Measuring program results is a challenge.

White House to provide summer jobs for young Americans ages 15-25.

Bipartisan bill would cap increases to certain health insurance fees in the program.

This week, I gave my last keynote speech as Chief Architect in the Ministry of Finance on enterprise architecture and strategy.  As already revealed on Twitter and Facebook, I am taking a leave of absence from the public sector to assist Accenture in the establishment of an EA-practice inside their IT Strategy & Transformation group here in Copenhagen – starting February 7th…

Doing The Right Things Right
My primary message in the keynote address was that EA must both make IT Strategies more robust and guide IT organizations towards successful delivery.  EA is not just complex diagrams and terminology that only enterprise architects understand.  Viable IT strategies must be underpinned by sound EA-thinking – and successful IT-portfolio delivery must be underpinned by sound EA-thinking.

Since the publication of a white paper on EA by the National IT and Telecom Agency in 2003, Denmark has been a leader in the design of national EA-programs.  But, as in many other EA-programs in private and public organizations, the implementation has often been too technically focused.  As also noted in my PhD dissertation, many public EA programs spend far too much time and energy selecting and populating technical EA frameworks.

By focusing on our own unique context, we must instead secure management support for our EA programs by supporting the strategic agenda with robust EA-frameworks.  The goal must not be to slavishly populate standard frameworks and follow rigid EA-methods.  EA must support solution design by interlocking the language and work products of EA with those of solution design.

We must improve our ability to define our own ‘light weight’ EA-frameworks that meet the needs of the business, work within the existing IT environment and contribute towards the realisation of the enterprise’s IT strategy.  EA programs must proactively be customized to a specific context if success is to be achieved – and help the business do the right things right.

The final keynote can be found at www.modernisering.dk (in Danish).

A couple of months ago I was interviewed as “Architect in the Spotlight” for the November 2010 issue of the Journal of Enterprise Architecture.  It is a great honor to be in the spotlight, and I thank the chef editor and his team for noticing our work with EA in the Danish government.

With permission from JEA, I have inserted the interview with me below.  Please also see the other great articles in the November issue at JEA’s new website here.

JEA: IS THERE A DANISH WAY OF DOING EA?
KHM: All EA programs must be designed for a specific context. Denmark has a strong cross-governmental collaboration culture and we have built our EA-program in this context. I’m not a fan of large and complex EA frameworks – in any sector. EA must provide just enough structure and guidance to bring the business and IT communities together for coherency. In Denmark we have bridged this traditional gap with all of our government reference models, a business reference model, and a service and technology reference model. These models span municipalities, regions, and the central government and we use them extensively for benchmarking, reviews of IT investments, service definitions for re-usable and sharable services, and semantic definitions across our public portals.

JEA: WHY THE FOCUS NOW ON REFERENCE MODELS?
KHM: In the early 00′s we built a comprehensive EA framework and methodology for Danish e-Government. But adoption has been low and many agencies have found it difficult to understand the complexity. Thus, with the reference models we now pursue a more “lightweight” approach to EA. The shared taxonomies create a common language for business and IT to use when agencies are involved in the delivery of cross-agency services and it provides the Ministry of Finance and our new shared service center for IT, Statens It, which was established in 2009, a framework for the cost-effective and timely delivery of IT services with standards, principles, and templates that assist in the design and delivery of IT capability.

The reference models are developed and maintained by a national editorial board with three FTEs representing the Danish municipalities, regions, and the central government. This setup provides a solid foundation for agencies to work from and a strong common language across the national e-Government program. We supplement the reference models with other tools from the EA toolbox. But, it is all about creating just enough structure and guidance – and not get too technically focused on frameworks and complex methodology.

JEA: WHAT IS THE NEXT BIG THING IN EA?
KHM: Fashions come and go. But, I think that EA programs should embrace and leverage social media platforms. Since 2004 I have had my own blog (EAGov.com) and in the Ministry of Finance we recently launched a blog for the reference models with a Twitter profile. The new blogging tools were not launched to jump on the IT fashion bandwagon. We are using the new tools because we think the greatest economic value will come from finding ways to connect people that work with reference models or taxonomies inside or outside government. We use the new tools to get out of our comfort zone in the editorial boardroom and, hopefully, come up with creative new and innovative ways to use the reference models that generate more value with fewer resources in the interaction with our users.

Another trend that we are seeing in both private and public organizations in Denmark is that EA is moving out of the CIO office. Sitting in the Ministry of Finance, I am not part of the CIO office. I work in the Danish CFO office and talk more about coherency, performance management, and decision support information than I talk about applications and technology. EA is moving up the value chain helping the business align itself and the underlying IT-infrastructure – providing real business value by applying the rigor of EA to the business discussion. This is a really exciting development for the EA discipline. Something that we need to study further and encourage others to do.

JEA: WHAT’S IT LIKE BEING A PRACADEMIC?
KHM: I don’t flash my PhD in the Danish government. Most of my colleagues don’t know my academic background. But, I think that my academic background has improved my “reflection on action” and “reflection in action” when I recapture my experience, think about it, mull it over, and evaluate it in our national EA program. JEA seeks to bridge the gap that tends to be between scientific and practical knowledge – and I think that is great!

Last week I was interviewed as ‘Architect in the Spotlight’ for the Journal of Enterprise Architecture about the Danish approach to enterprise architecture and emerging trends in enterprise architecture.  Here I mentioned social media platforms as a trend that enterprise architects should embrace and leverage – to create business value.

The Small Shift
In the Ministry of Finance we recently launched a blog and Twitter profile for Denmark’s Joint Cross Governmental Reference Models.  And the new blogging tools were not launched to jumping the IT fashion bandwagon..

We are using the new tools because we think the greatest economic value will come from finding ways to connecting people that work with reference models or taxonomies inside or outside government.  We use the new tools to get out of our comfort zone in the editorial boardroom and, hopefully, come up with creative new and innovative ways to use the reference models that generate more value with fewer resources in the interaction with our users.

This blog has been active since 2004.  It has been a great way for me to communicate my research to practitioners during the highs and lows of my PhD-studies, and these days it provides me an opportunity to participate in the global “conversation” about enterprise architecture.

Social media has opened up a new horizon for enterprise architects to share information and interact with a wider and larger community of users.  New tools like wikis, blogs, and microblogs facilitate user involvement, experience, and relationship management.

The power of pull is here to create business value for the enterprise architecture discipline!

Those of you paying attention in Sunday School may remember this thing called the apocalypse. Earl Robert Maze II was my Sunday School teacher, and he may be the most fearsome schoolmaster ever to scratch a chalkboard. One spitwad and there was sure to be a rapture. Mr. Maze would get pretty wrapped up in the lesson of the day and we'd all have to keep at least one eye on him as he paced back and forth. Not because we were worried about being asked a question, but because as he paced and talked, he'd build up globs of white something or other in the corners of his mouth, and every so often one of them would take flight and land on some unsuspecting front row pupil's hand, to their horror.

As luck would have it, I was late to class on the day Mr. Maze deemed that we were, at last, ready for the book of Revelation; I took the last seat -- In the front row -- Right in the line of fire. Sure enough, he was so worked up by the time he got to the part about the divine apocalypse, that one of those white gobs of goop chose that moment to set itself free and was headed for me like a heat-seeking missile. There was nothing I could do! And so to this day, the term apocalypse conjures up a frightening memory for me.

Which brings me to the current situation in the client management vendor landscape. The apocalypse was to be foretold by four horsemen representing conquest, war, famine and death (if you've ever worked for a company whose business has been disrupted, as I have, you've probably met with all four!). The four horsemen before us now in the client management market in the second quarter of 2012, are:

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If you think the term "Big Data" is wishy washy waste, then you are not alone. Many struggle to find a definition of Big Data that is anything more than awe inspiring hugeness. But, Big Data is real if you have an actionable definition that you can use to answer the question: "Does my organization have Big Data?" Proposed is a definition that takes into account both the measure of data and the activities performed with the data. Be sure to scroll down to calculate your Big Data Score.

Big Data Can Be Measured

Big Data exhibits extremity across one or many of these three alliterate measures:

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On Wednesday, American footwear company Skechers agreed to pay the US Federal Trade Commission $40 million. This settlement resulted from a series of commercials that deceived consumers claiming that the Shape-Ups shoe line would "help people lose weight, and strengthen and tone their buttocks, legs and abdominal muscles." Professional celebrity Kim Kardashian appeared in a 2011 Super Bowl commercial personally endorsing the health benefits of these shoes.

This settlement was part of an ongoing FTC campaign to "stop overhyped advertising claims." A similar effort would serve the information security community well. For example, one particular claim that causes me frequent grief is: "solution X detects and prevents advanced persistent threats." It is hard, dare I say impossible, to work in information security and not have heard similar assertions. I have heard it twice this week already, and these claims make my brain hurt.

Read more

The Autonomous Mission Operations team wraps up its first series of tests.

NES begins re-enrollment for the 2013 school year.

NES project update for May 21 - 25

Two men involved in a scheme that paid more than $30 million in bribes and kickback for federal contracts pled guilty to federal charges, federal investigators said Thursday.

At military installations, suburban-style sprawl is out and walkable communities are in, under new Defense Department planning guidelines released Thursday.

Two senators are seeking five years' worth of data on budget, travel and conference spending by all 11 General Services Administration regional offices.

Listen to my podcast with Ronald G. Ross, an internationally renowned expert in information system development, which includes business rules, data modeling, and much more. Ron is co-author of the book Building Business Solutions: Business Analysis with Business Rules and... Peter Schooff http://www.ebizq.net/MT4/mt-cp.cgi?__mode=view&blog_id=37&id=4

Listen to my podcast with David Luckham, emeritus professor of electrical engineering at Stanford University, and author of Event Processing for Business: Organizing the Real-Time Enterprise, published by Wiley. In this podcast we drill down on one of the keys... Peter Schooff http://www.ebizq.net/MT4/mt-cp.cgi?__mode=view&blog_id=37&id=4

Listen to my podcast with Clay Richardson, senior analyst at Forrester Research. In this podcast we discuss something that is becoming a very important, but remains a somewhat misunderstood, aspect of BPM and that's social BPM. Also, Clay will be... Peter Schooff http://www.ebizq.net/MT4/mt-cp.cgi?__mode=view&blog_id=37&id=4

Facebook sells your addiction to advertisers, hoping to make a buck off your personal information. Will you wake up in time to kick the habit, or do you "like" the security risks of blurring the line between personal and professional?

Will Congress require social networks, VoIP, and Webmail providers build in backdoors that FBI could tap for electronic surveillance purposes? Explore the main issues at stake.

The focus of many federal virtual world activities has moved to the U.S. Army's "MOSES" experimental open source environment

The bill still must get past Obama's veto pen.

The Energy Department is offering multiple training courses online in 3D virtual worlds in its National Training and Education Resource online platform.

Federal agencies are facing critical needs for information technology upgrades and enhancements. Not only are many of today’s government systems antiquated, they are also expensive to maintain and manage. The core systems have undergone so many changes over the years that the source code has become virtually obscure. Add to this tardy application response times, clumsiness in data handling, problems with connectivity and integration, lack of flexibility to add new services and functionalities, lack of web capabilities, growing license fees and maintenance costs, and the dwindling number of resources capable of supporting these systems, and you have the perfect recipe for impending disaster. There is a general recognition that IT infrastructure modernization is necessary for meeting today’s expanded federal government needs.

A modernized IT infrastructure that is architected appropriately, would be much easier for Federal agencies to maintain, and less costly to secure. Since a modernized IT infrastructure would consist of components that cost less, last longer and require less labor to operate and maintain, the total cost of ownership would also be considerably lower. In addition, modernization would improve the interoperability of government IT and provide unified real-time access to information, as well as visibility across agencies to data residing on disparate systems. This will create a collaborative environment and contribute to faster and better decision making.

What Modernization Entails

Modernization often entails migration from legacy systems and determining ways to achieve greater collaboration and interagency sharing, dealing more effectively with unstructured data, and consolidating silos of information. Modernization will involve migration of large volumes of data and complex business rules to new systems. An effective migration strategy needs to be put in place for identifying master and transaction data and moving them from existing systems to new enterprise systems or custom applications. To maintain a technological edge, Federal agencies must adopt an enterprise-wide service oriented architecture that is interoperable with systems in other Federal departments and can share information with non-traditional partners. Successful enterprise-wide solutions generally drive down the total cost of ownership while offering a single source for real-time online data that is available when needed.

Modernization: Available Options

Most legacy environments are expensive in terms of both hardware infrastructure, as well as software license fees. The need to reduce this expense is a significant driver for many organizations to modernize their legacy systems. CIOs have multiple options for application modernization, including redevelopment of applications, divestiture, and outsourcing. Redevelopment of such complex applications to be at par with modern industry standards would be a monumental task in terms of the costs involved, and the time it would take to complete development. While divestiture may meet key business needs in many cases, they often do have limitations, and here again, the cost will be prohibitive. Outsourcing may not be an option open to the Federal CIO, and even if it is, it can have serious disadvantages including loss of quality and scheduling control. There are various other available options however, that can be examined as a means to modernizing existing technologies. These include Cloud Computing, Unified Communications, Services Oriented Architectures (SOA) and Virtualization, all of which can also contribute substantially to reducing overall costs.

Cloud Computing

By using Cloud services government agencies can gain access to powerful technology resources faster and at lower costs. Government departments can save scarce resources for mission critical programs rather than spending it on purchasing, configuring and maintaining redundant IT infrastructure. Federal departments can significantly reduce their IT costs and complexities, optimize workload and improve service delivery by adopting Cloud Computing. It provides a way to increase capacity or add capabilities on the fly without investing in new infrastructure, training new personnel or licensing new software. Incorporating cloud computing into the data center consolidation plan can minimize the government’s carbon footprint, reduce IT fragmentation, improve resource utilization, and conserve electrical power and fuel.

Government agencies can transition to the Cloud at their own pace. Security risks are often cited as the number one concern while transitioning to Cloud Computing. Modernization offers a step-by-step approach that enables government agencies to move non-core functions to the Cloud first, and once that has been successfully accomplished, move core functionalities as well. Transitioning to a private cloud is one option – providing the same web benefits from within the boundary of an agency's own firewall. A private cloud enables agencies to leverage benefits like pay-as-you-go licensing and elasticity – from within their own data centers, at their own pace. Another option would be to move a single application into the Cloud environment. Moving a single application will demonstrate the ease with which applications can be transitioned to a different operating environment while maintaining full agency control over the data.

Unified Communications

New technologies like unified communications offer exciting opportunities for expanding human collaboration within organizations and hold tremendous potential for supporting business strategies that rely on increased customer self service, enhanced employee productivity and streamlined processes. Unified communication provides government workers with the flexibility to reach their colleagues and access the information they need anywhere, anytime. It enables faster, better informed, collaborative decision making, which allows governments to improve the way they serve and protect the citizens. Combining unified communications with Web 2.0 technologies, such as mash ups and blogs can enhance service delivery to citizens. When successfully deployed, Unified Communications helps organizations reach their goals and meet deadlines by enhancing communication and access to data. It increases efficiency and reduces the time taken to share information. Because these technologies are IP-based, existing infrastructure investments can be leveraged, new features can be added as and when needed, and under-utilized network capacities can be tapped. The best way to reap the benefit of Unified Communications without having to deal with the complexity of integrating and managing the different technologies involved, is to leave the heavy lifting part to a managed services provider.

Service Oriented Architecture

Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) is useful for all major agencies because it offers the flexibility for rapid deployment of new software applications with minimum relative cost impact. SOA Integration involves re-using existing legacy systems by wrapping them with SOA interfaces. SOA Integration provides Federal agencies with increased agility as legacy components can be used as part of a new SOA based architecture. It allows government departments to adapt new technologies while responding to changing user needs. SOA reduces system complexity and deployment risks through a shared development style, uniform standards and common interfaces. By adopting a service oriented approach agencies can achieve the following benefits:

• Improved agility and responsiveness
• Ability to support net-centric operations and secure information sharing
• Ability to enhance and maintain management visibility and provide decision support
•  Reduction in cost of application development as well as that of operating an enterprise

Virtualization

Virtualization abstracts software from hardware and enables greater flexibility in processing IT services on different resources, at different locations, and at lower hardware and maintenance costs. In addition, server virtualization can extend the use of existing data center space and existing power and cooling capacity while increasing operational efficiency. Using a standardized platform is another option for government agencies to cut costs and boost performance. Standardization allows service providers to deliver utility IT services to a number of clients, thus helping them achieve better economies of scale. This will enable them to provide the services at lower prices.

Benefits of Modernization

Government agencies can expect to realize a number of benefits through modernization of their IT environment, including the following:

• Significant reduction in cost
• Reduced dependency on legacy skill sets
• Elimination of data silos resulting in greater flexibility
• Extended ROI from existing systems
• Better connectivity and integration
• Improved application response times and data handling capabilities

Legacy systems are an organization's biggest assets. The amount of data that these systems have accumulated over the years is invaluable and irreplaceable. Many Federal organizations depend on legacy systems for day-to-day operations. Though most of these systems have become obsolete and unwieldy, doing away with them altogether will be like throwing the baby out with the bath water. It is not an economically viable option. What is required is to leverage existing investments in IT applications so as to be able to address changing business requirements with agility. Legacy modernization using options like Cloud Computing, Unified Communications, Services Oriented Architectures and Virtualization is the answer.

 

Governments worldwide are beginning to emphasize that their IT departments adopt Open Standards because of the improved interoperability, organizational flexibility and responsiveness that such an initiative can result in, and also as a means for avoiding vendor lock-in. As technology becomes increasingly an integral part of other disciplines, this new-found preference for Open Standards is driving innovation in politics, healthcare, disaster management and countless other sectors.

In keeping with the general trend towards Open Standards, many government IT software procurement policies today specify that products and solutions should support and implement Open Standards before they can be considered. However, there are several challenges to be overcome if this is to be put into practice. The reality is that, sometimes, Open Standards may not be available or are not mature enough for a required technology. Also, in some cases, the usage of a de facto standard is so entrenched that it is not practical to ignore it.

By adopting Open Standards, Federal agencies can achieve the following:

• Introduce interchangeable components into their IT environments
• Increase portability and scalability of their applications
• Lower total cost of ownership
• Improve interoperability
• Gain access to better software products through increased choice
• Reduce costs for switching and transferring data to different programs
• Gain the ability to safeguard data over a long period of time
• Reduce potential for unfair contract terms
• Reduce lock-in to one system or one vendor

Standards Development

Individual standards typically are developed in response to specific concerns and constituent issues expressed by both industry and government. U.S. industry competitiveness depends on standardization, particularly in sectors that are technology driven.
Standards seek to ensure that:

• Systems can be harmonized within and between organizations and across borders;
• Different parties or entities can produce technologies that work together in order to foster mass adoption of those technologies by the community and to promote competition;
• New players can more easily enter existing markets and manufacture new technologies or products that work with existing technologies and products; and
• Consumers and users can be instantly familiar and comfortable with new systems, products and emerging technologies.

To effectively respond to the challenges posed by globalization, the emergence of new economic powers, and public concerns such as about climate change, and because of the need to stay abreast of evolving technologies, standards development organizations and the standards development process itself must be flexible as well as capable of adopting the most innovative and best performing technologies available.

Interoperability

Open Standards enable diverse products to work together. This gives governments choice among a diversity of applications from a wide range of suppliers/vendors, and leads to innovative technological developments. In the IT industry, standards are particularly important because they allow interoperability of products, services, hardware and software from different parties. Since the specifications are known and open, it is always possible to get another party to implement the same solution adhering to the standards being followed. Interoperability allows for better coordination of government agency programs and initiatives to provide enhanced services to citizens and businesses.

If Open Standards are followed, applications are easier to port from one platform to another since the technical implementation follows known guidelines and rules, and the interfaces, both internally and externally, are known. In addition to this, the skills learned from one platform or application can be utilized with less need for re-training. It is also in the interests of national security that Open Standards are followed to guard against the possibility of over-reliance on foreign technologies/products.

An interoperability framework needs to be put in place. This can provide baseline standards, policies, guidelines, processes and measurements for governments to adopt. The framework will detail how interoperability will be achieved among agencies and across borders, allowing the exchange and management of data and functionality. Combined with baseline audits of interoperability, interoperability frameworks can help create a pathway to greater interoperability through open IT ecosystems.

Baseline audit, mapping, and selective benchmarking efforts that are guided by a clear vision and goals make later policymaking more focused, effective and user driven. These efforts, if initiated with the early involvement of relevant stakeholders, will help identify systems silos that inhibit interoperability, and define areas where Open Standards are likely to have the greatest impact. Mapping standards means identifying all standards in use within and across agencies. An early mapping effort enables agencies to focus on making legacy systems interoperate and minimizes any disagreement over definitions that may impede progress.

Service Oriented Architecture (SOA)

Like in interoperability, Open Standards are the backbone of a service-based approach. In particular, a service orientation increases flexibility, modularity and choices. They ensure flexibility so that criteria and decisions are service-oriented and technology-neutral. They enable managers to combine, mix and match, and replace components without the expense and expertise of custom coding connections between service components. Service-oriented, Open Standards based interchangeable components give government organizations choices at the component level. Changes such as replacing legacy systems can be made without degrading the functionality of other parts of the ecosystem. Services can be built with modular components on different systems using a service-oriented architecture.

Improved Flexibility

By following Open Standards, governments gain new efficiencies from increased competition, access and control. Greater competition among suppliers, products and services helps governments maximize their return on investments and performance. Openness can also strengthen a buyer’s negotiating position since they have more options. This ability to choose not only lowers costs but also gives end users more latitude to set requirements and performance criteria.

The ability to see, use, implement and build from an Open Standard allows managers and users to exert more control while determining if and when they need to add functionality, swap components or fix bugs. By relying on Open Standards, managers can decide when to upgrade and who provides software support. They can replace suppliers or even implement upgrades in-house. Organizations can keep pace with changing technology, and become more efficient and effective in meeting citizen and taxpayer needs.

Other Benefits

• Open Standards offer a balance of private and public interests that can protect IP with fairness, ensure clarity in disclosure policies, and promote reasonable and nondiscriminatory licensing.
• Using Open Standards will also offer better protection of the data files created by an application against obsolescence of the application.
• Open Standards make it an easier and, in some cases, the only possible means for local companies to participate as major players in supplying services and solutions to the government. The government can leverage Open Standards to mix and match solutions from different suppliers in order to give the local suppliers a chance.
• Governments also benefit from the greater transparency that Open Standards bring to the IT ecosystem. This transparency enables organizations to determine the best balance between aspects such as protection, control, risk and cost. Open Standards allow government agencies to build on existing protocols and procedures, and to innovate on top of them.
• As needs change or services expand, Open Standards can enable the evolution of a business case by allowing the future addition of components and functionality.

The Need for Building Awareness

Having a knowledgeable citizenry is necessary if governments are to sustain the advantages of open technologies, innovate and spur a society’s social and economic development. Education, R&D and training merit attention and resources in order to strengthen a nation’s knowledge base and its ability to share in innovation.

Governments must find ways to support and extend the work of collaborative communities, and where possible, formalize their role in a consultative process. User feedback, which often highlights smaller issues, may help identify new areas of growth for standards, evolve service-oriented approaches, test new designs or produce other innovations that enhance IT ecosystems. Collaborative development processes can also broadly impact openness in government and an economy, driving efficiencies, growth and innovation, as well as contribute to a society’s sustainability.

Open Standards are important to promote the wider adoption of standards and the corresponding development of interoperable and innovative technologies. There is often a degree of openness in the processes followed in the development of standards. However, it is the openness of the legal interests in standards – namely, users’ rights to access, use and share the technology embodied by a standard and its documented specifications – that is of fundamental importance in promoting interoperability and innovation.

In moving towards Open Standards it is necessary that the legal rights and restrictions that apply to standards and standard specifications are properly managed. In particular, it is crucial that copyright and patent interests are clearly disclosed to all developers and users of standards from an early stage and that the terms upon which these interests are licensed are made clear.
 

With its huge potential for saving money and improving operational efficiency, virtualization has come as a boon to cash-strapped Federal CTOs. Not only can it substantially reduce the cost of running data centers and corporate networks through more efficient use of both hardware and software, it can also significantly reduce the number of physical devices on the network, thus considerably lowering the complexity of managing the network infrastructure. Whether it's greater performance that you seek, or reliability, availability, scalability, consolidation, agility or a unified management domain, virtualization is your best bet for supporting public sector IT modernization goals.

Virtualization will however, result in more traffic in the consolidated area. Rather than merely adding more virtual servers, what is required is to create a converged infrastructure that allows all resources to be shared. This way storage, bandwidth, and applications can be reallocated based on current workload and organizational need, without them mixing with or disrupting other partitioned resources in the system.

10 GbE: The New Thing in Networking

As virtualization efforts evolve, you run into networking challenges, and that’s the time you should begin to think about laying the groundwork for the adoption of 10 Gigabit Ethernet in the data center. The shift toward 10 Gigabit Ethernet means more than moving to a higher bandwidth. It means re-examining your entire network architecture. Higher thorough-put from the 10 Gigabit Ethernet switches allows you to connect server racks and top-of-rack switches directly to the core network, obviating the need for an aggregation layer. Now that high-speed network technologies like 10 Gigabit Ethernet have become widely available, several new solutions have been developed to consolidate network and storage I/O into small numbers of higher bandwidth connections.

How 10GbE Works

10 GbE technology is used primarily to interconnect switches and routers. By separating data and routing information, it allows you to control your own IP address routing and make the changes you want. You do not have to share your routing scheme with your service providers. And you can support both IP and non-IP based protocols. The latest 10 Gigabit Ethernet rack-top switches now support the same 48-port density as 1 Gigabit Ethernet switches, which means you do not lose valuable rack space when upgrading to 10 Gigabit Ethernet.

The primary advantage of 10 GbE technology is the sharp reduction in the number of adapters and ports required for a server. In addition to the usage of fewer physical devices, you also save valuable floor space, as well as power and cooling resources.

The Benefits of 10 Gigabit Ethernet

With applications becoming increasingly bandwidth-intensive, faster networking solutions are required to improve network connectivity while maintaining high reliability levels. 10 GbE technology provides the perfect solution to meet this requirement. In addition to increasing network speed, it also offers the following:

•  Potentially lowest total cost-of-ownership in terms of expenditure on infrastructure, maintenance costs and the involvement of human capital
• Quick and easy migration to higher performance levels
• Proven plug and play integration capability using your existing infrastructure
• Familiar network management feature set that involves hardly any learning curve

Upgrading to 10 Gigabit Ethernet is a great way for Federal agencies to get better results from their server virtualization and infrastructure consolidation initiatives. It provides a significant increase in bandwidth while ensuring full compatibility with existing interfaces, thus protecting your investment on cabling, equipment, processes, and Ethernet based training. It retains your existing Ethernet architecture, including the Media Access Control (MAC) protocol and the Ethernet frame format and frame size.

But the biggest benefits of 10GbE come from having fewer servers and less storage gear plugged in. You can deploy just two 10 Gigabit Ethernet instead of using four to eight 1 Gigabit Ethernet in each server, and still achieve full redundancy for availability and additional room for expansion. In terms of scalability a 10 Gigabit Data center enables terabits of aggregate traffic without adding more layers to the network. Additionally it simplifies the network design by eliminating congestion points and reduces the need for complex QOS schemes.

Here’s a run down on the benefits of a consolidated and virtualized 10 GbE data center:

• Enables flexible, dynamic and scalable network infrastructure
• Reduces overall physical connection count
• Provides high availability and redundancy
• Improves server utilization and application efficiency
• Reduces power consumption
• Offers significant cost benefits

With network traffic increasing inexorably by the day, Federal data center managers need to look for faster network technologies to solve increased bandwidth demands. 10 Gigabit Ethernet offers ten times faster performance than Gigabit Ethernet, allowing you to reach longer distances and support even more bandwidth hungry applications, making it the natural choice for expanding, extending, and upgrading existing Ethernet networks. 10 Gigabit Ethernet helps you get the best out of your virtualized environment.

 

We are in the midst of a big shake out in how organizations use social technologies. As we develop a common understanding of the opportunities and risks, better decisions are being made about when and how to use the technology available. We are no longer having exciting breakthroughs every day, so the changes in the market have become more subtle, but no less profound. There are three big challenges I see as we move forward:

1. First, many organizations have enthusiastically embraced and rolled out social technology, but didn’t really think to include staffing and content resources with the initial roll out. They have let 1,000 flowers bloom – or die – on their own. While this approach can be very effective in that it allows rapid experimentation and organizations can really discover what works best for them, it also comes with some pretty high risks. If the stage is not well set for productive use of the technology by community managers, people may not use the tools in ways that have clear and uncontroversial value – and there may be no one to track it even if they do. Successful experiments won’t be shared to other groups. Dead groups that project a failed community won’t be cleaned up. Executives who come in to take a peek my see chaos – or nothing – which is not helpful to garnering their support and extending the value of community to the entire organization. 

2. Another big challenge faces community management teams in organizations that are further along in their community lifecycle. These teams, in many cases, are being squeezed and asked to address near impossible tasks like reconciling the culture of the organization across geographies and functions in order to engage in a consistent way. Part of the reason is that executive sponsors don’t really understand what they are implicitly asking of these teams and don’t adequately understand some of the growing risks in the online social world.

3. Finally, as social business initiatives grow so does the gap in experience. There are a fair number of people who have been managing communities in the online world for more than a decade, but often in contexts that don’t fit the growing need. Culturally and from a business perspective, online gaming and banking are very different worlds. Companies looking for community management are going to have to be flexible about who they hire for community management roles and plan to invest in training and other professional development resources for these individuals.  There are lots of people who are poised to fill community manager roles well, but very often don’t have the experience to prove it is something they can do.

The good news? Understanding the need for community management is on the rise. Training and other professional development services are available – including those we offer at The Community Roundtable. Finally, budgets for social business initiatives are growing. All of this will help address these challenges. Join us at the Enterprise 2.0 Conference as experts in the field share their experience on the community management journey.

See you there!

Rachel

As organizations work to transition collaboration and social pilots to enterprise-wide initiatives, architectural questions increasingly rise to the fore:

• How can we integrate with other systems?
• How do we incorporate enterprise directory structures?
• How can we ensure performance and reliability at scale?
• How can we convert features to applications?
• How can we put social applications within the flow of everyday activities?
• How much does SharePoint — present and future — really address these issues?
• How solid are all the many other vendors?
• And so on…

The architecture track at the Enterprise 2.0 Conference this June was designed to answer these questions. I hope you can join us there.

I’ll kick off the track with a pre-conference workshop, “Insider’s Guide to Evaluating Architectures and Selecting Vendors.” As a customer, you have more choices than ever, in terms of architectures, delivery and license models, functional breadth, and integration alternatives; this session will help you sort it all out.

For the conference itself, Kashyap Kompella leads off with “Social as a Layer, Not a Place: Are We There Yet?” This session critically assesses a emerging architectures that posit social and collaboration services as a layer (rather than a place) to apply over diverse workstreams within the enterprise.

As many enteprise collaboration leaders will testify, “SharePoint happens.” But do you have to accept that platform as-is? Join three leading SharePoint gurus — Jill Hannemann, Richard Harbidge, and Sadie Van Buren — for “SharePoint: Optimizing 2010 / Looking Forward to 2013.” We’ll turn next to the customer perspective with “Social Collaboration at Scale: Customer Panel.”

Finally, industry luminary Mike Gotta will analyze key building blocks in “Design Considerations For Enterprise Social Networks: Identity, Graphs, Streams & Social Objects.”

If you have any questions or comments, just ping me here.

See you in June!

Tony Byrne

Social technologies are changing the ways we market and sell, that’s obvious.  But the change is not simply superficial or new ways to do the same old work.  Social — along with analytics and mobile technologies — is enabling companies to be far more knowledgeable about who they target, what messages they deliver, and even what products and messages they develop.  In short, social companies have the ability to do business better than their non-social rivals. 

But what does that mean?

Check out our track at Enterprise 2.0 in Boston on June 19^th.  It will showcase some advanced thinking about social adoption, revenue development and how companies are adopting social approaches.

Our goal for the track has been to identify and bring to our audience real thought leadership from some of the industry’s leading practitioners in a variety of disciplines.

• Gerry Murray, Research Manager, and Joe Ferrantino , Research Analyst, both from IDC will share some of their findings from very recent social research.
• Phil Fernandez, CEO of Marketo, will discuss how modern socially based marketing technologies affect revenue generation.
• Steve Adams, CEO VirtuOz will talk about how virtual agents will take on some tasks to improve eCommerce and eServices.
• Jarek Sygitowicz, CEO, Smartupz will discuss how to make the most of social graph analysis.

We are also planning a special panel discussion to round out the Sales and Marketing track.

So make the Sales and Marketing track a focus of your time at Enterprise 2.0.  You are coming aren’t you?

Is 'bring your own device' the next big thing for government or is it just a fad?

The Naval Air Systems Command plans to leverage commercial cellular technology to test the broadband communications capability aboard three ships in 2013.

The association gave out awards to women who are making an impact on their fields.

GSA officials want their largest annual conference to be presentable and respectable.

Nowadays, it's rare to find a locale without wireless connectivity. But when it happens, it's not pretty.

Now that they’ve closed many of their smaller data centers, agencies are moving on to bigger operations and challenges.

Could the same principles that apply to gaming help increase workforce productivity and employee engagement?

Second Life remains a popular 3-D platform, but agencies are exploring other options, including in-house development.

The Federal Aviation Administration is weighing the widespread use of remotely piloted aircraft.

Dispute centers around election rule governing such events.

The study suggests up to 75 percent of space-based Earth observation instruments, such as satellites. could be gone by 2020.

Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff says as social enterprise trend diversifies company's sales, he's hiring aggressively to keep up with customer demand.

Google renewed its pitch to embrace cloud IT at its Atmosphere roadshow. But its count of companies going Google Apps doesn't add up.

SAP forges closer ties with Intel, IBM, analytics vendors, and systems integrators to jump start its in-memory database.

So in the next days few Facebook goes public and investors are poised to exhibit the same irrational exuberance that was rampant in the 1990s. Needless to say, I will be on the sidelines of this IPO.

I am not a Facebook fan for many reasons, but I understand some of the excitement around the IPO, except the price.

Once again, many are looking for the immediate 'home run", the proverbial long ball that will save their financial butts, give them bragging rights, whatever -  without having done sufficient due diligence.

Often we see the same irrational exuberance when a company enters the government contracting (GovCon) arena. Thinking that registering with CCR or getting a GSA Schedule will automatically generate income is nothing less than self-delusion. A small company walking into an OSDBU office expecting a contract is a similar but frequent occurrence.

Rational expectations are predicated on market knoweldge, historical persepctive, patience and applying lessons learned to your current situation. Money can occur either in the stock market or the government contracting arena, but only when you really are a student of the respective market and apply lessons learned from the front lines.

Operating on rumor, innuendo, myths and outright falsehoods propogated by cold callers selling the idea of a GSA Schedule being your personal panacea will lead to massive disappointment.

GTSI, the grand-daddy of government resellers, today was purchased by Unicom Systems of Los Angeles. Initial news is sketchy, as Unicom is not a publicly traded company, but here are a couple thoughts.

This is big news for the government reseller community for many reasons, not the least of which is that GTSI is among the oldest (if not the oldest) of the IT resellers targeting the feds. For many manufacturers in the 1980s and early 1990s, it was the first and often the only stop for market entry.

As most know, GTSI has had some problems over the past few years: lower sales, sagging stock price, problems with the SBA over ANC relationships, and more. I have no interest in rehashing these.

So here are a few thoughts regarding Unicom's opportunity.

First, market entry can be accomplished organically or by purchasing an established company, and there are thousands examples of each. For Unicom, this could be a great market entry strategy. This moves them from obscure to very much on the radar.

Second, when companies with a long tradition get purchased it is usually not a good idea to change the name, as the brand equity usually means a lot to the market. In this instance, there is so much baggage with the GTSI name that it is probably better to apply the Unicom name. For many people and for a variety of reasons, GTSI was the company they love to hate.

Third, Unicom is in LA and GTSI is in Northern Virginia/DC.  Who is going to drive the Federal bus? Unicom has a GSA Schedule, but it does not seem to be very active. Now they have a TON of contracts, so they need someone who can manage these who has demonstrated success to maximize the value of each these vehicles.

Fourth, GTSI is a reseller, regardless of what the press releases say. That means they need great manufacturer relationships. They also need to make a huge decision on whether or not to continue representing hundreds of companies or to narrow the focus to maybe 25-50 companies.

Fifth, if they are going to revitalize this company, regardless of the name, they need a great spokesperson. When CDWG made the successful run toward the top of the VAR category in the mid 2000s, Max Peterson was the "face" of the company. he was a capable, credible and available spokesperson. In my opinion, this was one of several critical factors in the CDWG growth curve.

This is a huge opportunity for Unicom Systems. Purchasing a company with a wide array of contractual vehicles, a solid installed customer base and a recognized brand name is always a plus. But in this market we have seen this before, and it is never a given that success will occur.

The unasked question is will this significantly impact the government VAR landscape?  That remains to be seen.

Stay tuned..............

The Waldo Factor series of blog posts is designed to help those in the government contracting arena understand the power and importance of differentiation (determining what you do exceptionally well), then being found by the right people and companies once you have determined and enunciated what makes you different - the skill that makes you stand out.

Thought leadership is high on the list of marketing and business development topics lately, and much of what is being discussed as "thought leadership" revolves around content: generating content in various formats to share.

Being a subject matter expert or thought leader truly means being in the top 2% in your field and to have a documented history in that niche. Generating and sharing good content is part of the puzzle; having performed in the niche (past performance in gov-speak) is the ultimate key.

At numerous venues over the past year I have heard prime contractors address the issue of selecting sub-contractors.

Invariably one of the top criteria is the potential sub-contractor being a recognized subject matter expert and/or thought leader in a niche that matters to the government and to the specific contract, preferably a niche that is important to the program.

Ed Swallow, VP of Business Development for Northrop Grumman (Civilian) discussed this on my radio show April 9: he had four criteria:

1) having a killer app or skill needed for a specific program

2) a strong customer relationship where NG does not have one

3) geographic presence (being in a location near a customer where NG has no office and where it makes more sense to partner with a company that has that presence)

4) socio-economic status.

Dan Mintz (COO of PowerTek) was also part of the interview and introduced the concept of "the enduring value proposition"  - does your company have a unique process or suite of tools that adds value? Do you reinvest in that process to stay on the cutting edge?

You can listen to that show in the Federal News Radio archives:
http://www.federalnewsradio.com/79/2821177/The-current-state-of-contracting

My advice to the small business out there seeking sub-contracting opportunities is

1) determine your area of expertise;

2) demonstrate this skill through your work;

3) work hard at staying on the cutting edge;

4) clearly enunciate it when you have the opportunity in person;

5) clearly state it on your web site, collateral material, and your social networking activity.

Now you are ready to meet prime contractors that pursue contracts that involve your area of expertise.

These are topics that you need to address before you pursue sub-contracting opportunities.

Being found before you determine your area of expertise is akin to crying "wolf": you may get attention once or twice, but after that people will ignore you.

So I’m in one of those tiny, big-practice medical examining rooms, waiting for the doctor. They used to keep copies of the Physicians Desk Reference in these rooms, which were fun to read, but I imagine that’s gone all digital. So I scan e-mail on my BlackBerry, get bored with that, then pick up and examine the football-sized model of the human digestive system. In real life, it covers a lot of yardage, if not exactly a straight line.

Result of the visit is, I have to take a pill every day. No biggie, I’ll add it to the statutory Lipitor. And the fish oil. And baby aspirin. And multi-vitamim. I’m no spring chicken.

For most of the world, there is no electronic medical record. This particular specialist has an iPhone and a notebook PC on a rollabout stand. The laptop seems to be connected to a WiFi network, but the doctor has several pages of written notes. Regardless, whatever he knows is unknown to my primary care physician P.C.P.). That practice, in yet another fancy building in Bethesda, Maryland is something like Jiffy Lube — it simulates personal care. But they know your body in the same way the grease monkey at Jiffy Lube knows your car. He’s seeing 50 cars on his shift. Not like the mechanic you grew up with who, when you were filling up, would call out, “Hey, let me know when you want to bring it in for those ball joints.” Heck, a checkup today, they don’t even unbutton your shirt to listen to your heart. You could be speckled with melanoma and your P.C.P. would never know.

Anyhow, basically sound as I am, it occurs to me that the P.C.P. ought to be aware that I have acquired a new pill habit that won’t otherwise show up on his records. The two practices don’t communicate. They would if some sort of EMR infrastructure existed in a meaningful way. But automated medical offices are stovepipes, lacking automated cross communication. The specialist wants two or three tests added to the next time the P.C.P. does my semi-annual blood workup. So I have a scribbled-on piece of paper to carry in the next time they draw blood. How’s that for sneakerware? This isn’t rural West Virginia, but a hub in one of the densest, most affluent suburbs in the hemisphere. The three miles between the two practices are clotted with doctors and facilities including the National Institutes of Health and the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center and a big hospital with a helipad on the roof.

When I call the primary care place, I finally reach a somebody who agrees to take a message for the P.C.P. Yet I sense a blend of irritation and puzzlement in her voice. Like, “Why is this turkey calling us to tell us about a prescription from some other place?”  The next time I go I’m going to test to see whether he is aware of the information. The incident brought out in sharp relieve, if only in a routine situation, the efficiency and better quality that and electronic medical records infrastructure could bring.

Yet I can see why — despite a two and  a half year program of the federal government trying to bribe medical practices into adopting EMRs for “meaningful use”– so few practices have it. It’s mainly that they are too busy.

From the basement to the bedrooms, a house full of obsolete things.

A Bose clock radio bought on a special discount a decade or more ago at the now-defunct Comdex trade show. (It used to draw 100,000 people.) The radio has a built-in CD player. But it cannot read the MP3 format. Functional still for other CDs, but obsolete. On the wall opposite the bed, a 19″ tube TV with a semi-zapped-out sound circuit. Mounted on a state-of-the-art 1990 bracket that now looks like something in an old hospital room. Just haven’t gotten around to replacing with a flatscreen.

First floor, let’s start with the stereo. In 1978 I purchased a sweet Harmon Karden receiver, 40 watts RMS per channel, pure analog. Also a belt-driven turntable with a tone arm that moves in a straight line, to match the way vinyl records are cut. Cat’s meow. All the better to play the latest direct-to-disk recordings of the pre-CD, apex years of LPs. Plus two AR speakers in hand-rubbed walnut cabinets. When my son was small he put a tiny fistule through one of the woofers and I could still find a replacement. Now one of the midrange drivers has rotted away, and I’m wondering if the parts dealer still exists. My wife says, can’t we just toss out all of this crap?

In the closet: A collection of old film cameras. The mechanical shutters have grown sluggish as the grease congeals with age. Foam panels are drying to dust. It’s all basically worthless. I looked into a digital back for the 4 x 5 view camera. They make ‘em, but you could by a new Beetle for about the same money.

In the basement, wet-photography gear — tanks, trays, washing devices, a motorized enlarger disassembled for 20 years. I was going to get around to building a new darkroom when we moved here, but kids, career…So all sits moldering, still in the United Van Lines boxes. In the meantime, wet photography went the way of oil painting and engraving.

I even have three manual typewriters gathering cobwebs. I may go back to writing letters on them. Ding—zzzzzzzip! On my desk, next to the Lava Lamp, sits my Western Electric black rotary phone.

The thing about old stuff is that, when it was current, it gave a generation, sometimes two or three, of service. The Nikon F first came out around 1959 and stayed in production until the 1970s, when the F2 came out. But mechanical things are different from electronic ones, where the technology is still doubling capacity every 18 months. I used the Nikon F for 20 years after the F2 came out. But I’m on my third Mac computer in five years.

People have gotten so used to awesomely faster and better every year, that Apple’s stock fell because it called the new iPhone the 4S, instead of giving the “5″ designation. It’s 33 percent faster at this, 50 percent better at that, processes the other at twice the speed, and has umpteen new features. At which all of the analysts yawned.

Electronics also throws off junk. I’ve got baskets of leftover detritus from years gone by. A zombie’s spaghetti dinner of old USB cables, telephone cords, power supplies with every odd voltage and terminator, stands from long-ago monitors, serial and parallel cables, backup CDs from trashed computers, old hard drives. All mixed in with assorted knobs, button batteries, Velcro tidbits, stick-on rubber feet, assorted strain reliefs, cable ties, fasteners, clips, connectors, allen wrenches, 9V battery sockets, and a few guitar picks that got in there somehow. But it’s easy to throw out old electronics. Who gets sentimental about a Dell computer?

I’m not sure why I can’t get myself to sell or give away my mechanical and analog items. Sometimes I think I’ll just put it all in a big box and drop it off somewhere. I know I won’t. Probably because, like the played-to-death Meet The Beatles album in the dog-eared cover, their dust-gathering presence maintain a physical connection to when I was young. Plus, the stuff technically still works. The Nikon F and Mamiya C330 were built like brick shithouses. And I really miss the grip and mechanical interaction of typewriters and spring-powered cameras.

I can do the basics in Photoshop, but it’s doesn’t match the dark mustard-colored seclusion of a darkroom and the smell of hypo. Getting your hands in the chemicals and the washing trays. The magic of seeing a white sheet morph into a brilliant print. As long as the materials are still available, I still harbor the hope I’ll build that darkroom. And man, it will have the best sound system ever.

Two of the most dreadfully overused words these days are “innovation” and “job creators.” Politicians who talk about “job creators” ad nauseum mostly don’t have the faintest clue about what it takes to create even one  job on a firm, sustained basis. That is, to cause wealth creation. They fail to understand that at best, government imposes only a small drag on people doing the work of the word. At worst, it smothers economic growth, using an array of blankets.

“Innovation” hardly means anything, when people apply it with the same breathlessness to some new web gewgaw as they would to a new rocket ship. Government, while it doesn’t itself innovate, can help create  conditions in which innovation occurs. A case in point is the Global Security Challenge.  A small agency called Technical Support Working Group, funded by the Defense Department, is behind this challenge. The challenge prize — in this case $500,000 divided between each of two winning companies — is provided by TSWG. BAE Systems also contributes to the process. The whole thing is staged by a contractor, OmniCompete of the U.K. It also stages challenges in other fields with other sponsors. In this case, the goals it to find great and promising new innovations in security.

I was a judge, one of five, for the U.S. East Coast regional competition in the Global Security Challenge. The competition took place at the Australian Embassy (with a reception afterwards up the street at the New Zealand Embassy). The chief judge was John Morgan, technology advisor to the Army Special Operations Command. We heard from two sets of five companies — small, going companies with revenue and startups, which mostly don’t yet have operating revenue. Each company sent one or two representatives give five-minute presentations, followed by 10 minutes of Q&A by the judges.

Wow.

Talk about real innovation. And the potential for jobs creation.

All of the presenters were smart cookies. They ranged from brainy engineers to slick salesmen. Some were canny, repeat entrepreneurs who’d started and sold other companies. Several had long histories in the thickets of federal contracting and service delivery to military customers. Connected people. They represented technical developers from all over the world. Israeli engineering strength undergirded several entries. One company had its complex mathematics models programmed in Russia.

I found the range of innovations startling. One startup called WallEye developed a microwave camera capable of seeing through walls yet priced cheap enough to produce as a tool you will be able to buy at Home Depot. The secret? Reduction of wave propagation technology from expensive electronics to a plastic spinning antenna the company can produce for pennies apiece.

In the end, we chose as one winner a company called DefenSoft, whose software, it said, makes short work of planning the placement of communications towers, antennae, cameras and sensors in complicated campuses with difficult terrain. Its chairman, Kris Nybakken, was a founder of WebMD. Its CEO, Lawrence Cassenti, is a veteran of many border installations and defense communications projects. Our other winner was a startup called InView. It’s founder, an engineer named Bob Bridge, has replaced the receptor array in an infrared camera with a single, micro-mirror detector. This change drops the cost of an industrial infrared camera by an order of magnitude.

Some ideas were more impressive than others, and we argued back and forth before settling on a single choice in the two categories. That’s about all I am allowed to say about our deliberations. But in all cases, we witnessed the competitive drive of people producing new things because of their creative drive and desire to capitalize on their brains.

The winners from our D.C. regional event join winners of other regional presentations from all over the world. They convene in London for the finals next month.