All Pilot County RFA Implementation Coordinators and SPOCs:
February 14, 2024 UPDATE: The CWS-CARES team will deploy CWS-CARES hotfix 0.11.3 to remove the Chatter feature from the CARES-RFA application. The hotfix is scheduled for tonight, February 14, 2024, beginning at 5:00 PM and concluding at 6:30 PM.
During the hotfix deployment, the CWS-CARES Resource Family Approval (RFA) Application Submission, Review, and Approval Process will be accessible for pilot counties Contra Costa, Fresno, Placer, and Santa Clara.
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An issue was discovered in the CARES-RFA application that was showing the Chatter feature in the application, under the Event / Call area. The Chatter feature should not be visible in the Production environment. The CWDS team is working on correcting this issue as soon as possible. Updates will be provided as they are received.
Action Required
No action is required at this time.
If users experience any issues with the CWS-CARES, please follow your county process for reporting issues. CWS-CARES County Administrators may contact the CARES Service Desk through the CWDS ServiceNow Customer Support Management (CSM) Portal at https://cwds.service-now.com/csm. Alternate methods are phoning 1-855-292-3444 or via email at Servicedesk@cwds.ca.gov during normal business hours. You may also email after hours, and a Service Desk representative will contact you the next business day.
CWDS Bulletins
California Department of Technology Service Desk Bulletin – SBCS Infrastructure Servers Security Patching
All SPOCs, Technical Contacts, and SBC Administrators:
The California Department of Technology (CDT) has scheduled maintenance on Saturday, February 24, 2024, beginning at 6:00 AM and concluding at 10:00 AM. During the maintenance window, CDT will apply Standard Monthly OS Security Patches to SBCS Infrastructure Servers. There is no anticipated outage for this maintenance; however, CDT is asking that everyone log off from the Citrix SBC system, if not actively using it during the maintenance window.
Action Required
If users experience any issues with CWS/CMS, please follow your county process for reporting issues or you may contact the IBM Boulder Help Desk at 1-800-428-8268.
The California Department of Technology (CDT) has scheduled maintenance on Saturday, February 24, 2024, beginning at 6:00 AM and concluding at 10:00 AM. During the maintenance window, CDT will apply Standard Monthly OS Security Patches to SBCS Infrastructure Servers. There is no anticipated outage for this maintenance; however, CDT is asking that everyone log off from the Citrix SBC system, if not actively using it during the maintenance window.
Action Required
If users experience any issues with CWS/CMS, please follow your county process for reporting issues or you may contact the IBM Boulder Help Desk at 1-800-428-8268.
CARES-RFA
CARES RFA Pilot Counties:
An issue was discovered in the CARES-RFA application that was showing the Chatter feature in the application, under the Event / Call area. The Chatter feature should not be visible in the Production environment. The CWDS team is working on correcting this issue as soon as possible. Updates will be provided as they are received.
Action Required
No action is required at this time.
If users experience any issues with the CWS-CARES, please follow your county process for reporting issues. CWS-CARES County Administrators may contact the CARES Service Desk through the CWDS ServiceNow Customer Support Management (CSM) Portal. Alternate methods are phoning 1-855-292-3444 or via email at Servicedesk@cwds.ca.gov during normal business hours. You may also email after hours, and a Service Desk representative will contact you the next business day.
An issue was discovered in the CARES-RFA application that was showing the Chatter feature in the application, under the Event / Call area. The Chatter feature should not be visible in the Production environment. The CWDS team is working on correcting this issue as soon as possible. Updates will be provided as they are received.
Action Required
No action is required at this time.
If users experience any issues with the CWS-CARES, please follow your county process for reporting issues. CWS-CARES County Administrators may contact the CARES Service Desk through the CWDS ServiceNow Customer Support Management (CSM) Portal. Alternate methods are phoning 1-855-292-3444 or via email at Servicedesk@cwds.ca.gov during normal business hours. You may also email after hours, and a Service Desk representative will contact you the next business day.
California Department of Technology Service Desk Bulletin - SAFE Cloud Service Scheduled Maintenance
ALL SPOCs, Technical Contacts and CAD Contacts:
The California Department of Technology (CDT) has scheduled maintenance of the SAFE Cloud service. The maintenance begins on Saturday, February 24, 2024, at 8:00 PM and concludes on Sunday, February 25, 2024, at 2:00 AM. The activity will cause interruptions in the SAFE Cloud service. Some Business Objects (BO) reports will fail to send, or automated scripts may fail to retrieve from SAFE during this scheduled maintenance.
Action Required
All users should logoff of the SAFE Cloud service prior to the start of the stated maintenance timeframe. Please check on your scheduled BO SAFE reports and automated FTP scripts. If needed, re-run the reports and scripts.
Contact the IBM Help Desk (800-428-8268) to report any issues with your Business Objects content in SAFE.
The California Department of Technology (CDT) has scheduled maintenance of the SAFE Cloud service. The maintenance begins on Saturday, February 24, 2024, at 8:00 PM and concludes on Sunday, February 25, 2024, at 2:00 AM. The activity will cause interruptions in the SAFE Cloud service. Some Business Objects (BO) reports will fail to send, or automated scripts may fail to retrieve from SAFE during this scheduled maintenance.
Action Required
All users should logoff of the SAFE Cloud service prior to the start of the stated maintenance timeframe. Please check on your scheduled BO SAFE reports and automated FTP scripts. If needed, re-run the reports and scripts.
Contact the IBM Help Desk (800-428-8268) to report any issues with your Business Objects content in SAFE.
CWS/CMS Infected and Unsupported File Extension File Cleanup – UPDATE
CWS Directors, SPOCs and Technical Contacts in Affected Counties:
February 8, 2024 UPDATE: The California Department of Social Services (CDSS), the CWDS Project and IBM are still working on determining an approach for sharing with counties the documents that have been quarantined. This decision will take a little longer to complete than originally thought. The updated ETA for the decision is now March 15, 2024. An update will be shared out to everybody once the decision has been made.
In the meantime, the CWDS Office is still awaiting notification from the CWS Directors from a majority of the impacted Counties on your preference to delete or to keep quarantined the affected files. If you have not yet shared your preference, please do so by the extended deadline of February 29, 2024.
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December 26, 2023 UPDATE: The California Department of Social Services (CDSS), the CWDS Project and IBM have decided that the safest option is to quarantine the identified infected and unsupported files in CWS/CMS. The files will not be deleted from CWS/CMS, but users will be prevented from opening the affected documents. The affected documents will be saved to a quarantined area of CWS/CMS on Saturday, January 6, 2024. If a CWS/CMS user attempts to open one of the quarantined documents, they will receive the following error message:
Please note that this DRMS 00122 error message is informational only and that the user will be able to continue to work in the CWS/CMS application after receiving the error message.
The CWDS Project and IBM are still looking to receive responses from the CWS Directors indicating their permission to permanently delete these files. Please contact CWDS Customer Relations (CWS_CustRel@otsi.ca.gov) by January 31, 2024, with your decision whether to have IBM delete the files in a batch file deletion process.
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December 18, 2023 UPDATE: In the attached letter the California Department of Social Services (CDSS) has provided updated guidance to Counties impacted by the CWS/CMS infected and unsupported file cleanup effort.
Please contact CWDS Customer Relations (CWS_CustRel@otsi.ca.gov) with any questions related to this guidance.
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As part of planning for CWS-CARES V1, the CARES Data Conversion team has been performing incremental conversion from CWS/CMS data and documents into CWS-CARES. After the documents are extracted from CWS/CMS, they are scanned to ensure that no viruses are introduced into the CARES environment. During this process, it was discovered that, out of 73 million documents that are stored in the CWS/CMS database, approximately 2,400 documents are infected with a virus or malware. Of these 2,400 documents, 95% were last updated in 2001 or before.
Further, there are an additional 2,600 files that have an unsupported file extension.
Due to security concerns, these documents and files cannot be moved into the CWS-CARES application.
Please NOTE: These infected documents are stored in binary large object (BLOB) format on the mainframe in the Db2 database. As a result, these documents do not affect CWS/CMS data on the mainframe. However, if the document is opened, the virus can infect the user’s personal computer. Please ensure that you have a current antivirus operating on your workstation.
If you are receiving this communication, it means that your county is impacted by this issue.
For each affected County, we will send a report listing the infected files and unsupported file extension files, with additional details pertaining to that County. The reports will be sent to affected counties after the Kick-off meetings.
Please provide a point of contact including IT Support and Security Officer as appropriate and their information (Name, Email, Role, etc.) for the person that should receive your County’s report no later than 11/8/23. The report will be sent via encrypted email to that person.
Please use this form to provide the point(s) of contact: CWS/CMS Infected Documents/Unsupported File Extension - Contacts
Once Customer Relations receives the point of contact person’s information, they will be invited to the Kick-off meetings scheduled for 11/14/23 and 11/16/23. The intent of those meetings will be to review next steps.
Action Required
Please provide a point of contact and their information (Name, Email, etc.), using the link above, for the person that should receive your County’s report no later than 11/8/23.
February 8, 2024 UPDATE: The California Department of Social Services (CDSS), the CWDS Project and IBM are still working on determining an approach for sharing with counties the documents that have been quarantined. This decision will take a little longer to complete than originally thought. The updated ETA for the decision is now March 15, 2024. An update will be shared out to everybody once the decision has been made.
In the meantime, the CWDS Office is still awaiting notification from the CWS Directors from a majority of the impacted Counties on your preference to delete or to keep quarantined the affected files. If you have not yet shared your preference, please do so by the extended deadline of February 29, 2024.
____________________________________________________________________________
December 26, 2023 UPDATE: The California Department of Social Services (CDSS), the CWDS Project and IBM have decided that the safest option is to quarantine the identified infected and unsupported files in CWS/CMS. The files will not be deleted from CWS/CMS, but users will be prevented from opening the affected documents. The affected documents will be saved to a quarantined area of CWS/CMS on Saturday, January 6, 2024. If a CWS/CMS user attempts to open one of the quarantined documents, they will receive the following error message:
Please note that this DRMS 00122 error message is informational only and that the user will be able to continue to work in the CWS/CMS application after receiving the error message.
The CWDS Project and IBM are still looking to receive responses from the CWS Directors indicating their permission to permanently delete these files. Please contact CWDS Customer Relations (CWS_CustRel@otsi.ca.gov) by January 31, 2024, with your decision whether to have IBM delete the files in a batch file deletion process.
__________________________________________________________________________________________
December 18, 2023 UPDATE: In the attached letter the California Department of Social Services (CDSS) has provided updated guidance to Counties impacted by the CWS/CMS infected and unsupported file cleanup effort.
Please contact CWDS Customer Relations (CWS_CustRel@otsi.ca.gov) with any questions related to this guidance.
_________________________________________________________________________________________
As part of planning for CWS-CARES V1, the CARES Data Conversion team has been performing incremental conversion from CWS/CMS data and documents into CWS-CARES. After the documents are extracted from CWS/CMS, they are scanned to ensure that no viruses are introduced into the CARES environment. During this process, it was discovered that, out of 73 million documents that are stored in the CWS/CMS database, approximately 2,400 documents are infected with a virus or malware. Of these 2,400 documents, 95% were last updated in 2001 or before.
Further, there are an additional 2,600 files that have an unsupported file extension.
Due to security concerns, these documents and files cannot be moved into the CWS-CARES application.
Please NOTE: These infected documents are stored in binary large object (BLOB) format on the mainframe in the Db2 database. As a result, these documents do not affect CWS/CMS data on the mainframe. However, if the document is opened, the virus can infect the user’s personal computer. Please ensure that you have a current antivirus operating on your workstation.
If you are receiving this communication, it means that your county is impacted by this issue.
For each affected County, we will send a report listing the infected files and unsupported file extension files, with additional details pertaining to that County. The reports will be sent to affected counties after the Kick-off meetings.
Please provide a point of contact including IT Support and Security Officer as appropriate and their information (Name, Email, Role, etc.) for the person that should receive your County’s report no later than 11/8/23. The report will be sent via encrypted email to that person.
Please use this form to provide the point(s) of contact: CWS/CMS Infected Documents/Unsupported File Extension - Contacts
Once Customer Relations receives the point of contact person’s information, they will be invited to the Kick-off meetings scheduled for 11/14/23 and 11/16/23. The intent of those meetings will be to review next steps.
Action Required
Please provide a point of contact and their information (Name, Email, etc.), using the link above, for the person that should receive your County’s report no later than 11/8/23.
CWS-CARES Extended User Scenario Testing (EUST) – UPDATE #2
All Directors and SPOCs:
February 7, 2024 UPDATE: Child welfare leadership,
Thank you for your staff’s participation in the CWS-CARES Extended User Scenario Testing (EUST) experience.
During the February 1st EUST kickoff and in a subsequent email, CWS-CARES leadership shared that the activities originally scheduled to begin on Monday, February 5, 2024 were postponed to a later date.
The details of the updated activities are listed below. Meeting invitations with these dates have been sent to your staff. Please have your staff contact the CARES project team (CARESPVSTeam@osi.ca.gov) if they are participating in EUST activities and have not yet received session invitations.
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Tuesday February 20th - EUST Overview Training (morning and afternoon sessions offered; staff should select only one)
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Wednesday February 21st - Scenario Walkthrough
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Thursday February 22nd - CARES Basics Training (morning and afternoon sessions offered; staff should select only one)
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Wednesday February 21st – Testing begins
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Friday March 15th – Testing ends
Meeting invitations will be scheduled for Office Hours on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays during the testing period from February 21st to March 15th.
If you have any questions, please contact CARESPVSTeam@osi.ca.gov. Thank you for your support of the EUST process.
Action Required
Staff to accept the meeting invitations, as necessary.
Thank you,
CWS-CARES Product Value Services (PVS) Team
____________________________________________________________________________________________
Child welfare leadership,
Thank you for your staff’s participation in the CWS-CARES Extended User Scenario Testing (EUST) experience.
During the EUST kickoff today, CWS-CARES leadership shared that the activities beginning on Monday, February 5, 2024 are postponed to a later date because of additional stabilization needed in the testing environment.
Therefore, we are rescheduling the dates for demonstrations, training sessions, virtual office hours, and the overall testing period to ensure that users have an optimal experience to provide their valuable feedback.
We will provide an update as soon as possible, with a minimum two-week advance notice prior to the new start date of testing activities.
If you have any questions, please contact us.
Thank you for your time and commitment to the EUST process.
Action Required
Staff to accept the meeting invitations, as necessary.
Executive Leadership Team (ELT)
Cynthia Tocher
Jessica Rougeux
Tricia Gonzalez
CWS/CMS Release 9.3 and Interim Release 9.3.0 (3-Day Reminder) Bulletin
Release 9.3 will be implemented on Saturday, February 10, 2024
The application outage begins on Saturday, February 10, 2024 at 5:00 AM and will most likely complete around 11:00 AM. Users will not be able to access the CWS/CMS application during this period. All application updates will be applied during this outage and should be available once the outage is complete.
Note: Business Objects will be unavailable from approximately 8 AM to 11 AM while the Release 9.3 updates are being applied.
Customer support will be available from the IBM Helpdesk at (800) 428-8268.
Coexistent county CWSCMS.MSI file availability:
The CWSCMS.MSI file was made available on Friday, February 2, 2024 for technical staff to begin testing the installation of the release. The code is located on the CWSDFSr share in the following location:
Dedicated County CWSCMS.MSI file delivery:
By Friday, February 2, 2024, dedicated county users should have started seeing the CWSCMS.MSI file copied to their workstations during Windows logon. Technical staff can verify that they have received the file by checking for its presence in the C:\CACW\R93 folder. This file must exist on the workstation for the installation of Release 9.3 to take place on or after February 10, 2024.
Dedicated County users should do the following on the night before the release:
The application outage begins on Saturday, February 10, 2024 at 5:00 AM and will most likely complete around 11:00 AM. Users will not be able to access the CWS/CMS application during this period. All application updates will be applied during this outage and should be available once the outage is complete.
Note: Business Objects will be unavailable from approximately 8 AM to 11 AM while the Release 9.3 updates are being applied.
Customer support will be available from the IBM Helpdesk at (800) 428-8268.
Coexistent county CWSCMS.MSI file availability:
The CWSCMS.MSI file was made available on Friday, February 2, 2024 for technical staff to begin testing the installation of the release. The code is located on the CWSDFSr share in the following location:
- \CODEDIST\Staging\R93
Dedicated County CWSCMS.MSI file delivery:
By Friday, February 2, 2024, dedicated county users should have started seeing the CWSCMS.MSI file copied to their workstations during Windows logon. Technical staff can verify that they have received the file by checking for its presence in the C:\CACW\R93 folder. This file must exist on the workstation for the installation of Release 9.3 to take place on or after February 10, 2024.
Dedicated County users should do the following on the night before the release:
- Restart (reboot) the workstation and log into Windows (aka the "welcome screen").
- Restart again and do not log into Windows.
- Leave the workstation powered on.
CWS-CARES Scheduled Maintenance - Feb. 13, 2024 | 5PM - 8PM
All Pilot County RFA Implementation Coordinators and SPOCs:
The CWS-CARES team has scheduled maintenance activity for the CWS-CARES production environment for Tuesday, February 13, 2024, beginning at 5:00 PM and concluding at 8:00 PM. During the maintenance window, the CWS-CARES Resource Family Approval (RFA) Application Submission, Review, and Approval Process will be accessible for pilot counties Contra Costa, Fresno, Placer, and Santa Clara.
During the maintenance window, document-related functionality in the CARES application will not be accessible.
Action Required
No action required for end-users is needed during this maintenance window.
If users experience any issues with the CWS-CARES, please follow your county process for reporting issues. CWS-CARES County Administrators may contact the CARES Service Desk through the CWDS ServiceNow Customer Support Management (CSM) Portal. Alternate methods are phoning 1-855-292-3444 or via email at Servicedesk@cwds.ca.gov during normal business hours. You may also email after hours, and a Service Desk representative will contact you the next business day.
The CWS-CARES team has scheduled maintenance activity for the CWS-CARES production environment for Tuesday, February 13, 2024, beginning at 5:00 PM and concluding at 8:00 PM. During the maintenance window, the CWS-CARES Resource Family Approval (RFA) Application Submission, Review, and Approval Process will be accessible for pilot counties Contra Costa, Fresno, Placer, and Santa Clara.
During the maintenance window, document-related functionality in the CARES application will not be accessible.
Action Required
No action required for end-users is needed during this maintenance window.
If users experience any issues with the CWS-CARES, please follow your county process for reporting issues. CWS-CARES County Administrators may contact the CARES Service Desk through the CWDS ServiceNow Customer Support Management (CSM) Portal. Alternate methods are phoning 1-855-292-3444 or via email at Servicedesk@cwds.ca.gov during normal business hours. You may also email after hours, and a Service Desk representative will contact you the next business day.
CARES-Live Scheduled Outage - Feb 10, 2024 | 5AM - 1PM
All SPOCs and Technical Contacts:
In support of the CWS/CMS Release 9.3 deployment scheduled for Saturday, February 10, 2024, from 5:00 AM to 1:00 PM, the CARES-Live application will also not be available during this CWS/CMS scheduled deployment.
Action Required
If users experience any issues with CARES-Live outside of this scheduled outage, please follow your county process for reporting issues. CARES-Live County Administrators may contact the CARES Service Desk through the CWDS ServiceNow Customer Support Management (CSM) Portal. Alternate methods are phoning 1-855-292-3444 or via email at Servicedesk@cwds.ca.gov during normal business hours. You may also email after hours and a Service Desk representative will contact you the next business day.
In support of the CWS/CMS Release 9.3 deployment scheduled for Saturday, February 10, 2024, from 5:00 AM to 1:00 PM, the CARES-Live application will also not be available during this CWS/CMS scheduled deployment.
Action Required
If users experience any issues with CARES-Live outside of this scheduled outage, please follow your county process for reporting issues. CARES-Live County Administrators may contact the CARES Service Desk through the CWDS ServiceNow Customer Support Management (CSM) Portal. Alternate methods are phoning 1-855-292-3444 or via email at Servicedesk@cwds.ca.gov during normal business hours. You may also email after hours and a Service Desk representative will contact you the next business day.
CWS-CARES Extended User Scenario Testing (EUST) - UPDATE
All Directors and SPOCs:
Child welfare leadership,
Thank you for your staff’s participation in the CWS-CARES Extended User Scenario Testing (EUST) experience.
During the EUST kickoff today, CWS-CARES leadership shared that the activities beginning on Monday, February 5, 2024 are postponed to a later date because of additional stabilization needed in the testing environment.
Therefore, we are rescheduling the dates for demonstrations, training sessions, virtual office hours, and the overall testing period to ensure that users have an optimal experience to provide their valuable feedback.
We will provide an update as soon as possible, with a minimum two-week advance notice prior to the new start date of testing activities.
If you have any questions, please contact us.
Thank you for your time and commitment to the EUST process.
Action Required
No action is required.
Executive Leadership Team (ELT)
Cynthia Tocher
Jessica Rougeux
Tricia Gonzalez
Child welfare leadership,
Thank you for your staff’s participation in the CWS-CARES Extended User Scenario Testing (EUST) experience.
During the EUST kickoff today, CWS-CARES leadership shared that the activities beginning on Monday, February 5, 2024 are postponed to a later date because of additional stabilization needed in the testing environment.
Therefore, we are rescheduling the dates for demonstrations, training sessions, virtual office hours, and the overall testing period to ensure that users have an optimal experience to provide their valuable feedback.
We will provide an update as soon as possible, with a minimum two-week advance notice prior to the new start date of testing activities.
If you have any questions, please contact us.
Thank you for your time and commitment to the EUST process.
Action Required
No action is required.
Executive Leadership Team (ELT)
Cynthia Tocher
Jessica Rougeux
Tricia Gonzalez
If unable to find a specific Bulletin, please contact Communications.