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Data Sharing, Government Style

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the popular-and-fun-just-like-ada dept.

rowama writes "The Department of Homeland Security and the Justice Department have been collaborating to develop an XML-based model for data sharing. After less than a year since the initial release, in October 2005, the National Information Exchange Model (NIEM) 1.0 Beta is out. It's big, really big. There are no less than 9 namespaces and plans for future expansion. Contact your local government contractor, with resume in hand, and you may be one of the lucky developers to implement NIEM-capable software."

4 of 96 comments (clear)

  1. thank Government for databases by yagu · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Meanwhile grandma is still taking off her shoes and getting wanded at the airport. Nice to know yet another debacle is launched. Here's hoping they're as successful as they have been with the new Air Traffic Control System.

    1. Re:thank Government for databases by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful
      Meanwhile grandma is still taking off her shoes and getting wanded at the airport.

      The knowledge that she will get the same treatment as the rest of us is the one thing keeping grandma from demanding body cavity searches for the rest of us.

      I, for one, am glad that we don't live in a world where grandma gets waved through security with a smug little smile on her face while I get directed to the body cavity search room to take it in the rear to appease grandma's paranoid fears of "all those terrorists".

  2. Obvious bloat. by SatanicPuppy · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Just glancing at it, I can see problems. XML is too often used for databases when it shouldn't be, but there are similarities, and just looking at it I can see that it violates one of the most basic database design principles: normalization

    Just as an example, there are three different namespaces dedicated to the various FIPS (Federal Information Processing Standards)...To three different STANDARDS.

    I'm no expert on government info, and I just looked at this thing for the first time, so maybe it's brilliant and I'm ust not seeing it, but it sure looks a lot like they've fallen victim to a database noob mistake, and created a monster tree with disproportionate crazy branches everywhere, and that is bound to cause relational problems, redundant data, and warped design challenges.

    --
    ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
    1. Re:Obvious bloat. by punkinabox · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Well, they said data sharing, not data storage.