NGAC Briefing 1

Creating a Cloud Based Geospatial Platform

National Geospatial Advisory CommitteeDecember 6, 2010

12/7/10

Dr. David L. McClure, Ph.D.Associate Administrator

Citizen Services and Innovative Technologies

NGAC Briefing

What is Cloud Computing?

On-demand Self-Service

Ubiquitous Network Access

Location Independent Resource Pooling

Rapid Elasticity

Measured Service

NIST defines cloud offerings as having five essential characteristics:

Why is cloud important?

NISTCloudDefinition

Rather than building and operating dedicated infrastructure to provide IT services, Cloud Computing services are shared resources offered and maintained by a third party to multiple IT “tenants” or organizations . Benefits of this shared services model include:• Faster acquisition and deployment of computing resources• Economies of scale through easier sharing of IT services across organizations • Lower capital equipment expenditures By focusing on emerging customer demand, GSA can successfully pilot the acquisition and use of select cloud services now to establish a leadership position for Federal agencies

2GSA Confidential and Proprietary12/7/10

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Cloud Computing – A Key OMB IT Priority

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Resource: FY2011 OMB Report on Information Technology

A “Cloud First” Policy Announced by OMB

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Federal Cloud PMO

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GovAgencies

Vendors CCESC/CCAC

CloudComputing

PMO

• Cloud Computing Vision / Mission

• Information Portal• Market Research / Use Cases• Policies and Guidelines• Enterprise Architecture• Apps.gov / Procurement Support• Information Dissemination• Virtual Online Summits

• Data Call• Requirements• Interests & Feedback

• Standards Requirements• Security Processes• Procurement Approaches• Best Practices• Gov-wide Communications

• Direction and Guidance• Facilitation• Schedule and Coordination

• Compliant Services and Offerings• Input to Standards• Collaboration on Developing

Standards & Best Practices

Security

Standards

OpsExcellenceComm

Cloud Computing Working Groups

• RFI/RFPs• Definitions• Security

Requirements• Standards

Requirements• SLAs

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Apps.gov FedRAMP Data Center Consolidation

Initiative

Infrastructure-as-a-Service

Software-as-a-Service Email

Platform-as-a-Service

(Geospatial)

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Promoting adoption and removing obstacles in the government-wide acquisition and utilization of cost effective, green and sustainable Federal cloud computing solutions.

Cloud Computing PMO Overview

http://info.apps.gov

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Info.apps.gov – Showing the Way

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Info.Apps.gov is a place where agencies can gather information about how Cloud Computing can help create sustainable, more cost-effective IT Services for the

Federal Government.

Keeping you informed in upcoming events!

Reference Documents at your fingertips!

Provides tools to navigate the cloud landscape.

News and Information on Cloud and Data Center Topics

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Apps.gov

First Federal storefront site to commoditize cloud services so that buyers may cross-compare products and purchase (launched September, 2009). Currently

offering SaaS and social media products.

Cloud Services available on apps.gov

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12 Cloud Service Providers Receive IaaS Awards

Vendor Cloud Storage Virtual Machines Web Hosting

1 Apptis, Inc. X X

2 AT&T X X

3 Autonomic Resources X

4 CGI Federal Inc. X X

5 Computer Literacy World X X X

6 Computer Technology Consultants X X X

7 Eyak Tech LLC X X X

8 General Dynamics Information Technology X

9 Insight Public Sector X

10 Savvis Federal Systems X X

11 Verizon Federal Inc. X

12 Carahsoft X

Total Awards by Lot 6 11 5

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FedRAMP – Federal Risk & Authorization Management Program

Unified Government-wide Risk Management Program• Provides joint security authorization and continuous

monitoring• Agencies participate by leveraging the results for

covered products• Agencies retain their responsibility and authority to

ensure their security needs are met in the use of systems

Vendor Benefits• Government-wide authorization and security

compliance cost reductionAgency Benefits• Cost savings through reduced duplication• Rapid acquisition• Increased security assurance

Cloud Providers

Federal Agencies

Risk

Man

agem

ent

Problem: Independent agency risk management has inefficiencies

Solution: Unified risk management eliminates inefficiencies

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Cloud ProvidersVisit fedramp.gov for Documentation & Comments

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Software-as-a-Service (SaaS): Email

• Inter-agency SaaS Email Working Group established in June 2010.

• Developing an RFQ for a government-wide BPA of SaaS email solutions.

• RFI completed.

• 13 respondents.

• RFI responses will be leveraged to create RFQ requirements.

• Pre-solicitation day held November 1 to solicit vendor and government feedback.

• Email Procurement to be conducted early 2011.

• GSA completed security authorization of Google Apps which may be leveraged by other agencies.

• USAID leveraged Google Apps security authorization package to greatly reduce timeline for system implementation

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GeoCloud Community Technical Platform Introducing the Initiative

Business Drivers• Growing pool of identified

agency applications seeking cloud benefits

• 12 Existing Geospatial applications as targets

• Quantify savings, identify risks, ease migration

Platforms• Construct a discrete subset of

secure supporting platforms• Develop processes for rapid

application migration• Leverage certifications and

platform commonalities• Develop chargeback

mechanisms for self-sustaining funding

Best Practices• Capture lessons learned• Document techniques, issues

and solutions• Document cost models and

benchmarks• Build a cloud platform

support community• Maintain platforms, scripts

and updates for client agencies

Results

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…

More …

FGDC App 1

FGDC App 2

Potential Offerings: Geospatial PaaS

Infrastructure as A Service Savings

Hardware Savings Operations Savings Scalability Savings

GeoCloud Community Platform

Large pool of agency applications identified for

cloud migration

Federal Platform Reference Implementations

AppsNeed

Platforms

PlatformsAmplify

IaaSSavings

Platform Revenue Stream

Enable Infrastructure Savings

Platform Savings

Platform building time & effort

Reduced mainten-

ance costs

Faster deploy-ment

Cost effective develop-ment /

test

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Cloud Community Platform Service ScopeInitial Target Applications for Community Platforms

Agency Platform Based On Base Platform Category

DOI Wetlands Mapper Windows/IIS/ESRI Windows ESRI Platform with additions for ORACLE as needed

Normal

USDA USDA CDSI Web Services Windows/IIS/ESRI /SQLServer Normal

USDA USDA Geospatial Public Catalog

Windows/JSP/ESRI/SQL2008 Normal

EPA EPA Lakes & Ponds Windows / PostGres/ESRINOAA NOAA Particles Linux/Java/Axis/MQ Linux Open Source

Platform with Java/Ruby on Rails/Tomcat,/EJB3, PostGres, MySQL (alt) Python, PHP, Perl and ApacheGood candidate for a single base platform

Normal

USGS GEOSS GeoNetwork w. additions

Linux/TomCat/PostGres Normal

Census TIGER/LINE Shapefiles Linux / Apache / Perl/Python Normal

NOAA IOOS Registry + Linux/TomCat/PostGres Normal

NOAA NOAA ERDAP Linux/TomCat/THREDDS Data

DHS Emergency Web Response Site Linux LAMP Normal

USGS USGS VGI OpenStreetMap Linux/Apache/PostGIS/Ruby On Rails/Timecop

Normal

FGDC GeoCloud Community Platform Portal

Linux LAMP/Drupal Normal

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Platform asa Service (PaaS)

Platform as a Service Architectural FrameworkDistinguishing Application, Platform and Infrastructure

Applications12 identified GeoSpatial Applications + more agency apps…

Infrastructure

Virtual Machines / CPU

Storage

Application Servers: Provide the deployment environment for actual business applications with access to enablers, frameworks and runtimes

Frameworks and Libraries save time and expense freeing developers from having to build common code and behaviors.

Platform Enablers: Platform enablers provide core supporting capabilities for developing , testing and deploying code, including DBMS, Directory, Queue, Service Bus, etc. A relational database is the most common enabler example but is not present in all platforms

Runtimes: provide the execution support for developing and running the code. Examples include Java, Python, Microsoft Common Language Runtime, etc.

PlatformApplication Servers

App Frameworks / Libraries

Runtime Systems

Platform Enablers (DB’s, etc)

Operating System

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Data.gov

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“Raw” Data Catalog Includes datasets in an download of machine readable, platform-independent datasets

Tool CatalogProvides hyperlinks which may lead to agency tools or agency web pages that allow you to mine datasets.

Geodata CatalogLinked to Geodata.gov

What are Data.gov Catalogs?

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Data.gov Today

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2895 Raw Datasets

638 Tools

303,181 Geodata

306,714 Total in Catalog

Geo-Spatial Data is A Key Enabler for “Killer Apps”

• Combine capabilities of Geodata.gov and Data.gov

• Enhanced visualization and data-mashing capabilities

• Geo-aware applications are key.How to realize the promise of geospatial information systems (GIS) for the nation?– Geo-data “architected and built-in”– Lightweight geo-applications and mash-

ups for Web 2.0/Gov 2.0– Incremental, agile, actionable and

affordable delivery

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What’s Next? Geo-data Integration

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Data.gov :Migration, Key Improvements and Policy Issues

• Geospatial enhancements to Data.gov:– Catalog Services

• Adopting automated harvesting methods• Provide access to all data types from geodata.gov• Provide access to FGDC metadata as defined and populated by suppliers• Implement a geospatial search and visualization • Implement a harvestable Catalog (API)• Enable data.gov to search suppliers and other open data catalogs• Implement GeoRSS and RSS notifications• Publish data.gov catalog as a map (KML,WMS) and data service (RDF) for

multiple client access

• Public domain Geodata.gov datasets that don’t meet policy guidelines will be migrated and maintained in a distributed catalog

• Decommission Geodata.gov?

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Data.gov Catalog – Relationship to Geo-Platform and Cloud

• Data.gov should provide the catalog and metadata searching services for the Geo Community– Treat data as data

• Data.gov site and application; over time can be a SaaS offering – running in a cloud

• Data.gov has observed a need for its suppliers to have geospatial services (Paas) to support use cases to do:– Geo enablement services for datasets– Map Service Hosting– Dynamic map service creation for datasets– Delivery /Download services for large datasets– Formatting services for datasets

• Data.gov has observed need for its suppliers to have IaaS services• Data storage• Computational Processing

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Data.gov in Geo Community

…PublishHarvest

TheNationalMap

Discovery

Access

applicationscatalog

Geospatial One-StopPortal (geodata.gov)

Data and service sources (Federal, State, Local, Tribal, and Private)

data

services

metadata

Framework Datasets

Discovery

Client

HarvestPublish &Harvest

metadata metadata metadata

Data.gov

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Questions

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