AGENCYWIDE DOCUMENTS ACCESS AND MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS (ADAMS) 

USER GROUP MEETING 

Wednesday, October 29, 2008 

2:00 p.m.–3:00 p.m. 

NRC Headquarters 

Public Document Room (O1-F21) 

Agenda for ADAMS User Group Meeting No. 16

1. General Announcements and Introductions—Anna McGowan (2:00–2:05 p.m.) 

2. Member Issues and Questions—Anna McGowan (2:05–2:30 p.m.) 

3. Enterprise Content Management Status Briefing—Tom Smith (2:30–2:45 p.m.) 

4. New Business or Questions—Anna McGowan (2:45–2:55 p.m.) 

5. Adjournment (3:00 p.m.) 
MEETING MINUTES 

1. General Announcements and Introductions—Anna McGowan (2:00–2:05 p.m.) 

Anna McGowan opened the meeting at 2:00 p.m. She introduced the U.S. Nuclear 

Regulatory Commission (NRC) staff in the meeting room. The staff present included the 

Public Document Room (PDR) staff, Tom Smith and James Baughman (Information and 

Records Services Division), Joseph Holonich (Information and Records Service Division, 

Director), and Cindy Bladey (Office of Administration). One member of the public was 

present in the meeting room. Ms. McGowan asked the users on the telephone bridge to 

introduce themselves. There were representatives from: Westinghouse, Scientech, HFC 

Controls, STARS, Bechtel, the State of Tennessee, Nuclear Energy Institute, Winston and 

Strawn, and General Electric Wilmington. 

Ms. McGowan introduced Adam Glazer, a new PDR librarian. She also described the new 

public service desk rotation in the PDR, which began in February 2008. PDR librarians now 

work some hours in the NRC Technical Library and some hours in the PDR each week. The 

new shared schedule promotes knowledge transfer within the Section and expands the 

understanding of the respective subject matter for all members of the Technical Information 

Center Section. The Section is comprised of the Public Document Room and the Technical 

Library. 

Ms. McGowan explained that the public Agencywide Documents Access and Management 

Systems (ADAMS) User Group (AUG) meetings are held semiannually, once in the spring 

and once in the fall. The purpose of the meetings is to assist the public with ADAMS issues 

and to address their concerns. 

2. Member Issues and Questions—Anna McGowan (2:05–2:30 p.m.) 

In addition to being included in the meeting minutes, the questions and answers from this 

meeting will also be available on the PDR Web site. 

Q1: The full-text search in Citrix-based ADAMS is still broken. When will it be fixed? 

A: We believe that the problem has been fixed by the installation of a specific FileNet content 

search patch on the Citrix server. Through our work on this matter with IBM, we discovered 

that the versions of the search application Direct Library Link (DLL) files were not correct. 

They have been changed to the correct versions and the text search is now working properly 

for the Citrix server and the ADAMS Public Library. 

Q2: A lack of error-checking enables documents to be entered into ADAMS with inaccurate 

information (such as document dates of 2009 or later). What is being done about this? 

A: We have an “error-checking” process for ADAMS documents to ensure that the documents 

are properly profiled and published for the public version. We have implemented standard 

operating procedures (SOPs), which the document processing staff follows daily as part of 

the quality control (QC) phase described in the SOP. This QC phase happens immediately 

after the document profile is completed, and any identified errors or typos are corrected. 

The staff also performs two other QC checks daily, as an extra precaution, to catch and 

correct any mistakes made by the profiler or any errors missed previously by the QC staff. 

The first test is performed in the morning at 8:00 a.m. and includes any newly added 
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documents from the previous day, and the second test runs at 4:00 p.m. and includes newly 

added documents for that day. 

To address the date example cited in the question, as part of these QC checks, we search 

our entire library with search criteria for dates several years into the future (i.e., after 

yesterday’s date, October 28, 2008, through infinity. Any documents with an incorrect 

document date are corrected. We also conduct several similar searches to review other 

profile fields to ensure that incorrect data identified by those searches are corrected. We 

also use the spell check function for all profile titles. The profiling staff takes pride in its work 

and is very good at catching and correcting mistakes before the document even gets to the 

QC phase. Unfortunately, like every data entry task, there is a slight chance of errors (e.g., 

the name of the author is misspelled or an incorrect document date is given). However, the 

staff is fully committed to providing the most accurate data in the records. 

The QC function rests mostly on our contractor who recently has had to handle a large 

number of documents being added to ADAMS from the new reactor program. As an added 

note, we have found that date range errors usually occur at the beginning of a new year. 

Q3: Can the timeout function be eliminated so that you are not kicked out if you have not done 

something in a minute or two? Sometimes it will let you view only 100 items, even though 

the hit list was 200. (Recently, this is not happening very frequently.) 

A: The information technology (IT) staff has worked to remove any reference to a timeout 

function from the default client registry. IT believes that the problem has been resolved, but 

if it is still an issue, the staff will revisit it. While checking the profiles, the IT staff did find that 

the timeout function was set to 10 minutes on many of them. The staff has changed this. 

Regarding the number of viewable items, we have changed the system settings so that the 

user specifies the number of documents returned. We have tested numerous anonymous 

profiles that are used by the public and consider the matter resolved. However, at times of 

extremely high usage, there is a limitation in the Filenet software. This issue might return 

because of this system limitation. A suggested solution is to perform segmented searches, 

using date range, to further reduce this timeout risk. 

Q4: How confident are you that the search function is functioning correctly? 

A: See the response to question 1. 

Q5: Is it possible to get attachments released at the same time as the cover letter? Many times 

a letter or meeting summary is released that indicates attachments, but the attachments 

are not there and, upon inquiry, many have a release date several days later. 

A: The author is responsible for setting the release date. One problem is that the attachment 

may be written at a different time, or the release date is intentionally set later than the cover 

letter. The PDR staff never knows the precise cause and must contact the author directly for 

the explanation. Please let us know if you spot an anomaly, and we will work to have it 

fixed. These variances may be caused by the agency’s policy of allowing time for the 

specific items to be received by the correct recipients before being released to the public. 

Q6: What is the NRC process for review of nonpublic documents that might allow them to be 
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made public? What resources will the NRC apply to such efforts? What priority would 

user group members suggest for such effort and what types of documents would be a 

priority? 

A: We are combining the answers to these two questions since they are related. Internally 

generated documents go through a sensitive unclassified nonsafeguards information review 

process. A cover letter from Luis Reyes to the Commission dated July 6, 2007, outlines this 

process. (For more information, see COMSECY 05-0054, “Policy Revision: Handling, 

Marking, and Protecting Sensitive Unclassified Non-Safeguards Information,” dated 

October 26, 2005.) The NRC recently revised its Form 665, which is completed by NRC 

authors when adding records to ADAMS. Completing the form requires the author to select, 

in a revised document sensitivity field, whether the document is eligible for a periodic review 

depending on its sensitivity. This may change depending on how the Government wants 

Federal agencies to handle controlled unclassified information (CUI). Government wide CUI 

guidance is forthcoming. Agency staff reviews externally generated documents before they 

are made public. This process is called the “nonpublic, pending review” (NPPR) process. 

The NPPR process is an established NRC process, and any re-review of documents listed 

as nonpublic will be based on direction from the Commission. No plans exist to re-review 

legacy documents in ADAMS. 

Q7: Can some or all of the requirements for the ADAMS replacement system be described? 

A: The Enterprise Content Management (ECM) Project Team is gathering information for the 

requirements of the replacement system as part of its task to update the technology at the 

agency. As described during the May 2008 AUG meeting, the Next Generation ADAMS 

project has expanded to include other information management needs to allow greater 

efficiency of access to agency information. The following are benefits for moving to the ECM 

system: 

• enhanced features that improve each office’s effectiveness and productivity and 

allow for future growth 

• increased agency records management effectiveness and efficiency 

• decreased complexity and costs 

• increased ease of use (e.g., finding information/content more readily using a 

robust search engine) 

Q8: As part of the discussion on NextGen, can the NRC be prepared to identify the 

documentation it would send out to the user group after the meeting? 

A: There are no formal handouts for this meeting; when we do have handouts, we will be happy 

to distribute them to the AUG members electronically, as well as post them on the ADAMS 

Web page as appropriate. For earlier reports on the NextGen project, please check the 

minutes from the previous 15 AUG meetings, which are available on the ADAMS Web page. 

Q9: Why does the agency not release the request for additional information (RAI) until 1 month 
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after the response was issued and 2 months after the RAI was sent to the licensee? This 

does not make much sense. 

A: The Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation provided the following response: 

The Division of Operating Reactor Licensing (DORL) process for RAIs is the same as the 

processes for its other public documents. Once the document has gone through the 

concurrence process and is an official agency record, it is placed in the appropriate ADAMS 

folder to be declared and added to the public version of ADAMS. This occurs within 

5 working days. 

When documents are received from the licensee, they are processed at the Document 

Control Desk. The documents are also entered into ADAMS and labeled as either public or 

nonpublic, as appropriate. This process normally takes a few days from the date the NRC 

received the document, which is not necessarily the date of the letter if it was mailed. 

DORL has recently implemented a method of electronic distribution for outgoing publicly 

available documents. Through this avenue, the public can sign up at the NRC public Web 

site to receive correspondence about any plant(s) of their choosing. When the document 

becomes an official agency record, it is sent to everyone on the corresponding plant list as a 

pdf file. The instructions for navigating the Web site and signing up are provided below: 

If you would like to sign up additional e-mail addresses, or add or remove yourself from 

distribution for any plant, please complete the following: 

1. Go to the NRC’s public Web site (www.nrc.gov). 

2. Click on the “Public Meetings & Involvement” tab. 

3. On this page, under the heading “Information and Meeting Schedules to Help You 

 Participate,” click on “Subscribe to E-mail Notices.” 

4. At the top of the next page will be a link to the Operating Reactor Correspondence Web site. 

or 

5. As an alternative method, click on the following link: 

 http://www.nrc.gov/publicinvolve/listserver/plants-by-region.html. This URL can be entered 

 into your browser as well. 

The Office of New Reactors (NRO) provided the following response: 

If the question relates to NRO reviews, the staff e-mails the questions to the applicants and 

processes the e-mails as ADAMS records, which are then made available to the public. The 

conversion of the e-mail to an ADAMS record is completed automatically, and the record 

should show up in public ADAMS within days. The staff may be a little behind in updating 

the related Web pages but this is also done periodically (at least monthly). The responses 

may sometimes lag because they are profiled as NPPR, and we typically look at these and 

re-profile them monthly (but it has sometimes been longer). 

Q10: The Recently Released Documents display does not work correctly. It does not scroll 

 smoothly—it advances from one page display to another so that you cannot see both the 

 bottom of one page and the top of the next. The listings that do appear are not as 
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numerous as I have seen earlier this year. There is no scroll tab (on the side) to go up 

and down. The scroll tab on the bottom does not go left and right. Note that the Webbased search function does not allow me to see these document listings. 

A: The following responds to each point raised in the question: 

• The Recently Released Documents display does not work correctly. It does not 

scroll smoothly—it advances from one page display to another so that you cannot 

see both the bottom of one page and the top of the next. 

A member of the IT staff checked into this yesterday, October 28, 2008. He concluded that 

the move from one page to the next is intentional and is probably dictated by the operating 

system. The same thing happens in Windows Explorer when viewing files. If the window is 

expanded, then the column of files flows to fill it. There is no need for a scroll bar on the 

side. 

• The listings that do appear are not as numerous as I have seen earlier this year. 

The IT staff cannot verify this. All documents should be in the folders if appropriate. 

Documents are added and removed on a daily basis which causes the numbers to fluctuate 

from one day to the next. 

A recent Filenet full indexing of the Publicly Available Records System library has been 

performed; text searching is working as expected. The incorrect Filenet DLL file issue has 

been fixed with the help of Filenet Tech support. 

• The scroll tab on the bottom does not go left and right. 

An IT staff member checked this, and the scroll bar did work as it should. It does scroll from 

page to page so it “jumps” rather than scrolling smoothly. Despite this, documents can 

always be seen and they are always listed in left justification. This should not affect use. 

3. ECM Status Briefing—Tom Smith (2:30–2:45 p.m.) 

Mr. Smith gave a presentation on the current status of Next Generation ADAMS to the AUG. 

He told the group that Next Generation ADAMS is now called “Enterprise Content 

Management.” The name change reflects the increase in the ECM program’s scope to 

include not only ADAMS but also other internal functions, such as information and records 

management. 

Mr. Smith explained why the agency is upgrading ADAMS. He noted that ADAMS has aged 

to the point where the system constructs and application software are no longer viable in the 

NRC’s workspace. Agency staff requires a modern replacement that integrates with current 

and future NRC systems, processes, and workspace and delivers the following benefits: 

• enhanced features that improve each office’s effectiveness and productivity with 

the capacity to handle future growth 

• increased agency records management effectiveness and efficiency with an 

increased capacity to store records 
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• decreased complexity and costs 

• increased ease of use 

In other words, Mr. Smith noted that we are updating the technology at the NRC. 

Mr. Smith also stated that, since the last AUG meeting in May, the ECM team is looking at 

the benefits of some recently purchased IBM software. The new system will have a more 

robust search engine. 

• As part of a natural product upgrade, the NRC acquired software from IBM to 

address immediate needs. 

• An ECM Program Team within the Office of Information Services was established 

to ensure coordination of the activities needed to deliver ECM solutions that 

support the management and availability of information at the NRC. Program 

goals are aimed at addressing the business needs of capturing, storing, 

publishing, managing, preserving, and applying access to content. 

What is the baseline solution for meeting new technology needs for managing and using 

agency information repositories? 

• The public will have Web access to the ECM program technology using a more 

robust search engine. 

• The NRC will have tools available to configure solutions to meet the public’s 

needs without significant customization (custom code). Custom code increases 

the risks of problems with upgrades. 

• There have been no major changes in the baseline solution since the May AUG 

meeting. 

What are the next steps for the ECM Program? 

• Technology Assessment—The ECM program team will be looking at various 

technologies that will satisfy the NRC’s information technology needs. 

• Program Drivers—These include the following: 

– technology needs (core platform operations, content migration) 

– business needs (e-mail capture/folder level profiling for combined operation 

 license applications 

– information management needs (records management) 

– internal needs (e.g., Federal Information Security Management Act requirements, 

 508 compliance, Government security) 

• Integration and Testing—Once the solutions are in place, the NRC and 

associated vendors will integrate, phase in the solutions, and begin testing and 

pilot activities, including Beta-testing for the public. 
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• Rollout—Using a phased approach, the NRC will roll out the solutions to various 

offices and other stakeholder communities, such as the public. 

4. New Business or Questions—Anna McGowan (2:45–2:55 p.m.) 

Participants posed the following questions: 

Q1: Will there by a Beta-testing group in the various NRC program offices, and is it providing 

feedback to the ECM program? 

A: The NRC program offices will have representatives in a Beta-testing group for their specific 

part of the ECM. The public will test only the public version. 

Q2: Will the Citrix-based ADAMS go away with the new version of ADAMS (ECM)? 

A: Yes, it will be replaced by a Web version. There will eventually be a single access point to 

ADAMS. 

Q3: What about the Legacy Library, the database for pre-ADAMS documents? Will that go 

away with the new version of ADAMS? Can all the microfiche pre-ADAMS documents in 

the PDR become available electronically? 

A: No, the Legacy Library will not go away; its content will be incorporated into the ECM 

program. The agency currently selectively scans microfiche documents into ADAMS, but 

there are no plans to scan all the microfiche at this time. 

Q4: Is there a timeline for the ECM program? Can a timeline be put into the minutes of the 

AUG meeting? 

A: Yes, the timeline is from 2007 to about 2011 or 2012. The process has already started. 

Q5: Can the user continue to create reports in the new version of ADAMS? Reports are an 

essential component of Citrix-ADAMS. 

A: Yes, it is a very high priority. 

Q6: Is there an update for the guidance for electronic submissions? 

A: Mr. Smith is currently working on Revision 4 of the guidance document, which will include 

two changes: (1) a file-size limitation, and (2) replacement of the PDR staff as Tier 1 support 

with the new Meta-System Help Desk. Mr. Smith is working on a Federal Register notice 

regarding the new Meta-System Help Desk. 

Q7: Can the NRC Office of Public Affairs write a news release about the new Meta-System 

Help Desk? 

A: Yes, it will. (Since the meeting, the November 10, 2008, news release became available at 

http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/news/2008/08-205.html.) 
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Ms. McGowan recognized the work done by the PDR staff in providing Tier 1 public support 

for inquiries on electronic submittals and the agency’s electronic filing system before the 

creation of the new help desk. An AUG member also complimented the PDR staff on its 

work in this area over the past few years. Ms. McGowan also welcomed the new help desk. 

The next AUG meeting is planned for May 2009. The staff will call for agenda items before 

the meeting. 

5. Adjournment (3:00 p.m.)