From January 3 through January 5, 2004, the NASA website that tracked the doings of the Mars rovers sustained more than half a billion hits — 506,621,916 to be exact. That was a record for NASA, surpassing the world’s Web traffic in pornography over the same three days.

Working NASA’s enterprise web is exactly what I’ve been been deeply focused on for that past year. The entire stack, from infrastructure to software services, is being examined with the intent of providing a technological refresh. Details are beginning to emerge and I’ll share them here as I can.¹

Without sharing the nitty gritty details, anyone working with Web technologies should be able to predict what NASA is hoping to adopt. Cloud infrastructures. Open source software.  A good overview of this effort can be found in NASA’s Open Government Plan.

Working NASA’s Enterprise Web © J.J. Toothman, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported.

1. Meaning: as I’m allowed to

So what got me back to writing a post this morning?  It was how pleased I was at the public’s reaction, especially in D.C., to the Space Shuttle Discovery getting piggybacked into Dulles for permanent display at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum.

I’ve always liked the notion that the Space Shuttles were “our space machines”.  Seeing the people of DC come out and see Discovery arrive was a reminder of why I enjoy working at NASA in the first place. In the picture of what NASA does, my contribution is pretty small, but I do believe that I’m doing my part to help America’s space program and that I’m helping contribute to NASA’s mission, in particular the missions of inspiring the next generation of explorers and sharing knowledge with the world.

Last week’s event was a reminder that people still are fascinated by NASA and the American space program.¹  The media is rich in reports of NASA’s demise and there are no lacks of calls for shutting down the U.S. space program. In my opinion, NASA isn’t dying.  It’s evolving.

Why I do it © J.J. Toothman, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported.

1. And let’s be fair, that whole event was engineered in a manner to remind people that matter – like Congress – of just that.

I’m currently looking for 3 resources to help out with this pilot.  See below for details.

Project Description

The NASA Google Sites Projects will use Google Sites software (and other appropriate software applications within the Google Apps Enterprise Suite) to develop 2 prototype enterprise web solutions. The first prototype will explore Google Sites as a social intranet solution. The second prototype will explore Google Sites as a collaborative extranet that allows NASA scientists, researchers, and mission operations personnel to effectively and securely collaborate with trusted, non-NASA partners. Each prototype will be developed using content in existing legacy web content management solutions.

Project Timeline

Length of project is 2-3 months and will start on March 1.

Web Front End Design Engineer

Candidate will lead the visual interface design, information design, and information architecture of 2 prototype enterprise web sites to be built using Google Sites. Candidate will be responsible for developing the required Google Sites compatible themes, page templates, and Google gadgets required for the presentation of existing content within a Google Sites based solution. Candidate will also provide necessary documentation for use by resources tasked with content migration.

Required Skills

• 3 years experience designing and implementing web sites/ web applications using front-end web technologies, including XHTML and CSS
• Previous experience with Web content management systems and CMS templating features
• Previous experience designing and implementing designs and information architectures for web content published with Google Sites

Content Manager (2)

The Content Managers will be tasked with the migration of content from existing web sites into prototype web sites built with Google Sites. This task will include the implementation and formatting and content into predefined templates and layouts.

Required Skills

• Previous experience with online content management systems
• Previous experience publishing content using web based content editors and publishing tools used for display of photos and images
• Understanding of web templates and layouts
• Understanding of web display technologies such as html

To be clear, candidates would be working for Dell Federal Government Services on a contract Dell has to provide I.T. resources at NASA Ames Research Center in California.  But I am willing to discuss the project and work with the right person located anywhere in the U.S.

If you are interested, send me an email at jj.toothman@nasa.gov.  Please include your resume; any web links that might help me get to know  you and your previous work; and your hourly rate if possible.

Looking for Help on a Google Sites Project at NASA © J.J. Toothman, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported.

(Note: I rarely cross post the same piece to multiple blogs.  But in a tribute to Steve Jobs, I’m going to do so with this post.  Steve liked to say that he worked where technology met the liberal arts. His work crossed a lot of boundaries.  In that spirit, I’m going to share this on the many blogs I contribute to where the subject cross various boundaries.) 

I have always found it interesting to assess how I react to the passing of people whom I never got a chance to meet.  But despite that, they’re still people that have played a significant role in my life by inspiring me, adding joy, and impacting my life in so many positive ways.  It always takes me a while to collect my thoughts and find that proper clarity.  Clarity that helps me determine the proper perspective and context of the significance of the person the world has just lost.  As clarity emerged for me late last night, too late for me to start writing anything, I realized that the last time I felt this deep sense of loss (for someone who I had never met) was when Jerry Garcia died. 

Like Jerry Garcia, Steve Jobs infused a lot of joy into my life. Jerry did it with the sounds of his guitar, the songs he played, and the festive parties¹ we both participated in.  Steve jobs impacted my life with technology.  Life changing technology.  As Steve would put it, it was (and is) technology infused with the  liberal arts.

I did not grow up an Apple user.  I do not have a story that involves my first Apple II. In fact, I learned computing on TRS-80s, Commodore 64s, and IBM PCs.  On those systems, I learned how to write programs in BASIC, how to operate MS-DOS, and how to launch computer games via the DOS prompt. 

Back in the 80s, my mother was involved with desktop publishing and, as you might expect, involved with evaluating Apple products and desktop publishing software.  My first exposure to Apple and the genius of Steve Jobs was the Macintosh she brought home to evaluate  The Macintosh – a personal computer with a graphical user interface that made a fun, somehow appealing deep tone announcing its presence whenever you turned it on.  Mom may have brought that home to evaluate for work, but I was the one really evaluating it.² This only child found an instant playmate.  MacPaint.  Solitaire.  Just moving the mouse around and seeing the cursor move with you was a thrill.  It felt like…the future.

You would think that such an experience would create an Apple fanboy for life.  But it didn’t happen that way.  The main computer in the house remained an IBM PC.  That’s what got me through high school papers and college applications.  Attending the University of Vermont meant having a PC as well.  And so it went for me.  Developing early computing proficiencies that do this day have me primarily working primarily on a windows machine.  Nevertheless, the windows machines were life changing and would not be the same without Steve’s innovations with the graphical user interface.  I use computers every day.  Personally and professionally.  I can manipulate, absorb, and produce information in countless ways.  Ways I never would have imagined as a 13 year old boy.  If Steve doesn’t evolve personal computing with the GUI, I’m probably not writing this blog post right now. Or working in the job I have right now.  Or living in the house I am right now. Thank you, Steve

No, Steve Jobs didn’t start impacting my life with his own life altering inventions until the iPod came out. That was the first Apple product I ever owned. When I got one, my music collection was already spinning out control.  Having to select 10 CDs to take with me in the car or to work was not only hard to do due to having to think ahead about what I might want to listen to 4 hours from now, but also time consuming.  The iPod changed everything.  I could put the bulk of my music and have it at my fingertips for any moment. And it was the size of my wallet.  So small that it was easy to misplace. I once wrote that if my house was on fire, I would first make sure my family was safe then see if I could run back inside and grab the iPod. It was a device that infused my life with a constant soundtrack.  Thank you, Steve.

And Apple and I went from there.  The iPod was a gateway drug device. The iPhone. I can’t even tell you how much the iPhone has changed my life and so many others.  All this information from every corner of the globe.  In my pocket.  Thank you, Steve.

The evolutionary device of the iPhone, the iPad has once again shown me the future.  All I need to do is watch my kids with an iPad.  It’s just like when my Mom brought that Macintosh home.  I  have given my kids zero instruction with an iPad. They are three and five years old and they can both find a movie on Netflix, browse maps, play Angry Birds, and launch apps to help them learn spelling, math, and music.  It is the future.  My kids thank you, Steve.

They also thank you for Pixar. And the most impressive family friendly animated films the world has ever seen. 

The inventions of Steve Jobs continue to infuse the life of this family.  A family slowly morphing into an Apple household.  My wife now has a Macbook Air.  A machine so impressive that I myself have thought of ditching the windows laptop and purchasing one. 

It is perfectly natural, that I learned about Steve Jobs on his invention.  An iPhone.  I then used the same device to connect with friends on Twitter and Facebook.  And then used an iPad to read news stories and coverage of his death. His legacy and impact will be felt for generations to come.  It is hard to sound full of hyperbole with Steve Jobs.  He was the Einstein and Henry Ford of our times. He will be missed and there will never be another.

On the passing of Steve Jobs © J.J. Toothman, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported.

1. aka Grateful Dead concerts
2. Looking back, maybe that was Mom’s plan all along.  To see how a 13 year old boy can grasp the Mac with zero instruction and guidance.

I have intimate knowledge of everything the team went through to get this site launched. And as it is with anything having to do with the inner workings of the federal government, this project met its fair share of bureaucracy, repetitive debate, and internal politics.  I’m pretty sure they had to jump through a ring of fire, solve the debt crisis, and return the ring to Mordor before getting this site released to the public.²

But as much as I could praise their perserverance in seeing the project through to the finish line³, I’d much rather highlight and applaud the site’s visual and information design. As a admirer and practitioner of minimalist web design, I believe that interface design should get out of the way and let content shine through.  Simply put, the best web design lets the content speak for itself.  NASA possesses visual imagery that makes up some of the most compelling content anyone has ever seen.  I’m happy to see that open.nasa.gov was designed and developed in a way that I notice the site titles, logos, and navigation only as the functional elements that they are; and not the design and branding elements that they are often deployed as.

I wish I could say the same of every NASA web site.⁴

open.nasa.gov launches to the public © J.J. Toothman, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported.

1. Hey, just like this site does.  Those guys chose wisely.
2. No. Not really.  Except possibly the ring of fire part.
3. A lot of that bureaucracy stuff is often utilized to make projects organically drop off the radar
4. Especially, this one

By the way, if the above paragraph means little to you, it probably means that you have yet to try out Google+. Everything you wanted to know about Google+ (so far) can be found in this Mashable post.

What I think about Google+ is that by the end of 2013, we won’t be talking about it anymore and the tumbleweeds will be rolling in.  One of the big things I’ve heard people say about Google+ is that it provides a Facebook “do-over” for those Facebook users that ruined their social graphs by friending too many people, or worse, friending a lot of strangers.  But I think people like that are in the minority of Facebook’s 700 million users.  Furthermore, I think the majority of Facebook users shudder at the thought of having to recreate their networks on something like Google+. 

But there is a place Google+ can be an easy, uncontested slam dunk.  That’s as internal social network for enterprises making use of Google Apps. The number of people craving a Facebook for the workplace is massive.  People want to utilize social network mechanics as tools for working together and getting stuff done.  And while there have been plenty of attempts to provide this from companies such as Microsoft, Jive, and Salesforce, Google is in a position to simply turn Google+ on as part of its Google Apps offering and provide the solution with very little barrier to adoption.  I’m telling you, it would be an instant success.

I’m certainly not alone in desiring Google+ be included as a Google Apps feature and fortunately, Google appears to be hearing the pleas and taking action.

The big (and only?) opportunity for Google+ © J.J. Toothman, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported.

In reading the official NASA Open Source Summit Proceedings, two things dawned on me.  First, every tech conference should produce and distribute such a document.  Second, what would such a document look like for SXSW?

So was the event useful?  The best use for any NASA I.T. conference is that it creates a gathering of all interested parties in one place.  NASA is incredibly decentralized and silo’d across states, nations, and, if there’s a NASA astronaut orbiting the Earth at the time, across the cosmos.  Any opportunity to gather people in place has its benefits for NASA.

NASA Open Source Summit Proceedings © J.J. Toothman, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported.

There exists, without a shadow of a doubt, a massive “digital divide.”  Many organizations just assume ignore this fact of reality.  But it is undeniable.  It would be unfair to call this technology gap amongst the government populace as having age as its root cause. It is also unfair and would be, to be completely blunt about it, an egregious error to take a strategic tact at closing this technological gap by simply waiting for “generation Y” to emerge into positions of authority over the next couple of decades.  That approach is for the weak and unwilling.  People taking that approach are not the change agents we should have in place working to make things better.  Those people are not working.  They are waiting.  That approach is like watching your favorite baseball team in the playoffs and hoping the other team does something wrong so your team can win. 

Those of us in government who are rolling up our sleeves and drafting position papers, strategic plans, and trying out an abundance of tools and services in order to weld government with the social media practices almost all of us realize are, to put it most succinctly, one of the major mechanisms by which any of us will actually get in work done in the future, understand that workforce and organizational culture is the the biggest blocker to any utopian vision we have to overcome. 

Those of us who have accepted this simple truth also realize that we’re not doing enough to mitigate this problem.  As written by Publivate:

If there is a frustration, it is that I believe there are no or at least not enough actions aligning to the agreed upon problem of engaging culture blockers. Culture gets mentioned, everyone agrees, and then conversation turns to a technical or implementation discussion. We need to – arguably, have to – dig into the culture change deeper and on a regular basis. To not do this is robbing important momentum from public sector social media evolution.

There is no perfect tool or similar silver bullet that will correctly change culture.  There is a combination of elements that need to mix perfectly in order to make the culture change stew.  Actually, its not so much stew as it is a combination of ingredients to make a high-end gumbo.  And like any good gumbo, it needs constant stirring¹ from the very beginning.  Constant stirring with no deviation from attention.  Almost like have a newborn baby around.

Most social media programs initiated within large enterprises (government institutions included) start from the bottom up. These grass roots, borderline guerilla tactics are typically initiated by social media believers full of energy, and most importantly, belief.  In fact, it is belief that these grass roots mavens have in abundance.  Digital natives (as Nick Skytland refers to them) are totally immersed in a social media existence.  Sharing so much text, imagery, and data about their lives is completely natural.  It is fair to say that they know no other way to be. 

So middle management exists as ground zero for the social media digital divide.  How can we approach ground zero?  What is the strategic plan to sway the middle management populace from social media skeptic to believer, adopter, and maven?   I argue that the digital natives are not best positioned to make such an approach.  Because they know no other way, they have a perspective that clouds their judgments and impacts their ability to strategically convert those mired in the middle.  Phrases such as “because social media is so cool” and “this is just how things are done now” have little to no weight with middle management.  Yet it can not be disputed that the energy is there if only because the craving to evolve the workplace is so intense. The digital natives are ready, yet uncoordinated.  The pockets of activity they engage in can easily be coordinated by first defining what the endgame is and pairing that goal with some mile markers to pass as they walk the entire organization towards Oz.

While digital natives may be the ones to do the heavy lifting, senior levels of organizational leadership need to help set the tone with enough participation to indicate validation of the cause.  It wouldn’t take much to be honest.  If one senior leader email to the troops per month were posted internally as a blog post instead of being sent to all@insertyourorganizationhere.gov with comments turned on, that would probably do it. And if one of those leaders invited everyone in his organization to connect with him/her on LinkedIn, that would further support the cause.

That’s pretty much what the digital natives need at this point.  Validation signs.  And a plan. Or an equivalent orchestrated guerilla tactics and coordinated underground efforts with tangible, measurable goals.  Approaching the middle from the top and the bottom will reduce the gap.

Middle management is ground zero for government’s digital divide © J.J. Toothman, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported.

1. any of you who have ever made homemade gumbo in the past know exactly what I’m talking about.  The key to good gumbo is a good roux.  And doing the roux right means stirring it constantly for the first 10 minutes of cooking time

I like Chris.  And I’ve enjoyed tackling some I.T. issues with him at NASA over the past few years.  The first time we sat down and had lunch together in, I found that I saw eye to eye with him on many things.  We immediately found common ground in the desire to be disruptive within NASA. Chris was most definitely disruptive¹. Not only did he bring fresh ideas about information technology to NASA but he brought fresh ways of tackling them.  Agile ways.  He tried to work at a high energy pace² in a manner that was more familiar with those who have worked in commercial industry or start up cultures.  The pace at which he tried to get things done was my favorite thing about him.

The void he leaves is one of approach as much as it is knowledge.  Will NASA survive without him?  Of course it will.  NASA is too big an institution to fall apart because one person left.  But whoever fills the role needs to bring the energy.

Big shoes to fill in the NASA I.T. world © J.J. Toothman, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported.

1. And also divisive within NASA. Unfortunately
2. Though sometimes, I admit that it looked like it borderlined on being uncontrollably chaotic and frenzied

My talk tied what I’ve experienced participating with open source communities and how the attributes of the most successful open source communities can be applied to working within our institutions and enterprises to change stagnant working cultures.

Presentation: How To Use Open Source Techniques For Your Project Management Needs: Achieving Organizational Culture Change And Breaking Down Barriers Through Social Media Participation © J.J. Toothman, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported.