Campaign Web pages for the history books

Among other things, the Smithsonian Institution collects quilts, Dorothy's ruby slippers, old appliances and rare gems. Add to that list a new entry: Web pages. The National Museum of American History has announced Web Archive '96, a project to record and track World Wide Web documents relating to the 1996 presidential election.

The National Archives and Records Administration will work to preserve "campaign ephemera" on the Internet and turn it "into a permanent, searchable record" before it disappears. Details on the archive are available at http://www.archive.org.

Budgets in the Ether

You can see what the president has proposed for the fiscal 1997 budget and get some analysis on it, too, from the Office of Management and Budget Web site. Point your Web browser to http://whitehouse.gov/WH/EOP/OMB/html/ombhome.html. There, along with the long document, you'll find "A Citizen's Guide to the 1997 Federal Budget," tables and background.

Information Exchange

Tap into ongoing projects bringing state, local and federal governments together on-line at the General Services Administration's Government Information Xchange: http://www info.gov. Click on "Intergovernmental Collaboration." You'll find information and on-line demonstrations relating to intergovernmental projects, including the Iowa Communications Network Pilot Project and the GSA/Arizona State University Information Highway Project. At the Xchange, you'll also find the "Federal Yellow Pages," a terrific, easy-to-use station for finding out more about government initiatives in such areas as electronic benefits transfer, electronic commerce, telecommuting and the Internet.

The initiatives listed under "Intergovernmental Collaboration" provide links to programs taking place in the United States. But the federal government is also working on an international level with the G7 nations to create 11 Global Information Infrastructure initiatives, ranging from international on-line commerce to electronic museums.

The Government Online Project is one of those initiatives. Canada and the United Kingdom lead this particular project, with assistance from other countries, including the United States. You can take a look at their progress over the last year by pointing your browser to http://www.open.gov.uk/govoline/golintro.htm.

Info Warfare

The Information Systems Office of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has recently put its home page on the World Wide Web. Go to the DARPA home page at http://www.arpa.mil, choose the entry marked "Organization" and go to the ISO. Exploring the program portfolios and reading the broad agency announcements (BAAs) is a great way to find out more about the future of information systems related to battlefield awareness and force management.

Check out the BAA for battlefield awareness and data dissemination, for example, listed under "Solicitations." Hint: If you use a World Wide Web browser that views graphics, turn off the automatic graphics loading capability, at least initially. The ISO opening WWW page is crammed with pictures that will significantly slow your visit.

Current Space

Subscribing to the NASA news listserv is one of the best ways to stay on top of new discoveries and endeavors related to space. NASA sends out frequent press releases on topics ranging from Comet Hyakutake to the U.S. space shuttle and space science breakthroughs.

To subscribe, send an e-mail message to domo@hq.nasa.gov. Write in the body of the message "subscribe press-release."

Java Alert

Gateway Guide is still on the lookout for Java applets appearing on federal World Wide Web sites.

Recently, FCW found two applets proudly displayed on the Welcome to the White House home page at http://www.whitehouse.gov.