FAA names AT&T exec Daniel Mehan to become its first chief information officer
The Federal Aviation Administration last week tapped Daniel J. Mehan to be its first chief information officer. FAA chose the career AT&T Corp. executive from a pool of more than 50 candidates. Mehan, 54, is AT&T's international vice president of quality and business management in New Jersey. He will start his new job at FAA on Feb. 1.
Despite setbacks, DOD vows to fix all date code
The Defense Department will be able to protect the United States and its allies next year despite the threat of date code errors crippling DOD systems, deputy Defense secretary John Hamre said this month. DOD will have all of its 2,304 mission-critical systems year 2000-ready by Dec. 31, Hamre said at a Pentagon press briefing. As of Jan. 1, 81 percent of the department's mission-critical systems had been fixed, he said.
System sells stats on demand
Stat-USA, the Commerce Department's fee-funded statistics retailer, has put up an online newsstand that lets customers buy individual documents through a third-party transaction service. "As far as we can tell, we're the first agency to use this kind of system," Stat-USA director Ken Rogers said.
Marines post buying guide
SAN DIEGO—The Marine Corps has created a buyer's guide and posted it on the Web to make sure that Marines buy and use a common suite of hardware and software products. The buyer's guide, established in August by the Marine Corps Systems Command, lists specific servers, PCs and notebooks that local commanders and contracting offices are authorized to buy. The guide, posted on the Web at http://www.marcorsyscom.usmc.mil/buyersguide, also identifies standard
DISA, other DOD agencies garner awards for operations upgrades, systems work
Several Defense Department agencies received Hammer Awards from the National Partnership for Reinventing Government for improving operations and consolidating systems. The DOD organizations were recognized for streamlining operations, cutting costs by more than $11 billion and eliminating more than 110,000 positions over a six-year period. Among the winners were the Defense Information Systems Agency, the Defense Finance and Accounting Service, and the Defense Logistics Agency.
LAB NOTES
In the pink. Apple Computer Inc.'s iMac has not only brought the company out of the red, it has revived the once moribund Apple in the hearts and minds of PC users as well. The iMac's rounded, post-modernist, translucent blue shell was what drew people's attention first. Then they started asking for it in other colors. Apple, seeing a golden opportunity, promptly announced it would make iMacs in five hues.
Opera browser is simple and effective
Tired of the browser battles? Want to eliminate Explorer and negate Netscape? Go to the Opera. This little browser's arias don't quite reach the same peaks as the Big Two. But Opera does a good job of supporting the Web's underlying Hypertext Markup Language most of the time.
New notebook makes good use of small package
GCNdex32 scores Floating-point math 4.20 4.50 Integer math 7.81 7.91 Video 7.04 7.02 Small-file access 2.89 2.71 Large-file access 2.60 2.65
Online service demands will drive outsourcing, futurist says
CHAPEL HILL, N.C.—James Canton thinks he has seen the future of government, and it is outsourced. Citizens accustomed to online consumer services will demand the same convenience from government agencies, said Canton, president of the Institute for Global Futures, a San Francisco think tank. But government cannot afford the time and money to develop information technology resources to satisfy them, he said.
Agencies ponder how to integrate buying reforms
Former AF exec Chip Mather says guides may help. Having developed policies to correspond with procurement reforms passed by Congress in the last few years, agencies are trying to apply them in a way that corresponds to their missions. The first step is integrating the policies, said William C. Greenwalt, senior staff member for the Senate Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Oversight of Government Management, Restructuring and the District of Columbia.
Federal 2000 emergency funds are going, going, halfway gone
How much have civilian agencies received? The government is spending its emergency year 2000 funds too quickly and perhaps unwisely, a group of Capitol Hill lawmakers is contending. So far, the Office of Management and Budget has allocated nearly half of the $2.5 billion Congress allotted in fiscal 1999 for emergency 2000 needs by civilian agencies. OMB also is reviewing a request from the Defense Department to tap the $1.1 billion lawmakers granted for
Treasury service wants agencies to switch to improved payroll tax app
The Treasury Department's Financial Management Service has upgraded the system that lets agencies pay their payroll taxes electronically, and it has streamlined the process by making the application available via the Internet. Now FMS must persuade agencies to use the new app, said Paul Gist, director of FMS' Financial Services Division.
VPN devices show strength on security
VPN devices and software employ multitier encryption, authentication and access control to establish secure Internet tunnels between remote sites, field offices and headquarters LANs. VPNs reduce network support and hardware requirements, eliminate expensive dedicated lines and cut telecommuting costs. A single VPN hardware server attached to the office network removes the need for maintaining modem banks and remote-access servers.
IT's impact and year 2000 readiness top CIOs' worry lists
Top challenges for federal systems executives have changed little over the last three years, according to an annual survey. Measuring information technology's contribution to performance and dealing with year 2000 fixes continued to dominate the third annual survey by the Association for Federal IRM. AFFIRM said the results show that IT management and meeting the objectives of the IT Management Reform Act are also chief concerns among federal IT officials.
IT guru will leave OMB for new 2000 post
In his new job, Bruce McConnell will focus on international issues related to the year 2000. Bruce W. McConnell, who has led agencies through many an information technology policy change in the past 15 years from his post at the Office of Management and Budget, will now focus exclusively on year 2000 issues at a new job in a new administration office.
ON Technology's Jumpstart can apply remote fixes, upgrades to network PCs
ON Technology Corp. of Cambridge, Mass., has added a desktop year 2000 module to its ON Command Comprehensive Client Manager (CCM). The CCM remote desktop administration tool, called Y2K Jumpstart, runs on a server under Unix or Microsoft Windows NT and evaluates clients running Windows 3.x, Windows 9x and NT. The administrator can apply fixes to a client's BIOS, operating system, network operating system files, applications and data without having to visit each separate desktop.
NASA raises eyebrows with low outsourcing prices
Outsourcing its desktop PC operations will cost NASA less than it had anticipated. The cost of desktop PCs at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., through the Outsourcing Desktop Initiative at NASA, will run from $2,000 to $3,400 per seat annually, said Mark Hagerty, the agency's ODIN program manager.
Thrift Supervision boosts field support
With most of its year 2000 work and an overhaul of its information technology organization done, the Office of Thrift Supervision plans to start some new projects this year. Frank DiGialleonardo came on board last April to help consolidate IT functions at OTS. The agency combined the Office of IRM, Test Projects Office and Information and Management Services Department into the Office of Information Systems. In the fall, OTS made
At Leong-Hong's farewell fete, officials laud her DOD service
What will Belkis Leong-Hong do next? That was Topic A among the 200 people who attended the recent retirement dinner for the chief information officer of the Defense Security Service. Leong-Hong took the job last June, capping a 29-year career with the federal government that included 18 years at the Defense Department.
PROFESSIONAL CALENDAR
15-19 Applications of Software Measurement and Software Management Conference. San Jose, Calif. Contact the Software Quality Institute, 330 Corporate Way, Suite 300, Orange Park, N.J. 32073; tel. 904-278-0524. 17 FBI Academy Technology Expo Exposition. Quantico, Va. Contact the Federal Business Council Inc., 10810 Guilford Road, Suite 105, Annapolis Junction, Md. 20701; tel. 301-206-2940.
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