Brand Niemann

 

Posts by Brand Niemann

Data On Government Data Center Closings Remains Spotty

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The latest data table at Data.gov featuring an interactive snapshot of the government’s progress in consolidating data centers is nice to look at (“eye candy” as some might say). But there are two big problems with it:

  • First, it is not real data that can be copied directly into a spreadsheet and reused (try highlighting it and copying to a spreadsheet – it fails); and
  • Second, when you do download the spreadsheet from the Socrata interface it has to be reformatted to map the data because the “Data Center Location” column is not formatted properly. Among other issues, the latitude and longitude data need to be in separate columns and without text).

Perhaps more importantly, the table still does not deliver a result that the public and decision makers can use without some additional work.

I have done a good deal of that work for two previous stories with details elsewhere. Over that time, the number of data centers listed in the table has grown:

  • 6/18/2011: “2010-2011” – 137 data centers (first story)
  • 7/21/2011: “2010-2012” – 373 data centers (second story)
  • 1/12/2012: “2010-2012” – 525 data centers (current data set)
I reviewed the current data table and it shows:

  • 525 rows in the table
  • 158 without locations all together
  • 33 without longitude and latitude

In addition it shows:

  • 149 data centers closed between initiative Kickoff 2/26/2010 and Report 11/15/2011
  • 310 to be closed between 1/1/2012 and 12/31/2012
  • 66 to be closed between 11/15/2011 and 12/31/2011

It appears that additional information about data centers continues to be released for the same or different years, but the data continues to suffer from the lack of two important features: missing locations and no cost savings data.

There is a real disconnect between this table and a statement in the recent GSA Office of Citizen Service and Innovation Technologies 2011 Annual Report, which claims:

“Data Center Consolidation savings by the end of 2015 are expected to be $3 billion, based on analysis of information provided in October, which shows that agencies plan to close 472 data centers by the end of next year (do they mean 2012 or 2013?).”

Note that 472 is yet another number different from 525 in the most recent data set.

And it would be nice to see a column of data for the cost saving by data center so citizens can see the individual closures and savings in their own locations.

So I say this is progress in accountability to taxpayers and transparency in reporting, but still not giving us real data that can be readily used to support decisions and understanding by me as a data scientist and by our readers I am working for.
 /  Published January 26, 2012 at 7:28 AM

Super Bowl Predictions And The Art Of Improving Government Performance

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With so much football playoff news lately, the one story that got my attention was one about the award-winning WhatIfSports.com simulation engine which concluded that the New England Patriots win 55% of the time by an average score of 27-25, based on 10,000 simulations. It’s not a stretch to see how sports simulations, and the data analytics behind them, might also be used to improve government performance.

Every week WhatIfSports.com simulates thousands of NFL games. WhatIfSports offers anyone a “test drive” of their simulators at no cost in a section called SimMatchUp. Users choose to play any two MLB baseball teams against each other going back to the 1885, NFL football teams back to 1941, NHL hockey teams back to 1917, NBA basketball teams back to 1950, and NCAA basketball teams dating back to different years depending on the team. All simulators produce complete box scores and full play-by-play.

With a 16-game season, users have the option of building a running game with Barry Sanders and Walter Payton, an aerial attack with Joe Montana and Randy Moss, or a tenacious defense with the 1985 Chicago Bears. Users set depth charts, game plans, offensive and defensive settings, deal with player fatigue and more. Keep reading →

 /  Published January 24, 2012 at 10:04 AM

Be Informed Platform For Business And Tech Teams – They really got it!

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Last May, I gave the keynote at the annual SEMIC (Semantic Interoperability Centre) annual conference in Brussels, at the invitation of the European Commission’s CIO Francisco García Morán, and was invited to share my thoughts on stimulating semantic development as much as possible.

One of my observations then — and now — is how a software platform called Be Informed works particularly well at bringing business and technology people together. In summary, “They really get it.”


I was back in Europe last week learning about Be Informed 4 from Menno Gulpers, Knowledge Architect – Chief Trainer, with the Be Informed Academy. Keep reading →

Post a comment  /   /  Published January 20, 2012 at 12:56 PM

Vivek Kundra Missing The Mark Again? | Commentary

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I got the announcement a couple days ago that Vivek Kundra is joining Salesforce.com as executive vice president of emerging markets, and the invitation to be first to post a comment.

Mark Amtower beat me to it and he was right to the point: “Is Salesforce.com part of that “IT Cartel” that Vivek warned us about?” Keep reading →

 /  Published January 17, 2012 at 5:06 PM

GSA’s Energy Usage Analysis System Illustrates Data.gov’s Limitations

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I recently was involved in a discussion debating the successes of Open Government.


Some of the individuals in the discussion felt the success of the Open Government initiative was the creation of Data.gov, but I disagreed saying that it was only a data catalog and even the featured data sets are difficult to use and understand.

We really need data apps and data stories from those that the public and decision-makers could use to justify funding and claim success.

The 25 most popular apps at Data.gov were mostly XML feeds and only 5 were Excel that I could easily make into data apps. Keep reading →

 /  Published January 4, 2012 at 7:25 AM

How To Simplify Benefits Website For Veterans

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I recently looked at the Veterans eBenefits portal and couldn’t help but conclude that it was overwhelmingly complex and needed a make over. One approach to reducing that complexity is to digitally mine the web site for its business processes and data sets and then integrating them. That would both improve the user experience and save the agency/taxpayer money.


That’s not the only approach, but it is a timely one in light of a recent story on the overgrowth of federal web sites talked about the “State of the Federal Web Report,” released Dec. 16 by a government task force. The report represented the first comprehensive review of federal websites, following the Obama administration conclusion earlier this year that there were simply too many government websites.

The report also highlighted findings from interactions with the public, which led to hundreds of suggestions for ways to improve users’ experience with federal websites. I found there were simply too many web pages with too many options and links at the Veterans and eBenefits Portal for even me to follow, let alone our veterans, their families, and service members. Keep reading →

 /  Published January 3, 2012 at 1:01 PM

A Dashboard For Army Cyber Warriors Of The Future

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Not long ago, I was inspired by this past summer’s LandWarNet Conference to develop what I thought the military knowledgebase dashboard of the future might look like. I had heard our senior military leaders call for the Army cyber warrior of the future to defend our nation against the increasing number of cyber attacks — someone who is a real geek, but also capable of the patriotism and discipline required for military life and a high-level security clearance.

My friend and professional colleague, Arun Majumdar, Cutter Consortium, and a panelist at the recent CyberSecurity Conference, brought this point home. He talked about the notion of need for offensive capabilities and the implications of the Stuxnet worm as a well-known example of how an offensive capability can be used to inflict targeted damage on critical infrastructure. Keep reading →

 /  Published December 30, 2011 at 9:01 AM

Government Retirement: A Positive Personal Experience

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The story last week about the Office of Personnel Management bringing in a 25-year IT veteran, David Bohen, to serve as its new chief technology officer to concentrate on the agency’s outdated retirement system reminded me of my own recent experience with the federal retirement system.

I left federal government service over a year ago after 30+ years, but decided to delay my formal retirement because I was too busy and had heard about the long delays in processing retirement applications.

In fact, I remember well listening to OPM Director John Berry’s keynote at the FOSE Institute Knowledge Management Conference last May and about the improvements in processing time that had, and would, be made under his leadership. That gave me hope that if I waited a little longer my experience would be better and it was.

I was especially interested in the part of the story that said: “OPM also created a proof of concept of an online retirement application to demonstrate how an electronic, web-based application could be used to collect data from an applicant and his or her agency human resource office that is required when an employee retires. This information could be used to reduce dependence on the current paper process.”

The paper (online PDF) application was the only thing that really bothered me because I thought in this day and age it would be electronic.

So here are the things I learned and the timeline I experienced:

The online PDF form Application for Immediate Retirement (CSRS) and is 20 pages long. (Less than my OMB online security clearance which was over 50 pages long!)

You do not need to complete the Certified Summary of Federal Service part of the form

(SF2801 pages 17-20) because your agency should forward that to OPM soon after you leave your agency. The story mentioned “on average, it takes 133 days to process requests for employee salary records from various agency in order to calculate retirement payouts. I really like that OPM starts giving you a interim payment that is usually less than the final calculated amount.

I sent my paperwork on November 22nd. Note: The paperwork should be sent to: US Office of Personnel Management, P.O. Box 440, Boyers, PA 16017-0440, unless you are in a hurry like I was, and then it should be overnighted to: 1137 Branchton Road, Boyers, PA 16017-0440. It cannot be hand-delivered to OPM in Washington, DC.

Keep reading →

 /  Published December 29, 2011 at 11:01 AM

Lessons From Army’s Weapon Systems Handbook – And Gall’s Law

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The 2012 Army Weapon Systems Handbook is available in a new, easier to access format.

I know, because Terry Edwards, Director of the Army’s System of System’s Engineering (SoSE), asked me to do it, but more to the point, I learned some lessons from the previous version (simpler is better) that I want to share with readers, especially those that want to build their own dashboards.

First some background: “The Army Acquisition Executive has launched a new highly collaborative SoSE campaign aimed at synchronizing development and delivery of technologies across the entire Army systems portfolio, service officials have said.

“Among the effort’s central tenets is a need to align programs more closely and establish an acquisition strategy that draws simultaneously from programs of record (PORs), commercial-off-the-shelf products, and emerging technologies from the Army’s Science and Technology Directorate–all as a way to maximize efficiency across the Army’s developmental spectrum.”

That led to a dashboard which is an important step to implementing Dynamic Case Management, such as Be Informed 4, and Business Events, such as TIBCO Solutions for the Army SOSE.

I first decided what this dashboard should be about: What should be Linked Open Data be like and what should be Structured Data be like. I concluded they should be similar to work done with the CIA World Factbook recently.

This is really important to the Quint (CIA, DIA, NGA, NRO, and NSA). Do not worry about what all those acronyms mean, just that they keep us safe, especially if they all work together “to connect the dots” and connecting the dots involves connecting unstructured and structured data by making unstructured data Linked Open Data as a first step.


Leaving out most of the details, I copied the Army Weapons Systems Manual table of contents to my wiki-scraper tool and gave it well-defined web addresses and drilled down within each item to give it additional well-defined web addresses (not to short and not too long). Boring, but absolutely essential work to succeed. That all goes into a spreadsheet which gets imported to a dashboard tool where the data sets can be sorted, searched, merged, etc. The detailed results are shown elsewhere.

One can go from the DoD System of Systems to the Army Weapons System of Systems to the individual systems. Now what you really want to do is use that to manage an enterprise of 153 weapons systems efficiently and effectively as Terry Edwards described above, in his work which is described further at “Army’s Resource Forest Is Good Metaphor For System Of Systems Approach.” Keep reading →

 /  Published December 29, 2011 at 9:03 AM

Every Medal Of Honor Recipient Deserves A Web Address

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I have been concerned by the recent press coverage of a living Medal of Honor recipient, who is facing challenges getting work, and decided to do some research on the Web to find out more about past Medal of Honor Recipients.

I started with a simple Google search that turned out to give unexpected results; there are multiple web sites with recipient names and a game by the same name!

So I looked for official sites and information like Wikipedia and the United States Army. At the latter, I found history, statistics, recipients, recommendation process, and resources.

I noticed that only the most recent recipients, like SFC Jared C. Monti, had their own web sites (at least US Army official ones listed), and I thought they should all have web address (just like individual grave markers, if they are deceased, as many are, as indicated by an * in front of their name).

I decided to build a knowledgebase dashboard to accomplish this remembrance they so deserve in our social media society of today. I also decided to include the Wikipedia links as well, such as for Staff Sergeant Salvatore Giunta, the most recent recipient whose story both touched me emotionally and excited me by its use of batttescape visualizations.


So I started with the most recent recipients and worked backwards through the nearly 3500 recipients.

An especially interesting result: Nineteen men have been awarded the Medal of Honor twice.” Keep reading →

 /  Published December 28, 2011 at 1:05 PM
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