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Data Centers and Consolidation: A Special Report

Governments combine data centers to save money.

Data centers and consolidation. The two seem to be joined at the hip these days. As in the corporate world, data centers have become the hearts of government operations, pumping the lifeblood of information into the organization.

But data centers have proliferated at a bewildering and unsustainable pace, driving up the cost of IT in government. As the need for more interoperability, shared services and enterprise applications grows, CIOs see an opportunity to consolidate, reduce redundancy and pare down expenses.

As a result, data center consolidation has become a significant factor in public-sector IT. At the federal, state and local levels, CIOs are embarking on efforts to centralize server farms and their administration.

But is consolidation the panacea to what ails government IT? In the article Same Old Song, Contributing Writer and former Deputy CIO of Missouri William Bott says CIOs must ask themselves why they are consolidating before they take the plunge.

Still, data centers --consolidated or not -- are huge expenses and in the present economic situation, public CIOs are under more pressure than ever to reduce costs. Are there some relatively painless ways to cut data center costs? Eric Gallant of Lee Technologies thinks so and in this report, he highlights five quick and relatively easy ways to save money.

Five Budget-Saving Ways to Maintain Data Center Uptime, by Eric Gallant, Lee Technologies

Advice: Information Technology Use More Important Than Consolidation, by Bill Bott, Change & Innovation Agency

With more than 20 years of experience covering state and local government, Tod previously was the editor of Public CIO, e.Republic’s award-winning publication for information technology executives in the public sector. He is now a senior editor for Government Technology and a columnist at Governing magazine.