Solar panels can juice up your notebook battery life
Off the grid doesn't necessarily mean out of luck. Say you're working at your notebook computer, with no electrical outlet nearby, when the low-battery light starts flashing. Just step to a sunny window or go outdoors, connect SunWize Technologies' Portable Energy System (PES) and keep working. One of the PES solar panels can extend notebook battery life as much as twofold.
Marine Corps wants to hand over some net operations to contractors
Marine Corps brass are weighing the advantages of turning over the day-to-day running of nontactical networks to vendors. The Corps wants to outsource part of its information technology and infrastructure work in the National Capital Region, perhaps within the next three months. If it works in the National Capital Region, the Navy will consider outsourcing the Corps' East Coast, West Coast and Okinawa, Japan, network operations, said Col. John Bouldry, director of plans and policies
IT funding hurdles result in stale federal systems
Male, pale and stale. That's the epithet some wags apply to the federal information technology work force. Actually, this group is probably equal to others when it comes to racial and gender diversity, and maybe better. But the word stale is a particularly sharp barb. We are expected to bring modern IT to our agencies. A failure to keep up with IT can cripple agency effectiveness.
Put NCs to work with Lotus eSuite
Lotus Development Corp.'s eSuite, heralded for more than a year as the working environment for the network computer, is one of the most innovative products in recent years. But innovative doesn't equal perfect. Known first by the code name Kona, the suite has Java applets that let users do basic office tasks. Not only are the applets innovative in how they work separately but also in how they unite to form a user-friendly framework.
Which way now, IRS?
No matter how amicable it may look, the departure of IRS chief information officer Arthur Gross isn't good news. It seems like the result of a chasm between Gross and new IRS commissioner Charles Rossotti on how systems modernization should proceed. The two officials' public statements about Gross' departure were all moonlight and roses. Neither alluded to widely reported differences in opinion. Rossotti has told Congress he envisions a radical makeover of IRS, including splitting
Lawmakers push for electronic signature use
Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.) represents Silicon Valley, that fabled land of great wealth, gridlocked traffic and our national future that stretches from Palo Alto to South San Jose. Rep. W.J. "Billy" Tauzin (R-La.) is chairman of the House Commerce Subcommittee on Telecommunications, Trade and Consumer Protection. Eshoo and Tauzin have introduced a bill, HR 2991, to require federal agencies to make their forms available to the public online and, more importantly, to have the capacity
VRML earns ISO's blessing
Government employees who assisted in the birth of the Virtual Reality Modeling Language in 1994 are surprised by how fast VRML grew up. Last December, the language received the blessing of the International Standards Organization as VRML97. "We're all very happy," said Don Brutzman, assistant professor in the interdisciplinary academic group at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, Calif. Brutzman sits on the board of directors of the nonprofit VRML Consortium and is a technical
IT fares well in '99 budget plan
The $1.7 trillion spending plan, the first balanced budget in years, reflects the Clinton administration's push for a streamlined government. "The administration has an ambitious agenda to continue reinventing government so that it is more effective, more efficient and more responsive to the American people," the budget policy statement said.
Sim model speeds decisions
Engi described his systems as combining protein computers--human experts--with silicon computers. Both are necessary in his global approach to making infrastructure models for government officials who respond to hot spots domestically and overseas. As yet, the Energy Department lab has no paying customers for the decision-support technology. But Engi is convinced the work his team is doing with dynamic simulation language models will prove invaluable to U.S. and international policy-makers.
Schools and libraries become inexpensive Net service providers
In several states, a movement is afoot to require telephone companies to offer a range of telecommunications services, including Internet access, at reduced rates. Michigan Gov. John Engler recently signed a law requiring that those services be provided at cost to school districts. An interesting side angle is that the schools can buy Integrated Services Digital Network, T1 Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line and other broadband services without restrictions on reselling or sharing the bandwidth with
Court of Federal Claims dispenses just rulings so far
There have been a few surprises. Nearly all the protesters are small to midsize companies. Moreover, in several cases, the court has acted as a court of appeals, reviewing a protest previously decided, at least in part, by the General Accounting Office. An important recent decision is CCL Inc. vs. United States. The case resulted from the consolidation of far-flung military data processing into a group of megacenters run by the Defense Information Systems Agency.
DISA revamps COE training
DISA has been conducting three-day classes on the fundamentals of the DII COE only since August, but the agency wants out of the education business. "It outstrips any of our estimates on demand, and it's not our mission in the first place," said Don Black, head of new customer development at DISA's Center for Computer Systems Engineering.
McHale retires from government work
McHale, chief of the Scientific Information and Data Systems Branch at the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS), retired from government late last year. The computer scientist will now devote much of her time to a lifelong love--natural sciences. McHale volunteers at the National Zoo in Washington, where she can be seen dipping her hand into the Think Tank, a petting zoo for sea life, and emerging with a creature to
Common patient data is key to VA, DOD project
The four partners will participate in the Government Computer-based Patient Record (GCPR) project that VA and DOD began earlier in the winter. The team plans to release a final statement of objectives this summer after receiving vendor comments, said Lt. Col. Rosemary Nelson, deputy program manager for the Composite Health Care System II.
NASA hooked on commercial shuttle robots
Replace John Glenn with a robot? That might seem far-fetched today. But NASA wants to use more robots aboard spacecraft in the not-too-distant future, and it's testing candidates now. The Mars Pathfinder proved last summer that robots built with off-the-shelf computer equipment could accomplish successful space missions, opening the floodgates for a new generation of NASA robots--including Ranger, Pathfinder's likely successor.
The furry one finds time-share is better than taking Notes
Again the cyberrodent braved Lotus Development Corp.'s surreal conference while the ratlings and Mrs. Rat cut loose to terrorize Mickey, Shamu and other theme park denizens. The Rats arrived in Orlando, Fla., a few days early to spend some quality time together before the head of the family had to submerse himself in the latest tips and tricks for Domino development and Defense Message System administration. Being on a limited budget, the Rat also subjected
MaxSpeed takes new tack on thin-client networking
A thin-client, fat-server network ideally delivers PC ease of use and robustness as well as administrative and cost benefits. Citrix Systems Inc.'s WinFrame is probably the best-known software server for thin clients, but it's a bit much for a small office or workgroup. MaxSpeed Corp. is trying something different. Instead of connecting to a server through a network, the MaxSpeed client connects to the server through a specialized VGA card.
Agencies worry about future of DEC's OpenVMS
Agencies have been running VMS ever since Digital introduced the original 32-bit VAX 11/780 minicomputer 20 years ago. Many federal applications still rely on VMS, now called OpenVMS, and systems managers said they don't want to move those applications any time soon. Digital officials have rushed to assure OpenVMS users that the OS is key to Digital's enterprise strategy and that Digital will continue to support it along with Microsoft Windows NT and Digital Unix.
LantraServer presents more remote-access options
Large enterprises have multiple access routes and platforms to consider. Small workgroup or departmental networks running Microsoft Windows NT or Unix present almost as many choices. The GCN Lab took a look at Stallion Technologies' LantraServer, a hardware-software combination that relies on Windows NT Server's Remote Access Server (RAS) module.
IRS' Gross to leave April 1, says he's reached his goals
Gross said he will leave his post April 1 to work with a nonprofit organization outside Washington. The announcement came only days after new IRS commissioner Charles Rossotti testified on Capitol Hill about a reorganization of the agency and discussed his ideas about the tax systems modernization effort. Gross in the fall had unveiled a new modernization strategy and more recently a draft solicitation for a lead contractor to oversee the effort.
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