WIC Business Analyst/Developer/Project Manager(.NET. SQL)(Job ID:30-DPH-36820-18)
Job Description
CCI has a Client who is seeking a Candidate to provide Crossroads Management Information System (MIS) Maintenance and Enhancement Services (M&E) for the Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC). The M&E services also include defect correction, change order implementation, software installation services, and production help desk support.
CROSSROADS WIC MIS BACKGROUND
The mission of the United States Department of Agriculture Food and Nutrition Service (USDA/FNS), Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) is to safeguard the health of low-income pregnant, postpartum and breastfeeding women, infants, and children up to age five who are at nutritional risk by providing nutritious foods to supplement diets, information on healthy eating, and referrals to health care. WIC is funded by a Federal grant program and is available in all 50 States, 35 Indian Tribal Organizations(ITOs), American Samoa, District of Columbia, Guam, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands and the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands.
In 1984, USDA requested that the NC WIC Program provide data processing services to assist the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians (EBCI) WIC Program to operate as an independent State Agency yet have similar features as the NC WIC Program. Since that time, the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians has utilized the State’s systems including MIS and EBT.
The Crossroads Consortium was created in 2005 in response to the FNS State Agency Model (SAM) mandate for designing, building, and implementing new WIC management information systems (MIS) nationwide. The FNS/USDA produced the SAMs in order to create economies of scale by combining information technology development efforts with multiple states rather than the FNS/USDA funding multiple MIS projects individually. The Crossroads Consortium, with North Carolina as the lead state, awarded a contract to the incumbent vendor Computer Sciences Corporation (CSC) in 2009 to build a SAM system for the states of Alabama, North Carolina, Virginia, and West Virginia. Rollout of the Crossroads SAM system was completed in all four (4) Crossroads Consortium states by 2014, with the North Carolina instance of Crossroads being hosted by the NC Department of Information Technology. In 2017, North Carolina amended the Crossroads contract with CSC to continue providing Maintenance and Enhancement Services using source code and documentation independent of the other three Consortium states. These continued M&E services include defect correction, change order implementation, software installation services, and production help desk support.
SUBPROGRAMS OF WIC PROGRAM
While the Farmers’ Market Nutrition Program (FMNP) and the Breastfeeding Peer Counseling Program (BFPC) are subprograms of the federal WIC Program, every state does not administer these programs. North Carolina does administer these programs, so its instance of the Crossroads source code does include the respective functionality that support both subprograms.
The summary provided outlines the State’s participation levels, number of users, number of retailers, and peer group structure.
CROSSROADS CURRENT SYSTEM ENVIRONMENT AND ARCHITECTURE
The Crossroads solution utilizes two different technologies for its web-based applications. The Clinic and State Office applications utilize a Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) browser-based application (XBAP) while the Vendor and Participant application websites are based on ASP.NET. Both technologies are deployed similarly; the code (.dll, .aspx, .html, .js, and .xbap) is deployed on the web server and IIS is configured to allow access to the files. Services are deployed on the application servers and web servers as appropriate.
All applications are initiated using the Internet Explorer web browser. The main difference between the XBAP and ASP.NET technologies is that the XBAP is downloaded and executes on the client machine. In the ASP.NET applications, the actual VB.Net code executes on the Crossroads web and application servers based on requests from the client. Only a small amount of client code (JavaScript) is executed on the client machine and it is typically related to user interface and service calls rather than business rule execution. Both technologies will utilize the application servers to execute service calls. The application servers, which reside in the internal (or system) demilitarized zone (DMZ), will access the database. This ensures that no server in the public-facing web DMZ has direct access to the database.
The client machine requires the Microsoft .NET 4.0 Framework and Internet Explorer to run the XBAP application. The .NET Framework can be installed on Windows 7. The general flow or process of communication is that all Crossroads WIC personal computers (PC) or desktops/laptops will communicate with the Web server via an intranet or Internet connection. Existing WAN infrastructure can be used along with a local Internet service provider, or other varieties of connectivity the North Carolina Local Agencies find most compatible with their current infrastructure. Since there is only one centralized database, all transactions are immediately seen by all users for their individual agency if the user has appropriate access rights.
At the close of business each day, the End of Day (EOD) processing is performed on the centrally located Process / Batch Server. This EOD process performs all nightly batch processing and prepares the system for the next day’s activities. In order to allow round-robin load balancing, all service requests are stateless. In other words, Crossroads does not maintain session information across individual PC to Server transactions. Any request can be executed on any available server without regard to previous or future requests from the same instance of the application.
Development is underway to upgrade the framework to .NET 4.7 or better during 2019. Planning is also underway to evaluate options for migrating away from the XBAP design before Internet Explorer reaches end of life in 2025, as this technology is not supported in the Microsoft Edge browser.
WEB SERVER The Web Server provides the “store-front” for all Crossroads WIC PCs. All transactions are submitted to the web server which in turn interacts with the application server, which in turn interacts with the database server. Crossroads will use Microsoft’s IIS 7.5 or higher to host the centralized .NET Web services. The interaction with the web and application servers will use industry standard XML-based Web Services encrypted via an SSL connection to provide web-enabled, cross-platform independent interfaces to each of the Crossroads WIC PCs. The Central Processing Site will utilize a web farm with a number of servers proportionate to the number of concurrent workstation users. The connection from the web server to the application server will be conducted through a customized IIS http handler. In this case, the web server will act as a proxy to pass through the requests and responses to/from the application.
APPLICATION SERVER
As State IT standards disallow direct communication between web servers and the database, the application server processes the request from the web server to the database server. Crossroads will use Microsoft’s IIS 7.5 or higher to host the centralized .NET Web services. The Central Processing Site will utilize a Web farm with a number of servers proportionate to the number of concurrent workstation users. IP load balancing is a hardware-based solution that works well with the proposed software architecture since a stateless Web Server is utilized.
MICROSOFT SQL SERVER FAILOVER CLUSTER DATABASE SERVERS
The database servers are configured in a SQL Server 2008 R2 Enterprise Edition failover cluster. This requires shared storage on the Storage Area Network (SAN). The online transaction processing database is primary on node 1 of the database cluster. The report database is primary on node 2 of the database cluster in a separate named instance. Development is underway to upgrade the database servers to SQL Server 2016 during 2019.
MICROSOFT SQL SERVER REPORTING SERVICES SERVER
The Reporting Services Server receives requests from the Crossroads web servers and provides completed reports to the requesting application. This interaction uses industry standard XML-based Web Services encrypted via an SSL or SYSHTTP connection to provide Web enabled cross platform independent interfaces to each of the Crossroads WIC PCs. The SQL Server Reporting Services standard databases (Report Server and Report Server Temp DB) are hosted on the Reporting Services Server.
Qualifications
Additional Information
For immediate consideration, please send your resume to hire(at)cci-worldwide.com with "WIC Business Analyst/Developer/Project Manager(.NET. SQL)(Job ID:30-DPH-36820-18)NC" as the subject line.