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E-Government Services Maturity Model with Automated E-services
Evaluation/Verification tools
By
Muhammad Nawaz
THESIS
Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of
Karachi Institute of Economics and Technology
in Partial Fulfillment of
the Requirements for
the Degree of
Master of Science (Computer Science)
Karachi Institute of Economics and Technology
February 2008
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In the name of noble profession
With countless regards, honor respect and love, who took me to the level of excellence where I stand
today looking for the most promising and gleaming career ahead.I hope to fulfill all of their expectations, and make them proud of me.
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Acknowledgement
I thank God who gave me the opportunity to learn under themeritorioussupervision, of Dr. Syed Irfan
Hyder, and also thanks to Dr. Syed Irfan Hyder, for his valuable guidance, great help and dedicated
support given me enough courage to complete this study.
I also like to thank my colleagues Mr. Issa Memon, Mr. Khurram Rashidi, Ms.Arshi and Mr. Muhammad
Raza for their great support in various phases of this study. I am also thankful to Ms. Seema Ansari,
whose personal and keen interest has given me great support.
I cannot forget to thank Mr. Adeel and the administrative staff of PAF-KIET for their support during the
work of this study.
Muhammad Nawaz
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Abstract
E-Government, refers to the use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) by government
agencies. Like Wide Area Networks, the Internet, and mobile computing that have the ability to
transform communications with citizens, businesses, and other arms of government. This technology can
provide a variety of services with better delivery of government services. The resulting benefits are
eradicating corruption, increased transparency, greater convenience, revenue growth, and cost saving.
Traditionally, the interaction between public and a government took place in a government office. With
emerging information and communication technologies it is possible to locate service centers closer to the
public. Such centers may consist of an unattended cubicle in the government agency, a service cubicle
located close to the public or virtual service by use of a computer at home or in office more friendlily.
During the course of research, existing e-Government services in Pakistan overviewed with the
perspective of their usability and interaction abilities. Some mature e-Government services were found
such as KESC institution supplying electricity to the Karachi city provides online billing whereas the
submission of online payment is still not available. Sui-Southern gas is also providing online billing and
online bills payment. However, obtain a new connection without visiting their office is not yet possible.
City District government-Karachi web portal provide some basic info forms and contracts information,
yet complaints system does not get solve grievances like unavailability of water; sewerage lines chocked,
street light facility etc. Electronic government directorate presented a website with some basic levels
training but this directorate fails to up-lift the standard of Pakistan e-Government services like other
developed countries. NADRA has also developed a good system to know about status of applied
Computerized National Identity Card CNIC but we may not have CNIC without visiting CNIC centre in
person.
Discussed e-Government services are developed by out serving e-Government projects. Present need is to
initiate the culture of in house e-Government services development. In Pakistan government, there is no
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concept or provision of in-house development rather they depend on out-sourcing the required software to
be developed. The limitation of out-sourcing the software development is the lack of support or future
changes required to be implemented by the government as soon as the outsourcing company winds up its
business
. The new outsourcing company does not accept the previously developed software and it requires
software to be developed altogether from scratch.
In house development of projects is usually done by the permanent staff members, as and when they
complete the project, they start planning to improve further because employee take interest to develop
public centric services for which they are compensated in the shape of appreciation promotion and other
financial benefits. Another important reason of inefficient e-Government services is lower salary package
of I.T professionals in government sector.
Pakistan is at No.136 on the ranking of e-Government services in the world. Situation existing on paper is
looks up to the mark; every tier of government related to ICT is fully functional but still fail to facilitate
public because e-Government Services in Pakistan are being developed in an adhoc fashion without
following any road map that could help to analyze the causes of their failure in meeting the public
requirements. In this research we present a road map for Pakistan an e-Government Services which
evaluate e-Government Services and identify why their e-Government Services fail to help citizens. An
automatic evaluation tool of coherent services also Identify their status of maturity and reasons of the
failure to meet public requirements.
In this research, we proposed a four staged model to evaluate the maturity of e-Government service.
Furthermore, to evaluate the presence of some parameters of an e-service we used a tool named Black
Widow. This is an automatic evaluation tool we provide a URL and Black Widow crawl throughout the
website and report all the errors, threads, broken links, used e-mails etc. But Black Widow does not tell us
the level of maturity of a website. Perhaps we may say Black Widow is only a verification tool.
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To evaluate the level of maturity of a website, we have developed a tool named e-Government
evaluation and verification tool. This tool evaluates the proposed level parameters and calculates the
level of maturity. Preliminary, this tool enables us to check the maturity level of a page by verifying
predetermined parameters. The parameters developed by using scripts. The development of intelligence
test is further needed. The intelligence-tests like hit counter used by the third party, java applet or php etc.
In this maturity model, four levels of maturity are outlined while complete structure of level-one is
proposed with detailed parameters and attributes. Integration of the used tools is yet required and to
develop the remaining three levels for the complete functionality.
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Table of Contents
1 Introduct ion ...........................................................................................................11
1.1 E-Government .....................................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
1.2 Phases of E-Government .................................................................................12
1.3 Status of e-Government in Pakistan ...............................................................13
1.4 Objective of Thesis ...........................................................................................16
2 Related Work .........................................................................................................17
2.1 The identified categories of SOA are:- ............................................................ 17
2.2 Existing Frameworks ........................................................................................ 18
2.3 Existing e-Government Services Maturity Model ........................................... 18
2.4 Levels of e-Government services ....................................................................20
2.5 Maturity Models and Approaches....................................................................21
2.6 Evaluation Verification Tools ........................................................................... 22
2.7 Black Widow ...................................................................................................... 23
2.8 Present Status ................................................................................................... 28
2.9 Legislation in e-Government ............................................................................29
2.10Electronic Government Directorate (EGD)......................................................30
2.11Failure of e-Government services ...................................................................30
2.11.1 Online Payment. ...................................................................................... 302.11.2 Absence of Maturity Model for E-Government Services. ......................... 312.11.3 Absence of E-Government Framework for Pakistan................................ 312.11.4 Implementation Issues. ............................................................................31
2.11.5 E-Government Outsourcing Issues.......................................................... 322.11.6 Lack of availability of Laws and Rules for e-gov services. ....................... 322.11.7 Lack of end user involvement. ................................................................. 32
2.12E-Government in Developed Countries. ......................................................... 34
2.13Public Trust on e-Government......................................................................... 36
3 The Proposed Model .............................................................................................37
3.1 STRUCTURE ...................................................................................................... 38
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3.1.1 Level-1 A Mature Website........................................................................ 383.1.2 Level-2, Dynamic Website .......................................................................423.1.3 Level-3, Integration with centralized data.................................................42
3.1.4 Level-4, Transformed Government .......................................................... 434 Automat ic Evaluat ion Tool Implementation ....................................................... 44
5 E-GOVERNMENT SERVICE EVALUATION SNAPSHOTS ..................................45
6 Conclusion and fu ture work .................................................................................52
7 References .............................................................................................................54
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Table of Tables
Table 1 E-Government status of South & Central Asia...............................................................................................13Table 2 Budgetary Provision for e-Government [68]..................................................................................................29Table 3 E-Government status of top 20 developed countries Source [UNPAN] .....................................................35
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Table of Figures
Figure 1 Levels of e-Government 2.4 ..........................................................................................................................21Figure 2 .9 Snapshot of Black Widow: Sowing folders hierarchy of www.Pakistan.gov.pk........................................24Figure 3 E-Government Services Evaluation and Verification tool .......... ........... .......... ........... .......... ........... .......... ...25
Figure 4 E-Government Services Evaluation and Verification tool .......... ........... .......... ........... .......... ........... .......... ...27Figure 5, Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk .......... .......... ........... .......... ........... ........... .......... .45Figure 6, 2
ndlevel Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk .......... ........... .......... ........... .......... ........46
Figure 7, 3rd
level Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk .......... ........... .......... ........... .......... ........46Figure 8, 4
th level Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk.......... .......... ........... .......... ........... ........47
Figure 9, 5th
level Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk.......... .......... ........... .......... ........... ........47Figure 10, 6
th level Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk........... ........... .......... .......... ........... .....48
Figure 11, 7th
level Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk........... ........... .......... .......... ........... .....48Figure 12, 8
th level Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk.......... ........... .......... ........... .......... .....49
Figure 13, Last level Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk........................................................49Figure 14, E-mails used in , www.pakistan.gov.pk......................................................................................................50Figure 15, Links used but not working in , www.pakistan.gov.pk .......... .......... ........... .......... ........... .......... ........... ......50Figure 16, Links contained errors in , www.pakistan.gov.pk .......... .......... ........... .......... ........... .......... ........... .......... ...51
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1 Introduction
1.1 E-Government
e-Government is the government owned or operated systems of information and communication
technologies that transform relations with citizens, the private sector and/or other government agencies so
as to promote citizens empowerment, improve service delivery, strengthen accountability, increase
transparency, or improve government efficiency. e-Government refers to the use of ICT by government
agencies Like Wide Area Networks, the Internet, and mobile computing that have the ability to transformcommunications with citizens, businesses, and other arms of government. This technology can provide a
variety of services with better delivery of government services. The resulting benefits are eradication of
corruption, transparency enhancement, greater convenience, revenue growth, and cost saving. E-
Government is further defined as Electronic Government (e-Government), also known as e-Gov, Digital
Government, Online-Government or Transformational Government, e-Democracy, e-Government Unit, e-
Rule Making, Electronic Services Delivery, Online-Consultation, Online-Deliberation, and Open-Source
Governance, refer to Governments use of Information Technology to exchange information and services
with citizens, businesses, and other arms of government. e-Government usually has been applied by thelegislature, judiciary, or administration, to improve internal efficiency, the delivery of public services, or
processes of democratic governance. The referred services are being employed at different levels like
Government-to-Citizen or Customer (G2C), Government-to-Business (G2B), Government to Local
Governments (G2LGs) and Government-to-Government (G2G). The significance of e-Government has
increased manifolds for the achievement of improved efficiency, convenience, and better accessibility of
public services.
E-Government means utilizing technology for the accomplishment of reforms by fostering transparency,eliminating distance and other divides, and empowering people to participate in the political processes
that affect their lives.
Governments have different strategies to build e-Government. Some have created comprehensive long-
term plans. Others have opted to identify just a few key areas. In all cases, however, the countries
identified as most successful have begun with smaller projects in phases on which to build a structure.
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1.2 Phases of E-Government
The process of e-Government implementation can be divided into three phases. The phases are not
dependent on each other; furthermore, they offer three conceptual ways to think about the goals of e-
Government. The three phases are:-
(i) The Publication phase. (ii) The Interaction phase. (iii) The Transaction phase.
Publication phase: The publication phase is concerned with the brief introduction presented by
organization along with organization hierarchy, contacts information and details of offered services with
existing clients, projects and pipelined projects. The graphical virtual tour may also be presented in
publication phase.
Interaction phase: The interaction phase covers the detailed information for the user by the organization
about the services offered, as well as, FAQs, online help, online-query forms, online-registration or
booking or seat reservation etc.
Transaction phase: The transaction phase provides not only the basic information, but also the e-
Commerce related activities like submitting the payment against the services availed like e-Ticket or
purchasing products. The limitation of interaction phase is the payment method which is not being
provided after the e-reservation or e-registration whereas the transaction phase also covers the facility for
e-transaction. However, e-Government phases in Pakistan are divided into following four phases:-
Informational: This is the first phase and includes the provision of information alone. The quality,
usability and currency of the content determine the value of this phase of e-Government. This is the least
complex of all the phases.
Interactive: In this phase, E-Government provides some degree of online interaction. For instance,
citizens can enter complaints or job applications online. This phase does not include secure transactions
such as financial or other transactions that require a high degree of authorization and audit.
Transactional: Provides secure transactions with high level of authorization. Citizens can now apply
online for passports, NICs and make payments online. This requires a high degree of security and basic
infrastructure allowing for secure transactions.
Collaborative: In this phase citizens and businesses collaborate with the government on processes,
projects, etc. This is especially important for businesses working together with the government on
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projects, for public-private partnerships, NGOs, citizen forums, etc. This phase requires a collaboration
infrastructure, which brings together suppliers, consumers and the government in a network with the
object of increasing value creation.
1.3 Status of e-Government in Pakistan
Presently, Pakistans e-Government services are at the stage of upgrading existing e-services to mature
services. IT Departments have been established in Federal & Provincial governments; E-Government
Directorate has also been established by Federal Government. Furthermore, Sindh IT Board & Punjab IT
Board has also been established to oversee and regulate IT in public sector.[1]
The published IT Policy is silent about mature services or maturity models. The web standards are
defined but automatic testing or evaluating mechanism is not available [2]. Present IT structure is lacking
the formulating rules and laws which is an impediment for its implementation. The main impediments in
the achievement of mature e-Government Services are lack of IT expertise in government sector, lack of
outsourcing model in context of e-Government software, and lack of e-Government services model.
Therefore, the global e-readiness ranking of Pakistan is facing downfall.
Table 1E-Government status of South & CentralAsia
e-readiness ranking by United Nations Online
Network in Public Administration and Finance
(UNPAN)
Index Rank in
2005 2005 2004
1 Kazakhstan 0.4813 65 69
2 Kyrgyzstan 0.4417 76 66
3 Maldives 0.4321 77 78
4 Uzbekistan 0.4114 79 81
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5 India 0.4001 87 86
6 Sri Lanka 0.3950 94 96
7 Iran 0.3813 98 115
8 Tajikistan 0.3346 117 ..
9 Nepal 0.3021 126 132
10 Bhutan 0.2941 130 165
11 Pakistan 0.2836 136 122
12 Bangladesh 0.1762 162 159
13 Afghanistan 0.1490 168 171
Average 0.3448
E-Government is not simply a matter of giving government officials computers or automating old
practices. Neither the use of computers nor the automation of complex procedures can bring about greater
effectiveness in government or promote civic participation. Focusing solely on technological solutions
will not change the mentality of bureaucrats who view the citizen as neither a customer of government
nor a participant in decision-making [3].
Several established e-Government services are evaluated [4] and each step of developing e-Government
services from scratch to mature services is studied. Several researchers have proposed models for the
achievement of maturity in e-Government services, but implementation of the models is still awaited.
However component based evaluation tools are available like Checker, ATRC (University Of Toronto,
2006), the Common Look Website Testing Tool (Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat), NetCentric
(Technologies Inc.), and Deque Ramp Grade (Deque Inc.,January 2005).
By the use of component based evaluation tools, several parts of a website can be evaluated as per
guidance of W3C or any other customized maturity standardization [5]. The existing tools do not support
evaluation testing of a complete website or web portal or e-Government services; instead the tools are
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limited to only a single page testing. In this context, a model for Pakistan e-Government services has been
developed with an automated testing or evaluation tool to verify the maturity of E-Government Services
and the level of their maturity.
The existing e-Government services in Pakistan are overviewed with the perspective of their usability and
interaction abilities. Some mature e-Government services were found like KESC institution supplying
electricity to the Karachi city provides online billing whereas the submission of online payment is still not
available. Sui-Southern gas is also providing online billing and online bills payment but we may not
obtain a new connection without visiting their office in person. City District government-Karachi web
portal provide some basic info forms and contracts information, yet complaints system does not get solve
grievances like unavailability of water; sewerage lines chocked, street light facility etc. Electronic
government directorate presented a website with some basic levels training but this directorate fails to up-
lift the standard of Pakistan e-Government services like other developed countries. NADRA has also
developed a good system to know about status of applied CNIC but we may not have CNIC without
visiting CNIC centre in person.
Discussed e-Government services are developed by out sourcing e-Government projects, so developed
parameter are shows tidally and in well mannered way but are limited and a large amount is spent to
develop these services.
Present need is to initiate the culture of in house e-Government services development. In Pakistan
government, there is no concept or provision of in-house development rather they depend on out-sourcing
the required software to be developed. The limitation of out-sourcing the software development is the lack
of support or future changes required to be implemented by the government as soon as the outsourcing
company winds up its business. The new outsourcing company does not accept the previously developed
software and it requires software to be developed altogether from scratch.
In house development of projects is usually done by the permanent staff members, as and when they
complete the project, they start planning to improve further because employee take interest to develop
public centric services [6] for which they are compensated in the shape of appreciation promotion and
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other financial benefits. Another important reason of inefficient e-Government services is lower salary
package of I.T professionals in government sector.
1.4 Objective of Thesis
This research evaluated that the e-Government Services in Pakistan are being developed in an adhoc
fashion without following any coherent Maturity Model that could help analyze the evolution of e-
Government services through various levels of maturity and identify the causes of their failure in meeting
the public requirements. In order to enhance the e-Government services, an e-Government Services
Maturity Model presents for Pakistan that can evaluate e-Government Services and help to understand
why their e-Government Services fail to help citizens. The model would also allow automatic evaluation
of coherent services. Identify their level of maturity and reasons of the failure to meet public
requirements. The model helps in automatic determination of the levels. Manual evaluation of level-1 and
level-2 is approximately presented however, complete automatic evaluation and determination of
parameters for level-3 and level-4 is proposed and needs further exertion.
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2 Related Work
This research is based on requirement of globally accepted e-services Maturity Model with automated
evaluation or verification tools. There is a need to investigate the parameters on which existing maturity
models are developed [7]. This study initiated with research on Service Oriented Architecture (SOA).
2.1 The identified categories of SOA are:-
Concepts and Characteristics of SOA [8].
Service Oriented Architecture Approaches [9].
SOA Based Data Collection [10], and.
SOA for Designing & Development [11].
By narrowing down the topic of SOA, the second area of research is analyzed as e-Government
services. During this course of research the following implemented, available and existing e-Government
services are observed:-
1. Basic information about government and its attached department and sub-government.
2. Online Services.
i) Online Tax Return/Submission
ii) Vehicle Registration
iii) Property Tax Submission
iv) Accessing centralized database
v) Excise Tax Submission
vi) Tariffs
vii) Online change / update of addresses
3. Archived database
4. Form Submission
5. Communication System
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(i) Group Mail (ii) Newsletter (iii) e-fax (iv) e-mail service
2.2 Existing Frameworks
Several frameworks are available to develop online services. These frameworks offer various kinds of
services available in different platforms. Some frameworks offer license based services whereas the
remaining ones are open-source and provide free services. Following platforms and their corresponding
web application frameworks are observed during this study :-
In Cold Fusion platform four web application frameworks available i.e FuseBox, Mach-II, ColdSpring,
Model-Glue.
Under Java platform approximately twenty two (22) web application frameworks existed some of them
are Apache Cocoon, Apache Struts, AppFuse, Aranea framework, Click framework, Google web toolkit,
Grails, Helma Object Publisher, JavaServer Faces, OpenXava, RIFE, Shale Framework, Spring
framework, Stripes, Tapestry, Thin Wire, VYRE Unify, WebObjects, WebWork, Wicket, ZK.
JavaScript present Dojo Toolkit, Prototype JavaScript Framework, qooxdoo, Yahoo! UI Library, JQuery.
Under PHP platform approximately nineteen (19) web application frameworks presented i.e Achieve Tool
Kit, Aukyla Platform, BlueShoes, Canvas Framework, Code Igniter, eZ publish, Horde, PHPOpenbiz,
PRADO, Qcodo, Radicore, SilverStripe, Seagull, Symfony, Virtual-OS, Xaraya, Zend, Zoop.
Perl platform presents Catalist, Interchange, Maypole, and Mason.
Python presents twelve different web application frameworks services, whereas Ruby and Smalltalk
platform also presents some web application frameworks.
Now a day widely used web application framework is recognized as DotNetNuke which is developed on
C#.
Other languages also presents some web application frameworks i.e. OpenACS, UnCommon Web, Yaws
etc.
2.3 Existing e-Government Services Maturity Model
Following existing e-Government services maturity models observed, New Public Management Model, e-
Government Maturity Model, Model for Metropolitan reforms, e-Government Model by Riley cover e-
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Government, e-Governance, and e-democracy, e-Local Government Model, e-Management, e-Service, e-
Commerce, e-Decision Making/e-Democracy [12].
a) Model for Metropolitan reforms: Musso, Weare et als presented model of metropolitan reforms, which
divides municipal government activities in the USA into two categories. Entrepreneurial measures
emphasize the provision of services to residents and businesses to facilitate economic development.
b) E-Government, e-Governance and e-Democracy: Riley outlines a model containing three progressive
stages; e-Government, e-Governance and e-Democracy. In this model, governments move from net
presence (e-Government), through to service provision and representative democracy (e-Governance), to
a final stage of e-Democracy. This model suggests a linear progression to final maturity.
c) Quircks Four Staged Maturity Model: This model offers four stages with different spaces for e-
Government, which is widely accepted and used in the world. This model gives information at the lower
end by Empowering Citizens at the final stage. It outlines different spaces of e-Government for local
authorities. Quirk describes e-Service: as Interface with customers, e-Commerce: as Cash transactions,
e-Democracy: as Political dialogue between citizen and community, e-Decision-making: as Betterinformed public interest decisions, e-Management: as Improved management of people.
Several other ways presented to develop a mature e-Government service, like a road map,
recommendations, and questions etc. One of them is a council of USA named Pacific Council on
International Policy defined a road map for e-Government for the developing world.
They recommended eleven (11) questions for e-Government leaders should ask themselves.
Recommended questions are:-
o Why are we pursuing e-Government?
o Do we have a clear vision and priorities for e-Government?
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o What kind of e-Government are we ready for?
o Is there enough political will to lead the e-Government effort?
o Are we selecting e-Government projects in the best way?
o How should we plan and manage e-Government projects?
o How will we overcome resistance from within the government?
o How will we measure and communicate progress?
o How will we know if we are failing?
o What should our relationship be with the private sector?
o How can e-Government improve citizen participation in public affairs?
The presented idea looks too old because technology world is developed at a mature level. This task is not
been solved by raising only ten questions instead of presenting a complete model or framework however
these questions could be helpful in developing a model for maturity.
After undertaking these services, now need is felt to validate the maturity of these services. In thiscontext, above mentioned existing e-Government services, [13] and maturity models are investigated with
the aim to investigate existing e-Government services maturity models and parameters on which existing
maturity models are developed. Furthermore, the issues under investigation are the choice of tools to use
for the evaluation or verification purpose, the quantitative approaches and other survey-based findings.
The research is focused on concepts, characteristics and development of e-Government services [14],
architectures [15], framework [16], models [17], projects [18], data distribution [19], information system
and quality [20].
2.4 Levels of e-Government services
E-Government services are being provided by one level of government to another level of government.
Therefore, the Services can be categorized on the basis of levels, like Government to Government (G2G),
Federal Government to Provincial Government (FG2PG) , Provincial Government to Local Government
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(PG2LG), Local Government to Local Governments (LG2LGs), Government to Business or Private
Enterprises (G2B), and Government to Citizens (G2Cs).
Figure 1 Levels of e-Government 2.4
E-Government
G-T-B G-T-C
G-T-G
B-T-G G-T-B G-T-C C-T-G
G-T-LGs LGs-T-G
2.5Maturity Models and Approaches
Maturity model presented by Quirck uses a survey based quantitative approach as an evaluation tool
whereas maturity models presented by others do not contain such evaluation tools. A scale named
EGOVSAT [20] is also provided by the American researchers for the evaluation of maturity, which
focuses on the quality and usability of e-services. With the help of evaluation tools and quantitative
measures, developers become capable to evaluate real maturity of a service.
Therefore, it may be stated that before the existence of above mentioned maturity models, the concept for
the maturity of service was never introduced. The formulation of presented model has initiated the need
of having a universally or widely accepted maturity model for e-services. The requirement to have a
widely accepted maturity model has become apparent which should also be equipped with automated
tools, as well as it should accommodate all presented small & customized maturity models.
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The common approach used for the development of maturity models is linear progression to final
maturity. Major area of undertaken research is focused on the staged maturity models. The American
concept of e-Government is initiated as Digital Government. National Science Foundation of USA
initiated several compensation programs to achieve the target of pre-determined goals towards digital
government [21]. Some presented generic type of services with different categories but this concept could
not achieve popularity for wide usage and remained limited for specific use. Some of the Italian
researchers suggested use of intelligent agents, which are capable of suggesting the users based on user
and device profile [22]. On this pattern, they presented a public administration agent for performing the
roles of addition, modification and removal of a service, offered as a uniform interface. Several models
are being developed on customized parameters and on need basis, instead of having a globally accepted
maturity models.
An institution of United Nation, United Nations Online Network in Public Administration and Finance
(UNPAN) published e-readiness global ranking, defines the criteria of maturity of e-Government services.
It recommends six parameters for each sector but weightage is given on the importance of each parameter
e.g. Connectivity and technical infrastructure 25%. Lowest weightage is to be given to the supporting e-
services, 5% for remaining four parameters on the basis of given ratio i.e. Business environment 20%,
Consumer and business adoption 20%, legal & policy environment 15% and social and cultural
environment 15% .
2.6Evaluation Verification Tools
The parameters on which existing models are based are on micro-level whereas the requirement is to
develop a maturity model based on either macro-level parameters or on the basis of aggregated data. The
criteria would serve as a guarantee for development of widely accepted e-Government services maturity
models.
In order to evaluate the maturity of a model, the automated verifying tools would play an important role
for the integrity of e-Government services. However, component-based evaluation tools which already
exist are required to be integrated. Component-based evaluation tools usually evaluate the parameters of
an e-service such as the design, the functionality, the utility, the broken-links, the email addresses
mentioned, the external links provided, the embedded databases, the login forms, over all structure of
website, the files available in hosting folders, any other knowledge relevant to the service, the files and
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folders placed in the hosting directory, and the size of files, but it lacks the information like maturity level
of e-service. Advanced level of integration of e-services is also considered to be an important factor
towards e-Government maturity.
The automatic evaluation and verification of e-Government services maturity is proposed in order to
evaluate whether defined e-services are available and functional or not and their level of maturity
according to defined maturity model. The proposed model comprises of following four levels of
maturity:-
1. Level-1 of e-Government services, A Mature Website.
2. Level-2 of e-Government services, website with dynamic features.
3. Level-3 of e-Government services, Integration with centralized database.
4. Level-4 of e-Government services, Transformed government having features of CRM, CM, AI, and
ERP etc.
Initially the emphasis is to develop the first level of e-Government services maturity model in detail,which will also cover evaluation and verification. The evaluation and verification is being accomplished
in two ways, one is through the software already developed named Black-Widow by SoftByteLabs and
second is our own developed software.
The Black Widow evaluates some parameters of a website. The customization in software is also possible
with the skills of c++ syntax based programming language. But we preferred to develop own software in
order to evaluate remaining parameters with the hope to fully evaluate e-Government service with own
developed software in future.
2.7 Black Widow
Black Widow is a tool to scan a site and create a complete profile of the sites structure, files, external
links and even link errors. Black-Widow also download all file types such as pictures and images, audio
and MP3, videos, documents, ZIP, programs, CSS, Macromedia Flash, .pdf , PHP, CGI, HTM to MIME
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types from any web sites. Pull links from Java Scripts and Java Scripts files scan Adobe Acrobat (.pdf)
and Flash files for links + more from any web site. Write your own "Plugins" for impossible to scan sites.
BlackWidow can be customized to make a plugin that will search and extract information from a web site
database, say, an online store, a job recruiting web site etc. If you are a novice or an experienced
programmer, you can make a plugin in less than 15 minutes. A plugin template for C++, Delphi and
PowerBasic. Just fill in the blanks, write your code and you're done. If user is not a programmer softlab
make one, just let us know what the requirements are. plugins can do anything, you need not restrict your
plugin to scanning files only. The SlowDown plugin for example, slows down the scan randomly to make
it look like a human is navigating the site, not a spider.
Errors: BlackWidow will list all link errors found by listing the links with the server error code and
description. This includes broken links, mistyped links, server errors such as configuration errors etc.
BlackWidow can be configured to list the status of links to external web sites to make it easy to find links
which no longer exist.
Figure 2 .9 Snapshot of Black Widow: Sowing folders hierarchy of www.Pakistan.gov.pk
Above snapshot shows folders hierarchy of Pakistans official Web portal discovered by the tool used
(Black widow) to evaluate various parameters. The tool discover DNS number used for portal and all the
folders, sub folder, and files with names and other details like size of file date etc at hosting space, usually
this information is treated secret and without using intelligent tool can not be traced.
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Figure 3 E-Government Services Evaluation and Verification tool
The graphical view of our proposed (E-Government Services Evaluation and Verification tool) shows
parameters of level-1 of our proposed maturity model. Option is given to check all shown parameters or
some selected parameters. Initially proposed tool may check the availability of parameters developed by
using java script; it is further proposed to develop the same parameters on intelligence test or OCR
readers based in future. The Universal Resource Locator (URL) needs a valid e-Government service
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address to evaluate the service, after providing the valid URL, on clicking the button check Maturity
Level this tool will firstly check the total number of pages available in e-service and then multiply
number of parameters with pages, as a result of this multiplication gain amount of script will be provided
to the maximum script count field. The total script found field will be filled by found scripts by
crawling all the pages of e-Government service. The field percentage level then calculates percentage
of maximum scripts and found script and accordingly shows the result.
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Figure 4 E-Government Services Evaluation and Verification tool
Evaluation of Pakistan Government website. As per our defined level-1 Website is @0.62 rank
This figure shows the test of maturity level by accessing a single page of official web portal of
Government of Pakistan, i.e. www.pakistan.gov.pk.
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2.8 Present Status
As far as e-Government services in Pakistan are concerned, e-Government services will be implementedby legislation, administration and judiciary. Legislation has accomplished its goal by establishing IT
Department in federal and provincial-level governments. Moreover, the IT policy has been formulated by
legislation and released by the electronic directorate. At federal- level e-Government directorate and at
provincial-level IT boards have been established. Administrative departments also started functioning by
launching Pakistans web portal and provincial-level web portals. Government has provided the funds for
the computer training which has been executed in different phases to provide the training to the concerned
government officials. The IT infrastructure for the organizations at federal and provincial level has been
established. Approximately four-hundred (400) websites covering all tiers of government have beendeveloped and regularly being updated.
The published IT Policy is silent about mature services or maturity models. The web standards are
defined but automatic testing or evaluating mechanism is not available. Present IT structure is lacking the
formulating rules and laws which is an impediment for its implementation. The main impediments in the
achievement of mature e-Government Services are lack of IT expertise in government sector, lack of
outsourcing model in context of e-Government software, and lack of e-Government services model.
Since the creation of the Ministry of IT in the year 2000, IT has been brought in the forefront through
Human Resource development, opening a number of IT universities and IT departments in the existing
institutions, strengthening and promoting the domestic IT industry through Pakistan Software Export
Board, through the provision of basic IT training to federal and provincial government employees through
Pakistan Computer Bureau and through automating various federal and provincial government
organizations. Several projects initiated by the Ministry of IT
E-Government Directorate EGD activities are being increased steadily, and a definite positive correlation
has been observed in the form of increase in the number and total value of projects being planned and
implemented by EGD. The current status of e-Government projects at the Federal Government of
Pakistan is as follows:
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Table 2 Budgetary Provision for e-Government Program
Rupees in Million
S.# Activity for Fiscal Year 2005-06 2006-07 2007-08 2008-09 2010-11 TOTAL
1 Basic Infrastructure inFederal Ministries
195.31 153.46 65.10 65.10 65.10 544.07
2 Baseline Applications inFederal Ministries
10.00 81.33 81.33 71.33 38.00 281.99
3 Basic Infrastructure inattached departments of theFederal Ministries
200.00 800.00 280.00 128.00 128.00 1,536.00
4 Baseline Applications inattached departments of theFederal Ministries
203.33 203.33 203.33 609.99
5 Agency SpecificApplications including high
impact applications andcitizen services
540.00 500.00 500.00 500.00 500.00 2,540.00
6 Capacity Building andcreating and creating anenabling environment
50.00 50.00 50.00 50.00 50.00 250.00
Total e-GovernmentSpending
995.31 1,584.79 1,179.76 1,017.76 984.43 5,762.05
2.9 Legislation in e-Government
Legislation is a key component in the overall IT Program. The introduction of online transactions and the
reengineering of processes require legislation and changes to the rules and regulations. The information
society has also created a new set of legal challenges that have to be dealt with by either bringing new
legislation or amending the existing laws. The most fundamental legislation is the recognition of
electronic transactions. The Government of Pakistan has promulgated the Electronic Transaction
Ordinance (ETO) in the year 2002. With the cover of this ordinance the legal system recognizes
electronic transactions and information stored in electronic form. The Ministry of IT has also completed
broad based consultations on the draft of the Electronic Crimes Act, which is to be submitted to the
Cabinet later this year. Work is also underway on the Data Protection Act and Electronic Signature Law.
Under the ETO the government has already established an Accreditation Council to accredit the
certification authorities that provide security authentication services. For example those authorities that
issue Digital Certificates. This Accreditation Council has been notified and the Secretariat has been
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formed under the National Telecommunication Corporation. The Accreditation Council is in the process
of framing its rules and other modalities of operation since 2005 [23].
2.10Electronic Government Directorate (EGD)
The Federal Cabinet approved the conversion of the IT Commission into the E-Government Directorate
(EGD). EGD was set up as a cell within the Ministry of IT to focus specifically on E-Government with
the following Terms of References (TORs):
o Lead the E-Government Effort in Pakistan
o Plan and Implement projects under E-Government program
o Provide technical support to Federal, Provincial and District agencies
o Preparation of standards for software and infrastructure in the field of Electronic Government
The E-Government Directorate has the primary responsibility for bringing about the e-Government
transformation within the Federal Government, with strong cooperation and commitment, necessarily,
from the various Federal Government organizations. Subsequently, EGD was further strengthened with
the sanction of 4 Business Analysts, a Director (Training), and an Executive Director.
2.11Failure of e-Government services
After having all these efforts, e-Government services still fail to provide facilities to the citizens and
therefore, the government is being criticized by the citizens. Several causes for failure of e-Government
were observed during the course of research. The overall issue is the lack of several basic requirements.
Some of frequently observed issues are given in brief:-
2.11.1 Online Payment.
The availability of earlier online payment option in e-Government services is being deprecated in the
world and ever new options are being introduced. Even in Pakistans private sector household entities are
being sold through online payment. But Pakistan government as yet fails to present a framework and
flexible laws to enable this option in their e-Government services. During this research several senior
bureaucrats of Government of Pakistan contacted and asked them for availability of online services, but
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they shows there inability due to non availability of related rules and laws. No clear policy or directions
as yet issued regarding the matter.
2.11.2 Absence of Maturi ty Model for E-Government Services.
The e-Government directorate has yet made several efforts to develop mature e-Government services by
developing web-standards, security frameworks, and outlined IT Policy but maturity model for e-
Government services and their automatic evaluation and verification is not yet presented. However,
presented model in the research may help e-Government directorate to define a road-map for development
of mature e-Government services besides the adhoc fashioned development. Completion of our next
phase research may present this improvement automatically and fully functional solution to the problem.
2.11.3 Absence of E-Government Framework for Pakistan.
Federal government directorate may play an important role to define a centralized e-Government
framework to develop successful e-Government services [24] with the support of rules and laws. All
government institutions may be directed to develop their e-Government services on the basis of federal
directorate recommendations. Information parameters can also be defined at this stage to know what
government information is to be published publicly and which information is needed to be published on
certain security and passwords or authorized access basis. The framework may be developed on the basis
of existing three tiers of e-Government these are:-
e-Government framework for federal institutions and department.
E-Government framework for provincial level institutions and provincial government.
E-Government framework for local government and their further three tiers.
Preferably an open source portal based framework will be useful for government sector like dot net nuke.
2.11.4 Implementation Issues.
The implementation on developed strategies, rules, standards, policies, and directions is an importantissue towards successful e-Government in Pakistan [25]. E-Government Directorate and departments have
been established and defined strategies like IT policy, web standards, e-mail usage policy etc, but the
implementations on defined strategies are not being followed/implemented, due to digital divide and
several other issues, some of the government agencies blame recommended services are costly,
inefficient, and lacking quality [26].
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2.11.5 E-Government Outsourcing Issues.
The e-Government services development strategy is based on outsourcing. The outsourcing way of
development is basically an adhoc based arrangement and never get mature, on completion of the project
contractor (who developed the project from scratch) do not take interest in the project even continue
payment is offered on yearly basis they just attend the project to release their payment. Further,
upgradation of project never provided until a new full-fledged PC-I is proposed as a new project which is
again adhoc fashioned development [27].
2.11.6 Lack of availabili ty of Laws and Rules for e-gov services.
E-Government Directorate is being functioning since year 2001, but no Act, Rules are yet notified to give
legal cover to the web based e-Government activities. IT policy and web standards are released, but theydoes not have any legal weightage, if these policies are not adopted by the government sector, no legal
action can be taken.
Last month Federal Government released an Ordinance named Prevention of Electronic Crimes
Ordinance 2007, which is yet to approve by the new assembly. If the same ordinance does not approve
with in three months this will expire and no existence of Ordinance will be treated. Further, several rules
are required to provide legal cover to various government activities. Frequently used rules are Privacy
Rules Under the E-Government Act of 2002, E-Transactions Rules etc.
2.11.7 Lack of end user involvement.
The successful implementation of e-Government project depends upon the feedback of user and
participation of end users in the project.
Unfortunately in e-Government projects, project developers do not knows who will be the end user of
project because in several cases end user as for concerned if data entry operators usually recruited after
development of project. In other cases end user usually a lower grade employee and frequently transferred
from one office to other, so they never consulted for their input during development of project. Second
end user in e-Government services project is general public, democracy in Pakistan do not yet established.
There is a clear and long distance between e-Government and public due to long tenure of dictatorship
and armed forces ruling in Pakistan, in this sequence usually these developments kept secret from public
and can be viewed by general public after released, whereas true sense of e-Government is that citizens
can participate as partners, taxpayers, constituents, employees, students, and customer.
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Some of frequently observed generic type issues are also listed below [28].
Lack of telecommunications and network infrastructure
Limited PC access
Lack of financial resources for developing an infrastructure
Lack of ICT literacy
Limited or costly Internet access
Cultural resistance
High costs of business investment
Strategic business impediments
Divides between countries or social divides within countries; and business divides related to
sector, region, firm and size.
The efforts so far made for reformation are initiated by the Chief of Army Staff holding the seat of
President on adhoc basis and the bureaucracy seems to be reluctant for the restoration of the public trust
on the reformations. The deadlock mentioned is a great impediment to achieve mature e-Government
services. Provincial-level web portals face discrepancies such as having the static websites instead of
dynamic web portals and therefore are not updated by the users. The concept of online-service is still far
from maturity. Bureaucracy seems to ignore public issues to be addressed in timely manner and seems to
be not interested even in responding to the public queries through e-mails [29].
The government sector is so far unable to lay down the criteria for the software procurement process [30].
Furthermore, various software products have been blindly procured from open-market for government
offices without any feasibility study and therefore can not be implemented. All procurement agencies
clearly mention a section in procurement terms and conditions that they will not be responsible to
implement procured software. Therefore, it is an apparent negligence on the part of government
administration in making such an agreement. As a solution, at least one party should undertake the
responsibility for the implementation of the procured software. Moreover, dispute resolution criteria may
also be determined in agreement in case of dispute between government and procurement agency.
Another important factor indicated in the research is the availability of friendly rules and regulations,
which is to be provided in the e-Government services. In this context, the National Conference of
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Commissioners on Uniform State Laws (NCCUSL) formulated the Uniform Electronic Transaction Act
(UETA) for the establishment of legal recognition of electronic records and signatures. The UETA laws
help to resolve the uncertainty regarding the legal validity of electronically generated records and
documents [31].
The judiciary is a potential institution to play an important role for the implementation of e-Government
services in Pakistan. There is an acute need of judicial related e-Government services where public may
get an easy access to the information related to all cases. But the judiciary is not so far able to dispose off
its existing backlog of cases and government issues. As per an estimation, more than seventy five
thousand (75000) cases are lying pending in Sindh Province only [32], half of which are pending since
last ten 10 years. With the help of World Bank a project named Access to Justice Program is initiated to
streamline the situation, but due to internal issues of government stakeholders this project is still in its
infancy and failed to take off.
2.12 E-Government in Developed Countries.
It is now extensively accepted that ICT offers increased opportunities for economic development and
plays a critical role in rapid economic change, productive capacity improvements and international
competitiveness enhancement for developing countries [33]. The range of choices and opportunities in
developing countries is expanding. ICT is believed to be a powerful enabling tool to address some of the
key barriers and challenges for entering the global economy and for future growth potential [34]. It can
transform old challenges and create unprecedented possibilities for sustainable economic development,
just as it has done for businesses in the industrial world [35].
The efforts as yet made by the developed counties are also being monitored by several organizations [36].
Similarly, a survey of e-Government services e-readiness ranking conducted by the UNPAN aimed to
categorize the progress made by UNs member countries. The following table shows the top twenty 20
ranked e-Government services of developed countries [37].
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Table 3 E-Government status of top 20 developed countriesSource [UNPAN]
Name of Country Index Rank
United States 0.9062 1
Denmark 0.9058 2
Sweden 0.8983 3
United Kingdom
0.8777 4
Korea, Rep. of
0.8727 5
Australia 0.8679 6
Singapore
0.8503 7
Canada 0.8425 8
Finland 0.8231 9
Norway
0.8228 10
Germany
0.8050 11
Netherlands 0.8021 12
New Zealand 0.7987 13
Japan
0.7801 14
Iceland 0.7794 15
Austria 0.7602 16
Switzerland 0.7548 17
Belgium
0.7381 18
Estonia 0.7347 19
Ireland 0.7251 20
The table mentioned above shows top twenty rankers of e-Government services of developed countries.
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The result of e-readiness ranking released by an institution of United Nation named United Nations
Online Network in Public Administration and Finance (UNPAN). The UNPAN publishes e-
readiness global ranking, and defines the criteria of maturity of e-Government services. It
recommends six parameters for each sector but weightage is given on the importance of each
parameter. According to UNPAN the most mature e-Government services are presented by the
United State of America by achieving 0.9062 index and placed at top among 190 nations
whereas Denmark is at second position by achieving 0.9058 index, Sweden placed at third level
in the world by obtaining 0.8983 index and so on.
2.13 Public Trust on e-Government.
The trust of citizens in their governments has gradually eroded. Public wishes that the governments
should introduce e-Government for citizen-to-government interaction. This research tests the extent to
which online initiatives have succeeded in increasing trust and external political efficacy in general public
[38]. The use of Internet to transact with government has a significantly positive impact on trust and
political effectiveness. The quality of the interaction is also important, but it is regarded as secondary
issue [39].
The citizens feel that existing manual governments do not listen to them. The expectations by usage of e-
Government services are to directly involve citizens in the policy process, decision making and take
measures to serve them better. E-Government can increase process-based trust by improving interactions
with citizens and perceptions of responsiveness.
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3 The Proposed Model
One of the main challenges for developing a globally accepted e-Government services maturity model is
the establishment of an appropriate and context tailored maturity model. All the initiative needs to be
rooted in a careful, analytical and dynamic process. The process of developing required maturity model
seems to be a very difficult task, requiring a focus on many aspects and processes, a holistic vision, long-
term focus and objectives. Many government institutions limit their activities to a simple transfer of their
information and services online without taking into consideration the re-engineering process needed to
grasp the full benefits. The government must have a clear road map to overcome the barriers to change.
By learning a lesson from the private sector, e-Government must be customer-driven and service oriented
[40], meeting the needs of citizens and general public. The vision of e-Government implies providing
greater access to information as well as better, more equal services and procedures for public and
businesses. Even when e-Government projects seek to improve internal government processes, the end
goal should be making government serve citizens [41]. The finalized maturity model would play the
diverse roles that citizens can play as partners, taxpayers, constituents, employees, students, and
customer. For the sake of theses requirement level one of maturity model is proposed in detail whereas
generalized level of remaining levels are also defined which need further revision.
An e-Government maturity model provides us with guidance on how to gain control of our processes for
developing and maintaining e-Government services and how to evolve toward a culture of excellence in
providing and managing e-Government. A maturity model can guide us in selecting process improvement
strategies by determining current process maturity and identifying the few issues that are most critical to
e-Government quality and process improvement. By focusing on a limited set of activities and working
aggressively to achieve them, we can steadily improve our organization-wide e-Government processes
and enable continuous and lasting gains in our e-Government capabilities [42].
Proposed Maturity Model contains four (4) stages. These stages will be defined with the mode of
parameters on which globally accepted e-Government services maturity model could be developed. In our
previous research following three parameters to define globally accepted e-Government services maturity
model were identified:-
Continent and sub continent level maturity model
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World e-readiness ranking level maturity model
Five or four levels maturity model.
We have proposed four levels maturity model for efficient development of e-Government services and to
make the e-Government services citizens centric, level one is defined completely and fully functional
however automatic testing / verification still need to be evaluated by integration of used tools. Remaining
levels are also proposed with partial parameters but still need to work out with the passage of time and
invention of advanced technology.
3.1 STRUCTURE
3.1.1 Level-1 A Mature Website
1. Standard formatting of a page contains following parameters:-
Scripts
i) Date of creation of page
ii) All dates of updates / modifications as yet
iii) Last modifier on
iv) Total visits of Page
v) Time of opened page
The function shows in above part of maturity level usually use scripts; these scripts automatically capturerequired information by predefined strings being used in a file. It is not compulsory that all abovefunctions use scripts, possibilities of using other technology is also existed.
Uniformity / Design
vi) Uniformed Style for whole website:-
a. Fonts:- Color, Size, Type
b. Exception Main Page
vii) Bookmarks to jump each section
viii) Print widgets
ix) XML based Expender and Minimized data optionx) Name of developer company with its CMMI level
xi) Screen resolution if not onto adjustable
xii) Statistical data
xiii) Word less Messages
xiv) Graphical Views
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The design of a website and web portal is an important matter. Good looking, friendly user and attractivedesign may have attention of visitor. These parameters will be evaluated by verifying the use of CascadeStyle Sheets, Strings, Intelligent Optical Character Reader, Computers auto adjust functions.
Accessibility
xv) Links of website
xvi) Download link if any, in PDF
xvii) FAQs
xviii) Site Map
xix) A to Z
xx) Site map tracking on each link
xxi) Search Engine
xxii) Related Links
Availability of accessibility options may offer an ease to the viewer and visitor. Lack of accessibility maylose the interest of visitor, availability of all above mentioned options will be treated a One WindowSolution, OWS is widely used and adopted phenomenon in prevailing standards. This option will also beverified with used strings, scripts, systems, and applets.
Terms of use
xxiii) Privacy policy
xxiv) User policy / agreement
xxv) Security statement
xxvi) Security Feature
xxvii) Contents rating
xxviii) Help/ Documentation
xxix) External links usage policy
Legal status of soft information is being authenticated with the covers of newly defined rules by thegovernment. So it is also important to define the terms of use of published data and referred data. Theavailability of these terms will also be verified by Intelligent Optical Character Reader IOCR.
a. Basic information about Organization / institute.
b. Contacts information.
Contacts Information
i. Telephone Numbers with Country and City Code of head office
ii. Telephone Numbers with Country and City Code of its branch office,attached office, its affiliated offices, attached independent authorities, boardsetc.
iii. Fax Numbers of all above offices.
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iv. E-mail address of all designation with embedded auto reply.
v. E-mail address of all departments in general.
vi. E-mail Address of general purposes i-e info, recruitment etc.
vii. Group mails facilities.
viii. Postal address of all above officers / Designation / Departments.
ix. P. O. Box Number of Organization / institutes.
x. UAN Number.
xi. Toll free Numbers.
xii. Auto response Systems by using OCR, ICR etc.
xiii. Feed back form count down
xiv. News Letters.xv. Web Hosting
The basic information shows the field and association of website/web portal. An attractive introductionmay also have the attention of user and website may achieve its entire goal by appealing user. The basicfunction of a mature website is to motivate the customer/user to attract by offering services, after havingthis goal the importance relies that user may easily approach the service provider. The contacts detailmentioned in the model may open several opportunities to contact. The best technique to find thementioned links in a portal is also Intelligent Optical Character Reader IOCR.
Quality Hosting
Following general parameters may be considered to have a quality web hosting.
i. Operating systemii. Site load speediii. Supportiv. Reliabilityv. Price
vi. Trafficvii. Storage
viii. Emailix. Databases MySQL, Access, MsSQLx. .Net frame work
xi. Software PHP, ASP, JSPxii. Control panel
xiii. Website statisticsxiv. Upgrading
Following are detailed parameters to standardized web hosting.
Details Hosting Parametersi. Disk Storage in GBs
ii. Data Transfer Limit upto 50 GBiii. Sub-domains creationiv. Web-based Admin Control Panel
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v. FrontPage Supportvi. File Manager, Domain Manager & User Manager
vii. SSL Support*
viii. 24 x 7 x 365 LIVE Technical Supportix. Site Builder (Build your own website in minutes!)x. Emails Unlimited
xi. POP3 Email Addressesxii. Email Redirects
xiii. Auto Respondersxiv. Mailing Listsxv. Web-based Email Access
xvi. AntiVirus & Spam Protection
Databasexvii. Databases
xviii. .Net frameworkxix. Microsoft Access Unlimitedxx. MySQL
xxi. Microsoft SQLDevelopment, Programming
xxii. Programming Language Supportxxiii. PHP, Perl, Python & CGI Supportxxiv. ASPxxv. ASP.net
xxvi. JSPxxvii. FTP Access
xxviii. FTP Accounts
xxix. FTP Session Managerxxx. Website Logging & Statistics
xxxi. Web analyzer Website Statisticsxxxii. Access Log Files & Error Logs
xxxiii. Graphical & Text-based Countersxxxiv. Additional Web Applicationsxxxv. Package Prices
c. Domain Registered with InterNic or PkNic
d. No External Advertisement
e. Advertisement Standardization for web
f. Defined ways of communicationg. Issuance of Cyber Laws, Rules
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3.1.2 Level-2, Dynamic Website
a. Two way Communication
b. Database driven web pages
c. Online Forms
d. Diversity of data sources i.e XML, RSS Feeds.
e. Profile based page generation
f. Payment options
I. Master Card
II. Visa Card
III. Scratch Card
IV. Pay pal
V. Other options
g. Traceable / Track able Communication
h. Consumer Centric website
i. Data Repository
j. Triggers based updating
k. Aggregated data
l. Issuance of Friendly Laws, Rules
m. Establishment of Cyber crime Departments
n. Efficient connectivity optionso. Level of Service delivery perspective
3.1.3 Level-3, Integration with centralized data
a. Content Management
b. Customer Relationship Management
c. Knowledge Management
d. Computerized Integrated Processese. Data warehousing, Data Mart
f. Quality Assurance
g. Issuance of Friendly Laws, Rules, Ordinances
h. Advancement with technologies of Cyber crime Departments
i. Advanced connectivity options
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j. Level of Participation perspective
3.1.4 Level-4, Transformed Government
h. Decision Making
i. Artificial Intelligence
j. Participative improvement
k. Issuance of Friendly Laws, Rules, Ordinances
l. Terabyte connectivity & transfer speed
m. Information delivery perspective
n. Integration of Cyber crime Departments with world wide organizations
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4 Automatic Evaluation Tool Implementation
In this research automatic evaluation and verification of e-Government services maturity is proposed in
order to evaluate whether defined e-services are available and functional or not and their level of maturity
according to defined maturity model. The proposed model comprises of following four levels of
maturity:-
1. Level-1 of e-Government services, mature website.
2. Level-2 of e-Government services, website with dynamic features.
3. Level-3 of e-Government services, Integration with centralized database.
4. Level-4 of e-Government services, Transformed government having features of CRM, CM, AI, and
ERP etc.
Initially the emphasis is to develop the first level of e-Government services maturity model in detail,
which will also cover evaluation and verification. The evaluation and verification is being accomplished
in two ways, one is through the software already developed named Black-Widow by SoftByteLabs and
second is our own developed software. The Black Widow evaluates some parameters of a website. The
customization in software is also possible with the skills of c++ syntax based programming language. But
we preferred to develop own software in order to evaluate remaining parameters with the hope to fully
evaluate e-Government service with own developed software in future.
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5 E-GOVERNMENT SERVICE EVALUATION SNAPSHOTS
Figure 5, Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk
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Figure 6, 2nd
level Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk
Figure 7, 3rd
level Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk
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Figure 8, 4th
level Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk
Figure 9, 5th
level Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk
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Figure 10, 6th
level Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk
Figure 11, 7th
level Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk
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Figure 12, 8th
level Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk
Figure 13, Last level Folders Hierarchy in hosted space, www.pakistan.gov.pk
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Figure 14, E-mails used in , www.pakistan.gov.pk
Figure 15, Links used but not working in , www.pakistan.gov.pk
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Figure 16, Links contained errors in , www.pakistan.gov.pk
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6 Conclusion and future work
In this research, we have formulated a complete and broader definition of e-Government since existing
definitions do not cover the overall scenario. As we evaluated e-Government, "e-Government is the
automated government systems of information and communication technologies that transform relations
with the citizens, the private, the business, the industrial sector and other levels of government and related
agencies so as to promote citizens empowerment, improve service delivery, strengthen accountability,
increase transparency, improve government efficiency, and eradicate the corruption.
By observing existing literature we may say, this era is the most important in context with developing
mature e-Government services. The developed countries are being utilized e-Government services. As per
estimation approximately 92% public services are diverted to e-Government services and the true essence
of e-Government services is achieved i.e. public centric e-Government services. At this stage public have
the opportunity to have all the related service accessibility through a single terminal i.e. from birth
certificate towards admission in school, educational test, educational certificate, diploma, degree, research
and its evaluation, initiating a business, marketing, business automation, online billing, online payment,tax paying, paying bills, or applying for immigration, approach government for information, registering a
vehicle, financial transaction to and from government, online billing of utility bills, costing a vote in
election and other amenities of daily use.
Presently, the need is to develop country wide or global services by developing rights management
hierarchy. Developed countries are now working on the projects such as developing nation-wide grid,
country-wide cluster, etc. The small level frameworks and portals are available free of cost and open-
source; an operating system is shipped along with all the tools required for small business organizations
such as financial system, exchange for communication, directory, databases, website builder etc.
Pakistans e-Government services are yet to upgrade existing e-services to mature services. IT
Departments have been established in all government levels. Furthermore, IT Boards in Sindh and Punjab
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have also been established to oversee and regulate IT in public sector. The published IT Policy is silent
about mature services or maturity models. The web standards are defined but automatic testing or
evaluating mechanism is not available. Present IT structure is lacking the formulating rules and laws
which is an impediment for the implementation of mature e-Government services. The impediments in
the achievement of mature e-Government Services are lack of IT expertise in government sector, lack of
outsourcing model in context of e-Government software, and lack of e-Government services maturity
model.
In Pakistan government, there is no concept or provision of in-house development rather they depend on
out-sourcing the required software to be developed. The limitation of out-sourcing the software
development is the lack of support or future changes required to be implemented by the government as
soon as the outsourcing company winds up its business. The new outsourcing company does not accept
the previously