DOD puts commanders in charge of Web sites
The Defense Department last month released a new Web site policy designed to safeguard sensitive information posted on the Internet by making commanders responsible for the content of their organizations' sites. Commanders, not webmasters, will have final authority on establishing and maintaining unclassified DOD Web sites with tight security controls and information that matches their organizational missions, Defense officials said.
GSA dips toe in PC outsourcing with PRC award
Just before year's end, the General Services Administration selected Litton PRC Inc. as the lead contractor under the Seat Management Program to take over PC operations for GSA employees. It is the first contract under the program, which GSA set up last year and for which it awarded contracts to eight vendors [GCN, July 13, 1998, Page 1]. To promote the outsourcing of PC work, GSA stepped up as the first customer.
Be wary of agencies' per-seat price figures | GCN
Since the award of the General Services Ad-ministration's Seat Management Program, the Outsourcing Desktop Initiative for NASA (ODIN) and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms' seat management contracts, many in government have eagerly awaited the first wave of by-the-seat pricing to see where they might fall in terms of total cost of ownership.
Sprint favors digital subscriber lines for ION
Sprint Corp. plans to open up local access to its Integrated On-demand Network by installing, wherever possible, its own high-speed digital subscriber lines for end users rather than leasing links from local providers. "The cost of doing the last mile for ION is more affordable than we thought," Sprint spokesman James Fisher said. The company will seek an amendment for ION services in its first-round FTS 2001 long-distance contract.
FTS IT Solutions program picks 10 vendors for $25 billion global ANSWER contracts
Ten vendors last month won contracts with a combined $25 billion ceiling under the Federal Technology Service's IT Solutions Concept of Operations program. Through ANSWER, which stands for applications and support for widely diverse end-user requirements, FTS will replace many contracts that underlie its Federal Information Systems Support program. Awarded by the General Services Administration's Pacific Rim Region on Dec. 30, the 10 indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contracts will run for two base years with eight one-year options.
Justice's IT guru returns to private life
Mark A. Boster's efforts toward better cooperation among Justice bureaus bore fruit, a Justice administrator says. This time Mark A. Boster says he is leaving federal service for good—he thinks. Boster, who has overseen the Justice Department's information technology operations for the last five years, will leave his post as deputy assistant attorney general for IRM and deputy chief information officer this month to return to the private sector.
Novell weighs in with hearty NetWare 5
How do you hide an 800-pound gorilla? Make it compete against Microsoft Corp. The joke pretty well sums up Novell Inc.'s situation. Once undisputed king of the LAN, Novell has been overshadowed by Microsoft in the network operating system market. Ironically, Novell only left the hardware business to develop NetWare because, at the time, IBM Corp. ruled the PC industry.
Backers of thin-computing movement tout slim servers, tightened terminals | GCN
"Even engineers use Windows," Gilbertson said. Thin is in. Again. If you looked carefully amid the clamor over 450-MHz CPUs, 34G hard drives and superfast 3-D graphics subsystems at the recent Comdex trade show, you saw signs that the thin-computing movement is far from dead. The avalanche of new handheld and portable computing devices could be construed as part of the movement, but more than one vendor focused on thin clients in
Navy CIO: '99 budget is hampering IT efforts
SAN DIEGO— A congressional directive in the fiscal 1999 Defense appropriations bill is wreaking havoc with Navy efforts to modernize and sustain its systems, the service's chief information officer said. House and Senate lawmakers ordered the Defense Department to spend no information technology funds on developing or modernizing systems that are not year 2000-ready.
Modem/LAN PC Cards
PC Card devices provide a reliable solution for both systems managers and users. In the market for adapter cards? Be in-the-know before you go. Being a mobile worker—visiting five field offices in three days, working on that remote project for a month or just telecommuting from home because your office supports air pollution control efforts—ought to be easy, right?
New year ushers in new wants, wishes on cyberspace front
January is a good time to take a look ahead. Here are some things to watch—and wish—for in the coming year: Why not develop a similar seal for government sites? Some agencies take weeks to respond to e-mail from citizens. Others do not update their Web sites often enough to identify correct contacts. What's needed is a minimum standard for federal Web site maintenance and a seal to show who meets it and who is asleep
INTERVIEW | Mark Day, EPA's IT edge man | GCN
| Mark Day, EPA's IT edge man Before coming to EPA in 1993, Day was CIO for environmental quality at the Missouri Department of Natural Resources. His work experience includes automating Missouri's inventory tracking and client scheduling for the state's weather program. Day has a bachelor's degree in political science and history from Southwest Baptist University, and he has done graduate work in IT.
Labs sport collaborative look
Scientists who move into new National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration laboratories in Boulder, Colo., will find a state-of-the-art asynchronous transfer mode network waiting for them. "Modern research lives or dies by its network and communications capabilities," said Britt Bassett, network manager for NOAA's Boulder labs. "There's a lot of collaborative research going on here that has been hindered" by inadequate network links between buildings scattered across the area.
Justice bans Net
Fearing a potentially disastrous cyberbreach of its systems, the Justice Department has taken a hard-core stance on applets: It has banned them. Responding to security concerns, the department is blocking script code such as Java, JavaScript and ActiveX from download via the Internet or e-mail messages because of the potential risks such code poses, said Mark A. Boster, assistant attorney general for IRM and the department's deputy chief information officer.
IRS will take delivery of 10,300 Micron PCs
Through a $26.7 million order from a General Services Administration schedule contract, the IRS last year bought 10,300 PCs from Micron Electronics Inc. IRS tax examiners will use the 6,800 TransPort Trek2 notebooks and 3,500 Milennia desktop PCs, ordered through ComTeq Federal Inc.'s Treasury Department Acquisition blanket purchasing agreement, said Greg Roseman, IRS contracting officer for TDA BPAs.
COMMUNICATIONS | New Products | GCN
| New Products Gigabit extends to campus distances A Hewlett-Packard Co. module for selected models in the HP ProCurve line of switches can extend Gigabit Ethernet service over campus backbones. The $1,999 Gigabit-LX module supplies a single-port, long-distance Gigabit Ethernet connection for the ProCurve 8000M, 4000M and 1600M switches.
Navy's '99 resolution: trim fat from systems support
SAN DIEGO—Faced with shrinking budgets servicewide, the Navy has launched a pilot at the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command to explore the use of regional information technology services. SPAWAR is taking the lead for the Navy in developing an enterprisewide approach to the service's fractured IT infrastructure. The command's pilot is a proof-of-concept project to demonstrate that the Navy can save money by changing the way it does business.
Packet Rat
Packet Rat R. Fink Politics reduces productivity; the Rat is certain of it. "Just look at Congress," he sighs. So the whiskered one purges politics—at least national and regional politics—from the workplace. Or at least he tries. As a former nautical creature, he has applied several rules of conduct in his office that he brought with him from his days in the wardroom. Chief among these is that it is inappropriate
SSA will deliver even if banks aren't ready for 2000
The Social Security Administration may not have heard the last of the year 2000 problem, despite President Clinton's proclamation last month that the agency's systems are ready and that Social Security payments are not at risk. The hitch? The distribution of Social Security benefits hinges not only on the administration's systems but those of financial institutions, too. The readiness of those systems is less sure.
'99 shockers: Contracts and acronyms run amok! | GCN
With a new year comes the columnist's tradition of predicting major developments of the coming 12 months. This year, I'm going out on a limb to make some really specific predictions. Jeanne Dixon, watch out. Someone will realize that the cause of the year 2000 problem is not computer programming at all. The reason we have this problem is, of course, because we have a year numbered 2000. And the reason the coming year has this
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