Simon Liu

RxNorm: prescription for electronic drug information exchange

Commercial drug information systems follow a variety of naming conventions. A smooth electronic exchange of the information in these systems - not only between organizations but even within a single organization - is crucial in assuring patient safety. This exchange requires a standardized nomenclature. To meet this need, the National Library of Medicine (NLM) created RxNorm, a standardized nomenclature for clinical drugs that is one of a suite of standards designated for use in US federal government systems for the electronic exchange of clinical health information.

Building an enterprise architecture step by step

For most organizations, getting started may be the hardest part of building an enterprise information technology architecture. One reason is that people have only a hazy idea of how to use a systematic architecting process to achieve specific goals. The entire idea of enterprise architecting seems grand and out of reach, so they feel more comfortable chipping away at it with patches. Unfortunately, these patches evolve to something only slightly more sophisticated. Some efforts never get that far. The architects get caught in a never-ending series of analyses and end up with nothing but a long to-do list just as the money runs out and the CEO expects to start seeing a return on investment. The article shows how to scope the project, set up the development team, and form a target architecture vision.

Data Loss Prevention

In todays digital economy, data enters and leaves cyberspace at record rates. A typical enterprise sends and receives millions of email messages and downloads, saves, and transfers thousands of files via various channels on a daily basis. Enterprises also hold sensitive data that customers, business partners, regulators, and shareholders expect them to protect. Unfortunately, companies constantly fall victim to massive data loss, and high-profile data leakages involving sensitive personal and corporate data continue to appear (http://opensecurityfoundation. org). Data loss could substantially harm a companys competitiveness and reputation and could also invite lawsuits or regulatory consequences for lax security. Therefore, organizations should take measures to understand the sensitive data they hold, how its controlled, and how to prevent it from being leaked or compromised.

Getting the most from your enterprise architecture

It should be clear that many things drive an enterprise architectures (EAs) value and that the EA effort provides you only the opportunity to create value. Organizations that have discovered this the hard way may be saddled with a failing EA. It is not necessarily too late to revive it. By improving the architecting process, strengthening your chief architects competencies, or refining the architecture products, you will eventually reenergize the EA and make it successful. The value assessors give you an idea of the work involved, but they are only a framework. How much value an organization actually gets from its architecture depends on many factors. Nonetheless, knowing what makes an architecture valuable will provide you with a solid foundation for the difficult job ahead.

Learner Autonomy as a Predictor of Course Success and Final Grades in Community College Online Courses

This study employed a quantitative research design to examine the predictive relationships between: (a) learner autonomy and course success; and (b) learner autonomy and final grades in community college online courses. Learner autonomy was defined as the characteristic of an individual who exhibited intentional behavior in learning activities. The results of the binary and ordinal logistic regression analyses suggested that learner autonomy was a valid predictor of course success and final grades in community college online courses. The implications of the results are discussed in the context of early identification and effective intervention. Specifically, two interventions are recommended: (a) blended learning programs, and (b) advisory and counseling services.

Challenges to transforming IT win the US government

Nearly seven years ago, the US Congress passed the Clinger-Cohen Act (CCA) to revolutionize IT management in federal agencies. So, where is the e-government? This article describes how federal agencies currently incorporate CCA. It analyzes the Acts effectiveness, and proposes practices to improve its implementation. Ultimately, the success of IT transformation in the US government depends on IT governance within federal agencies and across the federal government.

Cyberattacks: Why, What, Who, and How

As computers, information systems, and networking have become increasingly ubiquitous, cybersecurity has become even more critical for the continuity of basic business operations. This article analyzes the challenges associated with cybersecurity, including attack patterns and trends.

A practical approach to enterprise IT security

As the Internet has matured, so have the threats to its safe use, and so must the security measures that enable its business use. Traditional piecemeal, single-layer, single-dimensional security approaches are no longer adequate. These approaches can create a false sense of security and create as many problems as they attempt to address. We propose a multifaceted framework to prevent, detect, and respond to ever more sophisticated threats to enterprise IT information and assets. We outline a practical implementation approach to building enterprise IT security mechanisms in an incremental and continuous fashion. We believe that enterprises should adopt a similar multifaceted framework, following a practical but disciplined implementation approach. Enterprises must treat IT security as a required business enabler rather than just a costly item with low priority.

Surviving Insecure IT: Effective Patch Management

The amount of time to protect enterprise systems against potential vulnerability continues to shrink. Enterprises need an effective patch management mechanism to survive the insecure IT environment. Effective patch management is a systematic and repeatable patch distribution process which includes establishing timely and practical alerts, receiving notification of patches or discovering them, downloading patches and documentation, assessing and prioritizing vulnerabilities, performing testing, deploying patches, and auditing.

A practical framework for discussing IT infrastructure

Although increasingly important, IT infrastructure remains poorly defined. IT professionals need a practical framework to systematically discuss the nature, scope, evolution, and management of IT infrastructure. The guidelines presented can help one to think more clearly about infrastructure issues.