National Workshop on ANSN Capacity Building IT modules

OAP, Thailand

25th – 27th June 2013KUNJEER Sameer B

History of centralized ANSN website as well as national centers website evolution

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Contents

History

Structure

ITSG

Conclusions

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History• In 2004, ANSN IT network designed as a decentralized autonomous network system.

• Composed of three hubs in China, Japan and Korea; five national centers in Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand

and Vietnam.

• Hubs and national centers had their own databases and were interconnected via internet (SSO using security token access)

• In the beginning, hubs in China, Japan and Korea played core role in providing knowledge; NCs were mostly intended to

promote knowledge sharing among national experts and local communities, including access to information and knowledge

contained in the ANSN.

• In 2005, ANSN website (www.ansn.org ) and NC websites became operational.

• In May 2005, the Steering Committee agreed upon the basic access policies (http://

www.ansn.org/Level2/Organisation/OpenTopic.aspx?ID=8639 ) and visual identity (http://

www.ansn.org/Level2/Organisation/OpenTopic.aspx?ID=8640 ) for ANSN websites.

• ANSN documents were/are catalogued in a master index using a taxonomy which is a tool for users to locate and retrieve

information. Access to these documents through SSO.

• Primary reason for decentralized network was lack of reliability and speed of internet.

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History• In 2007, access to few and relevant ANSN documents was agreed to be given to general public. IT/IM security measures

were initiated by the NCs, so that information could be managed in a secure manner. A workshop was organized in Beijing

in November 2007 to address this.

• In 2008, IAEA proposed to the 8th ANSN Steering Committee meeting for changes in the ANSN IT network architecture (

http://www.ansn.org/Level2/Organisation/OpenTopic.aspx?ID=9218 ) It was also agreed by the Steering Committee to

establish a centralized user database in order to facilitate the management of various levels of access. (http://

www.ansn.org/Level2/Organisation/OpenTopic.aspx?ID=3229 )

• In October 2009, during the 5th ITSG meeting in Japan, advantages of breaking existing decentralized network extensively

discussed. Conclusion was a natural compromise via retaining capabilities of national center websites, with full

responsibility of each country for their content and local management of users

(http://www.ansn.org/Level2/Organisation/OpenTopic.aspx?ID=6084 ) This was reported to the 10th SC meeting.

• In 2009, ANSN Vision 2020 formulated and IT modules for capacity building were proposed and implementation initiated.

Migration of ANSN website from traditional ASP technologies to Microsoft .Net initiated.

• By 2012, several IT modules like online nomination, pool of experts, video conferencing integrated in the centralized ANSN

website. Also restructuring of centralized ANSN website completed.

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Users

National Centres

China

Japan

Korea Thailand

Vietnam

Malaysia

Philippines

Indonesia

www.ansn.org

Internet

Associate countries:Bangladesh, Pakistan

AustraliaFrance

GermanyUSA

----------IAEA

Singapore

NUCLEAR SAFETY

KNOWLEDGE

ASEAN

Supporting Countries

Hubs

Previous Structure

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IT Support Group

Existing Structure

Participating Countries

Thailand

Vietnam

Malaysia

Philippines

Indonesia

www.ansn.org

Mutual Learning and

Continuous Enhancement for

Nuclear Safety Capacity Building

Supporting Countries

FranceGermany

USA

EC

Japan

China

Korea

Australia

Pakistan

AssociateCountry

ASEAN

Bangladesh

Kazakhstan

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ITSG• Development of the decentralized autonomous network needed close coordination. For this, the ITSG was formulated in

2004.

• ITSG meetings on an average once per year to coordinate development activities and to decide on all facets of ANSN

infrastructure e.g. database formats, visual identity, data exchange protocols, search engines, taxonomy, etc.

• Initially hubs responsible for most of development; while national centers had the opportunity to increase their

understanding of the system and learn how to operate their nodes.

• Technical assistance missions by IT experts to the national centers have helped to evaluate their respective environment, to

install core software, and to train their staff on maintenance and basic new development.

• Almost all the ITSG members are same as in the beginning.

• Currently, ITSG headed by ANSN Project Management Officer in charge of Steering Committee and assisted by a senior

programmer/system analyst.

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Conclusions• Previous decentralized network architecture with SSO difficult, complicated and resource intensive to maintain and

operate. Also not feasible at times due to centralized ANSN website security policies as well as differing ANSN member

state cyber security policies.

• National center websites can have 2 logical parts:

Local pages/documents in their national languages; open to all without registration.

Information pertaining to regional Capacity Building modules, obtained from centralized ANSN website. This

information does not necessarily need registration to the website. Details of this information may need

registration in centralized ANSN website.

• ANSN participating member states face the challenge of lack of IT resources for maintenance of ANSN national center

websites.

• Lack of vision/instructions given to ANSN participating countries by the ANSN management team, regarding the role of

national center websites in ANSN Vision 2020.

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…Thank you for your attentions.b.kunjeer@iaea.org