Several of the CTOvision.com/ Crucial Point team, including RyanKamauff, BobGourley, AlexOlesker,  have been at the DoDIIS Worldwide Conference, immersing ourselves in presentations, attending demos, visiting technology providers and integrators on the expo floor, and networking with people we admire and respect.

While here we have also been collecting video and photos of several key technologies.  We have also been summarizing technologies of interest and have been posting summaries of hot technologies at http://dodiistech.com . We know many were unable to attend DoDIIS this year, due to budget pressures and the increasing demands of ongoing operations.  Our hope is that our summaries at DoDIISTech.com will help keep those that could not attend informed of some of the hot capabilities from the event. Over the coming weeks we will continue to enhance the site with other publicly available information on DoDIIS technologies, and hope this will be a long term reference for those seeking to serve this mission.  We also intend on this being a fast reference for anyone in government who seeks to start market research on hot technologies. DoDIISTech.com is one of a family of properties we maintain on the web, joining CTOlabs.com, FedCyber.com and CTOvision.com as outlets for our research.

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Crucial Point LLC has just established a new online reference focused on the DoD Intelligence Information Systems community:  DoDIISTech.com. DoDIISTech.com contains a wealth of information on the technologies supporting the intelligence community, including applications for infrastructure, analysis, business and mission domains. It contains relevant, action-oriented context, joining our growing family of web properties that include CTOlabs.com, CTOVision.com and FedCyber.com,

During the DoDIIS World Wide Conference of 2011 the DoDIISTech.com site will be updated continuously with twitter feeds, blog articles, photos and video of the hottest technology in the community.

For more information see:  http://DoDIISTech.com

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The DoDIIS Conference Agenda is now up at the conference site, and it really looks to be a great one. The confernece will be great for technology leaders in government, technology providers from industry, and the mission-focused executive leadership who seeks to guide both. If you want to shape the future, come to the DoDIIS conference and see what secure enterprises with advanced analytical missions are up to.

I’ve pasted the full agenda below, but some key highlights include:

• An overview by DIA’s CIO and Director of DS, Mr. Grant Schneider.
• Insights into secure collaboration provided by Mr. John “Mike” McConnell, former Director of National Intelligence and a mentor to legions of us who have long revered him.
• An overview of the mission needs put on the DIA technology team, provided by the Director of DIA Lieutenant General Ron Burgess.
• Insights into the human element of the system provided by noted professor and thinker Robert Axelrod.
• Deep dives into successes in innovation and information sharing, “CIA Style” presented by champion innovator Mr. Geoffrey Fowler, Director and Managing Editor of the World Intelligence Review (WIRe).
• Many breakout sessions are scheduled, including a wide range of mission-focused topics and advanced technology deep dives. I personally plan on hitting the ones on Hadoop (of course, since “Big Data” is an issue we should all be accelerating into our enterprise). I’ll also attend the “Data Center for the Future” talk since DoDIIS planners are always at the forefront of datacenter design and I’m sure I’ll pick up some good tips there.  I also noticed a breakout on the “Egyptian Revolution and Twitter” that might be insightful.

I hope to run into about 2000 of my friends at the event. I’ll also be blogging a bit from there, as will Ryan Kamauff and Chris Barnes.  And look for us on Twitter as well. We are at: @bobgourley, @Ryan_Kamauff, @ChrisBarnesCP

And, consider this a pre-announcement: we are putting the finishing touches on a site meant to pull together our evals of DoDIIS technology and twitter feeds/etc during the event. Find it at http://dodiistech.com

For more details and to register see: http://www.ncsi.com/dodiis11/index.html

Here is the DoDIIS agenda:

Sunday 1 May

Evening reception/strategy sessions/networking.

Monday 2 May

0750 – 0800

Announcements

0800 – 0830

Keynote Speaker

Mr. Grant M. Schneider Deputy Director for Information Management and Chief Information Officer, Defense Intelligence Agency

0830 – 0915

Secure Collaboration — Technology to Support the Mission

Mr. John “Mike” McConnell Executive Vice President, Booz Allen Hamilton

0915 – 1000

Networking Break/Technology Exposition

1000 – 1045

Keynote Speaker

Lieutenant General Ronald L. Burgess, Jr.Director, Defense Intelligence Agency

1100 – 1145

Vulnerabilities of Wetware Professor Robert Axelrod Walgreen Professor for the Study of Human Understanding, University of Michigan

1145 – 1300

Networking Break/Technology Exposition/Lunch

1300 – 1345

Breakouts / Learning Labs

1400 – 1445

Breakouts / Learning Labs

1445 – 1545

Networking Break/Technology Exposition

1545 – 1630

Breakouts / Learning Labs

Tuesday 3 May

0750 – 0800

Announcements

0800 – 0845

The Real Business Value of IT: How CIOs Create and Communicate Value

Mr. Richard Hunter Vice President Distinguished Analyst, Gartner

0845 – 0930

Disruptive Innovation in Computing, and Mission Impact in the Next Decade

Mr. David McQueeney Vice President of Software Research, IBM

0930 – 1030

Networking Break/Technology Exposition

1030 – 1115

Breakouts / Learning Labs

1130 – 1215

Breakouts / Learning Labs

1215 – 1330

Networking Break/Technology Exposition/Lunch

1330 – 1415

Potential for Two-Way Collaboration

Mr. Terry Kline Vice President and Chief Information Officer, General Motors

1415 – 1515

IC Executive Board: Integrating the Intelligence Mission through Technology

Moderator:
Mr. Al Tarasiuk Assistant Director of National Intelligence and Chief Information Officer, Intelligence Community

Panelists:
Mr. James Beagles Acting Director, Chief Information Officer, Department of Homeland Security

Mr. David DeVries Principal Director, Office of the Department of Defense Chief Information Officer, Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence

Mr. Dean E. Hall Associate Executive Assistant Director and Deputy Chief Information Officer, Federal Bureau of Investigation

Mr. Kelly A. Miller Deputy Chief Information Officer, National Security Agency/Central Security Service

Mr. Paul E. Muench Deputy Chief Information Officer, National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency

Mr. Grant M. Schneider Deputy Director for Information Management and Chief Information Officer, Defense Intelligence Agency

Mr. Neill Tipton Director, Information Sharing and Partner Engagement, Department of Defense

Ms. Jill Tummler Singer Chief Information Officer, National Reconnaissance Office

Ms. Jeanne C. Tisinger Chief Information Officer, Central Intelligence Agency

1515 – 1615

Networking Break/Technology Exposition

1615 – 1700

Breakouts / Learning Labs

Wednesday 4 May

0750 – 0800

Announcements

0800 – 0845

Unifying Intelligence Strategies — The Central, Critical Node to Achieving Integrated Intelligence

Mr. Robert Cardillo Deputy Director for Intelligence Integration, Office of the Director of National Intelligence

0845 – 0930

Innovation in Information Sharing — CIA Style

Mr. Geoffrey K. Fowler

Director and Managing Editor, World Intelligence Review (WIRe), Central Intelligence Agency

0930 – 1030

Networking Break/Technology Exposition

1030 – 1130

Services Panel: Secure and Collaborative Intelligence to Support the Warfighter

Panel Moderator: Mr. James R. Martin Director, ISR Programs, Office of the Under Secretary of Defense (Intelligence)

Panel Members:

Mr. Robert “Bo” T. Martin Deputy Director, ISR Capabilities, U.S. Air Force

Mr. Gregory B. Palmertree Chief Technology Officer, Marine Corps Intelligence

Ms. Lynn Schnurr Senior Technical Advisor, Army Intelligence Chief Information Officer, Information Management, Deputy Chief of Staff, G2 Headquarters, Department of the Army

Mr. Jack Y. Gumtow Chief Information Officer, Office of Naval Intelligence

1130 – 1215

The Path to Secure and Agile Cloud Computing

Mr. Michael Capellas Chairman and CEO, VCE, The Virtual Computing Environment Company

1215 – 1315

Networking Break/Technology Exposition/Lunch

1315 – 1400

Breakouts / Learning Labs

1415 – 1500

Breakouts / Learning Labs

1500 – 1545

Networking Break/Technology Exposition

1545 – 1630

Breakouts / Learning Labs

Thursday 5 May

0750 – 0800

Announcements

0800 – 0845

NIST Cloud Computing Program: Useful Information for USG Cloud Adopters

Ms. Dawn Leaf Senior Advisor, National Institute of Standards and Technology Information Technology Laboratory and Senior Executive for Cloud Computing

0845 – 0930

Keynote Speaker

Mr. James Stout Senior Director, DoD Customer Executive, Avanade Federal Services

0930 – 0945

Networking Break

0945 – 1030

Intelligence Studies: What Academia Provides

Professor James Breckenridge Dean of the Walker School of Business and Chair of the Department of Intelligence Studies at Mercyhurst College

1030 – 1100

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As a former DoDIIS CTO, one of my favorite things at the yearly DoDIIS Worldwide Conference is the expo floor. Visiting the many vendors and government displays there is a great way to get a snapshot of available technology. Firms that show technology at DoDIIS bring capabilities that are ready to go now. And, for the most part, the technologies there have great enterprise capabilities that work at scale.

Crucial Point will have a team of technology evaluators at the event. We will be visting every company there to ensure we have the latest info on capabilities. This helps us advise clients on technology selection, helps us perform due diligence assessments, and also provides great info we can use for our concept development at CTOlabs.com Additionally, time on the expo floor generates plenty of info and material for our writing here at CTOvision.com and at FedCyber.com.

For a snapshot of vendors that will be there, check out the official conference site at: http://www.ncsi.com/dodiis11/exhibitor_list.html

Here is the current list:

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The 2011 DoDIIS Worldwide Conference will be held 1-5 May 2011 at the COBO at Detroit Michigan. This is always an exciting event for technologists enthused about continued improvement of mission capabilities. The conference is focused on the mission of the US DoD intelligence enterprise, but the many topics tackled at the event are of interest to technologists from a wide range of enterprises.

For more see the official conference site at: http://www.ncsi.com/dodiis11/index.html

Here is some more info from the site:

The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) announces the 2011 Department of Defense Intelligence Information Systems (DoDIIS) Worldwide Conference!

Hosted annually by the DIA Directorate for Information Management (DS) and Chief Information Officer, DoDIIS Worldwide provides a unique opportunity for defense intelligence community members and industry peers to come together for knowledge sharing, training and discussion of current and future information technology (IT) challenges and requirements.

The conference’s 2011 theme, Secure and Collaborative Intelligence in Defense of the Nation, highlights the DIA Chief Information Officer’s commitment to developing and maintaining secure and reliable networks for Department of Defense personnel, services and information technology customers. Through partnerships and collaboration, the intelligence community facilitates the secure collection, analysis and presentation of actionable intelligence to warfighters and decision makers in a timely, comprehensive manner.

DoDIIS Worldwide Conference will attract more than 3,000 participants including 400+ exhibits from across the globe as well as expert speakers, interactive training sessions and daily networking opportunities.

We will be posting some additional context on the event in the coming days, and during DoDIIS will be blogging on some of the ongoing activities. We will also keep our twitter feed up at http://twitter.com/ctovision Please connect there and stay in touch.

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I previously mentioned the DoDIIS Worldwide Conference, which was held 17-21 May 2009.  I took lots of notes from the conference: enough, in fact, to fuel this blog for a long long time.  My associate Ryan Kamauff took even more (and more relevant) notes on the sessions there, and both of us kicked the tires on as many technology demos as we could.  This was a great education for us and the many other atendees there. I was also allowed to give a presentation at the conference (see: Five Megatrends in Enterprise IT).  Overall it was really a great time.

The following is a run down of some of the more salient parts of the conference.

Presentations were given by:

* Grant Schneider, DoDIIS CIO
* LTG Ron Burgess, DIA Director
* Ms. Sherrill Nicely, ODNI CIO
* Dr. Prescott Winter, ODNI ADDNI for Information Integration
* MG John Custer, CG, USA Intelligence Center
* Ms. Lauren States, IBM Cloud Computing director
* Mr. Mark Bregman, Symantec CTO
* Mr. Marlin Forbes, Verizon Federal
* RADM Tom Atkin, US Coast Guard
* Mr. Kurt Rao, CIO, Time Warner
* Mr. Bill Vass, COO Sun Federal
* Panels including all intelligence community CIOs and several senior customers were also held.

Our views of the most relevant/actionable information:

LTG Burgess very clearly demonstrated his strong support for and high expectations for the IT components of the enterprise, but he also laid down some requirements for the current team to achieve. He expects the mission to be served with highly reliable IT. And he expects that will be done in a way that does not give DIA customers “headaches.” DIA and the IT it provides is supposed to speed up mission success not slow it down (when customers touch DIA networks it should be “Like race time at Talladega”). He expects DoDIIS to deliver timely intelligence (“Intelligence without communications is nothing more than history”). He also expects DoDIIS to be in a mission support role. DoDIIS is to enable and support the mission. He reminded us all that he does not know the future but for planning purposes he believes FY11-15 will be an age of flat lines in the budget. “Not everyone will get what they want, but the mission will get what it needs– deployed in an enterprise style.”

Grant Schneider hit three themes hard: creating a change environment, moving DoDIIS forward to meet this change, and decreasing time to market for DoDIIS IT. Grant wishes to have an environment in DoDIIS that welcomes a change from the current policies. He also mentioned the movement towards “Green IT”. He underscored several other important capabilities, including the need for cross domain solutions and the need for collaborative tools. He established three focus areas for 2009: customer service excellence, enhanced requirements planning/management processes, and decreased time to market.  Upon closing of the conference Grant returned to many of these same themes, and also underscored that social networking is going to be driving much of the communication in the enterprise.

MG Custer provided one of the most exciting presentations of the conference. It was a very technology focused presentation that hit on the complex dynamic between the acceleration of technology and the need for customers to drive requirements. He is a clear believer that innovation on the edge should drive the systems we use, the architectures we employ and the methodologies we utilize on the battlefield. MG Custer provided thoughts on how DIA DS could better serve, and he did so in a way that made many of us think he was not getting responses to his needs in formal channels. Areas he said could use more DIA attention include:

• Designate GISA as Army JWICS regional support center (RSC)
• Develop cross-fertilization exchange program between GISA and RSCs
• Develop personnel exchange between G2 and DS
• Eliminate agendas and ‘not invented here’ syndrome
• MOA to establish battle hand-off between G2 and DIA

General Custer also showed the audience a YouTube video I reported on at this site (see:  http://ctovision.com/2009/03/you-really-have-to-see-this-from-mit-media-lab ).

Many speakers hit on common themes of the need for enhanced data sharing, the need for smarter data center strategies, the need for continual work in cross domain solutions (and smarter networks), the need for rapid implementation of ICD501, and the need to be able to share the results of programs and projects from elsewhere in the community. Speakers hit on the fact that A-Space is a positive thing but still pretty much limited to a small number of beltway analysts (J-space is coming and should be more broadly applied). Other speakers hit on the need to improve the acquisition processes.

The need for continual work in cross-domain solutions is particularly noteworthy. Progress has been made in many fronts regarding cross domain, and the government has done smart things like establish cross-domain management offices to help bring focus to this area. However, in some ways the establishment of cross-domain management offices and the regulations that come with it have actually introduced challenges regarding innovation. The government has focused so hard on reducing cross-domain solutions and narrowing the set of capabilities that new capabilities are very hard to introduce.

Technology themes during the conference mirror the technology themes elsewhere in the IT world: Virtualization, Storage, Cloud Computing, Open Source and Security were all key topics.

This conference informed our thoughts on high interested technology and was a fantastic opportunity to connect with old friends.  Thanks DoDIIS friends for letting me attend.

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Like Yogi Berra said: “It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future.”   This is especially true about technology.  Things are changing so fast in the tech world it is hard to keep up with the state of today’s IT, which means it is even harder to predict where it is going tomorrow.  I like to start my predictions of the future of IT with caveats like those so you realize it is ok to question my every assumption as we try to figure out what is coming next.

Which gets to the point of this post:  Enterprise CTOs need to plan for the smart use of resources and need to inform others on coming capability.  And doing that requires some insights into the future of IT.  So, although there is no really good model for doing that, we have to try.

My favorite model is to start with an assessment of today’s technology, look at the mega-trends sweeping through the IT industry, survey promising work being done in R&D, and then make assessments on what is coming next.  Since this is a model full of flaws I like to continually update and check the work and I really appreciate getting feedback from other technologists on what they think.  For readers of this blog and followers on Twitter, many of you have already contributed to this brief and that is much appreciated.  I have also pestered some of the greatest CTOs in industry to give me their thoughts and find that sharing the briefing with others is a great way to keep a good tech dialog going.

I had a great opportunity to get feedback on the most recent version of my brief at the 2009 DoDIIS conference.  I was allowed to present my briefing to a standing room only crowd of technologists, many of whom I have looked up to for years.  Immediately afterward I got lots of verbal input and that was very valuable.  I was also swamped with e-mail contact and that is also very much appreciated and as I get more feedback from these readers I’ll keep updating the briefing.

For now, would you mind taking a look and providing feedback?  It is pasted below.

If you have trouble seeing the embedded clip below visit this URL: http://docs.google.com/Present?docid=ddjnt9hd_165hbcmwqd6

Thanks!

Bob

The DoDIIS Worldwide Conference will be held in Orlando Florida this year, at the Orlando World Center Marriott. I really like this conference.  It is filled with folks I like and centers around a hard enterprise mission that cries out for strong IT solutions.

The theme of this years conference is “Empowering Decision Advantage.”  The plenary speakers this year are GREAT! (as usual).  They include Grant Schneider, CIO for DIA, LTG Ron Burgess, Director of DIA, Sherrill Nicely, ODNI CIO, Pres Winter, Info Integration at ODNI, Major General John Custer of the Army Intelligence Center, and an incredible panel of all key IC CIOs.  This panel includes Grant Schneider, Al Tarasiuk (CIO CIA), Charles Barlow (CIO, NRO), Kelly Miller (CIO, NSA), Chad Fulgum (CIO FBI), Craig Kaucher (CIO DHS), Bobby Laurine, CIO NGA, Sherrill Nicely and Pres Winter.   This is going to be an awesome panel.  Really.

I’ve been asked to speak at a breakout session and am honored to do that.  The presentation I’ve been working on is an updated version of a briefing I used to track the future of IT.  This briefing considers five “Mega Trends” in the IT world and then talks about some specific technologies that hold high potential of changing the IT landscape.  I’ll be presenting Tuesday at 1500.  If you are a CTO or other enterprise technologist I would really appreciate seeing you there.

A key thing I really like about this conference is the expo floor.  I’ve been known to roam around in there for hours, going from one technology demo to the next.  This is where America’s greatest technologies are demonstrated.  Every major IT firm will be there, and so will every IT savvy integrator.  Every great application developer and every great mashup capability will be there.   Companies like Carahsoft, Endeca, Adobe, Symantec, Sun, Cisco, Microsoft, Oracle, JackBe and many more will be there.  I can’t wait to catch up with all of them there.

For more on the conference please see:  http://ncsi.com.  NCSI always puts on a great event.

If you are going to be there and will be up on Twitter please drop me a note or connect to me on Twitter @bobgourley.  I’d like to track what you are putting out there.  I hope to be on twitter a bit myself there, but may be too excited to type.

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If all goes well I’ll get a speaking part at the next DoDIIS Worldwide Conference at Orlando 17-21 May 2009.  I love this conference.  It is attended by great folks, many of whom are technologists with a deep background in a favorite mission area. The greatest systems integrators come to the conference.  And the technology companies that exhibit at the conference are also great, with many demonstrating cutting edge, disruptive technologies that make for an intellectually stimulating time.

I submitted a proposal to deliver a presentation at a breakout session on megatrends in the IT world and some assessments on the future of IT. My thesis is that assessments on the future of technology can contribute to sound decisions today.   Since it is a DoDIIS conference I’ll try to keep that focused on the future of IT relevant to DoDIIS.  Since I’ve been keeping a briefing up on that topic for a while I think I should be able to pull together a relevant talk that should provide good food for thought.

But here is the hard part.  This is the sort of briefing that is out of date the instant it is printed.  It is always in need of a tech refresh.

So, I have a favor to ask.  Can I ask your views on the topic of the future of enterprise IT?

Please take a look at the slides below.  And send me a note with any feedback, pointers or criticisms.  I would really appreciate any suggestions.

Thanks,
Bob

090413_the_future_of_IT

[Note: This was just updated to fix a broken link]

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There are several megatrends sweeping the technology industry today.  Some of them are about to be accelerated.

I like to use five key topic areas to track megatrends in IT:

Over the past two months two major events have occurred which are impacting these trends.

The first was the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the resulting cascading effects on the financial industry.  The impact on IT spending and the movement of more enterprises to grid/cloud computing because of that are still being assessed, but for some thoughts see: Wall Street Crisis

The second was the Presidential election of Barack Obama.  President-Elect Obama has long articulated a technology strategy on his website.  It is most definitely worth a read by all enterprise technologists since it will form the basis of many of his policies and actions.  For some context, here is a paragraph that struck a cord with many enterprise technologists:

But perhaps more important than his stated technology platform is the energy behind the election and the new spirit that will be coming with him into government.   Part of that energy was discussed by Tim O’Reilly in a 29 Oct 2008 Endorsement.  A key slice of that endorsement read:

Based on the above and my views of enterprise technology today, the following is my analysis of the impact of the election on the key IT megatrends:

Convergence and trend towards unified communications and user empowerment

Consumerization and user empowerment has been the most important trend in IT for several years and is driving many other trends in the industry, including Cloud Computing.  This trend is almost a force unto itself and I don’t believe the Obama election or the excitement it generated will do anything to change this trend.   In fact, we could argue that this trend itself picked the next president.  The Obama team made the best use of the consumer technologies touching people everywhere, including social media, cell phones and of course the Internet.  So his team had people who understood the megatrend and took action to accelerate it into their campaign.   What if the critically beneficial trend of consumerization of IT had not been in place?  If consumerization had not been driving IT would this election have resulted this way?  Hard to tell, but to the point of my analysis, this trend is a force of nature of its own and I do not believe the exciting results of the election will change it other than to help move more social media into old government organizations.

But, we can assume that the senior team of the President Elect, the ones who will be leading the transition of the government, know the power of social media and consumer IT very well and will accelerate the use of Web2.0/Gov2.0/Social Media in government.

Globalization and increasing internationalization of IT and demographic shifts

There is a global competition for talent and for several years it has seemed like the US was on the loosing side of this trend.  There is a significant chance that this trend will continue, with Asia especially generating demand for technology talent.  But the energy of the US and the huge respect the country is gaining because of this election may be a mitigating factor in the competition for talent.

Increasing open development of software and hardware

This too is a trend all its own.  Open source software is clearly a force which is unstoppable already.  Here too, the Obama campaign appears to have leveraged open source sofware by extensive use of free and open software like MySQL.  (Sun Microsystem’s MySQL is the open source technology platform that powered BarakObama.com).

Power, Cooling and Space (PCS) impacting data centers and every place computing is done

Although this is another trend that is bigger than any one campaign, we have to assume that the energy savings, power savings and space savings of modernizing IT will be benefits that are highly regarded by the new administration and at least for the federal IT enterprise these trends will continue.

Increasing pace of technology development and probability of disruption.

I firmly believe that the speed of technology development will continue to accelerate.   At this time I don’t see the election as having a big impact on this trend on the short term.   It is clear that the new administration will be working hard to capture the energy and excitement of the populace to move the country forward on several issues, and in doing so that will hopefully improve the environment for startups and other technology generators.  But the bottom line here is that positive change and disruption of enterprise IT is going to be a fact of life and would be no matter who was elected.

The Significance of the Above

Now what is the meaning of these changes?  Here is a short list of assessments:

- Look for even more use of grid/cloud computing.  This will include more cloud computing in government.  Vivek Kundra is the model here.   His pioneering efforts in leveraging cloud computing have generated real benefits many of us knew were possible but few of had the courage to implement.

- Look for an enhancement to the current CNCI (Comprehensive National Cyber Initiative).   IT will be secured in government.  With a strong federal CTO we can expect some changes to the current approach to the CNCI. Most, if not all, unauthorized intrusions into federal systems could be prevented with a strong CTO in place.

- Expect to see much much more use of open source software and hardware in the federal enterprise, which will continue to drive more adoption by open source software in commercial sectors.   Expect to see a more widespread adoption of Open Office, Linux, Solaris, ZFS,  and MySQL.   This will be done for agility, flexibility, security and expense.

- Expect to see large pushes for automation of backend IT processes.

- Although federal IT budgets will be under significant downward pressure, good ideas regarding virtualization, automation and other high payoff disruptive technologies will be welcome and there will still be IT modernization efforts underway throughout the government.

Do you agree, disagree, or have other thoughts?  Please let me know.

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