= ssn_validator

* http://kevintyll.github.com/ssn_validator
* http://www.drexel-labs.com

== DESCRIPTION:

ssn_validator is a ruby gem that validates whether an SSN has likely been issued or not.
What exactly does that mean "likely" been issued?  We can't tell for sure if an SSN belongs
to a particular person, but knowing the "rules"[http://www.socialsecurity.gov/employer/ssnweb.htm]
on how the social security administration assigns numbers, we can determine whether a number
has ever been issued or not.

ssn_validator started as a need for the company I work for, Clarity Services Inc.  Incredibly, we
couldn't find an existing gem or service that provided what we needed.  Since we were going to have
to roll our own solution, we decided to create a gem out of it and share it with the community.  Much
thanks goes to the management at Clarity Services Inc. for allowing this code to be open sourced.


== FEATURES/PROBLEMS:

* What it can do:
    Validates the likelyhood that an SSN has been issued to someone.
    Checks the Death Master File if the SSN belongs to a dead person.  This will require you to purchase the dmf data from https://dmf.ntis.gov

* What it cannot do:
    Validate that an SSN actually belongs to a particular person.

* What it's planned to do:
    Determine when an SSN was issued...if i can find the historical data.  This can be used to further validate an SSN by comparing it to a Date of Birth.

== SYNOPSIS:

* Just instantiate the object with an SSN.
    ssn = SsnValidator::Ssn.new('123-45-6789')

* Then check if it's valid
    ssn.valid?
    ssn.death_master_file_hit?

    ssn.valid? only checks to see if the number itself is valid.  Check the death_master_file_hit? method
    as well to verify the ssn does not belong the the deceased.

    The death_master_file_hit? method will only return true of false if you have purchased the dmf data and
    loaded it into your database.  There is a generator and rake task to facilitate this, but you'll have
    to purchase the data yourself at https://dmf.ntis.gov.

* You can check the errors array to see why it's not valid.
    ssn.errors

== REQUIREMENTS:

* Rails 2.0.0 or greater

== INSTALL:

* To install the gem:
    sudo gem install kevintyll-ssn_validator
* To create the necessary db migration, from the command line, run:
    script/generate ssn_validator_migration
* Require the gem in your environment.rb file in the Rails::Initializer block:
    config.gem 'kevintyll-ssn_validator', :lib => 'ssn_validator'
* To load your table with the current SSN data, from the command line, run:
    rake ssn_validator:update_data

    * The SSN data is updated monthly, so you'll want to run this rake task monthly to keep your validations accurate.

* If you've purchased the death master file data, create the death_master_files migration:
    script/generate death_master_file_migration
* To load the dmf files you receive from ntis:
    rake ssn_validator:death_master_file:load_file PATH='path/to/file' AS_OF='2009-03-01'

    * You'll need to pass in the full path to where the file is on disk.  You'll also need
      to pass in the date this file's data are as of in the format yyyy-mm-dd.

    * This task must be used to load the initial file you receive from ntis on CD.  It can optionally be used
      to load the monthly update files you download from the website.  If you manually download the update files,
      you do not need to add your user name and password to the environment.rb file.  For a more automated approach
      to loading the update files, add your user name and password to the environment.rb file and use the 2nd rake task.

* To load the monthly updates from the ntis website:
    * Add your user_name and password to the environment.rb file

        SsnValidator::Ntis.user_name = 'REPLACE WITH YOUR dmf.ntis.gov USER NAME'
        SsnValidator::Ntis.password = 'REPLACE WITH YOUR dmf.ntis.gov PASSWORD'

    * Run the rake task:

        rake ssn_validator:death_master_file:update_data

        * This rake task will determine the most recent file that has been loaded, and loads all subsequent files in order
        from the dmf.ntis.gov website.

        * The death master file data is updated monthly, so you'll want to run this rake task monthly to keep your validations accurate.

== LICENSE:

(The MIT License)

Copyright (c) 2009 Kevin Tyll

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining
a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the
'Software'), to deal in the Software without restriction, including
without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish,
distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to
permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to
the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be
included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED 'AS IS', WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND,
EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF
MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT.
IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY
CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT,
TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE
SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.