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Oregon Bill Would Require Open Source Consideration
VeniDormi writes "I just found out that House Bill 2892 was introduced in the Oregon House of Representatives by Representative Phil Barnhart. The summary: 'Requires state government to consider using open source software when acquiring new software. Sets other requirements for acquiring software.'
Rep. Barnhart has a few comments on the bill." A NewsForge story has more information, including some words from Rep. Barnhart.
I'm pleased. Open source should be considered. And at the same time, I'm glad they didn't take things too far and require the use of open source. This is a positive influence yet doesn't seem too restrictive. Good for them :)
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It'd be interesting to know what Oregon's northern neighbors in Redmond think about this.
It's a baaare faced challenge to the quality of M$'s products.
Go OREGON!
"Sometimes the truth is stupid." - Lawrence, creator of Prime Intellect
thats nice but we need people that know how to use compouters in goverment first :)
As Illinois is currently facing a 5 billion deficit. While I would rather first see all the pork barrel projects come to an end, I know that would never happen. That would be like Microsoft cutting Internet Explorer out of windows.
This means nothing. This is a no-tooth bill that has nothing to do with increasing open source usage, but merely placating a bunch of lobbyists.
Here's how it goes when an agency is looking to buy software:
- They decide what they want, and which vendor to get it from. They seek a budget for it.
- The rules say they must let contractors compete on the bid, so they put out an RFP (request for proposals).
- They word the questions in the RFP in such a way as to make sure that the only product that will be acceptable is the one they originally planned on.
I see this day in and day out. Just this morning I read an RFP. They were looking for an RMS system to complement their police dispatching system.
The first requirement was: Must work with the existing dispatching system.
Well, the only RMS out there that works with the dispatching system is the one from the vendor of the 20 year old dispatching system. The whole RFP process is a beurocratic circle jerk.
Now if all the systems were 'open source', would it make a difference? Not really, since we'd be unlikely to rewrite our RMS for each and every bid. An open format for data transmission would be nice, but a pipe dream, since every agency in the country has their own way of managing the data.
So while this is a nice warm and fuzzy bit of legislation, it wont affect how the system works at all. If they put out a contract for a bunch of OS's, it'd read "Must support DirectX 9" or some such to pigeonhole it into what they already decided on.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Why is it important to enact a bill to say that the state should consider anything? I could work as an employee of some state controlled IT department and say, "I didn't choose the open source product because the sky is blue, but I did consider it." and be in compliance with this law (assuming it gets passed). It's a nice political statement, but nothing more.
And on the border of Oregon and Washington State, the tanks are massing for an invasion of Oregon.
The Govenor of Washington was heard to refer to this operation as "Operation Make Bill Richer"...
www.eFax.com are spammers
I bet slashdot could get an interview with him.
Requires state government to consider using open source software when acquiring new software. Sets other requirements for acquiring software.
In many cases where highly specialized applications are required, the consideration of opensource alternatives will show that while linux has multiple nice desktops, multiple nice office suites, multiple nice browsers, multiple nice email clients... it still has a number of fronts to work on.
When you compare all enterprise commercial apps against the most mature and most turnkey opensource ones, you'll find a lot of projects with good intentions but little functionality compared to commercial offerings.
The free software world is all about code and component reuse and sharing, and the attitude of 'hope someone can find use for this thing that I wrote - if it doesn't meet your needs or doesn't work, let me know and I might choose to do something about it... better yet, can you help? Here's the sourcecode'
If the government is committed to hiring software developers to *MAKE* opensource software work by *ENHANCING* it and *EXTENDING* it's functionality, then... HORRAY! We all Win.
...reap the freakin' whirlwind.
"Before he was elected to the legislature, Barnhart was a member of a local school board that was threatened with a software audit by Microsoft. Barnhart says, "It would have cost $60,000 just to perform the audit."
It looks like MS just made a New Friend. Licence 6.0 is making similar friends in the corporate world, too.
Francois.
This is a bill, a proposal for a new law, not a law. I would encourage every Oregon resident reading this to write your state senitors/reps and encourage them to support this bill. Letters from out of state can also be helpful, even if they are not counted as highly.
The only interesting part of this is how good a settlement M$ will have make to shut this guy up.
The issue is what you can do when you find a gap and who benefits from plugging the gap.
In the opensource world you can either try to rally the masses or hire your own programmers to fill a gap. The new code then gets returned to the community for possible future use and refinement. (Or it may remain so unique that no one else can gain any use from it.)
In the commercial/proprietary world you usually wind up having to convince the software owner that this is a gap worth filling in. Then you have to wait through the release cycle or pay them extra to do the work for you. At the end of the day the other company owns the fix and you end up re-buying it each time you get another license/upgrade.
(If it's a customizable API then you're exactly where you were with the open source stuff we're you're paying programmers to do the work for you.)
At the end of the day you're probably going to have to pay for a programmer, it's just a question of what return you get on that investment.
--- I wish I could hear the soundtrack to my life. That way I'd know when to duck.
Rep. Barnhart says, "I am a long-time lurker on Slashdot, so I have been aware of the [open source] issue for some time. I've been convinced for a long time that Windows is a difficult program -- wasteful and expensive." And, he adds, "The little experience I've had with open source has been very positive."
Get back to work!
To those of you who are posting asking, "Why do they need to write a law to 'consider'" ... you are missing the real power of the law which is located in the very last section. This proposed law *mandates* as a requirement of Oregon State that the software (whether Open Source or proprietary) adhere to open and transparent formats for data storage. In other words, Microsoft Office will not be allowed unless Microsoft *chooses* to alter Office to save files in an open/transparent way.
This is entirely upto Microsoft and is completely fair in the sense that the State of Oregon is saying that open formats are a *requirement* of all software purchased for state goverment.
READ THE BILL!
That's an interesting idea... You know what, though? Even if you're using open source software, and even if you have NO coding skills whatsoever, and you're not contributing to the actual development, there are OTHER ways to help out.
Testing: The more people that run the software in a real world environment, the more bugs that are found. Even running released software will help to overturn bugs that might not otherwise be discovered, because everyone uses software a little differently and in a different environment.
Evangelism: A government organization or big company that runs, say OpenOffice.org, evanglizes that software by simply using the program and the file formats. Telling other people your organization uses a particular software package also tends to make people in related businesses or organizations think "Hey, maybe that program will work for me?"
So just because you can't code, or don't have any developers doesn't mean your organization has nothing to contribute.
My journal has hot
... and if true, your boss (or his boss, on up to whoever is doing what you describe) belongs in jail.
This means nothing. This is a no-tooth bill that has nothing to do with increasing open source usage, but merely placating a bunch of lobbyists.
Here's how it goes when an agency is looking to buy software:
- They decide what they want, and which vendor to get it from. They seek a budget for it.
- The rules say they must let contractors compete on the bid, so they put out an RFP (request for proposals).
- They word the questions in the RFP in such a way as to make sure that the only product that will be acceptable is the one they originally planned on.
Not only is that a violation of current law (and, as another suggested, you should get the media involved), but that would be a direct violation of this law as well, since obviously if the vendor is chosen first and then the bidding started, the free software solution wasn't ever in consideration to begin with (a violation of the proposed legislation).
The law will be good for those departments which do obey the law, and will be an additional charge to be filed against the leadership of those who do not. This, to me, appears to be a good thing on two fronts: more responsible and more open IT policies in government, and additional ammunition to punish the corrupt.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
No way man. In this country our elected representatives listen to "The People", not Big Business.
There are 01 kinds of cars in the world. The General Lee, and everything else.
When you compare all enterprise commercial apps against the most mature and most turnkey opensource ones, you'll find a lot of projects with good intentions but little functionality compared to commercial offerings.
:).
Open Source software is the final destination of products that are destined to become commodities. Operating systems, word processing, personal finance, and some games, for example.
The software products that will likey never become open source serves domains so specialized, complex, or competitive that only businesses can drive them. In other words, no one would want to put up with such software in their spare time. A good example of this would be high-end computer-aided manufacturing and process planning. The problem domain and the hardware, such as multi-axis milling machines, are so expensive and complex that the cost and risk associated with proprietary software isn't that big of a deal. Also, there are so few people who can write such software well, that they deserve to recieve a salary for their work.
It's all these other "me too" products, such as Microsoft Office, Microsoft Windows, etc., that belong in the public domain
Healthcare article at Kuro5hin
And which country is that?
That would be the city of Medina. His property _doubled_ the amount of property paperwork for the small city (ie, he cost them $$$). They set up a linux box to run their stuff. They turned the monitor on one of the boxes to the window so passersby could see it was not running Windows.
Slashdot: Failed Car Analogies. Amateur Lawyering. Anecdote Battles.
By that measure, how many more people READ literature in this world than write it? How many more people VIEW art in this world than make it? How many more people LISTEN to music in this world than compose it, or even perform it?
The human race has been "Leeching" off of creative poeple at least since the discovery of fire. Up until we had this whole notion of Intellectual Property, this was considered by all parties to be a good thing.
Music without ears to hear it is a pattern of vibrations. Software without a user base is a random gob of bits.
"Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
--Dr.W.Edwards Deming
I'm shocked that there are so many in slashdot community who will, on one side, complain that IT departments in private corporations don't mandate that they consider open source products because the IT managers believe, based on false stereotypes and laziness of mind, that MS only is the way to go.
Now those slashdotters are complaining about a law who's sole purpose is to fight that mindset?
Of course this is politics, but its good politics. People who are hired in government IT departments are humans too and suffer from the same conceptions (or misconceptions if you will). Instead of shareholders who ask the CEO to make directives, lawmakers make directives of its subsidiary departments to make sure they fulfill certain goals.
Frankly, I think someone got the idea that Open source might save the taxpayers and the state money and that they are simply asking IT departments to make an effort to look at open source solutions rather than be lazy. Imagine that!
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
The proposed bill sets a mandate on how the government procures things. It has absolutely nothing to say about how non-govt. Joe Blow runs his IT department. Since you are a tax paying libertarian, I would think you would be in favor of anything that means the govt. spends less money or gets better return on what it does spend. Granted, the savings would be lost in the noise of all the other money governments waste.
It requires things that are entirely favorable to taxpayers. It mandates open formats for data storage which makes it less likely that the government would mandate say using Word to complete an electronic tax form. It legitimizes consideration of vendors and solutions the government couldn't consider. The consequences mean a bit more choice in how citizens interact with government. How is any of this a threat to libertarians?
However...
Requiring state agencies to "consider" open source is likely only to raise costs. Someone will spend a couple extra days saying they're considering open source, then go back to the safe choice. (At some point in the past, when IBM was king, the saying was that "Nobody ever got fired for recommending IBM")
If Oregon were to find all the places where open source could be dropped in with minimal disruption and then actually do it, the state could probably save a fair bit.
For example, in the town I live in in Oregon, there is a Community College (they like to call themselves a University, but tend to act like a Community College). Essentially all the faculty run Windows and run mostly screen savers, word, email and a browser (there are a few exceptions running Macs). All of these could easily be replaced with open source alternatives. They probably never will be - the Computing Services folks have bought big into MS and they will support the whines of the faculty who'll say "I can't learn anything new".
I've seen a couple of comments that an admin can say it's no viable and opt into proprietary solutions. That the bill is unenforcable or accomplishes little. Consider this:
1) It gets F/OSS on the list of allowable purchases
2) Portland school districts estimate 1.5M in licensing alone as pre-bill adopters. Savings indicative of larger statewide saving spotential.
3) Incentive for gov't focused VARs to deploy
4) Precludes use of EULA 6 type licensing
5) Considers the disposition of the a merit, protects integrity of public data systems
Not all of the benefits translate directly to savings, some will beget savings, some will encourage out of the box thinking, some are just the right things to do.
Hey, Ben -- chill out dude.
Yes, I wrote that bill at Phil Barnhart's request, with some very good help from Jeremy Hogan and Walt Pennington (who are hereby gratefully acknowledged) but I deliberately took myself out of the limelight when I wrote the press release -- and you'll notice that Jeremy and Walt aren't getting any credit at all for their contributions.
The story of how I came to write it is an interesting one that will supposedly show up on desktoplinux.com tomorrow.
I've been lurking here all day, just to see what people would say about this and I'm gratified that most of the comments are positive. Plus some VERY good jokes about Washington invading Oregon! But we're not worried 'bout those mean ol' Cougars and Dawgs with all of their claws and fangs coming down here and hurting us -- we Oregonians are well protected with...
... uh...
... ducks... and beavers... yeah, cute little Ducks and Beavers... they'll defend us, right?
We're not really worried about opposition coming from Micro$oft Corp. on this one. First of all, they have virtually no corporate presence in Oregon and secondly, I think we've caught them by surprise. Most of the key committee members have already heard our side of the story, and the only thing Micro$oft can do now is what they did in Maryland: Plaster the Speaker of the House with lots of money and liquor to get the bill diverted to a different committee. But now that I've mentioned that here, it will be a lot more difficult for M$ to get away with.
I'd love to write a long post explaining why we put certain things in the Bill and left certain other things out, but I won't. Basically it boils down to crafting a bill THIS year that we think has a chance of actually passing. Yes, it's watered down -- on purpose. As an IT admin myself, I don't want to anger a bunch of State IT people by telling them how to do their jobs -- so the Bill has lots of loopholes and "wiggle room" so that they hopefully won't object to it very strenuously. In the meantime the IT folks who WANT to implement Open Source will be able to do so without fear of losing their jobs.
That's a pretty good start. If it becomes law (not likely this time around) and too many state IT admins thumb their noses at it... well, the Legislature doesn't like to be ignored and they can sure as heck make it stronger down the road.
Stay tuned. This is going to be a lot of fun.
Ken Barber, aka "Mr. Firewall"
In times of universal deceit, telling the truth gets you modded -1 Troll
am really happy to see this.
We have made a couple of IT blunders that will end up costing us quite a bit over the next few years.
DMV computer system. BTW, most of the DMV computers run win32 to access an application via terminal emulator. I have never witnessed one of these clerks use anything but that terminal emulator for what they do.
Public Water billing system. This one is pretty scary. They contract the job out to a company that delivers a poor product. There are a number of project management problems with this system that have little to do with OSS, but I can't help but wonder if fixing it would not be easier if it were OSS software.
This bill made me think a little too about return on taxpayer dollars. Lets say we do correctly spec and develop a water billing system using Open Standards and tools. Lets also say it works. Why not hire out the group that built it to other cities currently under the thumb of whatever company sold them their billing system? Seems we could get back some of our investment with services dollars while doing something good at the same time.
The more cities that use the billing system, the cheaper ongoing repairs and upgrades will be because the interest in the code is shared.
My school district is currently working hard at getting the wrinkles out of the LTSP project. Pretty cool stuff really. The schools see the dollars they spend each year and are looking hard at reductions through OSS.
Lets hope this goes somewhere?
BTW, how does one know about the hearings? They would be interesting to attend.
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