IT Talk

April - June 2012 Volume 2 • Issue 2

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

www.nasa.gov

JPL Mobile Apps

Taking IT to New Heights!
IT Talk

Apr - Jun 2012 Volume 2 • Issue 2

Office of the CIO

NASA Headquarters

300 E Street, SW

Washington, D.C. 20546

Chief Information Officer

Linda Y. Cureton

OCIO Chief of Staff

John Hopkins

Editor and Publication Manager

Eldora Valentine

Graphic and Web Design

Michael Porterfield

IT Talk is an official publication of the 

Office of the Chief Information Officer 

of the National Aeronautics and 

Space Administration, Headquarters, 

Washington, D.C. It is published 

by the OCIO office for all NASA 

employees and external audiences.

For distribution questions or to 

suggest a story idea, e-mail:

john.hopkins@nasa.gov or

eldora.valentine-1@nasa.gov

To read IT Talk online visit:

nasa.gov/offices/ocio/ittalk

For more info on the OCIO: v www.nasa.gov/ocio v insidenasa.nasa.gov/ocio

 (Internal NASA network only) v www.nasa.gov/open/

facebook.com/NASAcio

 twitter.com/NASAcio

3684

12

Message

from the

CIO

Search

@ NASA

OCIO IT

Strategic

Goals

JPL

Mobile

Apps

I3P

Updates

In this Issue
Message from

the CIO

By Linda Cureton

The Office of the Chief Information Officer community has a challenging 

mission. But we are inspired by a common vision and guided by core 

principles and values. We are transforming the state of IT at NASA and 

modernizing government IT in the process. This will enable more effective 

and efficient mission results across NASA. NASA’s Information Resources 

Management (IRM) Strategic Plan identifies four IT goals and their 

underlying strategic objectives to be accomplished over the next three 

to five years in support of advancing our Agency’s mission and vision. In 

this issue we’ll highlight what Centers are doing to meet these goals.

Also we recently marked the end of an era in NASA computing. 

Marshall Space Flight Center powered down NASA’s last mainframe, 

the IBM Z9 Mainframe. In this issue we’ll look back at its history. 

And we’ll take a closer look at how some of our NASA Centers are 

teaming up to evaluate and test federated search for the agency.

—Linda

PS. In case you have not heard, the OCIO has moved to 1225 and 

1201 I (Eye) streets NW. The move is part of a renovation project at 

NASA Headquarters over the next three years. The I Street facilities 

are two miles away from NASA HQ. By car this is a 10-minute drive 

or a 15-minute Metro ride from McPherson Square or Metro Center. 

To walk from HQ to the new location would take about 35 minutes. 

Shuttle services are available to and from Headquarters. In addition, 

some organizations have relocated to another area within the HQ 

building. For more information about the HQ renovation project 

visit http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/fasd/bldg_renovate.html. v

NASA OCIO IT Talk April-June 2012 3
JPL Mobile Apps: Taking IT to New Heights!

By Sandy Gutheinz, Anil Natha, and Whitney Haggins, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology

The JPL Mobile App team in the 

Office of the CIO has partnered with 

JPL missions and programs since 

2010 to launch internal, iTunes, 

Android Market, and Windows Azure 

DataMarket mobile apps that have 

revolutionized the way we share data 

and learn on a global scale. JPLdeveloped mobile apps are used by 

thousands of students, educators, 

scientists, and astronomy and 

space enthusiasts worldwide, and 

represent a new chapter in telling 

the JPL and NASA story. The data 

gathered from these programs has 

provided insights to our own lives and 

changed the way we view our world. 

From the time an app is written, it 

takes up to one month to publish. 

During that time, the team works with 

the missions/programs to ensure 

data accuracy, and prospective apps 

must undergo extensive reviews and 

obtain key approvals before being 

submitted to the mobile marketplace.

For the eight JPL-developed mobile 

apps already in the marketplace, 

the public response has been 

overwhelmingly positive. The JPL 

team is thrilled that their efforts have 

increased interest in space and our 

home planet, and enjoy reading about 

the many ways their apps are being 

implemented in schools and daily life. 

The Earth-Now app, developed by 

the Earth Science Communications, 

Visualization Technology Applications 

and Development Teams at JPL, with 

support from NASA Headquarters, 

and published by JPL OCIO, was 

included in the iTunes Feature section 

and was downloaded 100,000 times 

in just one week. The Space Images 

app, designed and developed through 

JPL’s Office of Communications and 

Education, was featured as an iTunes 

Staff Pick and was recently named 

as the top Astronomy iPhone app 

by PC Advisor. With over 780,000 

downloads so far, the Space Images 

app continues to grow strong on the 

iPhone, iPad and Android platforms

To learn more about JPL mobile 

apps, visit iTunes or the JPL 

Mobile App website: http://

www.jpl.nasa.gov/apps v

Space Images

Spectacular images and videos of earth 

galaxy and beyond! Learn about each 

image and share them with your friends.

iPhone iPad Android

Earth Now

View stunning visualizations of climate change 

data on a 3-D model. It allows the user to visualize 

recent global climate data from Earth Science 

satellites, including surface air temperature, 

carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, ozone, water 

vapor, gravity and sea level variations.

iPhone

Aquarius

Learn about NASA's Earth satellite 

mission to measure global sea surface 

salinity, a major factor of climate change. 

This app features news updates and 

scientific data from the mission.

iPhone

Cassini

The Saturian system is at your 

fingertips with a visual overview of its 

current activities, including present 

position, flybys and latest images.

iPhone

4 www.nasa.gov
Satellite Insight

A super fun game based on NASA's 

GOES-R satellite series on Earth’s 

weather data. It puts players in the hot 

seat, bundling identical blocks of data as 

they're collected by a virtual spacecraft.

iPhone

Grail

Keep updated with this amazing 

mission! Get specific information about 

the science and purpose of the GRAIL 

Mission by following the pair of mirroridentical spacecraft to the Earth’s Moon.

iPhone

Be a Martian

Explore the Martian world by viewing 

images, participating in Q&A forums and 

even tagging craters and other surface 

features on real Mars images from NASA 

spacecraft exploring the Red Planet.

Windows Phone 7

Comet Quest

As a player, you get to drop a lander 

on Comet 67P while learning about 

the mysterious comet by observe and 

record interesting events as they occur.

iPhone

Earth Now Space Images

NASA OCIO IT Talk April-June 2012 5
On the Lookout: JSC’s Search Enhancement Team

By Debbie V. Nguyen, Johnson Space Center

The most common way people look 

for information today is to search the 

Web. Ensuring that Johnson Space 

Center (JSC) employees can search 

all the information required to do 

their work is the mission of the JSC 

Information Resources Directorate’s 

Search Enhancement Team.

“Our goals are to make information 

findable, reduce the time it takes 

to find something, and to make 

sure the information found is 

useful to the employee performing 

that search,” said Allan Stilwell, 

JSC Search Project Manager.

To make search 

results relevant 

can be difficult. 

For example, if 

two employees 

are looking for 

information 

on the STS135 crew, one 

employee may 

type in the 

word “Shuttle,” 

while the other 

types “crew.” 

That’s when 

you need 

to build 

taxonomy to 

automatically 

classify, 

organize, and 

connect information. The JSC Search 

Enhancement Team has partnered 

with JSC’s Chief Knowledge Officer, 

Jean E. Engle, to work with subject 

matter experts (SMEs) in every 

organization to help build JSC’s 

taxonomy, which essentially serves as 

the search tool’s dictionary. The real 

key to the taxonomy’s effectiveness is 

connecting the information together.

“These information silos are rich in 

historical data useful to new projects 

and programs,” said Sarah Berndt, JSC 

Taxonomist. “The growing need for 

access to this information necessitates 

a solid foundation for users to easily 

locate JSC content. To that end, 

the Chief Knowledge Officer has 

championed the development of the 

JSC semantic system: a combination of 

taxonomy, ontology, and term metadata 

library. Semantic search at JSC means 

seamless integration of disparate 

information sets into a single interface. 

The primary and most productive 

application for the semantic system 

at JSC is Google Search Appliance 

(GSA), http://google.jsc.nasa.gov.” 

For the past 7 years JSC has been 

using the Google Search Appliance, 

beginning with an index of roughly 

100,000 JSC documents. Since then, 

that number has grown to more than 

3.5 million documents, presentations, 

and Web pages. The team also 

integrated keyword matching and 

existing acronym applications to 

enhance search results. Now, when 

a user does a search for “PKI,” the 

searches will contain results for “PKI” 

and “Public Key Infrastructure.”

However, not all information is in 

electronic form and searchable. 

To bridge that gap, another key 

partnership is the Agency-wide Ask 

A Librarian at NASA (AALN) Project, 

which also has its own integrated 

Web tool called “Ask a Librarian.” 

“The Scientific and Technical 

Information Center (STIC) librarians 

work with the Search Team by providing 

the Search Team with the most 

common questions asked by NASA 

customers,” said Christa George, 

the JSC Scientific and Technical 

Information Center Supervisor. “We 

provide feedback based on requests 

the STIC has received in the past. 

The ability to analyze the search 

terms, phrases, and statistics allow[s] 

the librarians to understand what 

the JSC community is doing and to 

provide library services accordingly.”

The integration of taxonomy, autoclassification of content, Ask a 

Librarian, and the 

help of SMEs at the 

publication stage of 

categorizing new Web 

sites is having a huge 

and positive impact 

on the service that 

the GSA provides 

to its customers, 

said Stilwell. 

The team is working 

with LaRC, JPL, 

HQ, other NASA 

Centers and Google 

to evaluate and test a 

federated search for 

the Agency as well as 

working a new license 

deal with Google to 

broker the Agency’s 

current 17 search 

appliances. To test 

this capability, the team is also working 

with Headquarters IT Labs on a pilot 

called “Collaboration Search Portal”. 

The hope is that the collaboration 

search portal will reach all collaborated 

related content within the Agency 

and one day make all types of 

content available at your fingertips.

For more information, please see the 

following Web sites: Agency Search 

Collaboration Site: http://collaboration.

ndc.nasa.gov/google JSC Search: 

http://google.jsc.nasa.gov 

Ask a Librarian: https://

askalibrarian.nasa.gov v

6 www.nasa.gov
To Search For 

Words Where 

No One Has 

Searched 

Before...

By Tom Soderstrom, CTO,

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, 

California Institute of Technology

Responding to a request from the 

NASA engineering community to 

search NASA videos for relevant 

dialogue, the Jet Propulsion 

Laboratory’s Office of the Chief 

Information Officer (OCIO) has 

partnered with Microsoft to bring 

the Microsoft Research Audio 

Video Indexing System (MAVIS) 

to market. With MAVIS, users 

can search for specific words 

and find all the videos—and 

the place in the videos—where 

those words were spoken. 

A NASA IT Labs prototype has 

been successfully completed 

and demonstrates the MAVIS 

technology using videos from 

the NASA IT Summit 2011. Try 

it out by going to http://goto.

jpl.nasa.gov/VideoSearch.

The project now moves into its next 

phase: to secure additional funding 

to streamline the process, initiate a 

pilot to the NASA community, and 

integrate with search efforts. MAVIS 

has the potential to revolutionize 

how school children and the public 

learn about science, technology, 

and NASA’s current and upcoming 

space missions. It could also 

augment how NASA personnel 

research and find relevant 

discussions and lessons learned 

by searching through thousands of 

NASA-internal videos in seconds.

We invite you to try it out and 

imagine the ways you could 

leverage this evolving technology. v

NASA Google Federated Search

By Manjula Ambur, NASA Langley Research Center

The Langley Research Center 

(LaRC) successfully implemented 

federated search using Google 

technology several years ago, 

providing a one-stop, integrated 

search of key internal and 

external Web sites, databases, 

document repositories, and 

e-journals for Langley scientists 

and engineers. The main driver 

was “findability,” enabling easy 

access to key information in order 

to save valuable time and enable 

mission success. Langley’s 

federated search using Google is 

a valuable tool that has been in 

continuous use for about 4 years. 

Leveraging this experience, 

in 2010, Langley led a team 

consisting of Johnson Space 

Center (JSC), Marshall Space 

Flight Center (MSFC), and 

Headquarters/eTouch personnel 

to successfully develop a 

NASA-Google federated search 

prototype. The goal of this 

prototype was to demonstrate 

integrated search and access of 

digital project repositories that 

existed at different Centers to 

enhance technical information 

“findability” across the 

enterprise. For the prototype, 

approximately 40,000 documents 

were included from Apollo (JSC), 

high-speed research (LaRC), 

microgravity (MSFC) and the 

NASA Engineering Network 

(Headquarters/eTouch). Although 

only a fraction of NASA’s total 

content was used, the prototype 

successfully showed that it is 

possible to connect Google 

Search Appliances and document 

repositories from multiple NASA 

Centers and produce a single 

search interface to access 

content across the Agency. 

As in any enterprise project, the 

team faced numerous challenges, 

including ensuring consistency of 

network configuration settings, 

resolving differences in IT security 

policies, and developing common 

settings on the search appliances. 

The effort has provided NASA 

with a much better understanding 

of issues associated with 

enterprise search federation and 

optimization and has resulted in a 

number of next steps that include: 

•	 Identifying potential 

collaboration opportunities 

with missions and the Office 

of the Chief Engineer.

•	 Working with Google to 

continue to refine and 

optimize the federated system.

•	 Determining which high-value 

repositories to include.

•	 Forming, possibly, a 

community of interest 

around federated search 

capabilities. v

NASA OCIO IT Talk April-June 2012 7
OCIO IT Strategic Goals

Information Technology at NASA has been, 

and will remain, a critical enabling capability 

for our Agency and the Nation. The NASA IT 

organization must ensure excellence in every 

mission in order to achieve success within 

our complex environment. NASA’s Information 

Resources Management (IRM) Strategic Plan 

identifies four IT goals and their underlying 

strategic objectives to be accomplished over 

the next 3 to 5 years in support of advancing 

our Agency’s mission and vision. These 

goals define a common future ideal, such as 

providing affordable information technology 

and enhanced IT security, so that our IT 

workforce can collaboratively accomplish 

the IT strategy—within the constraints of 

the forecasted IT budget environment. 

IT Talk has asked several NASA Centers 

what they are doing to meet these goals.

AMES

Ames Research Center’s IT Directorate 

(ARC IT) has significant experience 

developing innovative and industryleading enterprise security programs, 

especially within the construct of supporting 

NASA’s space and science missions. 

Putting the “I” in innovation to meet and 

exceed OCIO Strategic goals, ARC IT 

continuously looks at new 

ways to enhance and 

strengthen both physical 

and virtual security, achieve 

an integrated and adaptive 

enterprise security posture, 

and deliver innovative 

solutions that protect 

NASA’s data assets. 

ARC IT is focusing on 

managing and streamlining 

the following three key areas 

of IT innovation during 2012: 

1. Computational Services, 

which include the industryleading work accomplished 

with cloud computing via 

NASA’s Nebula (http://nebula.

nasa.gov) program. ARC IT 

took inspirational steps in 

creating open systems and 

partnering with OpenStack 

and key business and 

Government thought-leaders 

to usher in a new generation 

of cloud computing. With cloud 

computing becoming more 

pervasive and commoditized, 

ARC IT is now looking at the 

next generation of Nebula. 

Plans include developing an 

open test-bed environment, 

tackling security-inthe-cloud concerns, and 

continuing collaboration 

with OpenStack and the 

open-source community. 

2. IT Security, which 

continues to be the singlemost critical factor ensuring 

mission and Agency 

success. With malicious 

attacks becoming more 

sophisticated than ever 

before, the Ames-hosted 

NASA IT Vision

The NASA IT organization is the very best in government

NASA IT Mission

To increase the productivity of scientists, engineers, and mission support personnel by 

responsively and efficiently delivering reliable, innovative and secure IT services.

NASA IT Principles 

Mission-Enabling, Innovative, Teamwork, Secure, Affordable, Integrated, Effective, Efficient

3-5 Year Objectives

•	 Ensure a positive 

end-to-end computing 

experience for 

stakeholders.

•	 Achieve efficiencies in 

providing IT services, 

e.g., Data Center 

Consolidation and 

Enterprise Service 

Desk (ESD).

•	 Empower the mobile 

workforce (anytime, 

anywhere, securely). 

•	 Provide enterprise 

applications that support 

the Agency’s business 

and information needs, 

with new initiatives 

and enhancements 

focused on improving 

business and 

management practices. 

•	 Enhance mission 

success by providing 

efficient and effective 

access to enterprise 

information and 

collaborative 

functionality.

3-5 Year Objectives

•	 Improve NASA’s 

capability to prevent, 

or to quickly and 

effectively respond to, 

any potential IT security 

incidents and centrally 

manage outcomes and 

the Agency’s response. 

•	 Achieve a risk-based 

balance between 

security, system 

operability, and the 

user’s experience. 

•	 Nurture a culture of 

security awareness 

that improves the 

accountability of 

IT resources and 

“bakes” security 

into IT solutions and 

everyday work habits.

•	 Achieve an integrated 

and adaptive 

enterprise security 

posture by increasing 

interoperability, visibility, 

and innovation across 

NASA’s enterprise 

security architecture.

3-5 Year Objectives

•	 Develop effective 

architectural roadmaps 

for each NASA domain 

that reflect future 

mission requirements 

and provide an 

effective management 

tool for identifying 

and selecting new 

information technology. 

•	 Expand partnerships 

with other Government 

Agencies and 

commercial partners to 

identify best practices 

in the acquisition, 

development, and 

maintenance of new 

IT, particularly in 

light of the proposed 

commercialization 

of space travel. 

•	 Identify innovative 

information technologies 

and create active 

participation 

opportunities for 

NASA scientists and 

engineers to collaborate 

on missions.

3-5 Year Objectives

•	 Align NASA IT workforce 

competencies with 

desired competency 

levels, and provide 

career enhancing 

opportunities and 

training to all IT 

employees. 

•	 Utilize innovative 

methods, including 

social media, to 

attract a productive IT 

workforce focused on 

efficiently achieving 

NASA’s IT mission.

•	 Develop and improve 

enterprise best practices 

for governance, 

shared services, 

capital planning, IT 

project management, 

and performance 

management. 

•	 Improve two-way 

communications with 

our internal and external 

customers regarding the 

IT services we provide.

Major Activities:

I3P ~ IT Security ~ Data Center Consolidation, Cloud & Green IT ~ Enterprise Business Systems ~ Innovation 

Labs ~ Enterprise Architecture Improvements ~ STI Program ~ Workforce Education and Competency

Strategic Goal 1

Transform NASA’s 

IT infrastructure and 

application services to 

better meet evolving 

stakeholder needs and 

support mission success.

Strategic Goal 2

Enhance and strengthen 

IT Security and Cyber 

security to ensure the 

integrity, availability, and 

confidentiality of NASA’s 

critical data and IT assets.

Strategic Goal 3

Identify, test, and 

adopt new information 

technology that will make 

NASA’s missions more 

capable and affordable.

Strategic Goal 4

Provide enterprise 

resources and processes 

that foster mission success 

and allow NASA to 

attract and retain a highly 

performing IT workforce.

8 www.nasa.gov
NASA Cyber Security Operations Center 

(SOC) is implementing new cyber-security 

features, remaining ever-vigilant, and 

innovating to stay ahead of the wellfunded malicious-hacker community. 

3. Mission Networks, which were developed 

by ARC IT in concert with the Multi-Mission 

Operations Center (MMOC) to enable 

cross-Agency collaboration, keep mission 

teams (e.g., the Interface Region Imaging 

Spectrograph [IRIS], the Lunar Atmosphere 

and Dust Environment Explorer [LADEE], 

and Kepler) in touch with key facilities, 

and provide a reliable, secure, and flexible 

network for users. Innovative productivity 

enhancements include MMOC support via 

centrally managed services. Mission teams 

no longer need to independently maintain 

their own networks and are provided 

tailored network security to address 

each mission’s unique requirements.

ARC IT is all about enabling new 

ideas and collaborative efforts while 

always considering and supporting the 

next generation of IT innovation. 

DRYDEN

Dryden Flight Research Center (DFRC) is 

working to strengthen its security posture 

commensurate with the objectives of 

Strategic Goal 2. Dryden’s approach has 

been to satisfy mission needs while evolving 

consistent architecture via technical solutions 

and proactive customer engagement.

We’ve collaborated with Marshall Space Flight 

Center to implement the NASA Common 

Border Infrastructure and enable centralized 

monitoring and management. We’re 

consolidating audit logs to a central server that 

is interoperable with the Kennedy enterprise 

data warehouse, thus enabling the next level 

of anomaly detection and auditing automation.

Dryden is piloting improvements to its Center 

proxy and content filtering service. The value 

will be improved mitigation of Web-based virus 

threats while fully eliminating direct exposure of 

Dryden systems to remote Web sites. Networkbased Smartcard authentication service 

improvements are in the planning stage. The 

goal here is to transparently authenticate Dryden 

users on the intranet with their NASA-issued 

Smartcard, thus increasing the trustworthiness 

of the systems attached to the Dryden intranet.

Finally, Dryden IT is proactively engaging local 

mission projects such as the Stratospheric 

Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA), 

Global Hawk, and G-III, collaborating 

with mission teams on the design and 

implementation of their highly specialized 

IT systems. By directly integrating with the 

project team, we add value by improving 

systems design and documentation 

while reducing overall project risk.

GODDARD

At Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), 

Adrian Gardner, Chief Information Officer 

and Director of the Information Technology 

and Communications Directorate (ITCD), has 

spent the last 18 months devising, developing, 

and communicating his plan for the Center’s 

Information Technology. Gardner’s 2011 

Strategic Plan (http://itcd.gsfc.nasa.gov/SAC/

index.html) for IT at Goddard is comprised of 

two volumes. Book 1, The Vision, sets the stage 

for needed change, and Book 2, The Tactical 

Implementation, defines timelines and future 

projects for the Center. Collectively, these plans 

lay out the framework for the future direction 

of Goddard’s IT portfolio, based on input and 

demands from Goddard’s stakeholders and 

end users, and outlines current and potential 

future activities within the GSFC ITCD in 

support of the Center’s IT requirements.

Overall, Gardner’s seven strategic 

goals matrix to the NASA IRM goals 

and objectives that were defined by the 

Agency CIO in 2011 and were also defined 

to enable and support the NASA 2011 

Strategic Goals. The seven goals are:

1. Increase agility

2. Modernize Physical Assets

3. Enhance productivity

4. Capture the potential of big data

5. Set the stage for project 

management success

6. Provide ready access

7. Strengthen the Enterprise Network

The successful execution of these 

coordinated strategies will ensure IT at 

Goddard is optimized to enable Agencywide IT and NASA mission requirements. 

Projects and efforts currently underway 

include “big data” segment architecture; 

IT Storefront, a Web-based application for 

ordering IT services and products; and an 

automation and integration working group, 

formed to help determine areas to be 

automated for cost-saving improvements. 

HEADQUARTERS

The NASA Headquarters Information 

Technology and Communications Division 

Strategic Plan aligns with the OCIO’s goals 

and incorporates a Center-focused vision of 

delivering “reliable, innovative, and respected 

IT solutions.” One aspect is ITCD’s goal of 

further positioning itself as a trusted partner 

by developing, maintaining, and strengthening 

relationships with customers and stakeholders. 

As we transition to the Agency-wide IT 

Infrastructure Integration Program (I3P), it is 

critical to build relationships and maintain an 

open dialogue with stakeholders at all levels. 

ITCD utilizes Headquarters IT governance 

processes to fully engage stakeholders, which 

includes organizational IT Points of Contacts 

(IT POCs) and the Customer Advisory Council 

(CAC). With these partners, we are able to 

effectively implement IT initiatives to all 

users, tailored to the requirements of each 

organization. Our Customer Service Project 

Review (CSPR) meetings are an example of 

how ITCD engages with customers, providing 

a face-to-face exchange, which in turn 

garners trust and confidence in the services 

provided. Formal processes are in place 

for obtaining, analyzing, and implementing 

customer feedback, along with a proactive 

communications and outreach program. 

These efforts, combined with ITCD’s goals, 

will ensure that the NASA IT organization will 

indeed be “the very best in Government.”

JOHNSON

“JSC’s Information Resources Directorate’s 

[IRD’s] mission is to enable our customers’ 

missions. One of those missions is to help 

achieve’ the OCIO’s goal to ‘...identify, test, 

and adopt new information technology 

that will make NASA’s missions more 

capable and affordable’,” said Lynn Vernon, 

IRD’s Technical Integration Manager. 

IRD is currently assessing the 

following services and tools: 

•	 Desktop Video: JSC is prototyping VSee 

as a potential desktop video collaboration 

solution to provide users the capability 

to perform video teleconferences 

with multiple individuals across the 

Agency to reduce travel costs.

NASA OCIO IT Talk April-June 2012 9
•	 Project Management Tool: IRD is 

collaborating with Ames Research Center’s 

Electronic Project Management System 

(EPMS) to fulfill customers’ needs for 

better ways to manage their projects. 

•	 LifeSize: LifeSize, an existing video 

teleconference capability, provides 

a more realistic presence. IRD is 

currently working to reallocate many 

units that were bought originally for the 

Constellation Program. The repurposing 

of these units to key organizations could 

potentially reduce travel costs as well. 

•	 The Cloud—Infrastructure as a Service 

(IaaS): IRD is looking into IaaS solutions to 

provide a more flexible, responsive, and 

cost-effective solution to our customers 

who require computing services. 

The goal is to improve management, 

performance, and utilization tracking; 

chargeback reporting; and provisioning.

KENNEDY

The Kennedy Space Center (KSC) IT directorate 

is currently establishing a SharePoint 2010 

infrastructure to facilitate collaboration 

with NASA’s external partners. The Ground 

Systems Development and Operations (GSDO) 

program commissioned this project after 

encountering difficulties with granting U.S. 

Air Force personnel access to institutional 

SharePoint sites. The project team is actively 

pursuing the creation of trusts with the Air 

Force, universities, and several Department 

of Defense contractors (Lockheed Martin, 

Northrop Grumman, Boeing, etc). 

This project is in line with the OCIO Strategic 

Objectives that encourage effective and 

efficient collaboration by providing enterprise 

applications to support the Agency’s business 

and information needs. The establishment of 

trusts with external partners such as the Air 

Force relieves NASA from having to support 

much of the account life-cycle management 

functions for logical access by partners, 

thus reducing operations and maintenance 

costs for Agency programs and projects. 

Essentially, Identity Federation allows NASA 

to trust external partners to perform identity 

management and/or credential management 

services for partner individuals who access 

NASA assets. The SharePoint 2010 project 

intends to implement this capability locally at 

KSC first, with plans to transition to an Agencylevel service as interest and awareness grow.

LANGLEY

The need to collaborate across NASA Centers 

and with non-NASA partners continues to 

grow, while at the same time, Federal travel 

budgets are expected to continue declining. 

Langley’s Office of the CIO, in collaboration 

with NASA MSFC, is testing enterprise-class 

desktop videoconferencing that could make it 

far easier for employees to quickly and easily 

establish video-based communication with 

partners across the country. By supplementing 

the existing NASA Video Teleconferencing 

Service (ViTS) room and conference room 

videoconferencing capabilities already in 

wide use across the Agency, high-definition 

desktop-based videoconferencing technology 

can provide a more convenient and easyto-use collaboration option for on-demand, 

remote, face-to-face collaboration for small 

groups and individuals. While not completely 

replacing the need for in-person interaction, 

being able to remotely meet with counterparts 

and easily share documents and images in 

real-time via desktop videoconferencing may 

make it possible to reduce the amount of 

travel required, saving both time and money. 

In addition, videoconferencing technology is 

maturing to the point where standards can allow 

solutions from different vendors to interoperate, 

enabling interaction even with partners outside 

of NASA using systems made by different 

manufacturers. This effort, led by Langley Chief 

Technology Officer Ed McLarney, supports the 

CIO strategic goal of identifying, testing, and 

adopting new information technology that 

will make NASA’s missions more capable and 

affordable. Technology evaluation and testing 

are expected to continue through the summer. 

MARSHALL

Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) 

has placed an emphasis on the goal of 

providing integrated tools and solutions and 

enabling a more collaborative culture.

MSFC has emphasized “a more collaborative 

culture” by starting ExplorNet, an internal 

social networking tool. All employees, both civil 

servants and contractors, at MSFC are given 

access to ExplorNet. It is used to find answers 

to questions, share information, find expertise, 

and collaborate. In its first year, 68 percent of 

MSFC employees used ExplorNet, while 21 

percent have contributed information. One of the 

concerns about a tool like ExplorNet is that it is 

a “social tool” and not for “getting work done,” 

but at MSFC, 90 percent of the groups, or virtual 

work units, are for business purposes. Many of 

the groups also allow for cross-collaboration 

throughout the Center’s workforce and increased 

process streamlining. Future plans for ExplorNet 

include a major upgrade that will make receiving 

notifications/information easier and encourage 

the use of groups across MSFC organizations.

MSFC has also emphasized “providing 

integrated tools and solutions” by adding 

SharePoint 2010. So far, 11 Web sites from 

SharePoint 2003 and one from SharePoint 

2007 have been migrated. This has enabled 

the retirement of servers and allowed the 

use of virtual environments to conserve 

energy and floor space in the data center.

STENNIS

For several years now, Stennis Space Center 

(SSC) has continued in its commitment to create 

a comprehensive virtualization of the Stennis 

Data Center (SDC) to allow for provisioning 

of computing services to SSC programs and 

institutional and administrative offices. This 

achievement supports NASA’s Information 

Resource Management goal to transform 

NASA’s IT infrastructure and application 

services to better meet evolving stakeholder 

needs and support mission success. 

 SSC’s OCIO has virtualized the SDC server 

environment and is now making significant 

strides toward implementing storage 

virtualization in the data center. This virtual 

environment sets the foundation for a highly 

available private cloud that services SSC’s 

Propulsion Test Complex and science and 

technology programs. SDC’s capability is 

delivered to customers through an extensive 

storage area network (SAN) fabric that now 

extends to all test control centers in the Test 

Complex. These systems allow engineers to 

centrally store large quantities of test data, 

including digital video data and high/lowspeed data acquisition system (DAS) content.

In addition to the SDC’s hosting services, the 

center also provides housing services for 

mission customers. Systems residing in the 

SDC include the Beowulf Cluster supporting 

propulsion testing and systems utilized by SSC’s 

Applied Science and Technology Project Office.

SSC’s programs have and will continue to work 

collaboratively with the OCIO on implementing 

new data center technologies and ensuring 

shared use of those resources to achieve 

efficiencies and enable mission success. v

10 www.nasa.gov
Mainframe Shutdown...

A Bittersweet Time

By Kim Edmondson, Marshall Space Flight Center

How many of us have depended on 

mainframes to do our jobs over the years? 

We perform development, administration, and 

operational support, and then one day it is 

time for the mainframe to be shut down due 

to a high cost to operate and not being a part 

of the NASA future enterprise architecture. 

The IBM Z9 Mainframe located at the NASA 

Data Center at Marshall Space Flight Center 

has just gone full circle. This mainframe had 

to be shut down by the end of the Shuttle 

Program; specifically, 6 months after the last 

Shuttle landing. A team began decommission 

efforts in mid-2008. “The January 26, 2012, 

shutdown marked the end of a very successful 

and lengthy effort by Sittra Battle, Project 

Manager, and her team to plan, execute, 

and complete an orderly shutdown,” said 

Neil Rodgers, NASA Enterprise Applications 

Competency Center (NEACC) Manager. 

The team had to work with Centers to identify 

applications for migration or retirement 

and identify applications that needed to be 

converted to some other alternative. The scope 

included 11 Centers with approximately 166 

identified applications. These were not all 

just Shuttle applications. Many communities 

across NASA were impacted and had work 

to do to accomplish this NASA mission. For 

example, the NEACC lead projects (such 

as the Materials Management Project and 

Integrated Asset Management—Property Plant 

and Equipment) had to remove applications 

like the NASA Equipment Management 

System (NEMS), NASA Property Disposal 

Management System (NPDMS) and NASA 

Supply Management System (NSMS). Battle 

and her team worked not only with these 

projects, but with all the impacted Centers 

to decommission their administrative 

applications and data successfully.

Neil Rodgers, NEACC Manager, commended, 

“It was a huge coordination effort and yet 

another example of the project management 

and technical competencies demonstrated by 

the NEACC to support NASA’s mission.” v

The NASA Engineering Network Builds Agency-Wide Connections

By Ann Bernath, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology

The NASA Engineering Network (NEN) Website, 

available within the NASA firewall, provides 

many features to help engineers discover 

contacts and experts at all locations within 

NASA. The Organization Charts tool provides 

a resource for discovering who is responsible 

for engineering at each NASA Center. Using 

an integrated employee lookup feature, 

pulling details from the NASA Directory 

as well as NEN’s user profiles, engineers 

can discover more information about each 

individual without leaving the chart display. 

Within each discipline-specific Community 

of Practice, such as Avionics, Guidance, 

Navigation, and Control, and Structures, 

to name only a few, engineers can access 

contact and member lists to find others with 

particular areas of expertise. User profile 

photos allow engineers to put faces to 

names. Also, an Employee Locator integrated 

into NEN’s search capability locates NASA 

employees using the NASA Directory. 

As Cynthia Null of Ames Research Center (and 

the NASA Technical Fellow for Human Factors) 

explains, NASA needs “to put the best minds 

on the problem and the best minds are spread 

out all over the Agency.” Lorraine Fesq of JPL 

(and Fault Management community leader) 

concurs. “We were desperate for a way to 

reach out and connect to other practitioners 

in the field from other Centers.” Designed to 

bring engineers together, the NEN provides 

discipline-specific communities of practice, 

organization charts, user profiles, and 

employee locators to help engineers reach 

out and connect with their NASA peers.

Making Connections Improves 

Engineering Disciplines

Engineers can keep connections current by 

making direct connections with peers and 

sharing expertise with others by joining a 

Community of Practice. Join this Community

keeps members abreast of important technical 

information, news, and discipline-specific 

events. The Fault Management community 

recently collaborated to define key terminology 

within their discipline. Human Factors added a 

Spotlight feature to their Community of Practice 

to highlight individual members. Engineers 

can also contribute to the resources on the 

NEN site and become subject-matter experts 

themselves to help expand the knowledge 

base of engineering disciplines at NASA. 

Seeking advice from and sharing knowledge 

with others can also be achieved using Ask 

an Expert. Engineers can submit questions 

to a particular community’s vetted, subjectmatter experts and can expect to see one 

or more responses within a few days. One 

engineer, for example, submitted a question 

to experts within the Avionics Community 

and received nine responses from experts at 

GRC, GSFC, JSC, and his own Center - MSFC. 

All questions and answers are archived and 

available for other engineers to reference. 

Improving User Engagement

This year, NEN plans to enhance the site’s 

capabilities to allow engineers to post events, 

resources, assets, and documents directly. 

The site improvement will also give users 

the ability to provide comments and to rate 

information posted to the site by others, 

enhancing the connections among participants.

NASA Engineers no longer need to face 

challenges alone. While taking advantage 

of resources such as Lessons Learned 

and a 40-repository, 3 million asset search 

capability, an engineer from any Center can 

seek out and connect with others at NASA, 

find experts, share their knowledge and 

expertise, and participate in an Agency-wide 

community using the NASA Engineering 

Network. Visit https://nen.nasa.gov. v

The Mainframe Decommission Team: Bobby Rafuse, John 

Hall, Sittra Battle, Clarence Golson, Dave Kroll, Leonard 

Haga, Lori Martin, Doug Hubbard, and John Givan.

NASA OCIO IT Talk April-June 2012 11
I3P Update

ACES End-User Services

The Agency Consolidated End-user Services 

(ACES) contract began March 1, 2012 at Wave 

3 Centers (Ames, Johnson, and Langley) which 

complete the transition from the previous 

Outsourcing Desktop Initiative for NASA (ODIN) 

contract at all NASA Centers. Hewlett-Packard 

Enterprise Services (HPES), the ACES service 

provider, had already assumed responsibility 

for Agency-wide services such as e-mail, 

calendaring, instant messaging, conferencing, 

and directory services in November 2011.

Deployment of new ACES seats is based 

on refresh eligibility (a standard 3-year life 

cycle) and replacing oldest devices first. 

This strategy will allow the transition to 

proceed more efficiently and effectively.

HPES will deploy software to the ODIN 

seats that have not been refreshed in order 

to effectively manage the environment 

with a consistent set of tools. 

Despite delays in the transition implementation, 

HPES remains fully committed to 

completing an orderly transition to the 

ACES solution. To learn more about ACES, 

visit https://aces.ndc.nasa.gov/.

EAST

The Enterprise Applications Services 

Technologies (EAST) contract completed its 

first year of support to the NASA Enterprise 

Applications Competency Center (NEACC) on 

January 31, 2012. A benefit of the EAST contract 

is the way it tracks work at an application level. 

This provides information that is critical for 

operations management and useful for strategic 

planning purposes. Our contractor workforce is 

organized by service areas (development, quality 

assurance, etc.) while our work is organized 

by Lines of Business (procurement, logistics, 

financial, human capital and workforce, etc.). 

The EAST tracking system allows us to gauge 

the capacity (from the service areas) utilized for 

maintenance and enhancement efforts by Line 

of Business. To execute this tracking capability, 

new tools and processes were introduced to 

the entire workforce last February, and we have 

worked hard over the past months to tweak our 

processes, train our workforce, and improve 

our internal tools in order to maximize this 

capability and optimize operations. We invoked a 

stabilization period that is drawing to an end and 

has allowed us to improve our assessment criteria 

(which is used in assigning application points to 

the work), and define more effective workflows to 

ensure proper authorizations and accountability.

We still have many improvements to make, and 

several currently underway, which will, over time, 

give us better data that will generate even further 

enhancements. EAST is a 2-year, fixed-price 

contract with options to extend it to 5 years. We 

are currently at the point where the first Option 

Decision Package due date is approaching. 

ESD

The Enterprise Service Desk (ESD) has continued 

to manage a growing NASA customer base with 

increased efficiency and improved performance. 

The ACES Wave 2 and Wave 3 Centers completed 

transitions in January and March, greatly 

increasing the volume of help tickets to the ESD. 

Centers have also begun relying on the ESD’s Web 

support and Tier-1 helpdesk support for NASA 

Integrated Communications Services (NICS). One 

final NICS transition (Kennedy Space Center) 

awaits in April, after which, all NASA Centers 

will be utilizing ESD for NICS support as well.

One week following the final ACES transition, 

the ESD is averaging 1,072 help tickets a day 

(Monday–Friday), with roughly 81 percent of 

tickets being generated through phone calls to 

the helpdesk. A growing number of employees 

are utilizing the Web site (https://esd.nasa.

gov) for easy, online ticket submission (around 

15 percent). ACES calls continue to represent 

the bulk of the traffic, but the helpdesk 

staff is becoming more adept at resolving 

issues, with about 60 percent of tickets now 

finding resolution without elevation to an IT 

Infrastructure Integration Program (I3P) provider. 

The average speed to answer calls continues to 

trend upward, exceeding defined metrics on most 

weekdays, and the abandoned call rate continues 

to diminish (also exceeding the defined metrics).

Customer satisfaction numbers continue to be 

high. The ESD generates a survey following 

every help ticket. Since go-live, about 8 percent 

of the surveys sent for tickets resolved by the 

ESD have been completed and returned by 

customers. The first survey question confirms 

that the issue has been resolved. If customers 

respond “No,” then their tickets are automatically 

reopened for investigation. If customers answer 

“Yes,” then they are presented with additional 

questions. Since go-live, 96.7 percent of 

respondents state that the ESD gave them 

an accurate response; 94.1 percent say that 

the response was timely; and 94.3 percent 

state that the ESD was overall effective.

The ESD team credits the improved performance 

on several factors. The team increased the 

number of call agents available during peak 

hours, which has driven faster service. New 

employees have had a chance to learn, mature, 

and grow more efficient. I3P providers and 

Center subject matter experts (SMEs) have 

continued to work tirelessly to build a valuable 

library of knowledge, which has helped agents 

quickly find answers. Also, knowledge articles 

are being refined for Center-specific concerns, 

making searching for specific needs easier for 

the user. System enhancements have enabled 

customers to view their service orders as they 

move through the system approval process. 

Additionally, customers themselves are growing 

more acquainted with the new processes and 

resources. Lastly, feedback that the ESD team 

has received from customers has driven change, 

such as the simplification of the phone tree, 

once the ESD is reached. Lastly, the ESD sent 

out tiger teams to train key personnel at each 

Center on the functionality of the ESD self-help 

Web site. Over 2,000 NASA employees were 

trained. Providing face-to-face training has 

greatly expanded expertise at each Center.

While the progress is promising, the ESD 

team recognizes that much work remains 

and many opportunities for improvement 

exist. Currently, the team is working on 

enhancements that once implemented will 

simplify usage for end users, approvers, and 

Center CIO points of contact. Soon, IT assets 

for each employee will be captured within the 

system, simplifying the process of generating 

tickets over the phone or online. There is 

much more to do to realize the vision of I3P.

NICS

The NASA Integrated Communications 

Services contract started on June 1, 2011. The 

Communications Services Office (CSO) has been 

established to manage all NASA communication 

services, including those provided by NICS and 

other Center-based contracts. NICS-provided 

services have been transitioned into the contract 

on time at all NASA Centers. The remaining 

Center, KSC, was transitioned on April, 1, 2012. 

For the first time, NASA now has one contract 

responsible for end-to-end network connectivity. 

The challenges associated with this endeavor 

are enormous. At the heart of this challenge 

is our ability to listen to Center management 

teams, understand their concerns, and work 

together for a common solution. Clearly, 

this is our most important challenge to 

overcome. Collectively, our solutions will 

benefit NASA through the standardization of 

architectures, economies of scale, and an 

efficient workforce aligning resources with our 

customers’ communications service needs.

The main focus of NICS during this nearly 

first year of operations is to successfully 

transition the Centers without disruption to 

existing processes and service delivery. After 

a period of stable operations, NICS will then 

focus on transformational initiatives that align 

with I3P and CSO goals and objectives.” 

WEST

Currently, Web services are continuing under the 

current vendor whose contract has been extended 

through April of 2013. Current services include: 

•	 Web content delivery 

•	 Web site development 

•	 Content management 

12 www.nasa.gov
•	 Bandwidth management 

•	 Search capabilities 

•	 Collaboration tools/services 

•	 Web hosting 

The new WESTPRIME Request for Information 

(RFI) and draft Statement of Work (SOW) was 

advertised on FedBizOpps from February 

6 through March 6, 2012. The NASA Office 

of the Chief Information Officer (OCIO) 

and the NASA Office of Procurement are 

finalizing the procurement timeline. NASA 

now expects to release the Request for 

Proposals (RFPs) for WEST by June 30 and 

make an award selection by April 30, 2013.

The goals of the WESTPRIME contract are to: 

•	 Provide web services that meet the needs 

of NASA’s diverse Web community.

•	 Improve the current system, provide 

a technology refresh, and apply 

the industry’s best practices.

•	 Improve agility in adoption of tools 

and implementation of services.

•	 Provide diversity of options for users 

while managing cost and scope.

Special Note

The I3P IT Operations Handbook (ITOH) is now 

available for use by I3P support personnel. 

The handbook covers a variety of topic 

areas including; I3P Governance, operations 

management and communications. The ITOH 

contains links to many supporting documents 

in order to provide timely information. IT and 

resource approvers will find the handbook 

especially helpful as it outlines critical areas that 

support their work. The handbook is always 

evolving and we appreciate input. You may send 

your feedback to Corrine Irwin or John Kasmark. 

The document is available at http://ocio.ndc.nasa.

gov/public/I3P%20ITOH/Forms/AllItems.aspx. v

ACES FileNet 

eForms

By John Sprague, End User Service 

Executive, and Fran Teel, eForms 

Manager, Office of the CIO

The Agency Consolidated End-user Services 

(ACES) service provider, HP Enterprise 

Services, is delivering Windows-based 

computer systems that continue to allow 

end-users to open, fill, sign (as applicable), 

and save NASA and Center forms designed 

via FileNet, the Agency eForms software. 

There were a few problems early in the ACES 

Windows deployment that required a patch 

for full operability, but those systems have 

been addressed and there should be no 

ACES Windows systems with FileNet eForms’ 

issues. Any end-user experiencing issues with 

eForms should call the Agency Help Desk at 

1-877-677-2123. ACES Windows systems 

will continue to include and run FileNet 

eForms software for the foreseeable future.

Apple end-users running Mac Operating 

System (OS) 10.6 (Snow Leopard) can 

continue to open NASA and Center forms 

designed in FileNet. Apple end-users with 

new ACES machines running Mac OSx 

10.7 (Lion) cannot open NASA and Center 

forms designed in FileNet. Some, but not 

all, NASA and Center forms are available in 

PDF format, which Mac users can access. 

HQ/Capital Planning and Governance Division, 

HQ Enterprise Services & Integration Division, 

and GRC/ETADS representatives are evaluating 

available options (e.g., local virtual machine, 

Citrix via ACES/HP) for alternative delivery of 

FileNet eForms to the growing Mac Lion user 

base. Also, plans are underway to purchase 

a new Agency-wide eForms solution in FY13 

to replace FileNet, with a transition window 

extending through FY14. In the interim, 

refreshed Mac users should be advised of 

the issues, and use a PDF version of NASA 

and/or Center forms when available. 

For more information on ACES, please 

visit the I3P Web site at: http://insidenasa.

nasa.gov/ocio/i3p/ACES/index.html v

I3P Benefits By Eldora Valentine, OCIO Communications Manager, Headquarters

Under NASA’s IT Infrastructure Integration 

Program (I3P), the Agency is consolidating five 

separate contracts and adding more and newer 

technology capabilities. NASA is already seeing 

some benefits for I3P. Gary Cox, NASA’s Associate 

Chief Information Officer for Enterprise Services 

and Integration, says that under the Agency 

Consolidated End-user Services (ACES) contract, 

employees are getting daily backup services and 

better security tools, including data-at-rest. “We’ve 

been without refreshes for quite a while. Now users 

are getting new hardware, and it’s pretty robust. 

NASA expects to see significant cost reductions 

from ACES over the next year and a 30-percent 

discount on products under the vendor’s catalog,” 

Cox says. But the benefits do not end with ACES.

NASA has switched from a cost-plus to a 

firm-fixed-price contract under the Enterprise 

Applications Service Technologies (EAST) 

contract, which provides a better idea of the costs 

necessary to support applications. Additionally, 

the EAST contract allows for more innovation 

in software development. The Human Capital 

Information Environment (HCIE) is one of the 

more than 60 applications and services covered 

by the EAST contract. Jeri Buchholz, Assistant 

Administrator for the Office of Human Capital 

Management, says she is impressed with how 

robust the human capital environment is today 

under EAST. “There’s a broad range of capabilities 

in this area. For example, the data we pull from the 

HR [Human Resources] portal is unique because 

of its single sign-on. You don’t have to use 

passwords each time you need to log into a NASA 

application. It’s like running HR on the Starship 

Enterprise. Because of these functionalities, our 

telework capability is enhanced, which allows us 

to access HR systems anytime and anywhere.”

Another contract under I3P, called NASA Integrated 

Communications Services (NICS), creates a single 

incident tracking system for network problems. 

“NASA is focused on catching the services at 

each of the Centers, picking up their local area 

network, and, in some cases, telecommunication 

and cable plant services. We want to make 

sure we don’t drop any of those,” Cox says.

Work is still under way to put the Web Enterprises 

Services Technologies (WESTPRIME) contract in 

place. NASA now expects to release the request 

for proposals for WEST by June 30 and make 

an award selection by April 30, 2013. Under 

WEST, public Web sites and other external 

applications would be hosted in the cloud. 

The goal of the WESTPRIME contract is to 

provide a consistent, capable, and agile, cloudbased enterprise infrastructure that provides 

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), Platform as a 

Service (PaaS) and Software as a Service (SaaS) 

for internal and external Web applications and 

sites using an interoperable, standards-based 

and secure environment. Using the cloud will help 

NASA align with the Federal Government Cloud 

First Policy (http://www.cio.gov/documents/

federal-cloud-computing-strategy.pdf).

NASA has a diverse and complex Web environment 

that requires integration into mobile applications 

and social media technologies, vigorous search 

capabilities, and diversity in the technologies 

used across the Agency. The WESTPRIME 

contract will provide a cost-efficient hosting 

environment that offers flexibility and opensource technologies to meet NASA’s needs. v

NASA OCIO IT Talk April-June 2012 13
Kennedy Data Center 

Consolidation—A Smart Move

By Charles Kilgore, Director of the

Kennedy Data Center Consolidation Project

“What have YOU moved for the Kennedy 

Space Center (KSC) lately?” That is the clarion 

call issued by the Kennedy Data Center 

Consolidation (KDCC) Project team to the KSC 

Information Technology systems owners. The 

KDCC project is responsive to and aligned with:

•	 The U.S. Office of Management and 

Budget (OMB) Agency Data Center 

Consolidation Initiative of February 2010 

establishing data center consolidation 

as a Federal Government-wide priority.

•	 The Presidential Memorandum of June 2010 

mandating Federal Government data center 

consolidation and reduction in numbers.

•	 The NASA CIO memo of August 2010 

articulated an Agency-wide initiative to 

“reduce the overall cost of data center 

services by leveraging newer and more 

efficient technologies, reducing power 

consumption and consolidating locations 

to increase space usage densities, and 

decreasing the real estate footprint of 

Federal data centers” with the support 

of Mission Directorate Associate 

Administrators and Center Directors.

Throughout most of KSC’s 50+ years of 

serving as the world’s premier spacelaunch facility, the supporting infrastructure, 

including IT, has been installed and operated 

in a geographically dispersed model, 

commensurate with the Center’s more than 

200-square-mile campus. The ensuing IT 

sprawl resulted in today’s environment, which 

spans five data centers and more than 300 

smaller server rooms and closets. Those areas 

occupy over 179,000 square feet of facility 

space, and they host and house approximately 

2,400 physical assets to be individually 

assessed and scheduled for consolidation.

In addition to becoming compliant with the 

Federal data center consolidation mandates, 

the incremental progress and final results will 

provide tangible financial benefits to NASA and 

KSC in the following representative areas:

•	 A reduction in costs for the procurement, 

operations, and maintenance of duplicative 

infrastructure (UPS; generators; and 

heating, ventilation, and air conditioning 

systems) that are required by IT 

systems at numerous locations.

•	 A decrease in server life-cycle costs 

as systems are consolidated and 

virtualized into fewer servers.

•	 A scaling down of power consumption 

as more servers are virtualized and 

excessed,, resulting in lower energy costs. 

Consolidation candidates are 

individually assessed and assigned 

into one of three categories:

1. Consolidate—These assets have no 

technical obstacle(s) that would preclude 

their relocation or virtualization into 

a consolidated environment. KSC has 

implemented a three-phase plan for these 

assets based on the following dates:

•	 Short-term consolidation—To be 

consolidated prior to end of year (EOY) 

2012. These systems are ready now and 

have no constraints other than recipient 

data center scheduling and preparation. 

•	 Mid-term consolidation—To be 

consolidated prior to EOY 2014. These 

systems are in the planning stages and 

have constraints projected to be resolved 

within their allocated timeframe. 

•	 Long-term consolidation—To be 

consolidated prior to EOY 2015. These 

systems present significant technical 

issues and/or cultural resistance to 

consolidation and have been deferred 

while the issues are resolved.

2. Excess—These assets are no longer 

functionally required, are obsolete, 

or provide redundant capability. 

Once determined to be in this 

category, they are powered down and 

excessed per NASA procedures.

3. Out-of-Scope—The assets meeting this 

definition are exempt from consolidation 

and are typically in situ and provide 

specialized support requiring their 

placement to remain static. As technologies 

and capabilities continue to evolve, these 

assets will be reassessed, as appropriate.

The KDCC project is measuring progress 

via several metrics that include:

•	 The number of servers relocated/

consolidated, virtualized, or excessed.

•	 The total power savings (kilowatthour 

[kWh]) realized from server 

consolidation and excess.

•	 The amount of facility space (square 

footage) returned to the Center Operations 

Directorate for reassignment or closure.

The KDCC project team is committed to 

working with system owners to ensure a 

successful consolidation of IT infrastructure 

and services at KSC. The team utilizes 

tools and methods that minimize risk to 

systems and services during transition 

while providing outstanding postconsolidation service and support.

The KDCC project is endorsed by KSC Director 

Bob Cabana and KSC Chief Information 

Officer Mike Bolger as a key strategic 

initiative in the Center’s transformation into 

the launch complex of the future. They are 

both vocal advocates and have successfully 

enlisted the support and cooperation of the 

entire Center’s senior leadership team. 

The cumulative effect of the benefits 

mentioned previously have a common result: 

save NASA and KSC funds that can be applied 

to our core mission—space flight programs. v

14 www.nasa.gov
HDI Visits NASA Headquarters

By John D. Sprague, End User Service Executive, Office of the Chief Information Officer

Members of the Help Desk Institute 

(HDI) Capital Area local chapter 

visited NASA Headquarters on 

March 6, 2012, and had one 

of their most heavily attended 

monthly meetings in recent 

memory. The topic was “Power 

of Metrics,” with guest speaker 

Malcolm Fry giving a training class 

on the subject. Sandy Seroskie, 

the chapter’s President Emeritus, 

said, “Thank you to NASA for 

hosting the inaugural tour of this 

workshop and to BMC Software, 

Service Now, and Serena Software 

for sponsoring the workshop, 

enabling the chapter to offer it to 

attendees at no cost.” Seroskie 

closed the meeting by thanking 

Fry for giving attendees a riveting 

metrics presentation. Rick 

Joslin, HDI’s Executive Director 

for Certification and Training, 

remarked that this meeting and 

training were great examples of 

bringing Government and industry 

together for the betterment of both. 

HDI is the world’s largest IT service 

and technical support membership 

association. v

Photo of the HDI attendees taken on the roof at NASA Headquarters.

Speaker Malcolm Fry discussing metrics at the NASA 

Headquarters Glennan Assembly Room.

NASA OCIO IT Talk April-June 2012 15
NASA Deputy CIO Receives 

Federal 100 Award

By Eldora Valentine, OCIO Communications Manager, Headquarters

Deborah Diaz, NASA’s Deputy Chief Information Officer (CIO), has received the Federal 100 

Award, which recognizes individuals in Government and industry who are making significant 

contributions to Federal information technology.

A panel of high-ranking Government and 

industry leaders chose Diaz to recognize her 

passion, spirit, and positive impact toward 

progressive transformation of Federal information technology. Federal Computer Week 

presented the Federal 100 Awards at a gala 

in Washington, DC, on March 28, 2012.

As Agency Deputy CIO, Diaz provided transformational leadership in the investment and 

development of next generation technology 

and adoption of new pilot programs. She 

was pivotal in developing the NASA Open 

Government strategy (ranked No. 1 in Government) and significantly increased full mission 

participation and infused new innovative 

techniques, such as Forward Maker, Idea Scale 

contests, and the Liquid Galaxy, to directly 

connect and interact with NASA’s stakeholders.

Leveraging her multiple IT Federal community 

and industry networks, she created new partnerships with Google, Microsoft, and Amazon to 

cultivate greater innovation test beds in areas of 

big data, collaboration tools, and 3D and mobile 

applications. As a catalytic Chair of the October 

Federal Open Government Community Forum, 

she produced the most successful open government global event ever held with more than 

160,000 virtual Government and private sector 

participants engaging in worldwide idea generation to introduce new technologies to NASA. 

Diaz’s collaborative work on the June Random 

Hacks of Kindness succeeded in influencing more than 1,500 participants (virtual and 

worldwide) to produce 74 solutions with 48 

functional demonstration projects and 23 

working IT solutions. Her insightful introduction of monitoring technologies into NASA’s 

data centers along with the implantation 

of the final data center strategy resulted 

in reduced system duplication and common system standards across NASA.

Diaz expertly strengthened the Office of 

the Chief Information Officer’s program 

management, and she improved service 

delivery governance by identifying and 

outlining requirements to increase stability and improve sustainability in several key 

IT initiatives. As chief technical advisor to 

the IT Infrastructure Integration Program 

(I3P) source selection boards, Diaz laid the 

groundwork for the rapid awarding of I3P 

contracts worth $4.3 billion this year. 

She also continued to advocate for better discovery tools on NASA networks that 

would locate, compile, and categorize existing 

Agency IT assets. Diaz deployed an Enterprise Discovery Tool to automate the collection of IT inventory data and conducted 

an automated application assessment in 

79 data centers, mapping all NASA centers. 

This greatly improved IT inventory control 

and application data architecture to reduce 

duplication and improve system security. 

NASA recouped 22,300 square feet of building 

space and more than $387,000 in annual 

energy costs. The Agency now plans to reduce 

its data centers by 50 percent by 2015.

For more information about other Federal 

100 winners, visit http://fcw.com/events/

fed100/information/winners.aspx v

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Office of the Chief Information Officer

300 E Street, SW (1225 Eye Street)

Washington, DC 20546

www.nasa.gov

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