Exclusives

Are You Sure You Are Maximizing the Value of Your Microsoft SharePoint Investment?
July 2013
The Microsoft SharePoint platform provides a wealth of opportunities for any organization to streamline business processes and expand knowledge sharing; however most government organizations struggle to take advantage of these opportunities.

Hurricane Preparedness
May 2013
Make sure you are prepared for hurricane season before it is here. Join in this Digital Communities teleconference and gain insight on how to prepare from experts who have been on the ground during major hurricanes.

Government-to-Government IT Services: What Works and What's Left to Work Out
May 2013
This paper offers some best practices for shared government-to-government services, but also points out challenges that government and industry still must overcome before this model gains widespread adoption.

10 Requirements for a Successful Oracle R12 Upgrade
April 2013
This white paper provides 10 key best practices to help your organization effectively manage change to your ERP systems, with particular attention to upgrading to R12.

Digital Cities & Digital Counties Survey: Best Practice Guide
March 2013
This Best Practice Guide helps address some of these weaknesses by highlighting the best practices displayed by cities and counties that are managing to move the needle and innovate.

311’s Role in an Emergency Operations Center Activation
March 2013
Every community has various types of events that result in the activation of their Emergency Operations Center which range from weather events to major fires.

Managing Virtualized Infrastructure to Improve the User Experience
March 2013
Increasingly, the major components of government IT infrastructure are virtualized: servers, storage, network, user workspaces. Virtualization saves hardware costs, energy and physical data center space. But virtualization complicates the job of the IT department to track and manage response time and the user experience.

Public Safety Mobile Apps for 4G Networks
March 2013
An unprecedented opportunity to improve public safety through the development and sharing of mobile applications will be made possible through the creation of the FirstNet network. However, at present no comprehensive model exists for the development of such nationwide, public safety focused applications. This paper discusses how governments and public safety officials can build off of the private sector’s mobile ecosystem, and work collaboratively to deploy targeted and secure public safety mobile applications.

Shared Services and SLA Accountability
December 2012
We will discuss the challenges of integrating your diverse existing infrastructure and monitoring tools into a service-focused, comprehensive Application Performance Monitoring solution which enables you to assess performance against your SLA’s, financial plan and organizational/mission requirements. These challenges include monitoring all components, including those such as network infrastructure, storage and others which may be utilized by multiple services. We will also discuss how to assess cloud-based services without relying solely on provider-generated performance metrics.

Ready San Diego: Developing Mobile Apps for Emergency Preparedness
December 2012
Ready San Diego is a premier emergency preparedness site which includes SD Emergency, a must-have Government-to-Citizen emergency preparedness app for smart phones and other mobile devices. Join this Digital Communities teleconference and learn how the County of San Diego is going mobile with apps like SD Emergency to help citizens prepare, plan and stay informed.

Payment Card Industry Compliance in Government
November 2012
How can government agencies ensure they are properly protecting cardholder data, and most importantly, instilling trust in constituents so they continue to complete transactions online? The answer is to comply with Payment Card Industry (PCI) Security Standards. This paper provides valuable information to government agencies about the complicated topic of PCI compliance so they can benefit from online transactions without the risk of non-compliance.

Next Generation Public Safety: Investing in Your Future to Improve Emergency Response
October 2012
For the last 30-plus years, our emergency call centers have aided millions of people and helped save countless numbers of lives. However, times and communication technologies are changing rapidly. Older systems that have served us so well for so long are beginning to show their age. Increasingly, more agencies are sharing resources with neighboring city and county agencies to reduce costs and increase interoperability. More powerful, more effective new systems are on their way, driven by a convergence of social, technological and economic trends. You will learn how a regional interoperability project has evolved and how local agencies are using these new technologies to improve their emergency response.

Shifting Landscape: Attracting and Retaining Top Talent in the Local Government Workforce
September 2012
This paper is an overview of the issues currently challenging local government executives seeking to build and maintain a successful and proactive workforce. The paper includes topics for discussion and resources leaders can use in creating their own strategies for hiring, as well as tips to engage and instruct their peer-level local government human resources executives.

Meeting the CJIS Mandate for Advanced Authentication
September 2012
This paper provides an overview of the CJIS requirements, presents various technology options, discusses considerations when implementing advanced authentication and offers best practices for meeting the CJIS mandate.

Continuity with Cloud Solutions: Improve Response and Reduce Time to Recover
August 2012
When planning for any type of disaster, public sector needs to consider a geographically diverse strategy for maintaining availability and access to mission-critical applications.

Hurricane Preparedness Teleconference
July 2012
Join in this Digital Communities teleconference and gain insight on how to prepare from experts who have been on the ground during major hurricanes.

Active Directory Disasters: Are You Prepared?
April 2012
Active Directory (AD) disasters can happen – do you have a recovery plan? Join Digital Communities and Quest Software for an audio only discussion to gain insight about the types of situations that can cause failure and how you can keep your enterprise services running smoothly when an AD disaster strikes. Are you ready for that dreaded day? The day where your entire organization grinds to a halt because of some unforeseen Active Directory disaster?

Sacramento Superior Court
March 2012
Listen to this informative teleconference to learn how Sacramento Superior Court was able to automate the processing of over 260,000 vehicle related citations annually from approximately 50 law enforcement agencies.

The Future of the Desktop in Government
March 2012
Until recently, there was no alternative to the familiar desktop computer, and its expensive upgrades and maintenance requirements. For cash-strapped local governments, the desktop computer is quickly becoming an unsustainable option for future progress. Now, a technology known as virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) offers an alternative. It can be significantly more affordable than buying individual computers for every employee, and it provides similar capability. This paper shows how VDI is the future of the desktop and is a game-changer for local governments.

CIOs Redefine Local Government and Industry Relations
September 2011
Based off of discussions of the Digital Communities Large Jurisdiction Chief Information Officer (CIO) Working Group, this white paper aims to answer the question, "In today's economic, political and business environment, what constitutes a successful relationship between government and industry?" Cause for Optimism identifies and clarifies the issues that separate government and industry, and begins to find an answer to the question necessary for both to enjoy a successful and prosperous future.