Amendment_8_Questions.doc

SOCIAL SECURITY

Office of Acquisition and Grants

November 29, 2012

TO:

All Interested Parties

FROM:

Christopher Mettee

Social Security Administration

Office of Acquisition and Grants

7111 Security Boulevard

Baltimore, MD 21244-1811

RE:

Solicitation SSA-RFP-12-1052 for Geospatial Information System Support Services, Amendment 8 To Whom It May Concern:

SSA provides Amendment 8 to the Solicitation SSA-RFP-12-1052 to respond to solicitation inquiries. The Agency received these additional questions after the response date for questions. While the Agency provides answers to these questions below, it believes the questions are immaterial to Offerors’ ability to submit a responsive proposal; therefore, the Agency does not provide an extension to the due date for proposals. The questions (in blue), with their respective response from the Agency (in red), are as follows:

Question 1: [T]here is still documentation that the SSA and its incumbent contractor who developed its pilot application have access to that [we do] not have access to which would allow us to formulate a more complete response. We recognize that generated code by the incumbent on behalf of the SSA is proprietary and cannot be provided to [us] or any other bidders and according to the RFP will be provided to the successful bidder. However, there are project artifacts and documents which would not fall under this category and access to this documentation would provide a level-playing field for all. These documents are standard project management documents which your incumbent contractor should have generated and should already have been provided to the SSA.

We respectfully request copies of the following project artifacts for all bidders.

· Functional Requirements Document

· Technical Architecture Document

· Design Document

· Data Flow Document… As part of the OFM GIS pilot project, the developer of this pilot system would have created project artifacts and documents such as a Functional Requirements Document stating what was requested by the SSA; a Technical Architecture Document that would have shown the hardware infrastructure, network infrastructure, database platforms, installed operating system and other middle-tier and presentation layer software which illustrated the relationship between the various modules. A Data Flow Document that would have for data inflows into the developed pilot system shown the source systems and associated tables and their destination tables in the pilot system with any constraints and indexes on these tables. For data outflow from the system, this document would have shown the associated stored procedures for extraction of this data and the data transfer to other systems. A Design Document which would list the various stored procedures run at the database and middle-tier levels of the pilot system. [We] request these standard project artifacts.

Answer 1: The Functional Requirements Document was available for public disclosure since September 1, 2010. This information is available on the Federal Business Opportunities (FBO) website. Offerors should do a web search for SSA-RFQ-10-1719.

Regarding the request for Technical Architecture information, please refer to Answer 32 under Amendment 5. The Agency will not publicly disclose its systems architecture because this is sensitive information.

The Agency does not have a Data Flow or Design Document as described in the question.

Question 2: You have replied to our request for the number of data map layers that are being loaded to the system every time as 345 layers. This requires a much more detailed explanation. For example,

· What is the definition of a data map layer? Is traffic one layer or traffic in Baltimore, Philadelphia and DC are considered 3 different layers?

· What are the sources of the map data layer? What are the underlying schemas?

· What order are they loaded on to the machine?

· What are their memory requirements?

· What are the server bandwidth constraints?

All of these are very relevant issues to why the machine runs slows or is intermittent or freezes up. Without this information which you should have already documented in your project artifacts, other bidders besides the incumbent can simply not provide you an informed solution for this solicitation.

Answer 2: The Agency does not believe that these questions prevent an Offeror from submitting a proposal. However, we provide responses in the same respective order as in the question:

· The definition of a data map layer is an industry standard term per Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC) standards. Per this standard, traffic could be multiple layers, but the Agency feels that this question is irrelevant to the referenced issue.

· Refer to Answer 11 of this document for the sources of map data layers. Schemas follow Homeland Security Infrastructure Program (HSIP) and National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) standards. Per Addendum B, Section 2.3 (h), the Agency will provide the winning Offeror with HSIP Gold Database access upon signing a Data Use Agreement and receiving a positive suitability determination.

· Map layers load alphabetically based upon the map layer name.

· See response to Question 6.

· There are no specific server bandwidth constraints for any individual user.

Question 3: Another example is your inability to properly render your images on printers and plotters in various configurations. Due to the lack of information about your server hardware configuration, your client desktop configurations and your various interfaces, non-incumbent bidders cannot provide you the best solution based on whether there are available COTS solutions such as printer drivers, or a customized tool needs to be implemented to solve the issue. The cost estimates for these are very different.

Answer 3: Offerors may assume that the Agency’s printing devices are operational and that printer driver versions are not the root cause of retaining print settings or other print-related issues identified within the Issues at Addendum B, Section 2.3(a).

Question 4: This question is a follow-up question to Answer 4 on Amendment 5:

Some of these 20 user functions are solely GIS layer functions and therefore not an issue. Some of these functions clearly utilize database tables and database stored procedures to return the required information. These links between the presentation layer GIS maps and the database layer database tables should be available in the previously requested Data Flow Document.

Answer 4: The Agency does not have a Data Flow Document. Further, the Agency does not believe that this information is required to submit a proposal.

Question 5: This question is a follow-up question to Answer 5 on Amendment 5:

The list of tables against which these procedures are run is requested by [us]. These should be available in the previously requested Design Document.

Answer 5: The Agency does not have a Design Document. Further, the Agency does not believe that this information is required to submit a proposal. As stated in the solicitation, the Agency will provide the winning Offeror with additional technical architecture information after award.

Question 6: This question is a follow-up question to Answer 6 on Amendment 5:

If only 4GB is available to the application and there are no other applications using the resources. What is the reference to the 64GB and 128 GB in the proposal? This information should be available in the previously requested Technical Architecture Document.

Answer 6: The Agency does not believe that this answer is necessary for an Offeror to submit a proposal. However, the Offeror should consider that 4 GB of virtual memory are currently available, but that the GIS application virtual memory has room to grow if necessary.

Question 7: This question is a follow-up question to Answer 8 on Amendment 5:

This question referred to whether the map services were received from internal or external sources to the SSA. This is covered in Inquiry 11 [Question 9 below].

Answer 7: The location and identification of map layers are not relevant to the Offeror submitting a proposal. The problem exists regardless of an external or internal source.

Question 8: This question is a follow-up question to Answer 10 on Amendment 5:

A list of all interfaces for the pilot system is requested. For this particular case, it would detail the make, type and model of the wide-format plotter. This information is necessary to make a cost estimate to resolve this issue. Once this information is available a determination can be made whether standard printer drivers exist for the particular model or have to be written to support this requirement. The previously requested Technical Architecture Document would contain a list of all interfaces to the pilot system.

Answer 8: The Agency believes that the type of printer is irrelevant to the Offeror submitting a responsive proposal. Please see Issue 6 at Addendum B, Section 2.3(a). The Offeror can assume that the Agency’s printers are operational.

Question 9: This question is a follow-up question to Answer 11 on Amendment 5:

Specific information on each of the 345 map data layers is requested. The previously requested Data Flow Document and the Design Document should contain the list of all 345 map layers that are loaded, what their data sources are, the amount of virtual memory consumed when launched and the order in which the 345 layers are loaded. This information is required in cost estimation for a number of issues to determine possible sources of deficient functionality.

Answer 9: The Agency does not believe that the identification of map layers is relevant to the Offeror submitting a responsive proposal.

Question 10: This question is a follow-up question to Answer 12 on Amendment 5:

This information should be available in a previously requested Data Flow Document along with the minimum and maximum file size and any validation procedures that are run on the incoming data flows.

Answer 10: This data is publically available at http://www.usgs.gov. There is no minimum or maximum file size. Offerors should thoroughly review Issue 10 at Addendum B, Section 2.3(a).

Question 11: This question is a follow-up question to Answer 13 on Amendment 5:

What is the list of four user groups and what are their exact permissions as related to table, procedures and user screens access? This information should be in the previously requested Design Document.

Answer 11: The four user groups are GIS Admin, GIS Publisher, GIS Emergency Responder, and GIS User. The Agency will not publicize the exact permissions of its users but will provide this information to the winning Offeror.

Question 12: This question is a follow-up question to Answer 23 on Amendment 5:

What is the layout of this file and what other procedures and map layers utilize this information so we can evaluate the extent of our changes? This information should be in the Design Document.

Answer 12: This information is publically available at http://www.usgs.gov.

Question 13: This question is a follow-up question to Answer 28 on Amendment 5:

A list of all printers used is required to determine the current versions of drivers and the work required to fulfill this requirement. This information should be available in a previously requested Technical Architecture Document.

Answer 13: The printers utilized by the agency and respective device drivers are irrelevant to respond to Issue 22 at Addendum B, Section 2.3(a). The Offeror should assume all printers are functional.

Question 14: This question is a follow-up question to Answer 32 on Amendment 5:

This information should be part of a previously requested Technical Architecture Document and would enable a bidder to better estimate whether current issues at SSA were hardware / network-related or software / database-related for cost estimating.

Answer 14: As stated in the solicitation, the Agency will provide Technical Architecture information to the winning Offeror upon a positive suitability determination.

Question 14: The solicitation is unclear as to whether there are two volumes or three volumes to be submitted with the proposal as the number is used interchangeably.

Volume 1 for the business and price proposal is clear.

Volume 2 refers to Past Performance. Is this simply the questionnaires to be filled out by our clients that are sent to you or must we list these past performances in a separate volume.

Volume 3 refers to Relevant Experience. This is clear in what is required. The confusion is generated by the overlap with the Past Performance. If the Past Performance is a separate volume then we would be duplicating our client list n[sic] Volume 2 and 3.

Please clarify at your earliest convenience as it will determine the structure of our resonses [sic].

Answer 14: The Solicitation is clear that there are three Volumes required. Please refer to Addendum E, Section 2.3 for the contents of Volume II. Addendum E, Section 2.4 includes the required contents of Volume III.

Question 15: As we are going through the final review of our proposal submission, I have one question for you regarding our Past Performance references. After speaking with our references, I have been told that each reference previously submitted their completed Past Performance forms directly to you prior to our original proposal submission in August. As I do not have a copy of their submissions, can you confirm whether you will accept these previous submissions or do I need to have each reference re-submit their form to you? Please advise.

Answer 15: The Agency will accept previously submitted past performance questionnaires in response to the Solicitation. Offerors need not have references re-submit past performance questionnaires.

Should you have any questions regarding this Amendment, please contact Christopher Mettee at Christopher.Mettee@ssa.gov.

Respectfully, Christopher Mettee

Contracting Officer

SOCIAL SECURITY ADMINISTRATION BALTIMORE MD 21235-0001