Federal Cloud Computing:From Business Use Cases to Pilots to

Implementations2nd Annual Cloud Computing for DoD & Government Conference

Premier Tyson's Corner in Vienna, VABrand Niemann

Semantic CommunityFebruary 7, 2011

http://semanticommunity.net and http://semanticommunity.info/Federal_Cloud_Computing

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Introduction

• Federal Cloud Computing has evolved in the past year from business use cases, to pilots, to implementations. This interactive discussion will help you build your professional network, understand the complex landscape, see the cloud computing use cases identified by NIST, see some pilots and implementations that I know about, and learn what I have learned from doing all of this the past 3 years. Your participation should empower you to engage in Federal Cloud Computing!

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Introduction• Recent Email: Google Apps Training Seminar, Open Seats!

– In December of last year, Federal CIO Vivek Kundra announced a "Cloud First" policy. OMB is requiring that agencies default to cloud-based solutions whenever a secure, reliable, cost-effective option exists.

– This will be an interactive training seminar where we will create a personal account just for you! This will be a great opportunity to come get a hands-on look at the email and collaboration tools that have been selected by the General Services Administration for all GSA employees.

– Hopefully you can attend!– P.S. Google Apps typically saves organizations 50% or more

compared to existing email systems, while equipping agency employees with modern tools that help them be more productive.

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Highlights• 1. Introductions

– Objective: Build Your Professional Network• 2. Roadmap

– Objective: Understand the Complex Landscape• 3. Business Use Cases

– Objective: Cloud Computing Use Cases identified by NIST• 4. Pilots

– Objective: Some examples that I know about.• 5. Implementations

– Objective: Some examples that I know about.• 6. My Own Work

– Objective: What I have learned from doing all of this the past 3 years.• 7. Questions and Answers

– Objective: Empower you to engage in Federal Cloud Computing!

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1. IntroductionsSix Questions Discussion

LeaderAttendee 1 Attendee 2 Etc.

Who (are you)? Brand Niemann

What (do you do)?

Enterprise Architecture & Data Science

When (have you done it)?

30+ years of federal service

Where (did you do it)?

U.S. EPA

Why (did you do it)?

Idealistic about public service

How (do you do it)?

Communities of Practice

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Purpose: To help build your professional network especially for doing Federal Cloud Computing going forward.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Ws

1. Introductions

6http://semanticommunity.info/Federal_Cloud_Computing

1. Introductions

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http://semanticweb.com/put-your-desktop-in-the-cloud-to-support-the-open-government-directive-and-data-gov-semantic_b15540

2. Roadmap

• "Executive's Guide to Cloud Computing," published by John Wiley & Sons, and co-authored by Mr. Eric Marks, president and CEO of AgilePath, and Mr. Bob Lozano, founder and advisor of Appistry.

8http://www.amazon.com/Executives-Guide-Cloud-Computing-Marks/dp/0470521724

2. Roadmap

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http://www.agile-path.com/solutions-cloud-computing-practice.html

2. Roadmap

• Software as a Service Inflection Point: Using Cloud Computing to Achieve Business Agility– Melvin Greer– http://www.melvingreer

.com/books.html

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2. Roadmap• Over the last few years, industry has begun developing

a model of information technology known as Cloud computing, which includes Software as a Service. This new model has reached an inflection point and will give users the choice to purchase IT as a service, as a complement to, or as a replacement of the traditional IT software/hardware infrastructure purchase.

• It's time for businesses to transform how they approach advanced software and innovative business models so they can achieve real agility. If you are a decision maker involved with the deployment of information technology, then it's imperative that you understand Software as a Service Inflection Point.

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2. Roadmap• Cloud Computing Workshop Day 1:

– Overview of Cloud Computing in Government: What you need to know– What is cloud computing and why is it so compelling?– Cloud computing role and significance in agency agility– Federal cloud Initiative: Summary and what's important– Exercise– Cloud computing delivery and deployment models– Strategic benefits of cloud computing in Government– Wrap-up and Q&A

• Cloud Computing Workshop Day 2– Recap of Day One and Questions– Technical considerations and architectural options– Public cloud offerings: What you need to know– Potential Risks of Cloud computing and how to manage them– Exercise– Open Source Cloud computing: What you need to know– Security, Privacy and Confidentiality– Emerging Cloud computing design pattern– Wrap-up and Q&A

12http://www.melvingreer.com/courseagenda.html

2. Roadmap• Recent Announcement:– The National Institute of Standards and Technology

(NIST), Leader of the Federal Government Cloud Computing Initiative, has selected Melvin Greer, Lockheed Martin Senior Fellow and IS&GS Chief Strategist Cloud Computing as lead for Federal Cloud Computing Roadmap, Business Use Case Working Group.

– Melvin will lead interested USG agencies and industry to define target USG Cloud Computing business use cases (set of candidate deployments to be used as examples) for Cloud Computing model options, to identify specific risks, and concerns and constraints.

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2. Roadmap• A Manager’s Guide to

Cloud Computing:– A Five-Step Process to

Evaluate, Design and Implement A Robust Cloud Solution• The Essential Desk

Reference and Guide for Managers

– Kevin Jackson & Don Philpott

– Published by: Government Training Inc. Jan 2011

– ISBN: 978-0-9832361-3-9

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http://www.governmenttraininginc.com/GovCloud-Cloud-Computing-Handbook.asp

2. Roadmap• The United States Government is the world’s largest

consumer of information technology, spending over $76 billion annually on more than 10,000 different systems. Fragmentation of systems, poor project execution, and the drag of legacy technology in the Federal Government have presented barriers to achieving the productivity and performance gains found when technology is deployed effectively in the private sectors.

• All that is about to change as the Obama Administration obliges federal departments to look to Cloud computing to cut costs and solve many of the problems that have plagued IT deployment for decades. The problem, however, is how do federal IT managers and those controlling the budgets go about deciding what is best for them.

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2. Roadmap

• A Five-Step Process to Evaluate, Design and Implement A Robust Cloud Solution:

– Step One - What is cloud computing?– Step Two - The Need– Step Three - Setting Goals– Step Four - Implementation– Step Five - How to make sure it’s working

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2. Roadmap

17http://semanticommunity.info/Federal_Cloud_Computing/A_Manager's_Guide_to_Cloud_Computing

See Complete Taxonomy ofFederal Cloud Computing inthe book’s Table of Contents!

Because of unprecedented demand, this bookis back ordered until the end of February!

2. Roadmap

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http://www.nist.gov/itl/cloud/

Points of Contact:Dawn M. Leaf, NIST, Cloud Computing Executive Program Manager(301) 975-2900Lee Badger, NIST, Cloud Computing SAJACC Lead(301) 975-3176Robert Bohn, NIST, Cloud Computing Reference Architecture/Taxonomy Lead(301) 975-4731Kirk Dohne, NIST, Cloud Computing, Business Use Cases Project Lead(301) 975-8480

2. Roadmap• The NIST Definition of Cloud Computing

• Authors: Peter Mell and Tim Grance• Version 15, 10-7-09

– Cloud computing is a model for enabling convenient, on-demand network access to a shared pool of configurable computing resources (e.g., networks, servers, storage, applications, and services) that can be rapidly provisioned and released with minimal management effort or service provider interaction. This cloud model promotes availability and is composed of five essential characteristics, three service models, and four deployment models.

– Note: Cloud software takes full advantage of the cloud paradigm by being service oriented with a focus on statelessness, low coupling, modularity, and semantic interoperability (my bolding).

19Source: http://www.nist.gov/itl/cloud/upload/cloud-def-v15.pdf

2. Roadmap

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http://collaborate.nist.gov/twiki-cloud-computing/bin/view/CloudComputing/WebHome

2. Roadmap

• Working Groups of NIST Cloud Computing:• As part of the NIST plan, Working Groups were created as a

public/private ownership to define standards. Follow the links below to go directly to the working group pages.

– Reference Architecture and Taxonomy– Standards Acceleration to Jumpstart the Adoption of

Cloud Computing (SAJACC)– Cloud Security– Standards Roadmap– Business Use Cases

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2. Roadmap

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http://semanticommunity.info/Federal_Cloud_Computing/State_of_Public_Sector_Cloud_Computing

3. Business Use Cases

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http://collaborate.nist.gov/twiki-cloud-computing/pub/CloudComputing/BusinessUseCases/Federal_Cloud_Computing_Use_Case_-_BrandNiemann04122010.doc

3. Business Use Cases

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http://collaborate.nist.gov/twiki-cloud-computing/pub/CloudComputing/BusinessUseCases/Federal_Cloud_Computing_Use_Case_-_BrandNiemann04122010.doc

3. Business Use Cases

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http://www.nist.gov/itl/cloud/use-cases.cfm

4. Pilots• Federal Cloud Computing Case Studies:

– Department of Defense• Project: Army Experience Center• Project: Rapid Access Computing Environment

– Department of Energy• Project: Cloud Computing Migration

– Department of Health and Human Services• Project: Supporting Electronic Health Records

– Department of the Interior• Announced Project: Agency-wide E-mail

– General Services Administration• Project: USA.gov

– National Aeronautics and Space Administration• Project: World-Wide Telescope• Project: Be A Martian• Announced Project: Enterprise Data Center Strategy

– Social Security Administration• Project: Online Answers Knowledgebase (SOASK)

– Federal Labor Relations Authority• Project: Case Management System

– Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board• Project: Recovery.gov Cloud Computing Migration

– Securities and Exchange Commission• Project: Investor Advocacy System

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http://semanticommunity.info/Federal_Cloud_Computing/A_Manager's_Guide_to_Cloud_Computing

4. Pilots• State and Local Cloud Computing Case Studies:

– State of New Jersey• Project: Customer Relationship Management

– State of New Mexico• Project: E-mail & Office Productivity Tools

– Commonwealth of Virginia• Project: Enterprise Application Development Platforms

– State of Wisconsin• Project: Collaboration

– State of Utah• Project: Cloud Computing Services

– City of Canton, Georgia• Project: E-mail

– City of Carlsbad, California• Project: Communication & Collaboration Services

– City of Los Angeles, California• Project: E-mail & Office Productivity

– City of Miami, Florida• Project: 311 Service

– City of Orlando, Florida• Project: E-mail

– Klamath County, Oregon• Project: Office Productivity

– Prince George’s County, Maryland• Project: School District E-mail

– State of Colorado• Announced Project: Launching an Enterprise Cloud

– State of Michigan• Announced Project: MiCloud

27Source: http://semanticommunity.info/Federal_Cloud_Computing/A_Manager's_Guide_to_Cloud_Computing

5. Implementations

• Learn cloud computing from content (previous) and now doing it with that content!– Federal Cloud Computing:

• Cloud Tools: MindTouch and Spotfire.• Methodology: Document Process in MindTouch, Build Databases

in Excel Spreadsheet, and Build Analytics in Spotfire.• Results: Spotfire Embedded in MindTouch with Excel Spreadheets

and Other Supporting Files Attached and Referenced.

• Kevin Jackson, Robert Marcus, and I started this Wiki in October 2008: – See http://

kevinljackson.blogspot.com/2008/10/federal-cloud-computing-wiki.html

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5. Implementations

29http://cloud.mindtouch.com/

With the power of MindTouch DReAM, MindTouch products excel at loading, transforming and re-mixing data from web services, databases and enterprise applications.

5. Implementations

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http://goto.spotfire.com/g/?SK3YHYAQFI=clicksrc:home

5. Implementations

31http://semanticommunity.info/Federal_Cloud_Computing

Scroll down to seetable of contents andfile attachments below.

5. Implementations

• Contents:– Federal Could Computing Wiki– NIST Cloud Computing Web Site and Wiki– Kevin Jackson Cloud Musings Blog– Kevin Jackson’s Manager’s Guide to Cloud

Computing Table of Contents– Vivek Kundra’s State of Public Cloud Computing– Linked Open Data Cloud Datasets– Linked Open Data Cloud RDF Triples

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5. Implementations

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http://semanticommunity.info/@api/deki/files/8435/=FederalCloudComputing.xlsx

5. Implementations

34Spotfire on the PC Desktop

5. Implementations

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Spotfire Web Player

5. Implementations• John Monroe, Editor of Federal Computer Week: You mention

that information architects should re-architect legacy systems -- in what way should they re-architect them?:– Great question and the answer is like I did at EPA and for interagency

programs - get the data out of the legacy systems and use it in free cloud tools like Spotfire.• http://semanticommunity.info/@api/deki/files/7163/=

BusinessAnalyticsInformationalFactSheet08182010.doc – Vivek Kundra's requiring agencies to put their high-value data sets

into Data.gov and to reduce the number of data centers can save money and improve results if there are more people like myself that will take advantage of that by "doing their own IT" with cloud computing tools and becoming data scientists - see my list of data science products at:• http://semanticommunity.info/#Data_Science_Products

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5. Implementations• John Monroe, Editor of Federal Computer Week:

You mention that information architects should re-architect legacy systems -- in what way should they re-architect them? (continued):– I should add a specific example in answer to your

question: The IT Spending Dashboard took 6 months and cost $8M for GSA to do - I re-architected and implemented it in about 3 days for free (except for the cost of my time at EPA) with Spotfire - of course part of the $8M was to build the databases which I did not have to do, but not the entire $8M - see:• http://semanticommunity.info/Federal_IT_Dashboard

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6. My Own Work

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http://fcw.com/Articles/2011/01/31/COMMENT-Brand-Niemann-social-media-archives.aspxFor links see: http://semanticommunity.info/A_Gov_2.0_spin_on_archiving_2.0_data

6. My Own Work• My model for this approach is based on my work at EPA and the classification of

EPA and interagency information. Here are the steps I followed:– I put all my critical e-mail messages, attachments, work products, Web pages,

scanned documents, etc., into a wiki — first using the General Services Administration’s ColabWiki, then 40 MindTouch Deki wikis and now the MindTouch Technical Communication Suite.

– I developed an information classification system at EPA and created a living document version of the Census Bureau’s Annual Statistical Abstract for organizing interagency information, which is the basis for organizing Data.gov.

– I developed an EPA ontology that organized and preserved the agency’s best content by topic, subtopic, data table, and data elements or dictionary.

– I developed a case study of the CIO Council that suggested how to organize the human resources and information across the entire government.

– I recently migrated everything I had done into a new environment, the Semanticommunity.net’s Community Infrastructure Sandbox for 2011. It includes the complete archive and tutorials of what I have learned from building each piece and what I needed to create a new environment for multiple communities of practice to use in 2011.

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6. My Own Work

Source: http://inkdroid.org/journal/2010/06/04/the-5-stars-of-open-linked-data/

YouTube:10:17 Minutes

The Five Stars of Linked Open Data

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6. My Own Work

• The Five Stars of Linked Open Data:– 1. Make your stuff available on the web (whatever

format);– 2. Make it available as structured data (e.g. excel instead

of image scan of a table);– 3. Non-proprietary format (e.g. csv instead of excel);– 4. Use URLs to identify things, so that people can point at

your stuff; and– 5. Link your data to other people’s data to provide

context.

Source: http://inkdroid.org/journal/2010/06/04/the-5-stars-of-open-linked-data/

6. My Own Work• The Linking Open Data Cloud Diagram:– How can I get my dataset into the diagram?

• First, make sure that you publish data according to the Linked Data principles (see previous slide). We interpret this as:– There must be resolvable http:// (or https://) URIs.

• They must resolve, with or without content negotiation, to RDF data in one of the popular RDF formats (RDFa, RDF/XML, Turtle, N-Triples).

• The dataset must contain at least 1000 triples. (Hence, your FOAF file most likely does not qualify.)

• The dataset must be connected via RDF links to a dataset that is already in the diagram. This means, either your dataset must use URIs from the other dataset, or vice versam. We arbitrarily require at least 50 links.

• Access of the entire dataset must be possible via RDF crawling, via an RDF dump, or via a SPARQL endpoint.

42Source: http://richard.cyganiak.de/2007/10/lod/

6. My Own Work

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Source: http://richard.cyganiak.de/2007/10/lod/

6. My Own Work• The image shows datasets that are published

in Linked Data format and are interlinked with other dataset in the cloud.

• The size of the circles corresponds to the number of triples in each dataset. The numbers are usually provided by the dataset publishers, and are sometimes rough estimates. The arrows indicate the existence of at least 50 links between two datasets. A link, for our purposes, is an RDF triple where subject and object URIs are in the namespaces of different datasets.

• The direction of the arrows indicate the dataset that contains the links, e.g., an arrow from A to B means that dataset A contains RDF triples that use identifiers from B. Bidirectional arrows usually indicate that the links are mirrored in both datasets. The thickness corresponds to the number of links.

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Arrow thickness Triple count

Thick >100k

Medium 100k-1k

Thin <1k

Circle size Triple count

Very large >1B

Large 1B-10M

Medium 10M-500k

Small 500k-10k

Very small <10k

Source: http://richard.cyganiak.de/2007/10/lod/

6. My Own Work• Cloud Computing for and with Linked Open Data Visualizations:

– “What the 5 star system does not take into account, however, is the quality of the data itself. As with everything on the Internet, remember that even if you get your hands on a well published Linked Open Data set, it may be incomplete, taken out of context or badly curated. Bad content in, bad content out does still apply. This problem is especially acute for Linked Open Data at the moment, because everyone is just starting out with creating the ontologies and links and there is no way to do this overnight, so incompleteness will probably prevail for a while.”

– “The basis of all visualizations is content, and the availability of Open Data certainly helps visualization creators and data journalists to find data that lets them support and discover the stories they want to tell. These are exciting developments and I’m looking forward to seeing all the interesting (Linked) Open Data visualizations the visualization community comes up with!”• Posted My Comment: Excellent article! Please see my Linked Open Data Visualizations at http

://semanticommunity.info/#Data_Science_Products• Also See Spotfire Community Post: http://spotfire.tibco.com/community/forums/t/952.aspx

• My Bottom Line: Do the “5 stars” and “linked data cloud” in MindTouch, Spotfire and the Concept-Map Ontology Environment with the Data Science approach.

45Source: http://datavisualization.ch/opinions/introduction-to-linked-data

6. My Own Work• Opening Data Sources to Spotfire:

– In a previous post, I mentioned how I was creating Linked Open Data with MindTouch and Spotfire, now I want to share what I have learned about actually importing Linked Open Data in RDF and Google Map/Earth data in KML/KMZ to Spotfire:

– KML/KMZ data presents a challenge since Spotfire only imports Shape files at present, but an EPA Geospatial Colleague, David Smith, helped me solve this one for an application.

– Richard Cyganiak , a Linked data technologist at the Linked Data Research Centre, helped me solve this for RDF to CSV as follows:• I'd suggest starting here: http://semantic.ckan.net/sparql• Here's a query to get some basic data (see below):

– Just paste that in and hit "Run query". The endpoint can actually produce CSV, if you select it from the format dropdown. So here's that data in CSV: http://bit.ly/fdrIvX

– So you just need to adapt the SPARQL query to return the information you want. For some clues as to what properties are available, you could study this (a Turtle rendering of the RDF data available about a given dataset -- DBpedia in this case): http://bit.ly/f5ro7k

– I appreciate the help I have received from David and Richard and wanted to share this with the Spotfire Community because there is a lot of free and open data in KML/KMZ and RDF that can now be used in Spotfire.• See Spotfire Community Post: http://spotfire.tibco.com/community/forums/t/1542.aspx

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6. My Own Work

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Growth in NumberOf LOD Datasets!

Sort Number ofRDF Triples inDescending Order

Web Player

6. My Own Work• Semantic Community: Community Infrastructure Sandbox 2011:

– http://semanticommunity.info/• Build Network Centricity for the NCOIC in the Cloud:

– http://semanticommunity.info/Network_Centricity • Build Your Own Data.gov GEO Viewer in the Cloud: To Create a

Data.gov and "Fighting Off One Map" GEO Viewer in MindTouch and Spotfire:– http://semanticommunity.info/Data.gov/GEOViewer – http://collaborate.nist.gov/twiki-cloud-computing/pub/

CloudComputing/BusinessUseCases/BrandNiemann01202011.ppt• Build Air Force OneSource in the Cloud for the Data.Gov and Open

Government Vocabulary Teams:– http://semanticommunity.info/Air_Force_OneSource

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7. Questions and Answers• NIST Cloud Computing Future:– Calendar of Working Group Meetings:

• See next slide.– Cloud Computing for the Business of Government “Update

and Outlook” press conference in DC, March 29, 2011, Kevin Jackson• http://governmenttraininginc.com/Press-Conference-

GovCloud.asp– Workshop III - April 7 & 8, 2011:

• See next slide.• 11th SOA for E-Gov Conference, MITRE, McLean, VA

(Cloud Computing Speakers and Panel)• https://register.mitre.org/soa/

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7. Questions and Answers

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http://collaborate.nist.gov/twiki-cloud-computing/bin/view/CloudComputing/UpcomingEvents