Autonomy: Accusations Fly from the US Air Force
January 7, 2014
The Washington Post story “Government Questioned MicroTech about Its Role in HP Fraud Allegations” puts search and content processing in the spotlight. The newspaper is digging into the interesting underbelly of US government contracting. (The full series is at http://wapo.st/19aZwPh.)
I am certain that there are many fascinating tales about the interactions of contractors, contract officers, politicians, and lobbyists. The Washington Post is hopping into the fray and not a minute too soon to probe activities somewhat less fresh than the Healthcare.gov project or a number of higher profile projects, including tanks that are orphans and fighters that are too slow, underarmed, and unable to outperform fighters from certain other countries.
In fact, I think the HP-Autonomy deal closed a couple of years ago and US government contracting has been chugging along in its present form for 40, 50 years. Perhaps the procurement processes will change so that contractors’ business practices can change accordingly.
I found this passage from the Post story interesting:
MicroTechnologies LLC is among two companies and six executives who are said to have taken part in the efforts to boost the revenues of software maker Autonomy before its sale to HP, according to documents prepared by the Air Force deputy general counsel’s office that raised the possibility of barring all the parties from receiving federal contracts.
The Post story was picked up by other “real” journalists, including the estimable Telegraph in the UK (See the British take in “Autonomy Founder Mike Lynch under Fire from US Air Force over HP Claims.”)
After working through the stories, I formed several hypotheses:
- Resellers bundled software, storage, and hardware for clients. The reason may be due to a desire to get an “appliance”, not a box of Lego blocks or to procure a system without having to go through the uncertain process of getting approval for a capital expenditure.
- The indirect sales model used by Autonomy with considerable success required Autonomy to pay money when the reseller picked up the phone and said, “We sold a big deal, and we need cash to move forward” or some variation on this theme that is well known to integrators and resellers.
- The business process in place provided payments to resellers because of the terms of a particular agreement with a reseller or class or partners. Autonomy purchased some resellers and integrators to respond to the challenges the indirect sales model posed to Autonomy since 1998.
- Some combination of factors was arbitrated by Autonomy’s financial team.
Autonomy purchased the Fast Search & Transfer government sales unit and that group may have imported some of Fast Search’s procedures.
With Dr. Michael Lynch inventing video technology like US8392450 and US 8488011 filed coincident with the HP closing, was he able to dive into reseller deals?
The fact is that Autonomy is now a unit of Hewlett Packard. What few pay attention to is another fact. HP was an Autonomy partner for a number of years prior to its purchase of Autonomy. HP was part of Autonomy’s indirect sales channel and presumably knows how procurements, sequesters, allocated funds, and the other arcana of US government procurement “works.”
Dr. Lynch did something no other search or content processing vendor serving the enterprise market was able to do. From the inception of Autonomy in 1996, he exhibited an uncanny knack for recognizing trends and incorporating solutions to information access problems on top of those trends. In the course of Autonomy’s trajectory from 1996 to 2011, Autonomy grew as a modern day roll up that generating almost $850 million in 2011.
I am supportive of a historical understanding of search and content processing. On one hand, Autonomy is now HP’s information processing prodigy. On the other hand, HP may not have the management or technical skills to build on Dr. Lynch’s work.
Oracle paid about $1 billion for Endeca, a system that dates from roughly the same era as Autonomy’s system. But HP paid $11 billion for Autonomy and discovered quickly that surviving and thriving in the odd universe of enterprise search and content processing is tough when the steering wheel is in its hands. Is Dr. Lynch on track when he suggests that his management team was more skilled than some realized?
Investigations into government contracting procedures are quite fascinating. I know from some of my past work that bureaucracies work in mysterious ways.
Perhaps some of these mysteries will be revealed? On the other hand, some of the mysteries may never be known. Where are the Golden Fleece awards today? Do bureaucracies have teeth? Do bureaucracies protect their own? Do special interests exert influence? These are difficult questions.
Maybe there will be answers in 2014? On the other hand, there may be more public relations, content marketing, and spin. I hope those involved with the matter dig into Bayes-Laplace methods, Shannon information theory, and Linear Weight Networks. The methods can help separate noise from high value information.
Stephen E Arnold, January 7, 2014
Making the Most of SharePoint 2013
December 27, 2013
This holiday season, CMSWire is holding out some love for SharePoint in their article, “A Stolen Kiss for Your SharePoint Governance.” The author, Andrew Bishop, finds that while SharePoint 2013 adoption moves along at a rapid pace, implementation of the improved features of 2013 does not keep this same pace.
Bishop writes:
“My first article for CMSWire discussed the exciting new features of SharePoint 2013. There is much to like about this latest release of the Microsoft collaboration wunderkind. In the period since the release I’ve seen a steady move by customers to SharePoint 2013, but not necessarily a big uptake of its new features. This is the case with my own customers, but also what I have heard from other end users and consultants.”
Stephen E. Arnold is a longtime leader in search and he keeps up with SharePoint at his search news service, ArnoldIT.com. Arnold finds that while SharePoint adoption is widespread, users are still widely dissatisfied with implementation. It may be that many do not take full advantage of all the SharePoint features, or that not enough time or energy is given to customization. Keep up with the latest SharePoint news at ArnoldIT.com.
Emily Rae Aldridge, December 27, 2013
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
SharePoint 2013 Hybrid Governance Support
December 6, 2013
SharePoint grows in breadth and depth with every update. SharePoint 2013 offers more features than ever before. However, the time and expertise it takes to customize those features is becoming more and more demanding. For that reason, organizations are looking for add-ons and intuitive customization options without a lot of hassle. PRWeb gives another good option in its latest release, “Microsoft SharePoint 2013 Hybrid Support Highlights New Release of AvePoint DocAve Governance Automation Service Pack 4.”
The release begins:
“AvePoint, the leader in governance, compliance, and management solutions for social enterprise collaboration platforms, announced today the latest version of its flagship product for automated service and proactive governance enforcement, DocAve Governance Automation Service Pack (SP) 4, with support for Microsoft SharePoint 2013 hybrid deployments.”
Finding and analyzing all the latest add-ons and SharePoint supplemental services can be exhausting. Many would benefit from a news service that boils down the important stuff. That’s just what Stephen E. Arnold does with ArnoldIT. A long-time leader in enterprise search, his recent attention has turned to enterprise search, and his expertise is invaluable.
Emily Rae Aldridge, December 6, 2013
MarkLogic and the New York Times
December 2, 2013
On Saturday, November 30, 2013, The New York Times published “Health Care Site Rushing to Make Fixes by Sunday.” As I now know, mission accomplished. But there was no aircraft carrier, brass band, or flag. (Here’s the link to the online story, but like so many “real” journalistic efforts, the link can go dead and you will have to hunt for a November 30, 2013 Times and look on pages A 1 with a jump to page A 12. Penguin, there is nothing I care to do about the link. Sorry.)
I wanted to document this passage from the Times’ story about MarkLogic. What’s interesting is that the company gets little attention from other “real” journalists. I suppose if I were curious, I would attempt to answer the question, “Why?”
I am not curious. Here’s what snagged my attention on the 30th:
Gary C. Boom, the chief executive officer of another vendor, MarkLogic, said his firm is also moving its software to differently configured servers.
The idea is from MarkLogic’s neighbor in Silicon Valley, Oracle. A few years ago, Oracle wrote a white paper banging on MarkLogic’s technology. You can find a copy of that analysis in “Mark Logic XML Server 4.1.” I wrote about the tempest in “A Coming Dust Up between Oracle and MarkLogic?”
The Times’ story continued:
MarkLogic provided the technology for the database that serves as the system’s internal filing cabinet and index.
The story does not make clear whether MarkLogic is an XML server that acts like a junction box among the moving parts of the HealthCare.gov site, a data management system interacting with Oracle’s technology, or a search engine for the Web site. MarkLogic positions its technology as doing each of these functions plus analytics, business intelligence, customer relationship management, publishing, and probably some other functions as well.
the Times quotes Mr. Bloom as having said:
I am picking up my house and moving it to a better foundation next door,” he [Mr. Bloom] said in an interview. He said MarkLogic is performing up to standard, but “the network and the storage systems are not properly sized and not properly run.”
It is not clear to me which vendor is providing the storage systems. Is it MarkLogic or is it another vendor such as Oracle, a company apparently unimpressed with some of MarkLogic’s technology if I understand the Oracle white paper.
The Times added:
“Another critical problem involved the specifications for a major computer switch that connects the computer services through a security firewall to the Internet. Mr. Bloom said it has been upgraded from four gigabytes a second to 60 [gigabytes a second]. He said the earlier speed was the equivalent of employing four security staffers to screen Heathrow Airport’s passengers. “The line to get through,” he said, “would go back to the city of London.”
I am not sure how these issues did not become known to the vendors pushing data through the system, but apparently, the 15X shortfall was not noticed. I wonder how many home builders move a completed house to a new foundation. Also, what if the security folks at Heathrow are more or maybe less efficient than those located where HealthCare.gov is?
I will keep my eye on this issue because MarkLogic has been emphasizing that it offers a search system. Where there is a search vendor, there seems to be some activity of interest. And where there are MarkLogic and Oracle, there may be some interesting discussion between the parties.
Stephen E Arnold, December 2, 2013
IT Policies Encompass Ergonomics Along with Help Desks and Google Glass
November 28, 2013
The collection of policies on ZDNet is titled 90+ IT Policies At Your Fingertips, Ready For Download. With a subscription the article offers templates for many of the policies necessary to govern IT and other workplace necessities. Of course, the pitch is a bit of a circular argument (instead of paying someone hundreds of dollars for a policy, pay us hundreds of dollars for many policies) but more important is the implied state of governance.
The article explains in the blurb provided for the IT Consultant Conduct Policy:
“By the very nature of their business, IT consultants–who have both access and exposure to a company’s most sensitive data–must be held to the highest ethical standard. Ethics are critical, not only to the consultant’s company, but to the client organization. In addition to ethical behavior, a consultant must maintain appropriate behavior at all times. This IT Consultant Conduct Policy outlines an example code of conduct and a code of conduct for consultants.”
Looking ahead, there is even a policy available for the day when employees start bringing Google Glass to work. This is a technology that provides for sneaky recording of audio and visual, (or perhaps not so sneaky, more of a hiding in plain sight maneuver) and so employers might do well to think ahead. Not included in the long list is any sort of editorial policy, which we thought might be making a comeback. Maybe not.
Chelsea Kerwin, November 28, 2013
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
A New Approach to Enterprise Search – Information Governance
September 2, 2013
The article titled Solving the Inadequacies and Failures in Enterprise Search on AIIM addresses the ongoing problems with metadata infrastructure. This problem translates into a major hurdle for all those organizations hoping to utilize enterprise search. According to the author, with an appropriately stringent framework in place, progress is possible. This includes the ability to use search in order to implement actual helpful tools like records management, migration and data privacy. The article states,
“An information governance approach that creates the metadata infrastructure framework to encompass automated intelligent metadata generation, auto-classification, and the use of goal and mission aligned taxonomies is required. From this framework, intelligent metadata enabled solutions can be rapidly developed and implemented. Only then can organizations leverage their knowledge assets to support search, litigation, eDiscovery, text mining, sentiment analysis, and business intelligence. The need for organizations to access and fully exploit the use of their unstructured content won’t happen overnight. “
With these improvements in place, the article suggests that enterprise search will be fixed. Decades of floundering will come to an end if this assertion is proven correct. Features and “bells and whistles” will no longer reside in the place of actual information and wisdom gleaned from content, what search is actually supposed to provide.
Chelsea Kerwin, September 02, 2013
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Keep It Separated
November 14, 2012
Respect data decentralization. That is the key to “The Challenge of Defensible Deletion of Distributed Legacy Data,” according to the eDiscovery Law & Tech Blog at X1 Discovery.
Blogger John Patzakis submits that, for large enterprises with data subject to governance requirements, centralization can make it hard to create a defensible retention schedule. Most archiving systems require that bits of data be pulled from their cozy homes on group and departmental silos and dumped into a central system before any retention and management process can even begin. He writes:
“Forcing centralization on these many pockets of productivity is highly disruptive and rarely effective due to scalability, network bandwidth and other logistical challenges. So what this leaves is the reality that for any information remediation process to be effective, it must be executed within these departmentalized information silos.”
Not surprisingly, Patzakis recommends one of X1’s own products, X1 Rapid Discovery, to do just that. The company has produced an hour-long webinar outlining their method. According to the article:
“X1 Rapid Discovery represents game-changing technology to effectuate the remediation of distributed legacy data due to its ability to install on demand virtually anywhere in the enterprise, including remote data silos, its light footprint web browser access, and intuitive interface. X1 Rapid Discovery enables for effective assessment, reporting, categorization and migration and remediation of distributed information assets by accessing, searching and managing the subject data in place without the need for migration to the appliance or a central repository.”
Sounds good. It may well be that X1 Rapid Discovery is the best solution for this process, or maybe not. Either way, the webinar could be worth a gander.X1 Discovery makes e-discovery tools and enterprise search solutions for IT and legal professionals. Founded by Idealab, the company is located in Pasadena, CA.
Cynthia Murrell, November 14, 2012
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
The Huber Affair: Demining Now Underway
June 26, 2012
Google is working overtime to keep attention focused on technical issues. You can wallow in the smart software encomium in the New York Times. (See “How Many Computers to Identify a Cat? 16,000” in the June 27, 2012, environmentally unfriendly newspaper or you can give the newspaper’s maybe here, maybe gone link at http://goo.gl/Twl9I.) The Google I/O Conference fast approaches, so there are the concomitant write ups about a Google hardware and news in “Google’s I/O Conference: New Operating System, Tablet”.
But there are two personnel stories which seem to haunt the company at what is the apex of the Google techno-promo machine: Larry Page’s minor voice problem and a person few people outside of Google have heard about. Both of these are potential “information minefields.” Google does not, as far as I know, have an effective demining system in place.
I have avoided commenting directly on the health thing. You can get the story or what passes for a story in “Google CEO Larry Page and the Healthy Way to Answer, ‘What’s Wrong?’” But I do have an opinion about the wizard responsible for Local Search, Maps, Earth, Travel, Payments, Wallet, Offers, and Shopping. I read more about about one Google executive than I expected in “This Exec May Have The Hardest Job At Google, And His Colleagues Are Tired Of Seeing Him Get Trashed In The Press.”
The basic idea, as I understand it, is:
Last week, we [Business Insider] published a story headlined: “Depending On Whom You Ask, This Google Exec Is Either ‘Weak’ Or He Just Drew The Short Straw?
The publication did some digging and learned from “senior sources”:
Their view is that Huber is a top-notch Google executive who asked for the hardest challenge his boss could give him and he got it – in the form of nascent, unproven products and an executive reporting to him that ended up being vastly under-qualified for her job.
The weak link in the Google brain mesh was a person from PayPal. Yikes. A female goofed with some PayPal type projects. The story wraps up:
Yahoo and Governance: Semel to Scott Thompson
May 4, 2012
Short honk: I don’t much, if any, attention to Yahoo. My last big analysis of Yahoo was shortly after its then Chief Technology Officer tried to explain to a financial services client of mine that Yahoo was ahead of Google in search. Crazy assertion from a crazy outfit. In my report, I included an image of Terry Semel as the captain of the Titanic. Got a laugh. Yahoo got zero positives from me. (By the way is that Wikipedia profile of Mr. Semel accurate? Check it out between conference calls and SMS texting.)
Navigate to “Scott Thompson Resume Scandal Is Not an Inadvertent Mistake—He Also Claimed Comp Sci Degree as CTO of PayPay.” I want to comment on the spelling of résumé but who cares? That’s my attitude to the coverage of an executive fudging a biography. Furthermore, in my analysis Yahoo is the type of outfit which lives in a world of illusion, silos, and confusion.
The fact that a senior executive would take the time to do a little digging is absolutely no surprise to me. I hear the phrase “I’m too busy” from people whom I know are not too busy. Some of these people ask me for work and then tell me, “We have a spring vacation.” I heard this phrase from a company president who is guiding a company which is losing millions of dollars each quarter. Right. Vacation. Spring break.
I think we have plenty of solid evidence of a core governance problem at Yahoo, but the same issue exists in many US organizations. Whether it is the confusion about the actions of US government employees or the unfortunate Google Street View incident, governance is not a core competency in many US organizations. Enron, Lehman Brothers, Tyco—remember these executive edifices?
Furthermore I don’t think governance can be fixed quickly, if at all.
When an individual professional does not do the basics like checking key facts, the egregious mistakes will continue and most likely increase.
Governance problems are not black swans.
Governance problems are a direct outcome of people who do not focus, gather information, analyze, and reflect.
Rushing to meetings, asking for others to collect information, and staring at mobile devices—these are flashing signals of trouble at Yahoo and elsewhere.
Fiddling with a biography is either effective public relations, impactful marketing, or the shortest distance between a person and the top of Maslow’s hierarchy. For me, Yahoo and fake credentials are no big deal.
Baloney is the business of many businesses.
Desperation marketing is the new normal marketing.
Stephen E Arnold, May 4, 2012
Sponsored by no one but me.
Google Search Saves the Day
March 1, 2012
According to the Nextgov article “Solyndra Investigation Led to New Search Tool at Energy” Google Search has joined the fight against crime. A “congressional investigation into alleged mishandling of a $528 million Energy Department loan guarantee” to Solyndra caused a data overload for Energy’s Loan Department. Energy workers were trying to provide congressional investigators with the information they needed but their current document search tools simply created even bigger problems. According to Energy Chief Technology Officer Peter Tseronis the searches “resulted in “GS-15s standing at printers hitting print, print, print, copy, copy, copy for emails, attachments, PDFs — information that was just voluminous.” In response to this mounting problem the CTO office joined forces with an outside vendor to help modify their existing Google search system. Users throughout the department then had the ability to index as well as sort through various emails, Word documents etc. Looks like Google Search was ready and saved the day.
April Holmes, March 1, 2012
Sponsored by Pandia.com
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