ArcGIS for National Government: What is it? Is it New? #esrifedcon

Today, Esri launched ArcGIS for National Government at their Federal GIS conference. What is it and is it anything new for ArcGIS users?

ArcGIS for National Government, as best I can discern from the presentations, is composed of data services, combined with pre-assembled workflow templates that also includes pre-configured model builder workflows that result in a specific "information product." If you happen to be working in an intelligence agency, there are specific templates/workflows called "ArcGIS for Intelligence."

For example, the ArcGIS for Intelligence solution contains specific content and other information products such as basemaps that may convey "live" current events happening in the world and provides the user the ability to drill down to information about actual incidents. The basemaps may include ready to use layers specific to that application or cartographic elements, such as a light gray, low contract basemap so point and polygon data will not be overwhelmed with colors and attribution of a typical base map.

Another aspect of the solution provides for the creation of an user-defined image or data catalog with a rating scale so users can see how helpful a data layer or image has been to others. Any value-added work created within a project can be published to the catalog and registered as a service that others can use as well.

Additionally, users can access ready to use products including analytical templates to answer specific questions. If you were working as a border patrol agent, these templates would include applications for:

• Situational awareness
• Border patrol mobile applications
• Border crossing activity

The template, then, includes standard map layers (land cover, water, etc.) but also known trails that illegal aliens will use and the locations of border arrests plus polygons for border patrol administration areas.

Finally, the solution also includes a pre-configured model builder template for these applications. The user then gathers data by browsing ArcGIS Online to look for layers that may be more specific to his/her own project area. Once the analysis has been completed, the entire analysis can be sent out via a layer package that other users can pull into their ArcGIS system.

Is any of this new? What's new is that these kinds of solutions are packaged. While the underlying technology is not new, Esri is trying to simplify the workflow, which would be particularly useful to neophyte GIS users. And with an expected expansion of knowledge workers that want to avail themselves of geospatial technology but are not yet expert with ArcGIS, this certainly gives them a push in the right direction. In a way, it reminds me of the large, post-sized workflow models that Esri used to publish for certain vertical industries. This is the evolution of those posters for the era of "cloud."

DHS to Re-solicit Remote Sensing for Homeland Security Procurement and other Federal Gov GIS News

In reference to the subject solicitation for Remote Sensing services, the Office of Procurement Operations, Enterprise Acquisitions Division (OPO/EAD) intends to cancel the procurement and re-solicit... 

It's not 100% clear why, but maybe the documents were just confusion. The cancellation notice goes on:

As a result of the response from industry, the Geospatial Management Office and the OPO/EAD will be streamlining the evaluation criteria in order to clarify for the vendors the basis on which their proposals will be evaluated.

- notice via @MAPPSorg

It's been a few years since the news of a new NGA HQ began. Another big milestone occured last week: the master plan was approved.

The National Capital Planning Commission (NCPC) approved the final plan for a redeveloped intelligence community campus in Bethesda, Md., last week.

The 39-acre campus and former home of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency will support 3,000 employees and be run by the Defense Intelligence Agency, according to the Army Corps of Engineers, which is developing the site. Construction should be finished by the end of 2013.

- Federal Times

The NGA released some imagery from the GAMBIT and HEXAGON satellites. The birds and their details were release last fall, but a few images became available in January. Sadly, they are not available for analysis.

The GAMBIT and HEXAGON satellites were formally declassified last September on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the National Reconnaissance Office.  At that time, the NRO released voluminous documentation on the development of those satellites.  But the associated imagery, which is held by the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, was not released.  Now a small number of satellite images have been made public.

However, the newly disclosed images are not originals, but are embedded in “posters” published by the NRO.  As such, they do not lend themselves to detailed analysis, complained Charles P. Vick of GlobalSecurity.org.  Nor are the original negatives of the declassified photos available for public inspection.

- Secrecy News

• AGRICULTURE. Olsson Frank Weeda Terman Matz has been hired by the National Geospatial Coalition to “consult and advocate regarding funding and use of geospatial imaging in federal agriculture programs,” according to lobbying disclosure records. Former Rep. Charlie Stenholm (D-Texas) is lobbying for the coalition.

Olsson, etc. is not a person but a law firm. And, the organization is not the National Geospatial Coalition (no such thing so far as I could find) but rather the Agriculture Geospatial Coalition, LLC, which I wrote about in 2009 (APB coverage).

- The Hill

EnhancedView Could Take $50 Million Hit - Aviation Week

Aviation Week is reporting that the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) may be forced to renegotiate the EnhanceView contract with GeoEye and DigitalGlobe due to an expected $50 Million cut to the agency's 2012 fiscal year budget with the prospect of more cuts in fiscal 2013. The original EnhancedView contract was $7.3 billion over 10 years and was signed in 2010. The contract was roughly split between the two commercial satellite providers. According to a source cited by Aviation Week:

“You’re going to have to find a way to probably restructure the current service-level agreements with both companies if they’re going to take $50 million out,” says one geospatial-intelligence industry official familiar with EnhancedView. “Any reduction in the budget on the service-level agreement means you’re changing the scope of the contract and you have to renegotiate.”

Last week we reported that NGA was going to procure less imagery in 2013 but that Pentagon investments in new spacecraft would continue.