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SNAPSHOTOnline report sponsored by:Web 3.0 ToolsFull strategic report at:www GCN.com/Web3ToolsInside:Tracking the Stimulus: Recovery.Gov Showcases Federal Evolution to Web 3.0, s2Inside the Relaunch – Understanding How Web 3.0 Works, s4Winning Results Via Web 3.0 Implementation, s5Q&A: An Interview with David Eaves, s7Best Practices Advice to Aid Agency Web 3.0 Migration Efforts, s8www Feature articles & full report available for download at: www .GCN.com/Web3Tools
www.GCN.com/Web3ToolsWeb 3.0 ToolsTracking the Stimulus: Recovery.GovShowcases Federal Evolution to Web 3.0In the effort to make government information more openand accountable, there’s perhaps no better examplepublic sector organizations and others can draw fromthan Recovery.gov, which was set up by the currentadministration to follow the ongoing impact of the president’seconomic stimulus plan, otherwise known as the AmericanRecovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009.Recovery.gov is the website being used to track thestimulus. The original site, launched in February 2009, waspowered by Drupal, an open source content managementplatform that offered blogs, forums, newsletters andpodcasting among its features. But users w ere not able tofollow the recovery funds from beginning to end as theObama administration had promised. Nor could siteadministrators use the site for the appro val process requiredto collect, sort and display spending data collected fromfunding recipients. As a result, the site became a tar get forwatchdogs, open government advocates and lawmakers‘underwhelmed’ with the site’s original contents and capabilities.“And we expect you, the American people,to hold us accountable for the results.That is why we have created Recovery.gov,so every American can go online and seehow their money is being spent.”— President ObamaAs a result, the Recovery Accountability and TransparencyBoard, which was charged with tracking stimulus fundsmade the decision to change not onl y the site’s look but alsoits core focus. They solicited a contract through theGovernment Services Administration (GSA) to redesign thesite. An 18 million contract was awarded to Hollywood,Md.-based Smartronix, Inc., a f irm experienced in federaland military IT projects, with help from three subcontractors,Synteractive, TMP Government and KPMG in July 2009.s21105 Government Information Group Custom ReportThe Recovery.gov contract awarded to Smartronix includedthe procurement, installation, conf iguration, security and24x7 operation and maintenance of a robust, secure andhighly available web infrastructure to support millions ofusers. A mirrored continuity of operations environment wasincluded in the contract. If all options w ere exercised, theaward would be valued at 18 million over five years.Ten Week TurnaroundHow Smartronix, along with partners Synteractive, TMPGovernment and KPMG redesigned Recovery.gov in just tenweeks from a static web site to a dynamic platfor m based onMicrosoft SharePoint, FAST Search and SQL Ser ver is astory worth explaining in detail. According to Evan Burfield,CEO of Synteractive, the incredibly challenging opportunityrequired his team to step back and think about the go vernment’sproblem. “We had a week to determine if we were thecurrent administration, what would we want to accomplish?”To that end, Burfield’s team came up with the concept fora site that would be “hyperpersonalized and localized for theaverage individual to understand and use,” he said.This concept comes primarily from a growing trend in theconsumer arena, in which a citizen in Dayton, Ohio franklydoesn’t care much about the national picture. Instead he orshe really wants to know what’s happening in their owncommunity.Using Web 2.0 and 3.0 concepts, it tak es radically fewerpeople to design and b uild a new web environment, Burfieldexplained. It takes a specialized skill set, along with theright incentives to rethink a problem so it can be effectivelyresolved. In the case of Recovery.gov the differences boileddown to a f ixed price contract, rather than a more traditionalcost plus contract. Another difference: using an iterativeapproach rather than a more traditional ‘w aterflow’ approachto design, along with relying on a few groups of highlyskilled personnel to implement the solution. “What w e’vefound in this type of development process is that many‘business process’ problems are actually collaborationproblems,” Burfield said. K
Web 3.0 Toolswww.GCN.com/Web3ToolsThe original Recovery.gov home page February 2009.Defining Web 3.0Web 3.0, otherwise known as the“Semantic Web” is a term coined by TimBerners-Lee, one of the originators of theWorld Wide Web. At its core Web 3.0 is aplace, where machines will read web pagesmuch like humans. It’s also reportedly aplace where Internet search engines alongwith software agents will troll the Internet tofind precisely what a user is searching for. Web3.0 has been described as a set of standardsfor turning the web into one giganticdatabase. Bing’s reference search is oneexample of a Web 3.0 application.Recovery.gov home page nowOn Recovery.gov –“I expect it to be a templatefrom this point onfor how the federalgovernment dealswith taxpayers’ money.”– Vice President Joseph Biden1105 Government Information Group Custom Reports3
Web 3.0 Toolswww.GCN.com/Web3ToolsInside the Relaunch:Understanding How Web 3.0 WorksWithin the redesign of Recovery.gov, the overarchingchallenge was to engage citizens in analyzing theRecovery Act’s funding data – and to do it f ast.The entire redesign had to be completed in ten w eeks.The contract award team of Smartronix, with partnersSynteractive, TMP Government, and KPMG decided thebest way to attack this challenge was to break all tasks downinto multiple elements, and then focus intentl y on the simplestway to resolve each challenge. With only 10 weeks to completethe redesign, engineers needed a robust solution that couldmeet all of the government’s security and governancerequirements and still be flexible and scalable enough tomeet the needs of an entire U.S. population. The overallarchitecture had to have content management workflows,which is primarily why the environment was moved toMicrosoft SharePoint, which is already widely deployedthroughout government. “We knew if the entire site had tobe up and running in ten weeks, it could take six weeks ormore to buy a new platform and complete the cer tification/accreditation process,” said Evan Burfield, CEO ofSynteractive.Development time that would have otherwise been spentbuilding a custom solution was freed up by the decision touse SharePoint, and that allowed the team to address criticalbusiness problems, such as how to collect data from hundredsof disparate sources. SharePoint is a collection of software thatcan be used to host web sites that access shared workspaces,information stores and documents, as well as host def inedapplications such as wikis, podcasts, b logs, widgets, gadgets,pipes and microblogs. At its core, SharePoint has built-inintegration for reporting, collaboration, social networking,and other capabilities that can g reatly improve how constituentsinteract with government and how government organizationsinteract with each other. “We also used open sourcecomponents and web services, including Microsoft’s Bing,because the architecture is already interoperab le and widelyused,” Burfield said.Ultimately, this early stage set of decisions is ho wRecovery.gov became the f irst government-wide platform torun on in a cloud computing en vironment, sources said.An Important IncentiveBecause this was a f ixed price contract there was atremendous incentive to get the solution implemented as costs41105 Government Information Group Custom Reporteffectively as possible. “We took an iterative approach,doing strategic design, engaging stakeholders at each stepalong the way. In reality, the development of a redesignedRecovery.gov turned into two separate, yet intertwined fiveweek challenges. The first challenge was to build adevelopment, test and staging architecture using Microsoft’sSharePoint, running on Amazon’s cloud computing platform.This helped determine the actual look and feel of the site,Burfield explained.The second f ive week challenge was focused on digginginto data elements that would reside on the newly revisedweb site. To resolve this challenge, several small, highlyskilled teams with ‘elite’ resources were used, Burfieldexplained. “Our goal wasn’t to build the end-all solution.Instead, we wanted to build the quickest solution possible,which could be improved upon after launch.”Among the teams working on the data challenges,Burfield explained that there were no more than 25 peoplededicated to any single challenge, with many teams usingfewer than 20 people. The teams built a collection of usecases, or the user stories. Teams were set up to build thedata architecture, the user experience, a content managementsystem, and all other elements of the ne w site, each workingseparately on challenges that somehow had to work togetherto resolve the team’s initial use cases. “It tak es a unique skillset to break down a business problem into workflows, andthen build the programs that would address each challenge.The development team included six SharePoint architectsand two project managers. The smaller teams of highlyskilled professionals (average age, 28) provided a uniqueand diverse skill set. “They brought pragmatism andinnovation to get the job done,” Burfield said.In many ways, the entire development process had aWest Coast startup feel, which in so many ways has beencompletely foreign to traditional government contractingdeals. Multiple industry observers agree that the iterativeapproach to resolving challenges using a Web 3.0 sitedesign has worked extremely well. “We chose to resolveeach problem by tightly defining specific elements andcreatively resolving each element by leveraging technologicaltools from Google, Amazon and Microsoft to help us alongthe way,” Burfield explained. K
Web 3.0 Toolswww.GCN.com/Web3ToolsWinning Results ViaWeb 3.0 ImplementationRecovery.gov now enables citizens to understandthe impact of the 787 billion American Recoveryand Reinvestment Act in their local community.Newsweek has reported Recovery.gov is, “perhaps thefinest interactive database ever produced by the Americanbureaucracy.”In recent testimony before a Senate subcommittee onfederal financial management, Earl Devaney, chairman ofthe Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board said,“The Board’s IT team members universally say they learnedtwo valuable lessons from the strategy of developingcomponents of [Recovery.gov] simultaneously instead ofserially. First, developing the typical monolithic, one-sizefits-all technology to solve a problem is not necessary.Quickly and imaginatively integrating existing technologiescan work as well, or even better. Second, deploying individualtools and components as soon as the y are ready andintegrating others as they become available can work justas well as waiting until all pieces have been completed.”The Recovery Act currently provides funds to more than275 different federal programs. According to Devaney,Recovery.gov 2.0 has raised the standard for accountabilityand transparency in the federal government. Recovery.govhas also been honored for innovation by several local andnational organizations, including the Ad Club ofMetropolitan D.C. and the 14th annual Webby Awards. Anda Newsweek article on the re-launch of the site repor ted,“The result is the cur rent incarnation of Recovery.gov –which, as anyone who has spent signif icant amounts of timescouring government websites for information will tell you –is perhaps the clearest, richest interactive database everproduced by the American bureaucracy.”Vivek Kundra, U.S. Chief Information Officer recognizedRecovery.gov as, “the f irst government-wide system to moveto the cloud.”The Recovery.gov redesign contract award team, includingSmartronix, with partners Synteractive, TMP Governmentand KPMG is working with Recovery.gov’s board to ref inethe site. The Recovery Accountability and TransparencyBoard is currently focused on open APIs, widgets, enablingpeople to build their own apps. “We are also working onways to engage the entire ecosystem to help with dataquality,” said Evan Burfield, CEO of Synteractive.Continued on page s6Awards and RecognitionSynteractive was recognized as Microsoft’s Federal Partner of theYear for its work on Recover y.gov honoring Synteractive’s innovativeuse of Microsoft technology in support of Recover y.gov.Winners and finalists were chosen by Microsoft’s U.S. Public Sectorteam. “Microsoft’s federal partners are essential to our goal ofdelivering technology that helps agencies meet mission requirements, ”said Teresa Carlson, Vice President, Microsoft Federal. “WithRecovery.gov, Synteractive created a solution that has becomesynonymous with transparency, accountability and the opengovernment goals of the administration. Synteractive’s approach toinnovation and to rapid, iterative solutions is invaluable given theemerging needs of the public sector.”In addition to Treasury.gov, Syneractive was also been tapped towork on http://www.americaspeakingout.com/, part of theRepublican leadership’s Pledge for America, designed to helpcreate a new vision for the political party during the current midtermelection season. “Rather than going into a room and coming up withthink tank ideas, the party’s leadership has opened a website foranyone who wants to participate to tell them which policy ideas tovote for or against. It’s all about being able to connect and seeingwhat others are thinking about policies across a broad network ofpeople,” Burfield explained.This site runs on Microsoft’s Azure platform and also leveragesMicrosoft TownHall. Constituents can even use an Android app oriPhone to participate through Facebook, bringing the conversation tothe people, wherever they may be located.Synteractive is currently getting as much business from foreigngovernments as it has from U.S. federal sector organizations. This ismostly because those governments are now under pressure to buildtheir own Recovery.gov sites as well. “Seems that as soon as it’sproven what can be done with this type of site, the ability to tell anycountry’s citizens ‘the information is impossible to provide’ becomesdifficult to sustain,” Burfield explained.1105 Government Information Group Custom Reports5
Web 3.0 ToolsContinued from page s5The Recovery Accountability and Transparency Boardis an independent board within the cur rent White Houseadministration consisting of 13 inspector generals from eachof the major agencies, along with leaders from Cong ress.What has been so amazing to Burf ield is that the Recoveryboard’s leaders, including Vice President Joseph Bidendidn’t just allow, but encouraged the team to break do wnbureaucratic barriers to work in this way. That’s becauseRecovery.gov has turned into a completely new way ofworking on a public sector challenge.FuturesRecovery.gov will soon be implementing a ne w element,suggested by Edward Tufte, Professor Emeritus of politicalscience, statistics, and computer science at Yale University,which should help users get a visual feel for ho w Recoveryfunds are being spent across the countr y. And Devaneyreported the Board is also engaged in a second round offocus group and usability testing, visiting cities acrossAmerica – including Detroit and Phoenix – with the ultimategoal of increasing the usability of the Reco very.gov andfurther enabling detailed tracking of Recovery Act monies.The Recovery.gov website will also be unveiling a newwidget that will allow users to put on their o wn websites alive, real-time display of ARRA projects in whicheverCongressional district they select. “We also plan to reach outto the public for input and ideas on additional widgets andhopefully get the citizenry engaged in creating new applicationswe had not even considered,” Devaney said.Future improvements may eventually include making datafrom Recovery.gov readily available through social mediaplatforms such as Facebook. Social media tools would likelyhelp users note er rors in the data, interact with the data toconstruct new data sets and mashups, upload videos using tothe site, and integrate various localized feeds from Twitter,according to industry reports.s61105 Government Information Group Custom Reportwww.GCN.com/Web3ToolsMeanwhile, the same development team that successfullycompleted the redesign of Recovery.gov was also awardedthe redesign of the Treasury.gov website, which is set to golive in the near future. There will be associated web sitesthat focus on helping constituents build f inancial stability,and making homes affordable. According to Burf ield, inWeb 3.0, the ultimate goal is to tur n data into a str uctured,living thing. The Treasury Department has a great deal ofimportant information for local constituents throughout theU.S., in addition to traditional federal go vernmententities. “We are working to turn that information into adynamic structure for everyone to collaborate on. If Web 2.0is about turning organizations into publishers andconsumers of content, then Web 3.0 is really all aboutdata – sharing a common str uctural approach to buildcomposite apps from data that may reside in 50 differentplaces,” Burfield explained.Recovery.gov’s success proves Web 3.0 concepts actuallydo work. Burfield maintains that the concepts in Web 3.0invert all established ideas on how to hold governmentaccountable. “Where before individuals or organizationswould hold hearings to hold an e xecutive or branch ofgovernment accountable, in a very ‘inside-Washingtongame,’ this technology creates a whole new way to holdgovernment officials accountable, empowering citizens toparticipate,” Burfield said.The biggest obstacle in understanding how to actuallyresolve thorny challenges is to be willing to rethink theproblem, sources said. According to Burf ield, “Is it reallynecessary for the Treasury Department to build better f inancialreports for internal or oversight organizations to review? Orwould it be better to put f inancial information into the handsof constituents, who can then work to hold governmentaccountable?”Ultimately, trusting that the process will work makes thebiggest difference, Burfield added. K
www.GCN.com/Web3ToolsWeb 3.0 ToolsQ & A: An Interview with Da vid EavesDavid Eaves, author, adjunct professor, public policyentrepreneur, open government activist and negotiationexpert was interviewed by 1105 GovernmentInformation Group Custom Media at a recent WashingtonD.C. conference on social media in go vernment.His observations provide insight into the ongoingchallenges, obstacles and opportunities governmentorganizations face as they work to find new ways to incorporateonline social media tools to better ser ve their constituencies.Q u e s t i o n : W h a t d o you see as one of the biggest singlechallenges facing gove rn m e n t t o d ay?E aves: Government organizations of all kinds arestruggling to f ind more and better ways to interact andcollaborate. Largely the problem centers around managingthe cultural shift required to better share infor mation. Onthe defense side, military organizations with incrediblyhierarchical culture have surprisingly adapted fairly wellto a ‘net-centric’ world, and are increasingly handing powerdown to lower levels. This is an enormous and ongoingtransition, but the military fully understands that to achievemission goals they require accurate, immediate intelligence,gathered from all levels of their organizations – lives dependon their decisions.That’s why collaboration and interaction are cr ucial.Civilian governments meanwhile, appear to be str ugglingmore to make the necessary adjustments to improve sharingand collaboration. It’s not about a magic technology themilitary establishment has obtained that civilian agenciesaren’t allowed to use. Instead, civilian organizations facenumerous cultural barriers and software challenges thathave been difficult to overcome. Each agency must have alegal department willing to engage in change. And becauseregulatory policies are so rigid the cultural changes requiredto better collaborate has been extremely difficult to accomplish.Q u e s t i o n : Besides the need to culturally a d a p t , wh a tother obstacles hinder gove rn m e n t ’s ability to improvecolla b o r a t i o n ?E aves: Most government organizations currently seethemselves as service providers. As Tim O’Reilly, founderand CEO of O’Reilly Media describes it, they seethemselves like a soda machine, constituents put mone y in(via taxes) and expect to receive services from governmentorganizations. In this scenario, data is lar gely considered abyproduct of any government organization’s primary missiongoals. What appears to be missing is a full and completeunderstanding about what makes the world’s most successfulenterprises so good at what they do. Ultimately, the bestorganizations all peddle information. Consider for example,Kmart versus Walmart. Both are so similar, except Kmartbelieves it’s a retailer. Data driven organizations, such asWalmart, understand that logistics information and datamanagement can be leveraged for every decision, fromwhere to locate stores to w hat items are sold in stores.Also, on a separate, but equally important note, it’s simplynot relevant to be better than any other agency or country’sgovernments. Online users want an experience that’s similaror of equivalent value as they receive from online servicesprovided by Amazon, Google and Microsoft’s Bing. That’swhy there’s a critical need in government for web designerswho can address problems of navigating current publicsector web sites in ways that make the sites more similar totop commercial web environments.Q u e s t i o n : A re t h e re any intriguing gove rn m e n t examplesshowcasing the impor tance of leve raging info r m a t i o n ?E aves: Yes, there are a few good examples, especiallyin the federal government’s ongoing initiatives to providemore and better information, such as data.gov, and evenmore specifically, how government is spending taxpayerdollars on the economic stimulus at Reco very.gov, forexamples (See related article on Recovery.gov in thisSnapshot report). Indeed, some of the examples that centeron the use of data mining to f ind fraud are fantastic atshowing that a greater understanding of an organization’sdata, both behind the government firewall and publicallyavailable, can help foster better security and e ven costsavings. However, an even greater cultural shift is needed tochange the current mindset from one in w hich security andprivacy concerns eclipse requirements on public servants toprovide valuable services or information. K1105 Government Information Group Custom Reports7
Web 3.0 Toolswww.GCN.com/Web3ToolsBest Practices Advice to AidAgency Web 3.0 Migration EffortsPublic policy entrepreneur, open government activistand negotiation expert, David Eaves is currentlyretained by several governments to advise on opengovernment and open data issues. He also contributedto a book entitled Open Government: Collaboration,Transparency, and Participation in Practice, published byO’Reilly Media, January 2010.Eaves offered his advice on key ways governmentorganizations can move toward greater collaboration andinformation-sharing via public web sites. To learn moreabout Eaves’ work or subscribe to his b log, please visithttp://eaves.ca/.I n fo r m a t i o n i s m o re t h a n a by p ro d u c t of a governmentorganization’s mission goals, it’s at the core of any successfulorganization. Government organizations still need to lear nhow they can leverage information so it can be distilled, analyzed, utilized to help agency managers make better decisions.D a t a i s b o t h a s t ra t e g i c a n d p u blic asset that is vital toall government operations. It’s important for governmentorganizations to incorporate the following three guidingprinciples, which have become widely accepted as a basisfor open government (namely “how to f ind, play with andshare data.”)The Three Laws of Open Government Data are:1) If it can’t be ‘spidered’ or indexed, it doesn’t exist;2) If it isn’t available in open and machine readab leformat, it can’t engage;3) If a legal framework doesn’t allow it to be repur posed,it doesn’t empower.B a r r i e rs mu s t remain low. To adhere to the Laws ofOpen Government Data, government organizations shouldn’trequire users to register to access data.s81105 Government Information Group Custom ReportK n ow thyself . It will be impossible to overcome culturalbarriers and achieve the interaction/collaboration andinformation sharing public sector organizations claim towant without clearly understanding what the organizationall about, and what it should strive to become.T h e c u l t u ral change needed to achieve collab o ra t i o ngoals takes leadership. A visionary kind of leadership isfundamental to achieving all-important collaboration goals.Migrating a government organization from the cur rent statusquo to one that’s fully aware of what ‘competitors’ of allkinds are doing, and striving to match those capabilities asclosely as possible takes a true shift of mindset for mostpublic sector organizations.As gove rn m e n t o rganizations rush to implement opend a t a p o r tals, it’s important to remember those online effortsmust be sustainable. In other words, manually updating thedata in these portals won’t work. Government organizationsmust figure out how to automate data updates.Enlist help from good libra r i a n s a n d d e s i g n e rs. Inorder to be navigable, open data sites must have excellentdesign, requiring a breed of librarian capab le of thinking inthe online space, to help create a system for locating datasets quickly and easily. It’s important to think about how thesite will evolve to avoid problems in the categorization ofdata later.Don’t fear feedback. No data set is perfect. Once citizensstart accessing data on the site, the y will f ind mistakes. Askto be notif ied of errors. Harnessing the eyes of the publicwill enable government organizations to identify and f ixproblems more quickly. K
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use of Microsoft technology in support of Recovery.gov. Winners and finalists were chosen by Microsoft's U.S.Public Sector team."Microsoft's federal partners are essential to our goal of delivering technology that helps agencies meet mission requirements," said Teresa Carlson,Vice President,Microsoft Federal."With
