Chances are that your IT shop (and most others) faces accusations every day. IT has its own set of goals and concerns that must come first. When these facts come into conflict with your user’s needs or wants, then something has got to give.

IT is currently facing two dilemmas. The first is many want their private cloud architecture to work with their existing data center. Secondly, IT professionals are looking to build private clouds that are open to other clouds but also equipped to run existing in-house systems and applications. So you may be asking yourself, “Why should I build a private cloud?”

In this week's Technically News: When Disaster Strikes, Will Federal Data Be Safe; Dell, Oracle form Strategic Partnership for Integrated Systems; Translating Good Intentions Into Effective Cybersecurity Policy; 25 Most Influential Government CIOs.

This week in Technically News: One Small Step for NASA, One Giant Leap for Open Source; Chinese Hack Targets Weapons’ Designs; SolarWinds Raises Profile in Cloud-Based IT Management; 30 Years of Accumulation: A Timeline of Cloud Computing; Tracking the Evolution of Big Data: A Timeline.

Constantly changing requirements are the bane of production at scale. Finding ways to balance the needed stability of a production environment while handling bugs and enhancements is the key challenge in operating and developing enterprise software.

In this week's Technically News: 5 Reasons the Government Needs to be More Like the Tech Industry; Lawmakers: What’s Still Missing in Data Center Consolidation; 5 Keys to Getting Big Data Under Control; Oracle: 4 Reasons Why Information Silos are Hindering Cloud Advantages; Amazon Web Services Gains FedRAMP Compliance for GovCloud; CloudCheckr Monitors Amazon GovCloud.

What’s the secret to successful BIM implementations? Well, our latest eBook, produced in partnership with DLT Solutions, draws on some of the lessons learned from these projects and offers tips, best practices and insights into real-world implementations to help your agency navigate its adoption and management of BIM projects and processes.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has published the fourth revision of the cybersecurity guide, Security and Privacy Controls for Federal information Systems and Organizations - or "SP (Special Publication) 800-53". Here are a few thoughts.

If your agency has decided on a BIM process and a technology to support it – how do you know if your BIM process is efficient? Are you getting every benefit available? Here are some simple checks, recommended by IMAGINiT Technologies, that you can follow to determine whether you’re getting the most out of your investment in BIM

Responding to the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests can be a cumbersome and time consuming process for government agencies. It involves gathering massive amounts of data, redacting or removing sensitive information, and sending the required material to the requestor in a timely manner. For many agencies – especially in today’s budget and resource constrained environment – responding to FOIA requests has become an increasingly challenging process.