Category: Hammerhead

TariffShark Hammerhead SP1 Now Available

Links Technology Solutions, Inc. is excited to announce the release of TariffShark Hammerhead SP1.  This release is an update to the wildly successful TariffShark Hammerhead eTariff software.  If you are a user of TariffShark Hammerhead, you are entitled to this software update for no additional fees.

If you are a user of the original TariffShark Premier product, we encourage you to contact LINKS for a demo of Hammerhead and see for yourself why so many customers are adding Hammerhead to their core product.

If you’re not yet using TariffShark to meet your FERC eTariff obligations, we invite you to contact sales and ask for a demo of TariffShark Hammerhead today.

What’s New in the Update?

  • A Filing may be associated with a Filing in a different Tariff Database
  • Overtaken by Events was added as a valid FERC Response for Pro Forma FTRVs
  • When generating FERC Attachment content, Whole Document TRVs are eligible for inclusion
  • Improved usability around changing Company and Tariff Database context
  • Greater visibility to licensed Companies
  • Various improvements to Filing validations
  • Microsoft Word 2013 compatibility
  • SQL Server 2012 compatibility
  • Various bug fixes and performance improvements

Reducing the Size of a TariffShark Database

TariffShark databases tend to grow larger and larger over time.  If you think about it, this makes perfect sense.  Each time an eTariff filing is made, Tariff Record Versions are added as are the filing’s FERC Attachments.  Data is constantly being added to a TariffShark database and seldom deleted.

As the size of a database grows, so does the cost of maintaining it.  The files that comprise the database require more space on disk and its backups run longer and also require more storage.  Therefore, it may be wise to take any steps available to reduce database size.  In a TariffShark database, there are opportunities for size reduction, which by and large come from tables in the database that store transient or audit data.

  1. Audit – All interactions between a TariffShark client and the application server are written to an audit table.  The audit table can grow quite large over time.  Records in the audit table are seldom if ever needed, but can be helpful when tracking down software issues.  In any event, data in the audit table older than a few weeks provides no value.
     
  2. TRV Processing Queue – The Tariff Record Version processing queue is used to track and manage the processing of all TRV documents.  This is truly transient data in that after a TRV document is processed successfully, the queue data is no longer needed.
     
  3. Binary Data – TariffShark stores binary data (Word documents and PDFs, for example) separately from other TariffShark data and seldom deletes table rows that are no longer needed.  Over time, unneeded documents can take up quite a bit of space in the database.
Each of these database areas can be cleaned up and, as a result, database size reduced by running a separate administrative stored procedure that ships with TariffShark Hammerhead.  If you would like to learn more about these stored procedures so that you can keep your TariffShark database running efficiently, contact TariffShark Support.

Cancelling a Tariff Database (or FERC Tariff Id) in TariffShark Hammerhead

An FAQ article is provided on the TariffShark website that answers the question “How do I cancel an entire Tariff Database?” It answers this question for pre-Hammerhead TariffShark versions in the 1.x range. If you’re running TariffShark Hammerhead and you’d like to know how to cancel a Tariff Database, keep reading.

In order to cancel an entire Tariff Database, you must submit a CANCEL-type Filing. At time of this writing, the following filing types are classified as CANCEL-type Filings:

Follow these steps in TariffShark Hammerhead to prepare a CANCEL-type Filing:

  1. Create a cancellation-type Filing and supply the standard Filing metadata. There are no special requirements regarding TariffShark’s Filing data fields.
  2. Create a TRV for one of the Tariff Records in the Tariff Database and place it into the Filing created in the prior step. For the Proposed Effective, enter the date on which you wish to cancel the Tariff Database. It doesn’t much matter under which Tariff Record the TRV is created.
  3. From an eTariff validation perspective, you may or may not provide content for the TRV created in the prior step. However, from an industry regulations perspective, content may be required.
  4. Create a transmittal letter and attach it to the Filing as a FERC Attachment in TariffShark. Provide other FERC Attachments as required or desired just as you would for any other eTariff Filing.
  5. Validate the Filing and then generate and download the XML. You’re ready to submit the Filing to FERC.
As always, if you have questions or comments, you may post them below or contact TariffShark Support.

TariffShark Grid Tip

Grids are used throughout TariffShark to display lists of data. With only a couple of exceptions, the data displayed in a grid cannot be updated in the grid. Therefore, in order to update a row in a grid, you must select the row and click a command in the SmartBar.

The grid that displays the FERC Attachments that belong to a Filing (Hammerhead version shown below) is perhaps a little confusing.

FERC Attachments in TariffShark Hammerhead

The column labeled “Waiver?” appears to have a checkbox that can be clicked in order to request a waiver of a particular attachment. Instead, the checkboxes aren’t clickable — they indicate whether or not a waiver has been requested by showing either an empty box or a checked box. Clicking the checkbox merely selects the row within the grid.

Note that prior versions of TariffShark did not display an empty checkbox when a waiver hadn’t been requested. Instead the column was left blank, as shown below.

FERC Attachments in TariffShark v1.1 and prior

Do you have questions or comments? Do you want to know more about grids in Hammerhead? Post below or contact TariffShark Support.