GTR November 2011

QLD councils mash up

apps GOVERNMENT TECHNOLOGY REVIEW

the Card from the

cloud

Parramatta’s wireless stimulus plan

How the NT

NOV/DEC 2011 • ISSUE 09

bytes problem drinkers Building Gov 2.0 Councils backing up Healing regional healthcare

Booting up CHOGM • Mobile revolution looms online

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INTRODUCTION 2 Editor’s letter 4 News 6 Ovum commentary

FEATURES 32 Shrinking to save The NSW Land and Property Information Office has brought 70 terabytes of information – and an unruly SharePoint implementation – back under control 36 Not a band aid Mobile technology has improved productivity of wound care experts in regional Victoria 40 Better backup Three local councils – Rockingham, Wentworth and Marrickville – explain the strategies they used to improve their backup regimes

cover story The card from the cloud Parramatta City Council hopes a near field communications smart card and the cloud will stimulate the area’s economy

8

44 Easy of hearing Don’t shop for telephone headsets without first reading our guide to the latest features in this product category 48 Inside Out Public servant and Gov 2.0 blogger Craig Thomler shares his experience advocating for greater openness in Australia’s government

features

28

12 AGGREGATING APPS When three Queensland councils merged, back office operations were made easier as all previously used the same core applications

18

TWEETS IN THE LIBRARY

National and State libraries are tackling the challenge of preserving digital artefacts for future, so they can be viewed and re-used

30

BOOTING UP CHOGM

Byteing problem drinkers

We bring back the back story behind what it took to build CHOGM’s IT rig

The Northern Territory’s Department of Justice explains the infrastructure it built to stop problem drinkers buying alcohol

EDITOR Simon Sharwood E: editor@govtechreview.com.au Tel: 02 8923 8017 NATIONAL SALES MANAGER Peter Ratcliff E: peter.ratcliff@govtechreview.com.au Tel: 02 8923 8016

I

feel sorry for you. Everyone agrees that if government can put more services online, it will benefit agencies by streamlining their operations and make citizens and other stakeholders happy by making it easier for them to interface with government.

When I speak to people in government, they always ‘get’ this. Many also tell stories about their online services achieving impressive results — after a lot of hard work. Others tell me they’ve just figured out how create a meaningful online presence for their agency and look forward to the work needed to get them up and running.

So why do I feel sorry for you?

Because the time has already arrived to start learning how to do this all over again for mobile devices. I say this because of a handful of pieces of research I’ve encountered lately. One, from Telsyte, suggests that in the next four years, 10 million more Australians will acquire a smartphone — 18.5 million of us will use smartphones by then. Telsyte also thinks smartphones will become the dominant media consumption device and singled out publishers as an industry most likely to find new ways to reach its audience.

Another piece of research, from Juniper, suggested that consumers are going mad for mobile coupons. These offers are the mutant offspring of group buying, discount vouchers and just-in-time location-based marketing. Juniper reckons the market for this stuff will surge from a little over $US5 billion today to $US43 billion by 2016.

Another mobile trend set to take off is electronic wallets powered by near field communications (NFC) technology, an idea that posits mobile phones replacing cash as consumers swipe their phones past special readers to make transactions.

We’ve learned of one government body that uses this technology already, in the form of Parramatta Council’s Parra Connect project (you can read about on p.8). It’s a fantastic project and the Council is already thinking about how it will evolve when, as expected, NFC becomes a common smartphone feature.

I suspect that in coming years many GTR readers will therefore have to rethink online services. The prevalence of smartphones will make mobile services important. Consumer consumption of coupons may be something government also needs to adapt to. And electronic wallets have all sorts of possibilities.

As use cases for these technologies develop, GTR will be here to cover them. Let’s get moving together.

Senior Conference Director Shahida Sweeney E: shahida.sweeney@govtechreview.com.au Tel: 02 8923 8027 NATIONAL SALES & MARKETING MANAGER - CONFERENCE & EVENTS Chris Rodrigues E: chris.rodrigues@govtechreview.com.au Tel: 02 8923 8002 DESIGN & PRODUCTION Annette Epifanidis, Russell Montgomery, Gail Lipscombe, Tim Hartridge, Monica Lawrie, Odette Boulton, Peter McKim NEW ZEALAND REPRESENTATIVE Debbie Bishop General Manager, Hawkhurst Media Services Limited E: debbie@hawkhurst.co.nz Tel: +64 9 589 1054 DDI: +64 9 571 9494 Mobile: +64 021 340 360 CONTRIBUTORS Natalie Apostolou, Alex Kidman, Beverley Head, Peter Noonan, Craig Thomler, Joshua Gliddon SYDNEY OFFICE Level 12, 99 Walker St. North Sydney NSW 2060 Phone: 02 8923 8000 Fax: 02 8923 8050 MELBOURNE OFFICE Level 8, 574 St Kilda Rd. Melbourne Vic 3004 PO Box 6137, St Kilda Rd Central 8008 Phone: 03 8534 5000 Fax: 03 9530 8911 Government Technology Review is published by CommStrat ABN 31 008 434 802

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All material in Government Technology Review is copyright. Reproduction in whole or in part is not allowed without written permission from the Publisher.

Simon Sharwood, Editor E: simon.sharwood@commstrat.com.au 2 | GTR NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2011

To arrange delivery of Government Technology Review email: subs@govtechreview.com.au

NSW launches $1million mobility fund New South Wales has found $1 million it is willing to give mobile application developers with ideas that can “build the State’s digital economy and improve the effectiveness of government services”.

Deputy Premier and Minister for Trade and Investment Andrew Stoner used those words to announce the fund, which is targeted at consortiums and operates under the same model as the Digital Concierge program that was a source of funds for the ParraConnect project (see page 8).

The new fund fulfils an election promise to explore mobile apps, and also marks a new direction for the NSW Government which, in the past, had been ambivalent about allowing third-party developers to access government data. Now, Andrew Stoner believes apps that use government data are welcome, if they “have significant potential for commercial success, job creation, and exports and bring efficiencies such as “government-to-

public or government-to-business interactions, reduced costs, faster processing, and more positive customer engagements”.

Stoner said the program is both an economic development effort and a way to improve government operations.

“Trialling the solutions with the NSW Government will provide consortiums with a low-cost and low-risk opportunity to fine-tune and validate their technologies while providing a valuable and trusted reference site for promoting future domestic and international sales,” he said.

“At the same time, the NSW Government will gain early and cost-effective access to innovative technologies that can improve the public sector by leveraging our ICT industry’s agility, innovation, and entrepreneurship.”

The program commenced in mid-November with an industry briefing.

A networking and pitching event will take place on December 8 and winning consortiums will be announced in March 2012.

Are you an ICT SME looking to win bigger deals?

Would you like to network with Multinationals and Government?

Would you like to gain the skills necessary to succeed in the ICT industry?

If you answered YES to any of these questions then CollabIT is the program that will help you to grow your business.

CollabIT is an engagement and business development initiative that links small and medium sized ACT-based companies with multinational corporations and other stakeholders in the ICT sector.

CollabIT is a joint initiative of the ACT Government and the Australian Information Industry Association (AIIA).

To register your interest in becoming a member of the CollabIT Program contact Nicole Campbell, n.campbel@aiia.com.au. Mention this advert when speaking with Nicole and you will be invited to attend one of the 2012 Canberra Managers’ Forum events as a guest of CollabIT.

www.aiia.com.au/group/ collabit_act

iPads take on new roles

AGIMO considers Microsoft options

The Australian Government Information Management “Diversifying into records management, I wanted the same software Queensland’s Logan Council has issued iPads to some Office (AGIMO) is reconsidering the way it acquires that large record centers use for efficiency and profitability.”

John Burrows, President, of its staff, who use the tablets to complete forms used Microsoft products for the Federal Government, DeWitt Records Management, Tamuning, Guam for inspections of food premises and nuisance trees. issuing a tender for ‘Provision of Whole of Government Facing an increased workload since amalgamation, the Council has tried other mobile Microsoft Large Account Reseller (LAR) Deliverables’. devices, but had difficulty synchronising data from the field to its back-office applications.

The tender documents reveal that the Federal “What we value most about O’Neil is their research and development iPads and technology from Blink Mobile have made that synchronisation possible, while (over $1 million a year), along with their continued best-in-class Government spent over $95 million on Microsoft the tablets were also easier for staff to carry than other devices the Council tried in the products under a Microsoft Volume Sourcing product enhancements.” past, with limited successRichard due toSteed, their bulk.

Agreement (VSA) agreement in 2010-11. That Vice President, Records Management, Sacramento, California Council has declaredPacific the pilot of the inspection forms on iPads a success, citing procurement was conducted by Data #3, AGIMO’s faster data capture, productivity boosts and better customer service among the benefits.

LAR since 2008. Data #3 is currently working under a It now plans to adopt the technology, but will also extend the mobile forms so they can be one-year extension of its agreement with AGIMO. “2.5 million boxes. 1,200 retrievals and returns per day. We needed aThe new tender calls for one or more LARs and used on other mobile devices. software system that could handle this workload and still deliver the says the winner will operate on a cost-plus-margin compliance and accountability that government requires.”

Voting by iPad basis, with the cost of products supplied by Microsoft Sally IRVINE-SMITH, Manager, Systems Control, Government Records Repository, The US State of Oregon has deployed iPads to help some of its citizens vote. The idea to the LAR disclosed and the LAR then operating State Records of NSW, Australia behind iPad voting is to assist citizens with limited mobility or disabilities that prevent them on an agreed margin. AGIMO is not committed to from writing. A bespoke iPad app lists candidates or can voice their names. Voters then tap appointing new LARs — if the tender does not produce the screen to select their candidate. The iPads are connected to a printer, which then prints a satisfactory outcome, it will be content to continue “Key is our ability to scan down to the tape level and require an a ballot paper recording aelectronic user’s vote.

Citizens then the chain vote inof a ballot box we as normal. signature – theplace 100% custody provide by working with Data #3.

printing the receipt of items we have picked up, or delivered with a date and time stamp. Our customers always have a record of what happened at each transaction and not just a number total.”

Greg LeFrancis, President/General Manager,

Data Protection, Las Vegas, Nevada “Southwest Diversifying into records “What we value most about O’Neil is management, I wanted the same their research and development (over software that large record centers $1 million a year), along with their use forforefficiency and profitability.

“Known their limited budgets, it doesn’t mean that government best-in-class offerings and continued I got that with O’Neil.” automation product expectations need to be limited as well. There product is enhancements.”

good qualityPresident records management software available. You just needRichard Steed, Vice President John Burrows, to do your dueManagement, diligence and work with DeWitt Records Tamuning, Guamthe right strategic partner.” Pacific Records Management, Sacramento, California Scott Reid, Senior Records Manager, City of Winnipeg Archives and Records Control, MB Canada

“Key is our ability to scan down to the tape level and require an electronic signature – the 100% chain of custody we provide by printing the receipt of items we have picked up, or delivered with a date and time stamp. Our customers always have a record of what happened at each transaction and not just a number total.”

“2.5 million boxes. 1,200 retrievals and returns per day. We needed a software system that could handle this workload and still deliver the compliance and accountability that government requires.”

Sally IRVINE-SMITH, Manager, Systems Control Government Records Repository State Records of NSW, Australia

Greg LeFrancis, President/General Manager Southwest Data Protection, Las Vegas, Nevada

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GTR NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2011 | 5

Mobility

or maintenance mess?

By Kevin Noonan, Ovum

T

wo of the most enduring symbols of this decade’s consumer technology will be smartphones and the mobile app. Already, mobile apps are being downloaded in unprecedented numbers and are opening new opportunities for streamlining government services. However, new services also bring new challenges for government planners and policymakers.

Ovum research indicates app downloads in Asia Pacific will have grown by 189 per cent by the end of this year. Mobile apps have quickly evolved from the playthings for early smartphone owners to serious business systems. Already making headline news in banking and retail, mobile apps are now producing similar reports in the government sector.

However, citizens are using their smartphones for a variety of activities, not just mobile apps. These include email, instant messaging (including SMS), social networking and Internet browsing. Indeed, smartphones are beginning to drive a new wave of traffic back to government Websites.

Many traditional websites are ill-prepared for small-screen devices. Indeed, some Website technologies cannot be accessed from mobile devices such as iPhones and iPads. Rather than creating new opportunities for citizen contact, the lack of mobile-friendly Websites could be creating a new class of information-deprived citizens.

“In many ways, mobile apps represent a return to fat clients.”

Over the coming five years, the smartphone and 3G phone market will overtake low functionality basic phones (see news, p.4).

Smartphones are being added to a growing collection of online consumer devices. Armed with a desktop computer, a laptop, a smartphone and possibly a tablet device, Australians are increasingly reaching for the most readily available device to do the work at hand. As a result, government technology planners need to realign their service delivery strategies from device/channel-specific services to a more generic, device-independent strategy. ‘Any, any, any’ is becoming the mantra — anywhere, anytime, and any device.

Faced with a fundamental shift in service delivery expectations, mobile apps can only provide part of the solution. However, early analysis indicates far too much is being expected of the mobile app. Inflated expectations could be creating big maintenance headaches downstream.

Consider the following: • Access and Equity obligations apply equally to mobile apps.

• Ovum analysis indicates there will be no dominant hardware vendor over the next five years. Indeed, the competition is likely to intensify between Apple and Android, with Blackberry and Microsoft still in contention for important slices of the market. Many private sector companies are choosing to develop apps first for the Apple platform, citing consumer market penetration, and availability of development resources. However, government can hardly choose to bypass a significant section of the community simply because they choose to buy their smartphone from one of the other large hardware suppliers.

• Mobile apps are not just a Website in disguise.

• Any quick look at government and corporate apps in Australia reveals many are designed to provide information that already exists on their Website. In such situations, a mobile friendly website would have done the job much more easily.

• Mobile apps are not just fat clients revisited.

• For the last five years, IT strategists have almost universally moved away from fat client technology, as this approach has proved too expensive to manage, secure and maintain. Thin client technology is on the rise and networked servers are being consolidated into central data centres. In many ways, mobile apps represent a return to fat clients, as data and systems are again being dispersed widely into the community.

Notwithstanding the problems, future mobile apps are likely to be at their most powerful when utilised as part of an overall government service strategy, particularly where they complement and enhance the existing service channels and social networking strategies.

Mobile technology has the potential to fundamentally change the way we think about government services. Future government service delivery strategies are likely to be built around conversations with citizens, rather than discrete unconnected transactions. Big and impersonal government is likely to give way to personalised, real-time interactions. Location-aware services and augmented reality each have the potential to add valuable context to client interactions.

However, such a transition will be very difficult to deliver if we continue to think about mobile computing as a disconnected set of discrete technologies.

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Cloud

the Card from the

cloud

Parramatta City Council will use the cloud, the Web, a near field communications-equipped smart card and innovative partnerships with vendors to create digital infrastructure aimed at boosting economic growth.

Story by Simon Sharwood

8 | GTR NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2011

The NFC wave

P

arramatta City Council will launch a major digital infrastructure initiative that it hopes will stimulate the local economy and attract new businesses and residents to the local government area. Dubbed ParraConnect, the project will use near field communications (NFC)-enabled smart cards and cloud computing to bring a range of new services to residents and local businesses.

The origin of the ParraConnect project is the NSW Government’s Collaborative Solutions program, which aims to help build the State’s digital economy and issues grants to programs that meet that objective.

Parramatta City Council’s proposal to the Collaborative Solutions program envisioned a NFC-enabled smart card being issued to residents and frequent visitors to Parramatta’s central business district (CBD), which is Sydney’s second-largest business hub and the sixth-largest such precinct in Australia.

The project targets the CBD for two reasons, one of which is to re-invigorate it as a home for business. The other is to assist retailers who struggle to compete with the local Westfield – it dominates the CBD and has become its cultural epicentre, thanks to its free parking, and recent railway redevelopments have made it the first exit available to visitors as they leave Parramatta’s train station.

Westfield’s dominance of downtown means a walk through Parramatta offers contrasting experiences. When GTR visited the city on a weekday morning to conduct interviews for this story, Westfield – replete with franchised stores using sophisticated merchandising – was buzzing. On the streets, however, homelier retailers appeared to be operator-owned and had rather less foot traffic.

The ParraConnect vision is for Council to step in with services for retailers that make shopping beyond Westfield an equally compelling experience. The smart card is at the heart of that vision, as it will offer shoppers the chance to store value on its 80KB of memory by using their credit cards to top up their balance.

Shoppers will simply swipe their cards past NFC readers to make small, cashless purchases. The system will also involve a tablet device, which will display the details of each transaction.

To sweeten the deal for retailers, Council will link the NFC readers to retail management applications hosted in the cloud and provided at low or no cost. “Small business owners work all day and then go home to do the books,” says Frank Dorrian, Managing Director of SGS Technologies, a software development company working on the project. “This will now give them an online model which allows them to run inventory and do things that only high-end shops can do and afford today.”

Near field communications (NFC) hit Australia in 2010 with the advent of the PayPass and payWave systems offered by MasterCard and Visa, respectively. Both see credit cards equipped with NFC chips that when swiped near, or tapped onto readers, quickly initiate a transaction. Under some circumstances, cardholders need not enter a PIN or sign to complete a transaction, with that timesaving convenience a plus for retailers and consumers alike. Credit card companies like it, too – they imagine consumers will use credit more often if it is easier to do so.

Google is another adopter of NFC, through its Google Wallet program that sees an NFC chip built into certain mobile phones.

The company has already created an Android app to handle transaction processing. Visa and MasterCard have both allied with Google.

NFC is also rumoured to be an inclusion in future iPhones, while Nokia is also keen on the concept.

The shared vision of all participants is for mobile phones to replace wallets as the item consumers use to pay for purchases. Cash, they argue, is inconvenient, and we all carry mobiles, so why wouldn’t we replace the casino’s worth of credit and debit cards many of us use with the phone we schlep around anyway?

That vision received strong local endorsement when, in October 2012, the Commonwealth Bank announced a mobile app called ’Kaching‘ which will allow peer-to-peer payments initiated by mobile apps. Kaching will eventually link to NFC-equipped handsets.

Andrew Lindberg, the Bank’s Executive General Manager Cards, Payments and Retail Strategy, made the case for the app, and for phone-driven commerce, by saying at Kaching’s launch that “Mobile and online social payment is the next step in transaction technology. Already, more than half our 10 million customers own a smartphone, and Australians are 65 per cent more likely than the British to bank on their phones.”

“The recent explosion in uptake of digital and smartphone technology has revolutionised how we all transact, interact and communicate with each other, and this new application will make the dream of mobile payments a reality,” continued Mr Lindberg.

“Why wouldn’t we replace the casino’s worth of credit and debit cards many of us use with the phone we schlep around anyway?”

GTR NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2011 | 9

Cloud

Other applications for ParraConnect The ParraConnect project will create the infrastructure to streamline Council’s own operations by making the card the only token staff need to access several of the buildings in which they work. The ParraConnect team has taken that idea a step further and is considering delivery of building security as a service. The idea is to tell businesses in the area – or those considering it as a home – that adopting the Parra Conect card will mean a chance to adopt electronic building access technology. By doing so, Council speculates it can create another small advantage that will help bring businesses to the area.

Another idea for the ParraConnect card could unlock the areas’s history.

Parramatta was, for a time, considered a candidate as the capital of New South Wales. Sydney Cove, the first British settlement, was a sprawling, brawling and somewhat disorderly port, considered by some as unsuitable as the seat of government.

Parramatta, by contrast, was a quieter and more orderly farming community.

Parramatta had the necessary infrastructure – by 1799 it hosted a grand Government House, one of two used by early Governors of the colony as they shuttled between Sydney and the inland settlement. By 1818, the city had gained Lancer Barracks, a significant military installation still in use today.

Grand homes like Brislington House appeared from 1821.

GTR understands that Council staff have considered that the ParraConnect card could be used to initiate displays of information about these historical landmarks. The Council is already conducting a ‘wayfinding project’ to digitise historical material and place it online and staff have imagined installing readers and displays at landmarks to inform the public about the history of the area. Visitors would swipe their cards to start an interactive presentation, an idea considered as an educational tool for students and a potential tourist attraction.

“The Council is already conducting a ‘wayfinding project’ to digitise historical material and place it online” 10 | GTR NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2011

Council will also consider attaching a loyalty scheme to the card, again hosting it in the cloud and again doing so in order to give local retailers a facility to equal or better larger retailers.Paying at Council’s four parking stations is another application for the card, and it is hoped that in future, merchants can pay for customers’ parking.

“Retailer could promote high-margin products by offering to pay for parking,” Dorrian says.

The ParraConnect scheme imagines the tablet devices could also display digital signage. Retailers may choose to create their own ads, or Council imagines large food manufacturers could take advantage of the tablets’ presence to send retailers images as part of their marketing campaigns.

A Website will list participating retailers to promote their offerings and new activities to cardholders. Another lure for consumers will be a cloud application that collects electronic receipts of their spending in participating stores and presents them in a format that makes collating expenses claims simple.

GTR understands that another idea discussed during the project’s planning phase involved distribution of vouchers for special offers from the Website. Council also contemplated, but appears to have ruled out, analysis of anonymised records of data collected by ParraConnect cards as a town planning tool.

Partnership model ParraConnect has come about through a new engagement model which saw Council eschew its usual approach of turning to its preferred suppliers panel. It instead issued an expression of interest to vendors who felt they could meet its goals to create digital infrastructure and the objectives of the NSW Collaborative Solutions program.

One vendor, ST Microelectronics, submitted a concept that included many of the plans for retailers detailed above. ST Microelectronics detailed the other vendors involved and the resulting consortium formed a part of Parramatta City Council’s Collaborative Solutions program submission.

The success of that submission brought a new employee to the project, with her participation supported by ST Microelectronics.

IBM is also involved, and in October 2011 helped Council by hosting a forum at which 100 business people discussed the Smart Cities concept as it could apply to the ParraConnect project.

Consultation with multiple stakeholders was conducted in order to make it plain that the Council is facilitating, rather than driving, ParraConnect.

We will provide small business with an online model which allows them to run inventory and do things that only high-end shops can do and afford today.”

Library first At the time of writing, in early November 2011, Parramatta City Council was around three weeks away from a formal launch. Ten thousand cards had been prepared and 3,500 users – heavy users of self-checkout services at Parramatta’s libraries – had been identified as the first recipients of cards, thanks to their existing behaviour making them more likely to adopt the new facility.

Encouragement for others to take up the card will follow and Council has already commenced discussions with local organisations, such as licensed clubs, which already issue membership cards and could benefit from the more sophisticated hardware on offer and the back-end services ParraConnect will offer.

Over time, Council expects that the increasing prevalence of NFC technology and e-wallets (see ‘The NFC Wave, page 9) in mobile phones will spur the adoption of ParraConnect and also see the concept migrate away from reliance on a physical card.

For the short term, however, Council hopes it can make the card a must-have for local residents and will educate residents that a single ParraConnect card can replace many loyalty cards. We want it to be the one card people feel they must have, a Council official told GTR.

Editor’s note: as GTR went into production, Parramatta City Council asked us not to include quotes from the staff we interviewed. GTR has complied with that request in order to ensure that the relevant staff do not fall foul of the Council’s policy that only certain personnel may speak to the press. Parramatta Council also requested that we remove some material said to be incorrect. Some of the requests Council made described material offered as opinion or conjecture. Where possible we have retained that material.

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