS Vendors could implement

Choice of Format Proprietary EDI XML

Simplifies the Program Simplifies Data Transfer Simplifies Data Display Industry Standard Structures

Why We Chose XML Every other option was as complex or more complex than XML State of the Art Technology Versatile, Robust, Powerful We predicted easier acceptance from RMS Vendors than with other methods

The Design Create Electronic Submission Manual RMS Vendors Create XML data and JPG Crash Diagram FTP XML and JPG to Registry Registry Clerk Reviews and Accepts All or Portions Mass Highway and Others Can View Crash Data, Narrative, and Diagram

Electronic Submission Manual Data Dictionary Contact Information XML Overview Creating the XML Electronic Submission Procedures Testing and Approval DTD Sample XML Everything a vendor needs to modify their software to generate XML

The Plan Visit RMS Vendors Fall 2000 – Spring 2001 Send Electronic Submission Manual Spring 2001 CDS with Manual Data Entry Live November 2001 First Vendor live with ESub January 2002

Reality Visit RMS Vendors Fall 2000 – Spring 2001 (on schedule) Send Electronic Submission Manual August 2001 (planned Spring 2001) CDS with Manual Data Entry Live November 2001 (on schedule) First Vendor live with ESub February 2003 (planned January 2002)

What Happened? Vendor Buy-In Technology Funding Resources

What Happened? – Vendor Buy-In Previously Vendor software just printed paper forms They updated their software for the new form Too much money with too little benefit for them to implement Electronic Submission

What Happened? - Technology Proved to be more complex for less advanced Vendors than we anticipated Predicted eight weeks of work once we received first draft XML Actually took about a year before XML was acceptable We believe this is extreme and not the norm

What Happened? - Funding Some RMS Vendors wanted money to implement Electronic Submission Vendors couldn’t see the benefit to them

What Happened? - Resources RMS Vendors were busy with other things We were busy with other things, such as implementing the data entry system Third parties were busy with other things

Registry Effort for Electronic Submission Research XML Technology 400 hours Design Solution and Write ESub Manual 600 hours Implement Solution900 hours (450 Esub and 450 for review screens) Support Vendors600 hours

Where We Are Today Electronic Submission is Live with one Vendor Three other Vendors expressed interest Average Data Entry Time per Paper Report is six minutes Average Clerk Time per Electronic Report is two minutes

Technology XML (Basic implementation of XML) DTD (176 distinct elements) MS XML Parser FTP Visual Basic (97 class modules) Oracle DBMS (250 tables)

Future More Vendors on Board Could design web page for Operator form entry which would produce the same XML and feed into the same process A national standard XML Structure for Crash Reporting

Summary Great Design Great Plan Great Technology Took much longer than expected Biggest problem was Vendor buy-in Never once questioned using XML Would definitely do it again

Electronic Submission of Massachusetts Crash Reports Dave Krasnow e