Info Electronics S-0183 SOW R3 Oct 20-Final-Rev-2018-01-31.doc

1. Introduction

 

The Build in Canada Innovation Program (BCIP) is an initiative launched as part of the

Government of Canada's commitment to promote Canada's economic growth as announced in

Budget 2010. The Program is managed by the Office of Small and Medium Enterprises – Stakeholder Engagement (OSME-SE).  In Budget 2012 BCIP was made a permanent Program.

 

 

2. P rogram Background

 

The BCIP was created to bolster innovation in Canada's business sector and supports the federal

commitment to bridge the pre-commercialization gap for innovative goods and/or services by:

 

a)                 Supporting Canadian innovators advancing the readiness of their pre-commercial goods and services; and,

b)                 Providing Innovators with the opportunity to enter the marketplace with a successful      application of their new good and/or service.

 

The BCIP is a Research & Development (R&D) procurement program aimed at procuring, testing and evaluating pre-commercialized goods and services in the late stages of development.

 

Under the BCIP, Innovators are matched with a federal government department to participate in the testing of an Innovation.  The Crown purchases the Innovation from the Innovator and provides funding support for selected Innovator costs associated with the testing being done by a Testing Department.

 

 

3. Terms

 

“Innovation” refers to the Met-WebGIS

 

“Testing Department” refers to Environment and Climate Change Canada, Canadian Meteorological Centre – Operations

 

“Contract Period” refers to the time from Contract award up to March 30, 2018

 

“Option Period” (if applicable) refers to an optional time period that begins at the end of the “Contract Period”.

 

 

4. Innovation

 

4.1.             Innovation Description

 

The Innovation is a software application for implementing operational weather briefing and forecasting workstations using Client-Server technology with a Web browser client.  It allows professional users to process, congregate, analyze, render and display meteorological data from all sources to generate, customize and distribute advanced weather based products for a multitude of special uses and decision making. It uses regular Web browsers on the client system.

The Innovation offers end users the flexibility to interactively query, build and visualize weather products customized to the application’s specifications and the area of interest context making use of the back-end services, the enabled GIS functionalities and the application’s Web-based graphical user interface.

 

The Innovation can be set-up to access and fetch data from a multitude of both publicly available as well as client’s private and restricted sources.  It could be set-up to ingest Web Map Service (WMS) and Web Feature Service (WFS) enabled data as well as raw data in its native or post-native format.

 

The Innovation has been designed to serve the requirements of various types of meteorological users.  It can be tailored to the requirements of any Meteorological, Aviation, Forestry or Disaster Monitoring Services. While some Services will be able to use the Innovation without any adjustments/customization (i.e., if they use WAFS-SADIS-ISCS data generated by the UK-Met Office and National Weather Service of the USA), others will need this customization related to database formats or specific application requirements. 

 

 

4.2.             Innovation Features and Benefits

 

The Innovation is a pioneer commercial application because:

 

1. It is a unique tool for weather professionals to take the weather data from its source to ready for use end products applying their own knowledge, expertise and subjective analysis using a Web based client.  This is made possible because of the Innovation enabled functionalities and its flexible setup to adapt to the operational environment and its specific data sources;
2. It is a unique tool which offers the end user customization flexibility by using a regular Web browser and no special software on the client side to query, render and visualize the end product that best suits their application and geographical area of interest;
3. It is a unique product that, once set up in operational mode, allows the professional user as well as the end user to preconfigure their preferences in customized products using a set of macros to be run manually in a couple of clicks or automatically and not to worry about any uniformization of the source data or the time synchronization;
4. It is unique in its completely Web enabled graphical user interface (GUI) for its operation by both weather professionals and end users, in comparison to similar solutions for briefing and forecasting weather workstations.  None of the available briefing and forecasting weather workstations have a completely Web-based GUI through a standard browser, thus implying considerable deployment efforts at the users’ terminals; and
5. One of the issues with any product having multiple users is to keep all user systems up to date.  Since all processing software is installed at the Central Server and the client needs only a standard browser, maintenance of the system is greatly facilitated.

 

 

5. Contract Objectives

 

The objectives of the Contract are to have the Contractor deliver the Innovation and associated components, and provide training, technical support and oversight services and consultation in support of the Innovation Testing Procedures.

 

 

 

6. Contractor

 

6.1.             Contractor Responsibilities

 

The Contractor must provide the products and services identified in Section 6 to assist the Testing Department in the completion of the Innovation Test Plan as described in Section 8.2.  

 

6.2.             Deliverables

 

6.2.1.            Contract Period

 

The Contractor must provide:

 

• Department-Wide End-User License;
• Online Internet access to the deployed Innovation on a Hosting service provider platform; and
• Documents – one .pdf copy of each of the following:
• Project Plan;
• Test Plan; and
• Training Materials.

 

6.2.2.            Option Period

 

The Contractor must continue to provide:

 

• Department-Wide End-User License; and
• Online Internet access to the deployed Innovation on a Hosting service provider platform.

 

 

6.3.             Transportation and Shipping

 

The Contractor must make transportation and shipping arrangements for all the deliverables identified in Section 6.2 plus any other required items, to the testing site(s) identified in Section 8.3.

 

6.4.             Installation and Configuration

 

6.4.1.            Contract Period

 

The Contractor must:

 

• Setup the Innovation ingest plug-in for the Testing Department source of data for display and analysis to integrate the ingestion of the Meteorological Service of Canada (MSC) GeoMet data source;
• Deploy the Innovation on a hosting service provider platform;
• Setup the Testing Department online Web access;
• Work with the Testing Department to identify specific adjustments and modification required;
• Make the required adjustments and customizations; and
• Ensure that the Innovation is ready for operational testing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

6.5.             Training

 

6.5.1.            Contract Period

 

The Contractor must provide two (02) days of training for up to five (05) Testing Department staff, in an office setting using online Web-based access to the deployed Innovation, with respect to:

 

• Application Graphical User Interface;
• User profile setup and customization;
• Product Generation;
• Analysis tools;
• Macro queries;
• Product generation scheduling and automation; and
• Bug reporting and tracking.

 

6.6.             Technical Support

 

The Contractor must provide remote technical support to the Testing Department during the testing period via telephone at (514) 421-0767, Monday to Friday during normal business hours of 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., Eastern Standard Time, excluding statutory holidays, and by E-mail at contact@info-electronics.com, with a maximum turnaround time of 400 hours for the duration of the Contract.

 

6.7.             Travel

 

Not Applicable.

 

6.8.             Language

 

All deliverables and support provided by the Contractor to Canada must be in the English and French languages.

 

6.9.             Security (if applicable)

 

It is the responsibility of the Contractor to ensure all Contractor Resources hold the identified required level(s) of Security Clearance.

 

6.10.        Controlled Goods (if applicable)

 

It is the responsibility of the Contractor to meet the Controlled Goods requirements.

 

This Contract does not involve Controlled Goods.

 

6.11               Innovation Certifications, Licences and Approvals (as applicable)

 

It is the responsibility of the Contractor to ensure all applicable certifications, licences, and or approvals required to test their Innovation in an operational setting and remain valid through the period of the contract.  Example:  If the proposed Innovation is a medical device, the Contractor must state the class of medical device and possess the appropriate licence (i.e. Medical Device Licence (MDL), or Medical Device Establishment Licence (MDEL).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

7. Testing Department

 

7.1.             Testing Department Overview

 

The Testing Department’s mission is to protect the environment, conserve the country's natural heritage, and provide weather and meteorological information to keep Canadians informed and safe.  It builds on its accomplishments with the environment through credible science, effective regulations and legislation, successful partnerships, and high-quality service delivery to Canadians.

 

The Testing Department supports sound environmental decisions. It works to repair the damage of the past, to collect and pass on knowledge, and to develop, implement and enforce policies to prevent future issues. It also works to ensure that Canadians have a safe, clean and sustainable environment today, tomorrow and well into the future.

 

The Testing Department’s Canadian Meteorological Centre (CMC) is home to environmental programs in weather, climate, and air quality, and expertise during environmental emergencies. It consolidates modeling and environmental prediction capability and professional development capacity at the national level in order to foster effective science and technology transfer, greater innovation, and workforce training and development.

 

CMC Operations is responsible for the 24/7 operations of the Meteorological Service of Canada’s automated analysis, prediction systems, the response to nuclear and technological releases of toxic material, volcanic ash and other health and safety operational response systems.

Data from Canada and the rest of the world, including space-based observations, are acquired in real-time, processed and quality controlled and ingested at CMC.

 

Meteorologists, computer and physical scientists and engineers at the Centre work with researchers to develop and effectively operationalize new knowledge in the field to continuously improve Canada’s weather and environmental prediction systems. New technologies are transferred to internal systems and products, as well as external partners and end users (e.g., NAV CANADA).

 

The information generated at CMC provides the basis for dedicated forecasts serving the public, marine and aviation communities. Specialized data and products are also delivered to support operations for agencies, such as provincial governments, the Department of National Defence and commercial end users.

 

Work related to weather forecasting and environmental prediction is dependent on the supercomputing capacity managed by Shared Services Canada.

 

The Canadian Meteorological Centre – Operations, where the Innovation is being tested, is responsible for the 24/7 operational production of numerical weather prediction data and products, such as weather and environmental forecasts, and their dissemination to operational 24/7 internal users as well as key socio-economic stakeholders and the public.  It is required to visualize in a timely and efficient manner subsets of a very large quantity of georeferenced datasets. Amongst its constraints, CMC Operations cannot copy over the network the entire raw datasets (over 10Tb of fresh data created daily) and the installation and maintenance of specialized software at multiple operational locations can be challenging. The Innovation may provide a suitable solution for data access and analysis, without the need for copying entire datasets or the installation of specialized software within the Testing Department.

 

7.2.             Testing Department Responsibilities

 

The Testing Department will:

 

• Provide the infrastructure to access the Innovation (e.g. computers, Web browser software, Internet connectivity);
• Provide staff to coordinate planning and Innovation requirements identification with the Contractor and with stakeholders within the Testing Department; and
• Provide staff to receive training on the Innovation, test the Innovation, and share written feedback with the Contractor on the Innovation.

 

7.3.             Security (if applicable)

 

This Project does not have a security Requirement.

 

7.4.             Controlled Goods

 

The Testing Department has a responsibility to ensure that the federal government’s Controlled Goods Program is adhered to.  Therefore, it must assist the Contractor in determining if Controlled Goods are involved with this Project, and if so, ensure compliance with the Regulations.  Refer to Section 6.10.

 

8. Testing

 

8.1.             Test Objectives

 

“Test Objectives” identify the performance characteristics to be confirmed during the Testing.  Objectives for the testing of this Innovation have been divided into two categories:

 

• Those that the Testing Department considers MANDATORY for the Innovation to be able to provide for it to be; and
• Those that the Testing Department considers OPTIONAL or “nice to have”.

 

Detailed descriptions of these characteristics are provided in the attached Appendix A.  Please refer to this Appendix for a detailed description of all referred to TDR-### (Testing Department Requirement -ref)

 

MANDATORY Objectives:

 

The Objectives of the Testing are to:

 

1. TO-1A: Confirm that the Innovation can access data available as per:

• TDR-111                             [pass level: it does]

 

2. TO-2A: Confirm that the Innovation can support the display of the WMS (Web Map Service) layers as per:

• TDR-221                             [pass level: it does]
• TDR-222                             [pass level: it does]
• TDR-223                             [pass level: it does]
• TDR-224                             [pass level: it does]
• TDR-225                             [pass level: it does]
• TDR-226                             [pass level: it does]
• TDR-227                             [pass level: it does]
• TDR-310                             [pass level: it does]
• TDR-320                             [pass level: it does]

 

3. TO-3A: Confirm that the Innovation can support the layer styles as per:

• TDR-411                             [pass level: it does]

 

4. TO-4A: Confirm that the Innovation can support the following ergonomic and performance specifications as per:

• TDR-510                             [pass level: it does]
• TDR-521                             [pass level: it does]
• TDR-531                             [pass level: it does]
• TDR-560                             [pass level: it does]

 

5. TO-5A: Confirm that the Innovation can support the analysis requirement as per:

• TDR-660                             [pass level: it does]

 

6. TO-6A: Confirm that the Innovation can support the operation use case as per:

• TDR-721                             [pass level: it does]

 

7. TO:7A: Confirm that the Innovation provides the required documentation and support as per:

• TDR-810                             [pass level: it does]
• TDR-820                             [pass level: it does]

 

OPTIONAL Objectives:

 

The Objectives of the Testing are to:

1. TO-1B: Determine whether the Innovation can access data as per:

• TDR-112
• TDR-120
• TDR-130

[pass: by scoring 7 or more points out of the 14]

2. TO-2B: Determine whether the Innovation can support the display of the WMS (Web Map Service) layers as per:

• TDR-210
• TDR-228
• TDR-330
• TDR-340
• TDR-351
• TDR-352
• TDR-353

[pass: by scoring 20 or more points out of the 40]

3. TO-3B: Determine whether the Innovation can support the layer styles as per:

• TDR-412
• TDR-420
• TDR-430
• TDR-440

[pass: by scoring 5 or more points out of the 15 ]

4. TO-4B: Determine whether the Innovation can the following ergonomic and performance as per:

• TDR-522
• TDR-523
• TDR-532
• TDR-533
• TDR-540
• TDR-550

[pass: by scoring 15 or more points out of the 33]

5. TO-5B: Determine whether the Innovation can support the analysis requirement as per:

• TDR-611
• TDR-612
• TDR-620
• TDR-630
• TDR-640
• TDR-650
• TDR-671
• TDR-672
• TDR-680

[pass: by scoring 12 or more points out of the 25]

6. TO-6B: Determine whether the Innovation can support the operation use case as per:

• TDR-711
• TDR-712
• TDR-713
• TDR-714
• TDR-715
• TDR-722

[pass: by scoring 7 or more points out of the 15]

 

8.2.             Test Procedures

 

8.2.1.            Contract Period

 

The Testing Department has its databases in WMS format and also has some requirements which need some adjustments.  The Testing Department has developed its own data preprocessing server outside the GTS (Global Telecommunication System of the World Meteorological Organization) platform in the form of its GeoMet and GeoMet Beta servers based on WMS and WFS standards.  Some adjustments must be made in the interface to ingest that data.  In fact these adjustments will be a part of the proof that the Innovation can be tailored to meet the requirements of a sophisticated Meteorological Service of the caliber of the Testing Department with relatively small effort.  For this Test the following adjustments to the Innovation are required:

 

1. Data Sources

It will be necessary to setup the Innovation ingest plug-in to ingest data from the MSC GeoMet data source as the main source for the testing of the display and analysis requirements of the Testing Department.

 

2. The User Groups’ Specific “Use Cases”

Some optimization of the Graphical User Interface as well as some of the analysis tools is required to best serve the actual operational production processes.  As an example, user groups from public forecasting, aviation, marine or storm surges working within the same NWS would have different “use cases”.

 

The Testing Department has already identified the Canadian Meteorological Centre – Operations as its main user group, but it was also clear that to make the best use of the Innovation some nominal modifications and adjustments would be required to cover other user groups.

 

The Contract Period will be used to identify and make the required modifications and customizations to allow the Testing to address the Objectives identified in Section 8.1.  Details of these Test Objectives (TO-XA) are in Appendix A:

 

• TO-1A: Confirm that the Innovation can access data available as WMS (Web Map Service) layers;
• TO-2A: Confirm that the Innovation can support the display of other web standards such as WFS (Web Feature Service) and WCS (Web Coverage Service);
• TO-3A: Confirm that the Innovation can support the layer styles;
• TO-4A: Confirm that the Innovation can support the ergonomic and performance specifications;
• TO-5A: Confirm that the Innovation can support the analysis requirement; and
• TO-6A: Confirm that the Innovation can support the operation use case.

 

The pretesting work will cover the following Phase activities:

 

• Phase1: Project planning: Identification of overall requirements and potential use of the Innovation:

• Review with the Testing Department’s main user group their current operation practices in order to adjust the Innovation GUI to best suited operation use cases;

 

 

• Phase2: Identification of the Modification Requirements to the generic version of the Innovation: This preliminary testing should result in the identification of user group operation use cases as well as custom adjustments and enhancements to best suit the Testing Department’s use:

• Integration of GeoMet & GeoMet Beta data sources: Setup of the Innovation ingest plug-in to ingest data from the MSC GeoMet data source as the main source for the testing of the display and analysis requirements of the Testing Department;
• Deployment plan: Prepare the Deployment plan;
• Preliminary test plan: Prepare the Preliminary test plan;
• Initiation training material: Prepare the Initiation training material ;
• Installation and setup services : Deploy the Innovation on a dedicated platform at a hosting service provider and provide access to Testing Department for running the test;
• Initiation training services : Provide Initiation training;
• Testing of the Generic innovation : Run preliminary test;
• Support services: Provide Support services for testing.

• Phase3: Innovation modification adjustment enhancement: Innovation modification as per the identified adjustment and modification in phase 2:

• Detailed adjustment and modification plan : Compile feedback from preliminary testing.  Prepare and review the detailed adjustment and modification plan;
• Testing plan : Prepare and review the Testing plan;
• Customize the innovation software package: Implement the adjustment, modifications and fixes as per the detailed plan;
• Update of the deployed innovation: Update of the deployment with the custom adjustment and modification as per the detailed plan ;
• Factory testing: Perform the factory testing.

 

8.2.2.            Option Period

 

During the Option Period, the Contractor will perform the following procedures using the Innovation with the incorporated modifications. Details of the Test Objectives (TO-XB) are in Appendix A:

 

• TO-1B: Confirm that the Innovation can access data available;
• TO-2B: Confirm that the Innovation can support the display of the WMS (Web Map Service) layers;
• TO-3B: Confirm that the Innovation can support the layer styles;
• TO-4B: Confirm that the Innovation can support the ergonomic and performance specifications;
• TO-5B: Confirm that the Innovation can support the analysis requirement;
• TO-6B: Confirm that the Innovation can support the operation use case; and
• TO-7A: Confirm that the Innovation provides the required documentation and support (This objective although Mandatory was left to the Option Period to have it covering all modifications as well as the second language).

 

The testing work will cover the following phase activities:

 

• Phase4: Innovation Testing, feedback and problem reporting:

• Final training plan: Prepare and review final training plan;
• Training services: Provide training;
• On site testing and reporting: The Contractor’s support of the on-site testing by the Testing Department;
• Results analysis: Perform the results analysis;
• Bugs fixing and improvement: Develop the bug fixes and improvements;
• Updates setup: Update the deployment with the bug fixes and the improvement;

 

 

 

• Phase5: Innovation in operation and support:

• Second language implementation : Implementation of the second language;
• Operation training : Operation training as required under the support services;
• Operation support: Support of the Testing Department operation services;
• Updates setup: Implement the deployment updates as required; and
• Final analysis and recommendation: Prepare the final report.

 

8.3.             Performance Metrics

 

For Objective specific metrics, refer to Section 8.1.

 

For the Innovation to be fully acceptable to the Testing Department, it must pass 100% of the MANDATORY Objectives .

 

For the OPTIONAL Objectives , each Objective will be evaluated separately.  In each case, the Innovation will be evaluated as ‘passed’ if it receives a score of points as defined under Section 8.1.

 

8.4.             Test Sites

 

8.4.1.            Contract Period

 

Tests during the Contract Period will be conducted at the following sites:

 

• 2121 Trans-Canada Highway, Dorval, Quebec; and
• Environment Canada’s office at Place Bonaventure, Montreal, Quebec.

 

8.4.2.            Option Period

 

Same as in the Contract Period.

 

8.5.             Schedule

 

 

8.5.1.            Contract Period

 

Task Name	Starting Week	Duration (wks)
	1*	52
Phase1: Project Planning	1*	0.8
Project plan documents	1	0.8
Phase 2: Identification of the Modification Requirements to the Generic Version of the Innovation	2	7
Integration of GeoMet & GeoMet Beta data sources	2	5
Deployment plan	2	0.4
Generic innovation package and licences (Payment Milestone #1)	2	0
Preliminary test plan	3	0.8
Initiation training material	4	0.8
Installation and setup services	6	0.6

*From Contract Award

 

8.5.2.            Option Period

 

Task Name	Starting Week *	Duration (wks)
Initiation training services	7	0.4
Testing of the Generic innovation	8	0.8
Support services	8	0.8
Phase 3: Innovation Modification Adjustment Enhancement	7	10
Detailed adjustment and modification plan	9	0.8
Test plan	10	1
Customize the innovation software package	7	8
Update of the deployed innovation (Payment Milestone #2)	15	0.4
Factory testing	16	0.6
Phase 4: Innovation testing	17	9
Final Training plan	18	0.2
Training services	19	0.6
On site testing and reporting	20	2
Innovation testing support	20	2
Results analysis	22	0.8
Bugs fixing and improvement (Payment Milestone #3)	23	2
Updates setup	26	0.4
Phase 5: Innovation in operation and support	27	25
Second language implementation	27	2
Operation training	27	4.2
Operation services	31	25
Operation support	31	25
Updates setup	31	25
Final analysis and recommendation	49	2

*From Contract Award