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gils: Summary of 10-17-96 meeting of OIW GILS Special Interest Group

gils: Summary of 10/17/96 meeting of OIW GILS Special Interest Group

Summary of 10/17/96 meeting of OIW GILS Special Interest Group

Steve Hufford (Hufford.Steve@epamail.epa.gov)
5 Nov 96 16:45:46 

Message-Id: <9611052146.AA1407@epahub2.rtptok.epa.gov>
To: gils <gils@cni.org>
From: Steve Hufford <Hufford.Steve@epamail.epa.gov>
Date:  5 Nov 96 16:45:46 
Subject: Summary of 10/17/96 meeting of OIW GILS Special Interest Group

Summary of the 10/17/1996 Meeting of the OIW GILS Special Interest Group,
held at the U.S. Department of the Treasury, Washington, DC

Organizations represented: Agency for Health Care Policy and Research, Dept. of 
Agriculture/Forest Service, Dept. of Interior/Fish and Wildlife Service, Dept. 
of State, Dept. of the Treasury, Environmental Protection Agency , Equal 
Employment Opportunity Commission, Garcia, Inc., General Services 
Administration, Government Printing Office, Library of Congress/FEDLINK, 
National Archives and Records Administration, Nuclear Regulatory Commission, 
Office of Management and Budget, Office of the Secretary of Defense, OMB Watch, 
SIMA, Inc., University of Maryland/Baltimore County, U.S. Information Agency, 
Veteran,s Administration

Evaluations of the U.S. Federal GILS

John Bertot of the University of Maryland/Baltimore County briefed the group on 
the GILS evaluation study to be led by Professors Moen and McClure under 
contract to the General Services Administration.  Bertot, a consultant on the 
evaluation, said case studies will be developed at several agencies, focusing 
on the issue of how well GILS is serving its customers.  The evaluation team 
has also planned focus group discussions for the 1996 GILS Conference to be 
held at NARA.  Bertot identified five main facets of GILS that will be 
addressed in the evaluation:  1) users, 2) technology, 3) content, 4) policy, 
and 5) standards.  For more information on this evaluation, see 
http://www-lan.unt.edu/slis/research/gilseval/gilseval.htm .

Patrice McDermott (OMB Watch) distributed copies of OMB Watch,s draft report 
on the implementation of GILS.  The draft report reflects research as well as 
findings from a voluntary survey of federal GILS contacts, and presents several 
main conclusions:  1) While individuals within agencies are working hard on 
GILS, rarely have they received technical, monetary, or staff support from 
agency heads.  2) Although useful information is available on agency Web sites, 
few agencies have made the connection between GILS and those services.  3) Even 
fewer agencies provide access to their GILS records to those who do not have 
access to the Web.  4) GILS will remain an &agency nuisance8 that is only 
minimally useful to users if it is not integrated into existing information 
collection, dissemination and archival plans.

Patrice emphasized that the report is only in draft, and she solicited comments 
on any factual corrections that should be made (contact patricem@rtk.net or 
phone her at 202-234-8494).

1996 GILS Conference

Jim Hastings (NARA) said the GILS Conference is fully subscribed.  The 
conference will likely be the biggest event hosted to date at the NARA II 
facility.  Over 300 people are registered and NARA may have an overflow room to 
supplement the main conference area.  The waiting list may reach 100, and 
international participation will be strong.  Parking will likely be a problem, 
so Jim encouraged those who will be driving to carpool and to arrive early -- 
by 8:00 a.m.  A shuttle will be provided from Prince George,s Plaza.  If you 
have already registered but will be unable to attend, please inform NARA as 
soon as possible so they can let someone else in (contact NARA by phone at 
301-713-7100, ext. 255).

Web Logfile Statistics

John Bertot briefed the group on the various world wide web logfiles, and the 
types of information they capture.  He explained the differences between 
access, agent, error, and refer logs.  He solicited and received several 
volunteer organizations to participate in making their logfiles available for 
analysis in support of the GILS evaluation.  U.S. federal government 
organizations interested in having their GILS servers included in the logfile 
analysis should feel free to contact John at bertot@umbc.edu or at 410-455-3206.

Vicki Ries (GPO) shared with the group the September GILS Database Usage report 
for GPO Access.  There were about 22 thousand total GILS searches and 24 
thousand total GILS retrievals in September, bringing the total year-to-date 
GPO Access GILS searches and retrievals to roughly 173 thousand and 239 
thousand, respectively.

Steve Hufford presented a status report on EPA's GILS implementation, 
highlighting the use EPA has made of access logs to track status and trends.  
EPA has hot-linked about 25% of their GILS records to the automated information 
resources themselves, and at least 53 external sites link to EPA's GILS site.  
Searching is more common than browsing, and more searches of EPA,s GILS 
records occur off EPA's Web home page than off  the GILS page itself. 

Electronic Freedom of Information Act (E-FOIA)

The group then discussed the new electronic Freedom of Information Act.  Owen 
Ambur (USFWS) introduced the topic, highlighting provisions that may relate to 
GILS:  
1) a requirement that records created on or after November 1 of this year shall 
be made available in electronic form by November 1 of next year, and 2) a 
requirement that an electronic index of records be made available by the end of 
the century, December 31, 1999.  The latter provision, found in section 11 of 
the Act, seems most closely related to GILS.

A very lively discussion ensued about the relationship between GILS and 
E-FOIA.  Topics included, among others, the nature and extent of agency 
requirements to provide electronic access to their information products, the 
level of aggregation and granularity of GILS records, potential revisions to 
OMB Bulletin 95-01, paper versus electronic media, electronic document 
management systems, electronic authentication, and Agency culture.  A full text 
version of the act is available at http://thomas.loc.gov, searching either for 
Public Law 104-231, or house bill 3802.

Evolution/Maintenance of the GILS Profile

The group decided to defer until the December meeting a final discussion of 
version 2 of the GILS application profile, as well as any discussion of general 
directions for profile version 3.

Logistics and Main Topics for Next Meeting

The next meeting of the GILS SIG will be at 10:00 am on December 4, 1996 
at the U.S. National Labor Relations Board.  The main topics will likely 
include a final discussion of version 2 of the GILS application profile, 
discussion of  records management-related deadlines, and followup actions from 
the GILS Conference.  NLRB is at 1099 14th Street, NW, Washington DC, near the 
McPherson Square metro stop.  We will meet in Room 6001, and a photo ID is 
required for entrance to the building.

Meetings of the GILS Special Interest Group are open to anyone:  public and 
private 
agencies, organizations, associations, or enterprises, whether profit, 
non-profit, or academic; government at Federal, state, and local levels, 
whether U.S., international or other nations; and any other interested parties.

The GILS SIG is operating in an information sharing mode.  The business of the 
GILS SIG is conducted primarily through electronic mail on the GILS discussion 
list.  To subscribe, send e-mail to LISTPROC@CNI.ORG and in the message write: 

SUBSCRIBE GILS <your name>

Summaries of prior GILS Subgroup meetings can be found under "Documents related 
to GILS" as part of the &Technical Topics and Other Information8 area at 
<http://www.usgs.gov/gils>.

Steve Hufford, US Environmental Protection Agency
hufford.steve@epamail.epa.gov     phone: 202-260-9732     fax: 202-401-8390

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