Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission |
WSSC: Water Lead Test Tracking Application |
Reginald built a Web application that he can track and update with Iron Speed Designer!
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WSSC: Water Lead Test Tracking Application |
Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission
Laurel, MD USA
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Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission (WSSC) offers lead testing of water samples
to the District of Columbia water authority. WSSC supports its operations with a
complex process that begins with the ordering of the test. Test samples must be tracked
throughout the process of testing and results tabulation so that areas most affected
receive highest priority in infrastructure replacement programs. WSSC used Iron Speed
Designer to build a Web application named DCWASA to track and update the test as it progresses
through its laboratories.
DCWASA, an intranet Web application, serves its users with up-to-date information
on water lead test samples. The application tracks the process closely from the
sample request to final laboratory results. Reginald Thorpe, Information Support Group Leader,
WSSC, developed DCWASA, and his Information Support Group now maintains
the application. DCWASA shares data with the Seedpak LIMS and a Pitney Bowes lead
test kit tracking system.
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DCWASA currently consists of seven distinct menus with multiple Web pages per menu.
The application uses two roles: users and administrators. All pages include standard
features like searching, sorting, and pagination. All users must sign in,
and the start page is set to the Chain of Custody page which shows the complete record
of the test sample as it passes from person to person. DCWASA uses one database with
multiple tables for requests, chain of custody information, shipping records, etc. The
largest table in the database exceeds 103,000 records and is growing.
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Integrated applications streamline WSSC operations |
WSSC's operations are run on multiple applications:
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DCWASA shows overall information about each sample as it passes through the laboratory
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Pitney Bowes application manages the shipping and receiving of the Lead Test Kits (LTK)
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Seedpak LIMS manages the information about the test and compiles the test results |
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All these applications are integrated with one another at the database level. Using Microsoft's Data
Transformation Services, Reginald programmed procedures that run periodically and transfer data from
and to each of the applications' databases. This ensures that all applications are synchronized.
Periodically, the customer database is downloaded from the master application into the DCWASA application.
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Application size and scope |
The application is comprised of one Microsoft SQL Server database with 16 tables and 30 Web pages.
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What's next? |
We plan to use Iron Speed Designer to develop other intranet applications.
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About the developer |
Reginald Thorpe is an Information Support Group Leader at the Washington Suburban
Sanitary Commission (WSSC). He has been programming for more than 18 years, including
mainframes, and client-server and Web applications. WSSC won a contract to test water for
the District of Columbia water authority — but the project to build and deploy a Web
application to track and update the water samples information had to be completed in
less than three weeks! Reginald found Iron Speed Designer by searching the Internet
and was successful in meeting WSSC's time-sensitive requirements.
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