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Intranet Publishing Guidelines: Introduction

Background
Infrastructure
Support & Process
Local Intranet Sites
Our EPA Intranet Server

Background

An Intranet is a system, usually based on Internet technology which allows an organization like EPA to share information among its employees.

These Intranet procedures are offered to establish some ground rules to standardize the publishing of pages on the Agency's Intranets. The Office of Environmental Information (OEI) is responsible for coordinating EPA@Work Intranet efforts. OEI welcomes your comments and ideas for improving this document and the Agency's Intranet sites. Please visit the Web Guide Contact Us page to submit your correspondence.

Infrastructure

EPA@Work is the Agency Intranet serving all EPA employees. EPA@Work is distinguished in this paper from the other Intranets within the Agency that serve local populations e.g. the Headquarters, Regional, RTP, Cincinnati Intranets. The EPA@Work servers are housed at EPA's National Computer Center in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina. The system will support a clearly defined set of Intranet technologies, including HTML , PDF, Oracle and Domino databases, and CGI scripting. Additional technologies will be tested and supported as necessary.

Support and Process

The information provided through EPA@Work at RTP is managed by the Office of Environmental Information (OEI) and is primarily an interface that organizes information created by program offices.

The methods of establishing "data ownership" and of mounting information will initially be similar to those in EPA’s public access arena, including ownership of data through the TSSMS account and approval of Intranet content by division directors (instead of office directors as is the case on the Internet side).

Local Intranet Sites

We expect that many EPA locations and program offices will want to have Intranet-type resources customized for their staffs. We ask that a "button" for EPA@Work be placed on these local Intranets to facilitate the use of these national information tools. These local "Intranets" could be physically on separate servers and be defined as a "site" within a Working Capital Fund provided server at RTP.

The Intranet and related Web technologies hold great potential for providing information to the EPA-network user community more quickly, extensively, and efficiently than has ever before been possible. The growth in the number of sites, the amount of material they contain, and their level of usefulness make the use of Web technologies an increasingly attractive and effective dissemination channel for EPA information. This same rapid growth also intensifies the need to establish standards and guidelines to help users publish, find, retrieve, and use the information they need.

EPA has made a major commitment to electronic networking as a primary means of providing information and services to customers. If EPA data owners conform to a reasonable set of Intranet guidelines for the organization and presentation of information, our customers will be able to enter our sites at any point and tap not only the specific information they first contact, but the full resources of the Agency. The Web is a key enabling technology for the vision of "one-stop shopping".

This document is not a training document, nor is it a complete style guide for composing HTML. It provides guidance to ensure high quality and consistent content, organization, and presentation of information on EPA's Intranet servers and to help users find pertinent information to answer their Agency-related questions. At the same time, this document tries to avoid placing unnecessary constraints on the design and format of individual information resources and services. EPA will use the Intranet(s) as the primary means for sharing information in a timely and universally accessible manner across the Agency, whether Office, site location, or agency-wide in focus.

Our EPA Intranet Server is Designed to:

Include links from our home page mainline program offices that are of interest to the national workforce.
Promote communication within workgroups and organizations.
Enhance communication at all levels through the use of a single technology and shared resources.
Help users identify Agency resources and services available to them by subject, role, or geographical location.
Provide a mechanism to electronically publish a vast array of information (e.g. policy, job availability, management, personnel, retirement, facility, services, etc.) for a better informed workforce.
Improve the working environment by increasing access to and availability of information and services.

Organization and Agency-sponsored Intranet materials must be coordinated and cross-linked within the Agency Web space in any of the above areas. This is to ensure that those who access EPA's Intranet servers easily gain access to the complete range of the Agency's information and services.

For assistance using the Intranet or technical issues, you may contact the EPA Call Center at 1-866-411-4EPA (4372).

For assistance in creating your HTML documents and graphics there are two Working Capital Fund (WCF) services available: Contact the Internet Service Center at: http://intranet.epa.gov/surfshop/contact.htm or Web Development Services at: http://intranet.epa.gov/webmast3/services/index.html. Both services operate under the Working Capital Fund service that can, for a fee, design Web pages and convert documents to electronic format for anyone at EPA. The most utilized formats on EPA's servers for word processed documents are Hypertext Markup Language (HTML), Adobe's Portable Document Format (PDF), WordPerfect or text.