The first federal agency achieves FedRAMP approval, DIA is looking to streamline its acquisition process, and the Census Bureau is embracing open source communities.  These are but a few of the agency innovation stories that are dominating the federal news cycle. Be sure to catch up with these news stories and much more in this week’s Federal News Round Up.  Happy Monday.

USDA Gets FedRAMP Nod
The Department of Agriculture is the first federal agency to achieve provisional compliance with the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP).

NIST Readies New Standards for Biometric ID Cards
Federal agencies looking to incorporate iris recognition authentication add-on capabilities to their Personal Identity Verification cards will soon get some expert help from the National Institute of Standards and Technology.

Defense Intel Agency Eyes TurboTax-Type Software to Run Acquisitions
The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) would like to find simple, TurboTax-like software to provide “cradle to grave acquisition support.”

Census in the Spotlight at Open Source Summit
The Census Bureau is using open source communities to further its digital development goals, and finding the approach rewarding.

DARPA Targets Simulation Capabilities for Battle Nets
DARPA is seeking information on modeling and simulation capabilities to be used to assess various systems, including communications, networking, and electronic warfare.

DISA to Award $450M for Commercial Cloud Services
The Defense Information Systems Agency recently posted a pre-solicitation for proposals for commercial cloud services with a potential value of $450 million.

NOAA’s Joint Polar Satellite System Completes Critical Program Reviews
NOAA’s Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS) recently completed two key programmatic reviews at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, and is continuing a steady, on schedule and on budget march toward the 2017 launch.