Federal IT

Box Makes a Huge Leap in Security

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The Keymaster and Gatekeeper from GhostbustersI saw the Box’s announcement of their Enterprise Key Management (EKM) feature yesterday. This is a big jump forward for Box and puts them well in the front lines for cloud security among vendors with traction. Matt Weinberger had a good write-up about how Box’s EKM works complete with a Ghostbuster reference.

Chris Walker wrote about Box’s EKM announcement and quoted a tweet I made. The tweet follows but I encourage you to go read his post as it is a good one.

I wanted to expand on the quote up above in a comment on Chris’s post then I couldn’t stop typing. I decided to write it here.

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Federal IT, A Different World

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It was a great November attending both of the Alfresco Summits. If you didn’t attend either one, you missed a great learning experience that was fun at the same time.

One thing that was missing from the events was representation of our Federal customer base. Given the current challenges facing many Federal agencies here in the United States, it wasn’t surprising. There isn’t a lot of traveling going on right now.

As a result, Alfresco bringing that learning experience directly to Washington, DC on January 29th for Content.gov 2014. That is more than hyperbole as we are bringing in our CEO, Doug Dennerline, our Chief Product Officer, Paul Holmes-Higgins, and many others to DC for the event.

Oh, and I’ll be there as well.

The reason I am taking time out to encourage you to come is that the drivers in the Federal marketplace are different than those in the rest of the world. The focus is not on revenue, but on serving constituents effectively and efficiently. Rules and regulations are more than factors in a risk equation, they are absolutes.

If you are trying to solve the Content problem in the Federal space, please come to Content.gov (it’s free) and talk to others facing the same problems. I, and the leadership of Alfresco, want to hear your perspectives on the unique Content challenges facing the Federal space.

It isn’t even a question of whether or not you use Alfresco. We all need to work together to solve this problem.

Healthcare.Gov Fiasco Shows the Problems in Federal IT

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TMS-Statler&Waldorf-BalconyBoxI’m writing this post as a rant. I am tired of hearing people who have never worked in Federal IT try and come forward with ideas about what was wrong about the way Healthcare.gov was developed. I have one statement for all of you who think you could have done better.

You would have ALL failed miserably.

Federal IT is broken. Hell, all of Federal contracting is broken from what I’ve seen, but I want to focus on the IT side for now.

Before I get started, a quick reminder of my background. My first Federal project was back in the late 90s as the tech lead for the Secretary of the Air Force’s correspondence tracking system. Over the years, I have worked on a multitude of projects and managed many more while I was the Director of Technology Solutions for Washington Consulting . I’ve responded to many proposals and run Federal IT projects through the wide variety of hurdles that they face.

I can tell you right now, I am impressed that Healthcare.gov even boots up.

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