Topic: Troubled Obamacare website wasn't tested until a week before launch

[oldcoastie6468]

Troubled Obamacare website wasn't tested until a week before launch
BY RICHARD POLLOCK | OCTOBER 17, 2013 AT 4:46 PM



The official federal government organizational chart for the Obamacare website project.

Federal officials did not permit testing of the Obamacare healthcare.gov website or issue final system requirements until four to six days before its Oct. 1 launch, according to an individual with direct knowledge of the project.

The individual, who spoke on condition of anonymity, described the troubled Obamacare website project as suffering from top-level management disarray, changing systems requirements and recurring delays.

The root cause of the problems was a pivotal decision by Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services officials to act as systems integrator, the central coordinator for the entire program. Usually this role is reserved for the prime information technology contractor.

As a result, full testing of the site was delayed until four to six days before the fateful Oct. 1 launch of the health care exchanges, the individual said.

Federal officials were “freezing requirements in time to permit full testing at all levels of the site — integration testing, user testing, performance testing and tuning,” the individual said.

“Normally a system this size would need 4-6 months of testing and performance tuning, not 4-6 days,” the individual said.

[Pandora]

The smartest people in the room.  They can't put together a working website but they think they can run "healthcare" for 300+ million people.

Or ....

... it wasn't supposed to work, in which case they've done splendidly, and is a harbinger of how they intend to run "healthcare" for a certain number of 300+ people.

[Libertas]

Engineered failure for political gain...SSDD...

[Pablo de Fleurs]

The Tech Surge? 

‘Tech Surge’ Planned to Fix Obamacare Exchanges

The Department of Health and Human Services said Sunday it was bringing in outside help to resolve some of the technical woes that have beset the federally run insurance exchanges, which the agency acknowledged “has not lived up to the expectations of the American people.”

“We are committed to doing better,” agency officials said in a blog post that also said that “our team is bringing in some of the best and brightest from both inside and outside government to scrub in with the team and help improve healthcare.gov.”

Spokespeople for the agency didn’t immediately respond to questions seeking more information about the development, which it is billing as a “tech surge.” . . . . .

http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2013/10/20/tech-surge-planned-to-fix-obamacare-exchanges/?mod=WSJ_hpp_LEFTTopStories

[Libertas]

Yes, take unpaid breaks from your lucrative day jobs and help Unca Shuggah straighten out this little cyber fiasco...

 

[oldcoastie6468]

Why they hired a sh**tstain outfit from Canada to "fix" this is a mystery. That company has failed the jobs for which they were previously hired.

Get two USA teenagers to set up the required program. It would be flawless and inexpensive, and maybe they'd do it for no fee.

[Pandora]

Why they hired a sh**tstain outfit from Canada to "fix" this is a mystery. That company has failed the jobs for which they were previously hired.

Get two USA teenagers to set up the required program. It would be flawless and inexpensive, and maybe they'd do it for no fee.

I'd rather it remain broken.

[oldcoastie6468]

Why they hired a sh**tstain outfit from Canada to "fix" this is a mystery. That company has failed the jobs for which they were previously hired.

Get two USA teenagers to set up the required program. It would be flawless and inexpensive, and maybe they'd do it for no fee.

I'd rather it remain broken.

How true, how true. I was just bashing the king of the world for his stupidity.

[Libertas]

Why they hired a sh**tstain outfit from Canada to "fix" this is a mystery. That company has failed the jobs for which they were previously hired.

Get two USA teenagers to set up the required program. It would be flawless and inexpensive, and maybe they'd do it for no fee.

I'd rather it remain broken.

How true, how true. I was just bashing the king of the world for his stupidity.

KoW is guilt free...other people are stupid for not making his dreams become reality.  Didn't his comments basically compare himself to be a visionary like Steve Jobs?

[oldcoastie6468]

Why they hired a sh**tstain outfit from Canada to "fix" this is a mystery. That company has failed the jobs for which they were previously hired.

Get two USA teenagers to set up the required program. It would be flawless and inexpensive, and maybe they'd do it for no fee.

I'd rather it remain broken.

How true, how true. I was just bashing the king of the world for his stupidity.

KoW is guilt free...other people are stupid for not making his dreams become reality.  Didn't his comments basically compare himself to be a visionary like Steve Jobs?

His comments compare himself to a god of good.

[Pandora]

Yeah; god of good-for-nuthin'.

I read the Canadian bunch was hired because their "expertise" is in single-payer.  Go figure.

[Pablo de Fleurs]

ALL programs work when they're written in Microsoft Word!

[RickZ]

http://www.nationaljournal.com/health-care/sebelius-explains-how-obamacare-isn-t-like-tickle-me-elmo-20131101

MEMPHIS -- Kathleen Sebelius brushed off questions Friday about reports saying only six people signed up for coverage on the first day of the Obamacare website's operation.

Speaking at a library in Memphis as part of an effort to encourage healthcare sign ups in the city, Sebelius said she didn't know where that figure came from and that the government doesn't have "reliable enrollment figures yet."

--SNIP--

Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) who invited Sebelius to the city, bristled at some of the questions she was asked, saying "Change is hard. Get over it. Barack Obama is president, and the Affordable Care Act is the law."

In the crowd was Republican state Sen. Brian Kelsey, the sponsor of a bill to block Medicaid expansion in Tennessee scheduled to be heard in January. He tried to give Sebelius a copy of the book "Websites for Dummies," which she appeared to hold briefly.

Cruella de Sebelius is not amused.

[AlanS]

http://www.nationaljournal.com/health-care/sebelius-explains-how-obamacare-isn-t-like-tickle-me-elmo-20131101

MEMPHIS -- Kathleen Sebelius brushed off questions Friday about reports saying only six people signed up for coverage on the first day of the Obamacare website's operation.

Speaking at a library in Memphis as part of an effort to encourage healthcare sign ups in the city, Sebelius said she didn't know where that figure came from and that the government doesn't have "reliable enrollment figures yet."

--SNIP--

Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) who invited Sebelius to the city, bristled at some of the questions she was asked, saying "Change is hard. Get over it. Barack Obama is president, and the Affordable Care Act is the law."

In the crowd was Republican state Sen. Brian Kelsey, the sponsor of a bill to block Medicaid expansion in Tennessee scheduled to be heard in January. He tried to give Sebelius a copy of the book "Websites for Dummies," which she appeared to hold briefly.

Cruella de Sebelius is not amused.

Shame isn't one of her strong points, I take it.

[oldcoastie6468]

Shameless pandering is, however.

[Glock32]

As our Canadian contributor mentioned a few weeks ago, this was the same firm involved in Canada's long gun registry and they were ultimately using their contracts with the Canadian government as a money siphon to the Liberal party there. So they were awarded a $600+ million project with the US Federal government, and where do you think a big chunk of that money is going? Cue Jeopardy theme music.

As for the technical problems with the system, there's simply no way this is the result of incompetence and oversight. Not something of this scale with as much money involved. This IS the "working" design, if you will.

[warpmine]

What's really disturbing is that a new batch of techies is needed to fix this mess and once again at tax payer expense. Why the fukc doesn't the original cast fix the problem at their expense. Doesn't the freaking govt expect any guarantee of operation at all?(Rhetorical)

When a business contracts a software company to build something is there not some sort of expectation or funtionality before final payment is issued? WTF. I'm sorry(not really) but you assholes in the federal govt need to stop this insanity and force these buttholes you entered into contract with to provide the fixes at their expense.

[oldcoastie6468]

Get 2 or 3 high school kids to fix it, and it'd be done in a week or less.

[Glock32]

What's really disturbing is that a new batch of techies is needed to fix this mess and once again at tax payer expense. Why the fukc doesn't the original cast fix the problem at their expense. Doesn't the freaking govt expect any guarantee of operation at all?(Rhetorical)

When a business contracts a software company to build something is there not some sort of expectation or funtionality before final payment is issued? WTF. I'm sorry(not really) but you assholes in the federal govt need to stop this insanity and force these buttholes you entered into contract with to provide the fixes at their expense.

I can tell you for a fact that those types of expectations exist, and are the norm in the software business. Any complex software project will have mutually agreed upon milestones and deliverables, and the customer makes payment in installments based on successful completion of different phases. For this to be a $600 million goose egg, that's simply inconceivable. As the customer, the government should have had people doing due diligence and demanding corrections long before it ever got to this point.

If their intent was ever to have a functional site, that is. If their intent was to create a digital Potemkin Village for the purpose of siphoning information from millions of dupes trying to "sign up for mah free insurance y'all" then it worked according to design.

[John Florida]

 It's shutting down tonight at 9.00pm and will be down till tomorrow morning sometine according to something I heard on the radio.