Digital Government

DOD puts vast nets to Y2K test

The Defense Department this week will complete what it described as 'the largest simultaneous Year 2000 test of information systems in the world' as part of a series of endtoend tests of how the Pentagon's missioncritical systems will operate after Dec. 31. The current series of tests focuses on

  • By Bob Brewin, Doug Brown and Dan Verton
Digital Government

USGS to replace CIO with GIO

In what it says represents an increased departmentwide emphasis on coordinating instead of collecting geographical data, the U.S. Geological Survey plans to hire the firstever geographic information officer, a senior executive job that will replace the agency's position of chief information of

  • By Doug Brown
Digital Government

Report: Government must work to attract IT workers

Report released last week by the CIO Council argues that the government must do whatever it can to make federal jobs more attractive to potential information technology workers, but the group stopped short of recommending a separate government IT pay scale.

  • By Doug Brown
Digital Government

Study: Exec pay hurts recruitment

A 'war for talent' being waged among private companies could increase the drain of the federal senior executive work force, and the government likely will fail to meet the challenge of recruiting and keeping highlevel workers, according to a study released last week. The study, conducted by the co

  • By Doug Brown
Digital Government

Viador brings portal tech to fed market

Viador Inc., which designs and installs World Wide Webbased information portals for large organizations, is making a push into the federal market, receiving approval for a General Services Administration schedule contract and opening a Washington, D.C.area office. Viador specializes in structurin

  • By Doug Brown
Digital Government

Innovation fund in limbo

A unique pot of money that was established in 1995 to nurture technical innovation governmentwide and was widely championed by Vice President Al Gore has been cut off from its source of income, leaving the fund's future in question. The General Services Administration, which supported the Informati

  • By Doug Brown
Digital Government

Interior unveils Indian record system

The Interior Department today unveiled a computer system that it hopes will improve the management of records associated with the Indian Trust Fund a complicated amalgam of land records, bank accounts and other records that the department acknowledges has been poorly organized and maintained.

  • By Doug Brown
Digital Government

CIO Council urges action to save IT work force

Competition for workers with information technology skills is intense, and the federal government must take immediate action if it wants to maintain a worldclass hightech work force, according to a study released by the federal CIO Council.

  • By Doug Brown
Digital Government

Government vulnerable to loss of top ranks

The federal government is in danger of losing droves of talented executives to private industry because pay for senior employees in government pales in comparison to salaries offered by private companies, according to a study released today by the consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers.

  • By Doug Brown
Digital Government

Interior challenges news report

It's like the Wild West on the Internet frontier, Interior Department Webmaster Stephen King says. Not surprisingly, the vast and relatively lawless terrain of the World Wide Web isn't without its rhetorical gunfights. Consider a recent skirmish between the department and The Washington Post. A Pos

  • By Doug Brown
Digital Government

Census opens data capture center for 2000 census

The Census Bureau and several privatesector partners today held a grand opening ceremony for a data capture center in Maryland, which will be used to organize and store demographic information from an estimated 40 million questionnaires for the 2000 census.

  • By Doug Brown
Digital Government

Book disputes mythical benefits of downsizing

It has become a mantra for Washington, D.C., politicians: Downsizing is happening; downsizing is good; long live downsizing. The idea that smaller government is easier on the federal wallet and forces government to become more efficient is attractive to politicians, who can sell themselves as oppon

  • By Doug Brown
Digital Government

Navy praises new SPS, but critics remain

While some users continue to criticize the Defense Department's $326 million Standard Procurement System, a key piece of the Pentagon's 'paperless contracting' program, top Navy officials have praised the latest version of the software. Elliott Branch, the Navy's executive director of acquisition a

  • By Bob Brewin and Doug Brown
Digital Government

Netcast nets deal for House Webcasts

After a threemonth trial, an Alexandria, Va.based company that specializes in broadcasting events over the Internet has signed a longterm agreement with the House of Representatives' Science Committee to air 50 hours a month of live testimony during committee hearings. Under the $6,000amonth

  • By Doug Brown
Digital Government

Agencies batten down

A growing wave of hacker attacks on federal World Wide Web sites, including an attack that resulted in the FBI shutting down its site for more than a week, has raised agencies' awareness of their vulnerabilities and spurred efforts to increase their online security. As a result, agencies recently h

  • By Diane Frank and Doug Brown
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