Using Apache Open Source Tools in the Federal Govt

["Galbreath, Mark A" <Ga...@state.gov>]

Alls,

I am part of a team in the US Department of State charged with transforming
our technical infrastructure from mainframe-centric COBOL and Micro$oft ASP
apps to Linux-based portals and Web services using open source.  Besides the
political hassle with vested interests in the legacy infrastructure, we have
Security and the Change Control Board refusing to even consider open source
unless we can show that it is being used successfully in other branches of
the Federal government, including the military.

If anybody can share such non-classified projects and/or sites, or a contact
(especially for classified projects) I can call to discuss same, I would
sure appreciate it!

tia,
Mark

Mark Galbreath, Sr. Technical Consultant
Project REACH
US Department of State
IRM/OPS/SIO/APD
SA-15/200
703-875-4006

THIS MESSAGE IS NOT CLASSIFIED.

Re: Using Apache Open Source Tools in the Federal Govt

["John K. Sterling" <jo...@sterls.com>]

Hi Mark -

I work for the Army in Information Assurance and although much of the
armed forces are still a bit slow to work with open source, the NSA has
been very active in certifying and securing open source systems.  For
example, they maintain what they call "Security Enhance" Linux (selinux)
and work with several apache projects.  I suggest contacting the nsa
research folks:

http://www.nsa.gov/selinux/

sterling



> Alls,
>
> I am part of a team in the US Department of State charged with
> transforming our technical infrastructure from mainframe-centric COBOL
> and Micro$oft ASP apps to Linux-based portals and Web services using
> open source.  Besides the political hassle with vested interests in the
> legacy infrastructure, we have Security and the Change Control Board
> refusing to even consider open source unless we can show that it is
> being used successfully in other branches of the Federal government,
> including the military.
>
> If anybody can share such non-classified projects and/or sites, or a
> contact (especially for classified projects) I can call to discuss same,
> I would sure appreciate it!
>
> tia,
> Mark
>
> Mark Galbreath, Sr. Technical Consultant
> Project REACH
> US Department of State
> IRM/OPS/SIO/APD
> SA-15/200
> 703-875-4006
>
> THIS MESSAGE IS NOT CLASSIFIED.