News

British Computer Society e-GIF Awards
11th December 2006

The e-GIF Accreditation Authority is delighted to announce the winners of this year's e-GIF Awards. The winners were announced as part of the prestigious BCS IT Professional Awards at a gala dinner at the Grosvenor House Hotel in London on December 7th.

The e-GIF Awards recognise outstanding achievement and effort in building projects with strong compliance to government interoperability standards. This year's winners are as follows:

Congratulations to all involved. Case studies for the winning entries have been added to the e-GIF Accreditation Authority web site.

Case Studies added to site
5th December 2006

Several case studies have been added to the e-GIF Accreditation Authority web site including the 2006 BCS Professional Awards e-GIF finalists, OSIAF case studies and projects that have been compliant with e-GIF.

BCS Awards - e-GIF Medallists Finalised
13th November 2006

The e-GIF Accreditation Authority is proud to announce the finalists for this year's e-GIF Awards. The awards form part of the prestigious BCS IT Professional Awards and the winners will be announced during a gala ceremony at the Grosvenor House Hotel in London on December 7th.

The e-GIF Awards recognise outstanding achievement and effort in building projects with strong compliance to government interoperability standards. This year's medallists are as follows:

e-GIF Public Sector Award Medallists
Bridgnorth District Council
London Borough of Waltham Forest
Registers of Scotland / BT Partnership

e-GIF Private Sector Award Medallists
Xansa
LogicaCMG
Atrium Software

Details of the winning medallists will appear on these pages shortly after December 7th.

Last year's winners Department for Educations and Skills (left) and Lorien.

Buying Compliance
16th August 2006

NCC's work supporting local authorities and their suppliers to achieve e-GIF compliance has delivered a useful guide for getting requirements right during procurement for all working in - or supplying to - the public sector. This guide has helpful hints on embedding good practice and sample text that may be used in contracts.

You can download the Buying Compliance Scrapbook (pdf 253kb).

Quality Assurance
14 August 2006

A robust approach to e-GIF compliance combines working with/within an accredited organisation, work being done by certificated individuals of at least e-GIF Foundation Level, and work being benchmarked for compliance to e-GIF using the e-GIF Compliance Assessment Service (CAS) tool.

e-GIF assessments may be more accurate depending on the expertise of whoever has carried them out and the maturity level of the organisation responsible for delivering the products or services that must be e GIF compliant. To support you in this, we've added a 'Quality of Assessment' option at the end of the Project Progress Page.

e-GIF Live!
14th October 2005

One of the pleasures (really!) of life in standards land is getting out and about and help others to realise the benefits of standardisation. We're shamelessly evangelical on the topic at NCC. We've covered e-GIF in public and private locations across the length and breadth of England, Scotland, and Wales and we're now enjoying what we might label 'second generation' briefings. These comprise the 'no surprises' topics such as:

• What is e-GIF?
  
• The business benefits of e-GIF and compliance
  
• Overview of e-GIF Compliance
  
• Overview of e-GIF Accreditation

These then break out into live, on-line assessment of a system so that the session ends with a report of how close to compliance a design or system is (or where compliance has been achieved). These sessions have proven valuable to promoting the understanding of the team effort required and has brought together e-Government officers, software engineers, and infrastructure support staff, responsible for installing hardware, implementing server policies and the like.

Please don't hesitate to get in touch with us here at The National Computing Centre (info@ncc.co.uk) if you feel that you'd benefit from this approach.

Procuring e-GIF Compliant Systems
14th October 2005

The importance of considering compliance early in the system lifecycle cannot be underplayed. So, when asked for advice on how to achieve a cost-effective approach to compliance during the procurement process (through into implementation) this is what we recommend:

When inviting tenders for systems which are within the scope of e-GIF, request at least an e-GIF assessment summary from the bidders for each part of the system. This may then be used to track the system is developed compliant by receiving updates from the successful bidder(s) as revised assessment summaries are delivered at key milestones.

• Each bidder should provide at least the summary report (http://www.egifcompliance.org/assessment/progress.cfm) of compliance from CAS
• Any questions on the summary report can be backed up by submission of the full report (http://www.egifcompliance.org/assessment/form/printquestionnaire.cfm) on how decisions were made, risks mitigated or accepted. Actions could then be made contractual obligations...
• The successful supplier should then continue to deliver at least summary reports during the development and implementation to show continued compliance and delivery in agreement with the original goals

British Computer Society e-GIF Awards
1 October 2005

The National Computing Centre (NCC) is delighted to announce the inaugural winners of the annual e-GIF Accreditation Authority Public Sector and Private Sector awards.

As part of the British Computer Society's Annual IT Professional Awards, the e-GIF awards recognise outstanding efforts in the development of systems complying with Government-led standards for interoperability within the Public Sector.

During the gala evening hosted by BCS at the Park Lane Hilton, London on the 29th September 2005, the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) received the e-GIF Accreditation Authority Public Sector Award whilst Lorien Public Sector received the equivalent award for Private Sector Companies.

DfES overcame stern competition from Glasgow City Council, Essex County Council / BT Partnership and The Adapters Club who all received medals in recognition of their achievements. The other Private Sector medallists were LogicaCMG, Parity and DPS Software.

Left: Saddick Johaadien of DfES accepts the e-GIF Public Sector Award.
Right: NCC's CEO Michael Gough presents Lorien's Gary McQuade (left) with the e-GIF Private Sector Award.

e-GIF Technical Standards Catalogue updated to version 6.2
16 September 2005

The updated e-GIF Technical Standards Catalogue that is now at version 6.2 can be found on GovTalk (http://www.govtalk.gov.uk/schemasstandards/egif_document.asp?docnum=957). Particularly to be welcomed is the explicit specification of standards for accessibility and usability in their own table.

We also expect that many will welcome the clear flexibility of the framework for file formats as it now states that 'Other file formats may be used . . . provided they meet the technical policy for document handling in the e-GIF'. Compliance with the core policies is still key and for this the e-GIF has not changed and remains at version 6.1 (See http://www.govtalk.gov.uk/schemasstandards/egif_document.asp?docnum=949).

Here at the National Computing Centre we are updating your on-line e-GIF assessment resource to include the revised Technical Standards Catalogue. Meanwhile, if you'd like to review the complete set of revised compliance questions, service subscribers can download an Acrobat PDF from http://www.egifcompliance.org/assessment/progress.cfm.

IPSV and GCL2
16 September 2005

The GCL (Government Category List) was the specified encoding scheme for the Subject element of the e-GMS (e-Government Metadata Standard). The latest update of the e-GMS sees the IPSV (Integrated Public Sector Vocabulary) taking the place of the GCL and the GCL will be gradually phased out.

The purpose of the subject encoding schemes is to make it easier for citizens to find information from all the electronic resources in the UK public sector. Go to the esd-toolkit to see the IPSV (http://www.esd.org.uk/standards/ipsv/).

The GCL is still available for existing users and will be displayed on GovTalk until some time in 2006. But it is no longer actively maintained and you are advised to switch to the IPSV as soon as you conveniently can. (See http://www.govtalk.gov.uk/schemasstandards/gcl.asp.)

It's wonderful to see the continuing commitment to interoperability and the growing knowledge of its practical implementation manifested in e-GIF compliant systems. Remember that the e-GIF Compliance Assessment Service is designed to promote user-customer-supplier cooperation and is geared up for team working.

Managing Compliance in the Public Sector
16 March 2005

This Conference will provide you with clear, practical advice and guidance to adopt, adhere to and maintain compliance with legislation, standards and best practice. Taking a holistic view of compliance pressures the conference will highlight how this approach will not only keep you legal, but help enhance other processes.

What are the benefits of attending?

• Develop your understanding of the compliance landscape and overlapping benefits between legislation, standards and best practice
• Hear how a proactive approach to compliance can deliver improved performance - rather than just another headache
• Learn about the latest developments from industry specialists and leading public sector organisations through streamed sessions
• Understand how different organisations approach compliance
• Hear how technological developments can help

The program covers:

• The legal issues affecting IT
• Interoperability Standards
• Management Standards
• Developing Opportunities
  

Conference delegates can also choose to attend an additional half day e-GIF briefing on the 15th March at a discount price.

Please visit www.ncc.co.uk/compliance for more details.

First organisations gain e-GIF Accreditation
24 January 2005

We are delighted to announce that the e-GIF Accreditation Authority has released the first tranche of e-GIF Accredited Organisations. This is a significant development and we are particularly pleased to note that both the private and public sectors are engaged, reflecting genuine and joint commitment to the e-GIF and the benefits it brings.

The e-Government Interoperability Framework (e-GIF) sets out the technical policies and standards that ensure interoperability of systems used to deliver e-services. Complying with the e-GIF is mandated widely across the UK public sector because it helps build more sustainable and flexible IT systems, making for efficiency and effectiveness gains in the immediate and longer terms as systems are upgraded or replaced.

The new e-GIF Accreditation Authority has been established by the Cabinet Office e-Government Unit to provide assurance that suppliers (both internal public sector departments and external suppliers) have the capability to deliver e-GIF compliant solutions and that the people involved have the appropriate skills. While the Accreditation Authority is a public sector initiative, it is well supported by industry and significant commercial sponsors have come forward to help in its establishment and be among the first to be accredited.

Procuring from an e-GIF Accredited Organisation offers the following key benefits:

• reduced risk of e-GIF non-compliance
• confidence in their e-GIF capability and professionalism
• eases the identification and elimination of unsuitable tenders
• provides evidence of due diligence.
  

Becoming an e-GIF Accredited Organisation will:

• increase an organisation's profile in the eyes of all stakeholders in e-GIF projects
• reduce the risk of e-GIF non-compliance for internal customers
• demonstrate organisational e-GIF capability, matching similarly accredited partners / customers
• give focus to managing staff skills development and deployment in the context of the e-GIF.

We would urge you to: share this information with the relevant people within your organization; consider including accreditation as part of supplier evaluation criteria; ensure e-GIF compliance is included in relevant PQQs and ITTs; consider becoming an accredited unit/organisation yourselves, and; encourage relevant staff to become Certified e-GIF Practitioners.

If you have any questions about the e-GIF and its role in public sector IT, please contact the e-Government Unit. Alternatively, contact the e-GIF Accreditation Authority directly or via the National Computing Centre Ltd for general guidance and or details about the new schemes.

The e-GIF Accreditation Authority is operated by the National Computing Centre Ltd. (NCC) under contract to the Cabinet Office e-Government Unit.