Data reference model released

Data Reference Model

Office of Management and Budget officials issued today the first volume of the data reference model, the long anticipated, much delayed, fifth and final portion of the federal enterprise architecture.

The data model was widely considered the hardest enterprise architecture model to construct. The first volume, one of four, sketches a basic data model consisting of three areas: categorization, structure and information exchange. Future volumes will craft in greater detail other elements of the reference model.

The model's release occurs against a backdrop of changes inside the federal enterprise architecture program office. De facto acting chief architect Richard Brozen, who had been on loan from NASA, has gone back to the space agency, and Karen Evans, administrator of e-government and information technology, has added the duties of chief architect to her job. In addition, responsibility for updating the federal enterprise architecture's five reference models will be a duty partially shifted to the CIO Council's Architecture and Infrastructure Committee, Evans told Federal Computer Week.

The position of chief architect is also in danger of being eliminated by House lawmakers. Language that would remove the position is in the committee report on the Transportation, Treasury and Independent Agencies Appropriations Act, which provides OMB's funds.