[GCARC] MODERNIZING THE FCC's IT - FCC.GOV

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Modernizing the FCC's IT

by:  <https://www.fcc.gov/blog/author/Dr.%20David%20A.%20Bray> Dr. David A.
Bray, FCC CIO 

August 20, 2015 - 11:59 AM

Our world and the  <https://www.fcc.gov/blog/importance-communication>
technologies we use are changing rapidly. As such, the information
technology used by the Federal Communications Commission must change as
well. Over the past year, we have made significant progress to
<https://www.fcc.gov/blog/modernizing-fcc-enterprise> upgrade and modernize
our infrastructure, and we continue to work on modernizing the FCC's legacy
IT systems with the resources we have available.

Over the Labor Day Weekend, the FCC IT Team will be working to upgrade and
modernize the FCC's legacy infrastructure. Starting Wednesday, September 2nd
at 6pm EDT, interactive public-facing web applications hosted at the FCC
will not be available. We will work to have these web applications upgraded
and available again by the morning of 8am EDT on Tuesday, September 8th.

These web applications will include our Electronic Comment Filing System
(ECFS), Electronic Document Management System (EDOCS), Universal Licensing
System (ULS),  <http://www2.ntia.doc.gov/broadband-data> National Broadband
Map, and other public-facing applications. Static content web pages under
the  <http://www.fcc.gov/> www.fcc.gov domain, like the FCC's consumer
guides, should remain available during this period.

Of note, our cloud-based  <https://consumercomplaints.fcc.gov/hc/en-us> FCC
Consumer Help Desk, recently modernized to a Software as a Service (SaaS)
option, will continue to operate uninterrupted. It is our goal to modernize
more of the FCC's legacy IT to SaaS and other cloud-based platform options
going forward. This modernization is more flexible, secure and resilient, as
well as more cost effective compared to the costs of maintaining on-premise
IT solutions. 

We understand that this temporary downtime before and during the Labor Day
Weekend may be inconvenient for some FCC stakeholders; however, we have
taken a number of steps to mitigate this wherever possible. For example,
filing deadlines for all Commission proceedings that happen to fall during
the affected time period will automatically be extended; more specific
details can be found in a
<https://www.fcc.gov/document/fcc-databases-unavailable-filing-deadline-exte
nsions-early-september> Public Notice here.

This work effort over the Labor Day Weekend is the
<https://www.fcc.gov/blog/risks-breaking-past-status-quo-and-it-transformati
on> latest in a series of on-going work to improve the FCC's legacy IT
systems, reduce how much we spend on our legacy infrastructure, and improve
public engagement with the Commission. The entire FCC IT Team thanks you for
your support and understanding.