The Server Tools menu provides three submenu items relative to using ProAdmin Desktop benefit coding through ProAdmin Server. ProAdmin Server is a supplemental software component that integrates into ProAdmin Online, or another existing infrastructure, to accept calculation requests from a participant website call center or voice response unit. ProAdmin Server utilizes the plan parameterization completed within ProAdmin Desktop, and is implemented to compute benefits for many different plans and clients. To enable this, the ProAdmin Desktop coding for each of the plans and clients is organized into System Plans and consolidated into a Plan Repository, with each separate calculation type identified by a set of “keys”: data values that will be included in the calculation request and will link the member with the desired calculation parameters. (Examples of key data values are location, plan codes, group numbers, employee type, plan contract numbers, etc.) In addition to the key information, a System Plan includes all of the parameters and assumptions required to do a calculation, including the plan rules and a full description of the types of output desired.

When a calculation request is sent from ProAdmin Online via Extensible Markup Language (XML), ProAdmin Server examines the request. The XML request details member data - including information regarding which plan to run - as well as decrement and commencement dates, any overriding assumptions and the Repository File Key values. When the information matches a particular System Plan’s Key Values, its Plan Definition rules are applied and the calculation is processed.

In order to maintain the System Plans and Repository, the user can select from the following submenu commands:

A System Plan consists of all the information necessary to do a calculation, including a Plan Definition, Projection Assumptions, an Output Definition, and Key Values of plan information that identify the System Plan’s members. As an example: Location must be 456 or 457 for a member’s calculation to be run. Each field, such as Location, group or Employee Category, etc. that contains Key Values is assigned a Key Number. The assignment of Key Numbers is completed within the Repository File Maintenance setup.

A Repository is a collection of System Plans from which ProAdmin Server calculations are done.

The Repository File Maintenance menu item provides procedures for maintaining Repositories. A Repository is a collection of System Plans from which ProAdmin Server calculations are completed. In addition to System Plans, a Repository maintains a collection of XML paths to the fields containing the Key Values; these are called Repository File Keys. The XML paths to the fields must be the same throughout the System Plans in the Repository: every System Plan must have the same number of Keys and the Keys must be in the same order. The Repository is set up to associate the Key Numbers from the System Plans to the Key Numbers in its collection of XML paths (Repository File Keys). Each System Plan in the Repository must have a unique set of key values. For an example of how Key Values, assigned in the Repository, and Key Numbers, which are defined in System Plans, are integrated click here. There can be an unlimited number of System Plans in a Repository, and an unlimited number of Repositories, but only one repository per web address or server is permitted.

Calculator Testing provides the functionality to test a large numbers of calculations using the Repository.