News and Updates

Innovative work, news, and ideas from people and teams in government

How NASA Chose a New Content Management System

A case study on how NASA is choosing a new enterprise content management system (CMS). The Challenge NASA.gov needs a new enterprise CMS. They’re facing issues such as software obsolescence, inconsistent website governance, and a large amount of unstructured content stored in flat HTML files. Their current system is almost a decade old, and the

Nov 21, 2012

Smart Traveler App

Mobile Gov Experiences are agency stories about creating anytime, anywhere, any device government services and info. This entry is a story shared by Department of State. Secretary Clinton often talks about using “21st Century Statecraft” at the State Department. For us in the website office, this equates to using new tools

Nov 20, 2012

Case Study: How GSA Launched Social Media Registry

In September, the General Services Administration (GSA) launched a registry of all federally-managed social media accounts. We want to explain a little of the history behind the registry and talk about a few things that make it a truly remarkable innovation from GSA. Before I start, I want to emphasize when I say “we” from

Nov 19, 2012

comScore Report, October 2012

In October 2012, comScore, a Web analytics research company, released an independently produced report that analyzes 75 federal agency websites on a range of quantitative and qualitative factors.

Nov 14, 2012

Government as an Information Franchise

The Digital Government Strategy represents best practices in today’s web services landscape. The DGS outlines a path to making government web services faster, more cost-efficient and higher-performing. It also frames out the digital government that everybody wants by making government information more flexible, actionable and easier to use. America Has Been There and Done That. Really?! Many consider

Nov 13, 2012

Centers for Disease Control Content Syndication

Mobile Gov Experiences are agency stories about creating anytime, anywhere, any device government services and info. This entry is a story shared by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) uses content syndication to share important health information with a variety of federal public

Nov 05, 2012

NSF.gov – Usability Case Study

Many government websites are informational in nature – you don’t sign up for things or buy anything. Instead, you look for something – a name, a ruling, some contact information. Informational sites – and scientific sites in particular – can be a challenge to design. With so much information, how do you make the important

Nov 05, 2012

GSA’s Child Care Information Portal

Mobile Gov Experiences are agency stories about creating anytime, anywhere, any device government services and info. This entry is a story shared by the General Services Administration. The Child Care Information Portal is a responsively designed web site built by General Services Administration’s Office of the Chief

Oct 25, 2012

Mobile Apps Life Cycle Webinar

Are you creating a mobile website or app for your agency? On Tuesday, October 30, at 11 a.m. we will host a webinar to get agencies thinking about how they can prepare for the entire life cycle of their mobile products—from planning–to implementing—to continually updating and upgrading. This webinar will

Oct 24, 2012

Feds Shed Light on Dark Social

“Dark Social” media took the web by storm this week, unveiling to many the shadows in measuring your social media impact. This accounts for the majority of your traffic and yet lives untraced where standard metrics fear to tread (or simply cannot) — places like email and instant

Oct 19, 2012

GSA Intranet (Insite) – Usability Case Study

Not all usability changes are dramatic. Sometimes a few small tweaks can make a site significantly easier to navigate, or make important but hidden content pop off the page. The DigitalGov User Experience Program helped test Insite, GSA’s intranet, on September 21, 2011. GSA took the feedback from their usability test and made some changes to the

Oct 15, 2012

FedRAMP – Usability Case Study

Websites allow newer government programs to establish a visual identity that introduces them to users and conveys the importance of their work. On April 18, 2012, the DigitalGov User Experience Program helped test GSA’s Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP) site, which at that point was less than six months old. Three immediate needs were

Oct 15, 2012

Taking Cancer.gov Mobile

Mobile Gov Experiences are agency stories about creating anytime, anywhere, any device government services and info. This entry is a story shared by National Cancer Institute. The National Cancer Institute (NCI), the nation’s leading cancer research agency and part of the National Institutes of Health has a legislative mandate to collect, organize, and disseminate the

Oct 02, 2012

Lost in Translation

Automated translation is touted as a one click solution. But is it? From time to time, the listserv lights up with the issue of translating websites into other languages and I’ve seen the interest increase as Web managers struggle to comply with competing mandates to serve their customers. Many Web managers are tasked with installing

Oct 01, 2012

Medicare.gov Responsive Redesign

Mobile Gov Experiences are agency stories about creating anytime, anywhere, any device government services and info. This entry is a story shared by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Medicare.gov is the consumer website for Medicare beneficiaries, caregivers, and advocates. The site includes information about Medicare plans, coverage, and care

Sep 13, 2012

Agency Digital Strategy Pages

In his May 23rd, 2012 Presidential Memorandum, President Obama directed Executive Departments and Agencies to implement the requirements of the Digital Government Strategy, and create a page at www.[agency].gov/digitalstrategy to publicly report progress of this implementation.

Aug 22, 2012

SMS or Short Message Service

SMS or Short Message Service (Texting) is a mobile device capability where users are able to send short (generally 160 characters maximum) text messages to another user via the use of the keypad or built-in keyboard. Seventy-three percent of cell phone owners use their device to text,

Aug 21, 2012