NOTE: IDAIDS
Originator: CIA
From: WITHHELD
To: JOHN F. PEREIRA @ DA
Document date: 02/20/1995
Document type: PAPER - TEXTUAL DOCUMENT

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2022 RELEASE UNDER THE PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY ASSASSINATION RECORDS ACT OF 1992

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CONFIDENTIAL

NOTE FOR:

FROM:

DATE:

SUBJECT:

John F. Pereira @ DA

(Gloria M. Boyd

02/20/95 11:33:42 AM

IdAids

As you may remember the Board, ie, David Marwell, took issue on several counts with the ld Aids and the disks that we

recently provided. Their concerns, 4 in number, and my recommendations to remedy those concerns are listed below. Some of their

concerns can be relieved, some may not. The larger issue is the amount of resources that may be needed to make the kinds of

adjustments they require, Initially we are talking about the 11 Oswald boxes. The remainder of the file will be harder to adjust because

of the large amount of documents/dAids, because the file is not in its original form (3rd Agency, HSCA) and because the audit is not

completed (IdAids matched to documents in file. There is also the lurking possibility that to provide the missing data we may be forced to

access the file data manually.

Concern 1: Classification Status

The original classification status of the document was not provided on the

IdAid. This issue is not a new one, it has been discussed before with

NARA. Ate data recorded on

the Id Aid reflects the status of the Id/Aid

and/or the version of the document currently at NARA - namely

all are

Unclassified. The data is in our file, however, since it was not a required

field at input there may be instances where the field is blank.

duable-programir

cost

printure disk

Recommendation: Have Cynde query for blanks in the field to determine

if there are a lot of blanks and, if the numbers are right, make the program

change. If the numbers are not right, ie, large number of blanks in this

field, we need to regroup.

Concern 2: Non Matching Hard Copy IdAid and Digital Id Aid

Mr. Marwell produced 2 versions of the same index record - 1 from the

hard copy IdAid collection we provided and one from the disks we

provided. I have talked to Cynde about this and she has checked the

program and firmly believes it to be impossible to have 2 versions of the

same record. I will talk to Jimon Tuesday but I view this as a human

error. I will also call NARA and ask them to pull this record for

comparison. My searches have produced no duplicates.

Recommendation: Talk to Mr. Marwell again to find out exactly how he

found the duplicate record and if more were discovered. Depending on

his reply I would suggest that this be categorized as a human error.

Concern 3: "Referred" Documents having a classification status

In his manipulation of the disk data Mr. Marwell discovered numerous

instances where a document was marked for referral/coordination and

also carried a classification status, eg, RIF, SAN, DIF. He reasons that if

a document is referred it should carry a "p" for Pending in the

classification status field. (Cynde informs me that the program inserts a

→ programe

Referral marking when the document originator is anything but CIA. This

marking was not inserted by the indexers but by the program. The theory

being that if the document was not CIA it waslis coordinated. It was also

reasoned that if/when the document had completed its coordination run it

was provided to NARA with an appropriate IdAid. The original August

release included IdAids for those documents pending coordination - the

IdAids appropriately stamped with "Pending Coordination" - but no

documents were attached. The difficulty here is a difference in

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interpretation of what the electronic data is to the hard copy, eg, what the

"referred" marking means. It seems that the providing of the interim

IdAids for those documents in the process of coordination may have

complicated the issue. (A clear case of too much openness!) The

difficulty also may be NARAs since we presumed that the provided

documents would be inter-filed in the basic file.

Recommendation: Reprogram to take out the "referred" markings. Barry

tells me that the coordination is almost completed and by the time that the

Board gets ready to look at documents the "trailing" coordinations will be

complete.

Concern 4: Carriage returns in the Comments field

programng-clean up

Mr. Marwell is concerned that these superfluous digital marks would

complicate NARA's life. The carriage returns are a natural input reaction

in the typing of narrative text in the Comments field.

!

Recommendation: Program to remove the carriage returns when they

occur in the Comments field.

CC:

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