Swiss get e-gov framework
Switzerland adopted its first e-government enterprise architecture to ensure that new systems are designed with interoperability as a top priority.
Swiss e-government architecture site
The Swiss government adopted its first e-government enterprise architecture this month, a framework developed to ensure that new systems are designed with interoperability as a top priority.
The new architecture — SAGA.ch, now in version 1.1 — is based on the architecture of the German government and recommendations from international standards organizations, such as the Internet Engineering Task Force and the World Wide Web Consortium. Comments and suggestions from the public were also incorporated, although some of those comments will not be included until version 2.0, according to Swiss officials.
As in the United States and other countries that have developed central e-government architectures, SAGA.ch is not only focused achieving interoperability between new information technology systems and services but also on reducing the amount of money spent on redundant and incompatible systems.
The architecture focuses on five aspects of e-government: communications protocols, Web services, data and metadata formats, information security and infrastructure. Each of those areas has more specific goals and requirements. Under security, for example, the architecture outlines a high-level data protection model and then details the different technologies to reach that goal, including public key infrastructure, access controls and IPSec.