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Show B April 13, 1995 Hilltop Times All in a day's ivork Information processed for 60,000 cus SB, efense MegaCenter Ogden employees celebrated an increase in their workload last month they now do data processing for 60.000 Air Force customers. TV rv i rry of! standard rr ' ' rf of Qn o comput- Hill work AFB fa the to ing plan under Defense cility completed a three-yea- r Management Review Decision 924. "We now do standard base-levcomputing for 60,000 customers in the Air Force, Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve in eight states," base-leve- l 5 el said Col. Dick Trainor, MegaCenter director. Installations, Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve units now supported by the MegaCenter are: Hill AFB, Salt Lake City Air National Guard and Hill's 419th Fighter Wing (Reserve); Fairchild AFB, Wash., Fairchild ANG and Camp Murray, Tacoma; McChord AFB, Wash.; Kingsley Field ANG, Portland; and Portland ANG, Ore.; F.E. Warren AFB. Wyo.; Cheyenne ANG, Buckley ANG, Colo.; and Minneapolis AFRES, Minn.; Defense Finance and Accounting Service, U.S.; Mountain Home AFB, Idaho; and Gowen Field ANG; Malmstrom AFB, Mont.; Great Falls ANG and Helena AFRES; Nellis AFB, Nev.; Beale. Castle, Travis and Edwards AFBs, Calif.; Vandenberg AFB, Naval Air Station Moffet Field ANG. Fresno ANG and Port Hueneme ANG; and McClellan AFB, Calif.; ANG Reno-Canno- n and California ANG. Other base-leve- l at computing 'centers-ar- e Tinker AFB, Okla.: Kelly AFB, Texas; Gunter all are air AFB, Ala.; and Robins AFB, Ga. logistics centers except Gunter, Trainor noted. "The Air Force took 74 sites and put the work into five regional processing centers," said Val Lof green, MegaCenter deputy director. "Information for all Air Force bases is processed at the centers. It's a whole gamut of information including personnel, financial management, contracting, supply and consolidated aircraft maintenance systems. There are 65 base-leve-l systems that are processed at each base and run in every functional area. The one that shuts the bases down is aircraft maintenance. Without that data, 1 they don't fly." The information is fed to the MegaCenter through telephone lines. To ensure the information is received, the Hill AFB MegaCenter has two message paths, so one can act as a backup if the other fails, Trainor said. Information is processed and sent to the MegaCenter through a "front end" computer during the day, then updated by the local staff. "A network control function in our system can tell in a heartbeat if the line is down between us and the other base," Lofgreen said. "Say there's a line down between here and McChord AFB workers here can pick up on it quickly and either fix it from here or call the appropriate communications people at McChord and tell them to reset something. Usually when the people come to work the next day, they don't know there had been an interruption in communications." A goal of the migration is to do the work without the customer noticing the change. "WTien they sit down at a terminal at Mountain Home AFB in Idaho, they don't realize it's connected to Hill. Basically, they disestablish their own base computing center and their ones and zeros come to here and process and go back to them." Lofgreen said. "I guess the universal comment from the centers we've migrated is 'you process our data faster at Hill that we did on our own base.' " The migrations started at Hill AFB, and finished at McClellan AFB. All the changeovers were completed on or ahead of schedule, Lofgreen said. Completing the migration was simplified by stretching the process over several months and selecting key personnel to do the work. "The secret to making it easy was an incredible amount of Trainor said. "We were able to go out and hand-seleby name about 25 people from the bases who came in and helped us do the migration. They had the necessary expertise. "Our plan included going out a year before with what we called a management visit. We talked to the management of the bases and got an idea of what their problems were," Trainor said. "We found each base to be somewhat unique. For example, when we went to McChord. we found the communications management infrastructure to be less than adequate to handle the kind of McChord ' -- " r it I $Attu Horn ij I TmvwV rusuj ' - J " Vadkmbrg Defense MegaCenter Ogden recently migrated the standard base-levfor eight western states. Areas include personnel, finance, accounting records and aircraft maintenance. e ." ct processing they had to do from a central site. By doing that a year in advance, it gave us the opportunity to get their infrastructure up to speed. We also found that McChord had only eight outside telephone lines. We encouraged them to increase the number of outside lines they had, and installed an 800 number so they could have immediate access to our program monitors here. "The whole point was to do sufficient planning up front to allow us time to get the base to make the necessary corrections to their deficiencies." Trainor said. "After the were completed, the rig the easiest part of thewr every one of the migntio of schedule." And the MegaCenHr i: tr DLisil consolidations will lint System with 16 Oklahoma and Washigt dude approximately 15( be on line in two yes. Troubleshooters Help Desk solves system pr T" nee Defense MegaCenter Ogden puts its customers on line, they're not left alone to figure out the new computer system by themselves. The System Management Center II pin p'mii"""-I",c puini oi contacv ior all trouble calls for Ogden Air Logistics i Center and 27 additional I fTOTj.xr" remote sites including Air Force bases, distribution depots and other J I 1 ) ' Vim, , . I V" IK hi : J Gladys Carson answers a question from a Defense Depot Ogden customer at the Help Desk. The desk receives more than 5,000 calls a week. - I k i government activities. "The Help Desk used to only support Hill AFB; now it supports Air Force bases in eight western states and Defense Logistics Agency customers worldwide," said Val Lofgreen, MegaCenter deputy director. "We get nearly 6,000 calls a week, 60 percent of which are from off base." The Help Desk has two levels of customer support: Level One Help Desk where customers call initially to report all computer or network-typ- e problems- - and Level Two, Network Systems Monitor and Control Functions, where problems are found and fixed before a user knows they have a problem. 7 We track our customer service metrics closely " Lofgreen said. "Within 30 days of migration, there's an executive-leve- l follow-up- . We start with the or base commander and wind up in meetings with thewing airmen and other people who use the system. Universally, they're happier than were before But we take a zero tolerance messagethey to them 'It's better than it was before, but is it as good as you want it? Is there something you currently do?' If they don system to do for them, w Staffed around the doc! cust number that off-bas- e access a Defense Switchei "Several bases we sujp outside lines," said Col.t?i tor. "The 800 lines heljjt The telephone system te tomers calling, how lon t swer, and how many cist ' being helped. "During heavy traffic p as many as 10 people ansv Trainor said. "On weekeni able. The calls are the he when workers are first tur s periencing problems. It as t bad as not but p.m., The new payroll systen center in the last few we quainted with a new way "The Help Desk is a con the new system." Trainor co ! Desk it's a network communication lines and system." The Help Desk is acc i |