SOLICITATION NOTICE
70 -- Software Development Collaboration Tools
- Notice Date
- 8/6/2004
- Notice Type
- Solicitation Notice
- NAICS
- 541519
— Other Computer Related Services
- Contracting Office
- Defense Information Systems Agency, Acquisition Directorate, DITCO-Scott, 2300 East Drive Bldg 3600, Scott AFB, IL, 62225-5406
- ZIP Code
- 62225-5406
- Solicitation Number
- Reference-Number-RFISWDEV1
- Response Due
- 9/3/2004
- Archive Date
- 9/18/2004
- Point of Contact
- Linda Goff, Contract Specialist, Phone 618-229-9486, Fax 618-229-9440,
- E-Mail Address
-
goffl@scott.disa.mil
- Description
- Purpose The purpose of this RFI is to seek information from industry on applicable COTS Software Development Collaboration tools and their ability to meet the requirements stated herein. Introduction Net-Centric Enterprise Services (NCES) provides the foundation for DoD network-centric operations by creating a set of nine core services for joint and service systems to use. NCES is part of the larger Global Information Grid (GIG) Enterprise Services (ES). The GIG ES supports the entire Department of Defense?s Information Technology (IT) requirements, including the Business and Warfighting domains, as well as interfaces with the National Intelligence Community (IC) domain. As the core enterprise services component of the Global Information Grid, NCES is the infrastructure on which Department of Defense (DoD) computer applications (e.g., C2, Combat Support, and Medical) rely. This new environment must (1) support posting data to common storage spaces as early as possible; (2) alert edge users to changes in relevant DoD information or time-critical events affecting their survival or threatening their mission; (3) provide users, down to the last tactical mile, with the capability to pull whatever they want, whenever they want, from wherever they are and limited only by the commander?s information management policy; (4) ensure information assurance (IA)/security; and (5) support interoperability among allies, coalition, and multinational partners. NCES relies upon the GIG transport services and tactical communications systems for the exchange between the CESs and the Community of Interest (CoI) capabilities. The nine NCES Core Enterprise Services are defined below: Enterprise Service Management The set of services that enables life cycle management of the information environment and that supports all Network Operations (NetOps) activities necessary to operationally manage information flows. Provides end-to-end GIG performance monitoring, configuration management, event correlation and mission impact assessment, and problem detection/resolution as well as enterprise resource accounting and addressing (e.g., for users, systems, devices). Web Services Management (WSM) provides the end-to-end management of web services within the Service Oriented Architecture (SOA Messaging Services that support synchronous and asynchronous information exchange. Selected capabilities used to exchange information among users or applications on the enterprise infrastructure (e.g., Email, DMS, VMF, USMTF, TADIL, OTH, Message Oriented Middleware, AOL instant messenger, Wireless Services, Alert Services). Discovery The set of services that enables the formulation and execution of processes to locate data assets (e.g., files, databases, services, directories, web pages, streams) by exploiting metadata descriptions stored in and or generated by IT repositories (e.g., directories, registries, catalogs, repositories, other shared metadata storage). Mediation Services that help broker, translate, aggregate, fuse or integrate data, providing capabilities that enable transformation processing (translation, aggregation, integration), situational awareness support (correlation and fusion), negotiation (brokering, trading, and auctioning services) and publishing. Collaboration The set of services that allows users to work together and jointly using selected capabilities on the network (i.e., chat, online meetings, work group software etc.). Collaboration services include synchronous and asynchronous modes enabling ad hoc interaction between disparate participants. Synchronous services are characterized by real-time point-to-point or peer-to-peer interaction between users and systems (i.e. chat, online meetings, etc.). Asynchronous services provide collaborative or shared workspaces that facilitate the interaction between disparate persons or groups. Please note this is a separate product space than Next Generation Collaboration Services (NGCS). User Assistant Automated capabilities that learn and apply user preferences and patterns to assist users to efficiently and effectively utilize GIG resources in the performance of tasks. Security Capabilities that include addressing vulnerabilities in networks, computing infrastructure, core services, and/or discreet systems. The set of services that provides Defense in Depth to ensure the integrity and continuity of the information environment and the information it stores, processes, maintains, uses, shares, disseminates, disposes, displays, or transmits. Storage The set of physical and virtual places available on the network to host data with varying degrees of persistence (e.g., archiving, COOP, content staging) Application The set of services necessary to provision, host, operate and manage the assured computing environment. The nature of GIG Enterprise Services requires a development effort with geographically disparate service providers and software developers leveraging a variety of software and hardware platforms. Collaboration among developers is crucial for the successful development and integration of enterprise services. This creates the need for a DOD-wide online collaborative development environment that will enable the developer community to effectively communicate and share project resources during the software development life cycle. DISA is considering the procurement of a COTS Online Software Development Collaboration environment with configuration management, knowledge management, project communication, project management, and architecture development capabilities. The service must have adequate security and administrative facilities as well as a user-friendly interface. Additionally, DISA seeks a service that may be fully integrated with the architecture of the NCES Core Enterprise Services. DISA?s objective is to provide software development collaboration as a service to DOD developers. The service may need to operate on as many as three networks: the Internet, the DOD Non-Classified IP Router Network (NIPRNET), and the DOD SECRET IP Router Network (SIPRNET). Although NIPRNET and Internet are connected via gateways, access to certain NIPRNET assets is restricted to DOD users, and this may be the case for the software development collaboration services. Given these environments, DISA is open to various business models: The vendor sells software to DISA, and DISA integrates the software and operates the service in its facilities. The vendor sells a turnkey hardware/software system to DISA, and DISA operates the service in its facilities. The vendor integrates and operates the service in DISA facilities, for a flat or by-subscription fee. The vendor operates the service in its own facilities, for a flat or by-subscription fee. Requirements/Capabilities: Software Configuration Management (SCM) Maintain version control and iteration history of project artifacts Track and record changes made to artifacts including who made changes, when the changes were made, and any comments entered about the changes Allow users to obtain an annotated view of text files that show what changes were made in the current version. Allow users to perform ?diff? analysis on text files between different versions Allow users to upload and download multiple files at once Service shall enable the versioning of files and directories/folders. This versioning shall allow users to move, copy, and rename files and folders within version control The version control service shall support atomic commits that will check if all objects are successfully committed into the DB. If all of the commits are not successful, or updates shall be automatically rolled back and user shall be given status information about the commit The version control service needs to allow for concurrent versioning. This will allow multiple users to check out a single file or a set of files at once. During an update or a check-in, the service shall inform users if a merge needs to take place between the latest version in the server and the user?s working copy. The service shall allow for automatic merging of documents and give indications on conflicts that prevent merges from taking place. The service shall operate over standard protocols (http(s), webdav, etc) The version control service shall support and complement common development processes (i.e. CMM, AGILE, RUP, Rational). The service shall be able to work within and enhance these processes in a software development environment. The version control service shall allow users to specify artifacts during the check-in process. The service will then create an automatic link to the specified artifact in the version control history section of the document. Support for artifact tracking The service needs to allow for the design, development, and tracking of custom artifact types (issues, defects, requirements, document tracking, etc) at domain and project level The service shall allow users to specify the attributes and options to track within an artifact type. This feature will allow users to specify the fields and options that need to be tracked within a given artifact type The service shall allow users to create custom queries against artifact types. These queries shall allow users the flexibility to query against fields defined within artifact types. Cross project or cross artifact type queries shall be possible. This will allow users to query across different artifact types and projects in order to obtain a consolidated view of query results. The service shall support the export of query results to Excel for analysis The service shall support basic workflow to track lifecycle states of artifacts. This feature shall allow users to set up a state transition process for each artifact (e.g. new, in process, fixed, closed) and specify options available by role-based access. This feature will make it possible to control what options are available to which users based on their role in a project The service shall support the export/import of artifacts via XML in order to allow for more easy integration with external applications The service shall support role-based access of artifacts. This feature shall enable project owners to specify which users (via roles) have access to artifacts. The service needs to be able to send automatic email notifications to project members to indicate artifact changes. The artifact tracking service shall provide automatic links to the version control service. Therefore, users shall be able to check in documents within version control and automatically link it to a particular artifact. Links to the document shall automatically be created within the artifact. Support for IDE integration The version control service shall work with the common integrated development environment (IDE) platforms (i.e. J2EE & .NET). This will allow developers to work in their favorite IDEs and check out/in artifacts right from their development authoring tools. The service shall allow users to version documents using their standard Windows file browser. The service shall offer command line interfaces to version control for Microsoft, UNIX, and MAC platforms Knowledge management (KM) File Sharing: The service shall allow users to easily share files and folders with project members. The service shall not care about file types as long as users have the appropriate applications to view files. Search The service shall allow users to perform full-text artifact searches across the domain. Searches shall include files, folders, discussion forums, mailing lists, and issues. The service shall allow for content based searches for common file formats (Microsoft word, PDF, Excel) The search functionality must be linked with the security model. Therefore, search results shall not show items that the user does not have access permissions to view. The service shall allow for searches across domains Project Communications (PC) Mailing Lists The service shall allow for the creation of custom mailing lists that can be used via standard email programs to send emails to project members The service shall allow project members to subscribe to mailing lists in order to automatically receive emails sent to mailing lists. The service shall automatically archive all emails sent to mailing lists. The archive has to be searchable by the subject and body of the emails. The service shall allow for moderated mailing lists. These lists will send email notifications to moderators for approval before distributing emails to the subscribers. Discussion Forums The service shall allow project members to create discussion forums. The service shall allow for threaded discussions within a discussion forum. It shall also allow users to obtain multiple views of postings (i.e. listing by topic, full text listings) The service shall track when users view forum postings in order to inform users if and when project members viewed recent postings. Project members shall be allowed to subscribe to discussion forums and receive email notifications of new postings. It shall also inform users of the existence of unread postings. Project Announcements The service shall allow project managers to post project news announcements that are visible to project members. The service shall allow project owners to choose dates for publishing and terminating project announcements. The service shall allow project members to suggest project announcements and enable project owners to approve or disapprove of these announcements. Project/Program Management The service shall support the import/export of MS Project work plans into a project. The service shall support calendar functionality. The service shall perform automated task management and tracking. The service shall allow project members to create self-planning tasks. The service shall provide a dashboard view of project status. The service shall support reporting of effort, schedule, and variances against the project plan. Provide view of project risks based on discrepancies on planned vs. actual efforts for milestones and individual tasks. The service shall provide a portfolio view of multiple projects. This report shall allow executives to easily obtain project status information at a high level and drill down capability. The service shall have workflow capability. Architecture Capabilities The service shall support traceability. The service shall support lifecycle management. The service shall allow for the comparison architecture artifacts The service shall be capable of interfacing with other NCES services. The service shall integrate with external services The service shall support and be built around open standards. The service shall allow for configuration management. The service shall be capable of interfacing with architecture tools Facilitate Asset Portfolio Management (APM) by making the organization?s assets visible to project teams; identifying, managing, and monitoring compliance with architectural standards; and helping with the distribution and tracking of architectural assets as they are used by project teams. Enable the tracking of architecture requirements Facilitate the tracking of current and target architecture Provide a collaborative environment for asset creation by helping with the identification, production, modification, and packaging of artifacts that create assets Provide a role-based environment to control views Create and track the proper metadata for assets (asset type, descriptive information, deployment information, feedback, financial information, supporting artifacts, etc) Provide portfolio view of multiple project status with ?drill down? capability. Provide bulletin board functionality Security The service shall provide role-based access to project information. The service shall support SSL. The service shall be capable of authentication using DOD PKI or X.509 certificates. . The service shall support single sign-on. The service shall supports security scans. The service shall support DISA ST&E requirements. Administration The service shall allow domain administrators the ability to post broadcast announcements. Federated project administration The service shall allow for form based user registration. The service shall have centralized domain configurations that will allow domain administrators to manage users, create and maintain domain level roles and permissions, manage artifact types, create broadcast messages, and run site level reports. The service shall be able to produce statistical reports. The service shall allow for the creation of custom reports. The service shall have back up and recovery and COOP capability. Workspace The service shall be Section 508 Compliant. The service shall support domain level branding. The service shall allow for project managers to customize the project home page. The service shall be fully functional with standard browsers The service shall be designed to allow for a project/program. Quality of Service (QOS) The service shall have a proven track record of 99% or better uptime The service shall support centralized data backup and storage The service shall support 24x7 monitoring. The service shall facilitate the creation of root cause analysis The service shall support security scans to check for security vulnerabilities. Professional Services Proven ability to deliver supporting services to foster successful implementation of software collaboration environment Services engineering Collaborative software process reengineering services. Services to continuously enable community development and outreach. Training. Services to create custom branding. Data migration services to enable the migration of data from legacy services. Custom application integration services. Help desk support Services in the area of collaborative software intellectual property rights Supplier Considerations The supplier must have proven ability to deliver software collaboration services in a large scale environment (thousand of users & projects) The supplier must have proven ability to deliver a high QOS to large customers Industry validation of supplier?s solution. The solution must have a track record of being successfully used by major corporations in mission critical programs. Questions Detailed replies to the following questions should be included in any response to this RFI. Can registered users invoke the full capabilities of your tool from a web browser? Does your company have experience dealing with data transport across multiple DOD classification levels (SIPER to NIPR), and will your product support the use of role-based access and DOD PKI certificates to transfer data to individuals with appropriate access? Does your product support single sign-on? Is the architecture of your product open enough that it will be possible to integrate the product with NCES services such as security, collaboration, service discovery, and enterprise service management, even to the extent of replacing the product?s native capabilities with the NCES services? What is the technology life expectancy of the product(s)? What is the product?s potential to be offered as a 24/7 service via the web through a thin client browser? What are the metrics of the product(s), to include but not be limited to, data exchange rates, seek time, mean time between failures, etc.? What are the technical specifications, operating parameters, and network design specifications for each product? Summarize the configuration options available for the product(s). Describe the scalability of each product to include but not limited to hardware and software upgrades? What standards do the product(s) comply with? Are there risks associated with the use of these standards? How does your company plan to mitigate these risks? What are the corporate support policies associated with the product(s)? What data types does each product support? What interfaces and protocols does each product support? What is the corporate 5-year evolution strategy for each product and service? What are the licensing cost models costs associated with the product(s)? Are there any additional software licenses and fees necessary to utilize the full capabilities of the product(s)? What engineering services are included with the product(s)? DISCLAIMER THE GOVERNMENT DOES NOT INTEND TO AWARD A CONTRACT ON THE BASIS OF THIS RFI OR TO OTHERWISE PAY FOR INFORMATION RECEIVED IN RESPONSE TO THIS RFI. However, this RFI will be the basis for collecting information on products available, and as a result of information received, the government may enter into Product Loan Agreements for trial and testing of products identified. This RFI is issued for information and planning purposes only and does not constitute a solicitation. All information received in response to this RFI that is marked Proprietary will be handled accordingly. The Government shall not be liable for or suffer any consequential damages for any proprietary information not properly identified. Proprietary information will be safeguarded in accordance with the applicable Government regulations. Responses to the RFI will not be returned. Whatever information is provided in response to this RFI will be used to assess tradeoffs and alternatives available for determining how to proceed in the acquisition process. In accordance with FAR 15.201(e), responses to this RFI are not offers and cannot be accepted by the Government to form a binding contract. RFI Submission. Prior to submitting a response to this RFI, Offerors shall register with DITCO via its Contracting Opportunities web site at https://www.ditco.disa.mil/dcop. During the registration process, choose the option for ?The solicitation requires vendor registration for eligibility?. You will be prompted to enter the RFI reference number. Upon completion of registration, Offerors will receive a user-id and password for use when uploading information. This process allows DITCO to precisely track when responses are uploaded (or attempted to be uploaded). Registration information will be verified by DITCO personnel, which takes about a day. Once the Offeror?s information is verified, responses will be able to be uploaded. Vendors must register a minimum of one week prior to uploading a response to ensure the RFI upload is accomplished by the closing date and time. Vendors should also attempt to upload their response as early as possible to ensure no problems arise at the last minute. If an offeror would like to test the upload process, they may do so by typing in this url: https://www.scott.disa.mil/dcop. Under the heading Submit Proposals for:, look for Upload Proposal Test. If you have any problems with this automated process, please contact Kevin Mehlan at (618)229-9334, email address: mehlank@scott.disa.mil, or the DITCO customer service center at (618) 229-9333. In order to be evaluated and considered in time to influence a potential near-term acquisition effort, submission should occur within thirty days of the posting date of the RFI. The Government may request additional information or discuss information received in responses to this RFI with individual responders. DISA shall consider meeting individually with interested respondents. Such meetings shall be constrained to one hour for presentation and discussion.
- Place of Performance
- Address: Eagle Bldg/Falls Church/VA
- Zip Code: 22041
- Country: USA
- Zip Code: 22041
- Record
- SN00638306-W 20040808/040806211620 (fbodaily.com)
- Source
-
FedBizOpps.gov Link to This Notice
(may not be valid after Archive Date)
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