The Client

The client is a leading employment firm in state of US. The mission of the client is to enhance the state workforce by providing businesses with employment-related solutions and helping people with job placement and career transition services. The career centers play a very important role in this where they help in “Helping job seekers find the right job and Helping employers find the right employee”. The Client is actively seeking Oracle Forms Migration to transform their legacy system into a sophisticated, modern web application.

Business Challenges

The client was using legacy Oracle Forms based applications, which was difficult to maintain, improve and upgrade. The issues were

• The existing applications were used by their employees as a tool for daily activities and it was based on client-server architecture where Oracle 6i uses Oracle 8i database for data services. Application business rules were either stored in the database stored procedures or in the library files distributed with the client server applications.
• The applications were not deployed and maintained centrally, hence up-gradation to the latest version was a daunting task as application running in all of the client machines needs to be upgraded simultaneously.
• The client implemented Oracle contracting services, an Oracle based application. This application uses the Oracle 8i database as its back end. As the support of 8i version was discontinued with an Extended Maintenance Support (EMS, the decision was made not to upgrade to a newer release of the Oracle database but to convert the application to an ASP.NET front end and MS SQL 2000 backend as these were the standard products for the client.
• Lack of complete documentation on legacy applications made the task of coding the applications in Dot Net more difficult, time consuming and obviously expensive.

Kumaran tools and Migration services were employed by the client to transform and modernize the Oracle Forms legacy application to a more sophisticated modern web based, multi-tier, thin client based Dot Net application

Some of the salient features of this legacy modernization by Kumaran were

• Look and feel of a completely re-designed modern web natural application
•  The existing functionality of the client server was preserved and future maintenance on the transformed code made less complex
• The transformed application was in sync with the existing Dot Net application of clients in terms of patterns and standards
• The existing client server access and functionality were role driven. The same role driven functionality was maintained.
• Intelligent validation and Query tuning to improve performance of the transformed Application.
• Issues & Defects existing in the application was corrected during the transformation.

The mission of the client was achieved through division of Work force services
Labor Market Information Center (LMIC)

The LMIC provides specific information on affirmative action, careers and occupations, Consumer Price Index, labor supply and labor force, population; wages, earnings and employee benefits, and training providers and program performance Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). TANF is a work program administered by the client and social services. The primary focus of TANF is to help qualified families with children make a successful transition from welfare to work by.

• Promoting family responsibility and accountability
• Encouraging self-sufficiency through work workforce Training

This subdivision provides employment and training programs designed to provide services that will increase skills for adults and youth. These efforts will result in employment and an increase in earnings. This subdivision also offers education and job training programs that can help in overcoming employment barriers.

Labor and Management

The division of Labor and Management is responsible for administering the state’s labor laws, child labor laws, answer questions about state and federal unemployment laws and administer the state’s workers’ compensation system.

How Kumaran achieved it?

Unemployment Insurance

The division of Unemployment Insurance provides financial assistance for persons who have lost their job, through no fault of their own until they find other employment. Employers through payroll taxes finance states’ unemployment insurance program and workers do not contribute to this plan

Field Operations

The Division of Field Operations is responsible for the state Career Center One-Stop system. Each Career Center is staffed with trained professionals ready to help employers deal with various labor issues and to help job applicants identify opportunities and prepare for productive employment.

Benefits

Kumaran has provided the best in class Oracle Forms Migration solution for the client with the following benefits

• The client was able to achieve a significant cost benefit of 30% for migrating the existing C/S applications, instead of a complete grounds-up development
• Since there was no functional change and the elements present in the client server were available in the transformed Dot Net application, the users were able to transition themselves to the new software with ease and very minimal training.
• The transformed application can be accessed using a browser and no special configuration or changes are needed on users PCs. Also since the software is maintained in a centralized environment, it is easy to change, and maintain. Updates can be made quickly and easily These factors significantly lower costs
• Since the existing legacy application had a role based security mechanism, the same feature has been provided in the converted application. Therefore, one cannot gain access to the system without proper roles and credentials.

The transformed application follows best practices, DotNet patterns and standards, thereby the outcome being a maintainable code base capable of dealing with any future business changes.