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Texas Bill Would Require Open Source Consideration

Posted by timothy on from the what-and-let-people-keep-their-money dept.

Skapare writes "The Texas Legislature now has before it a bill ( ASCII text here, PDF here), submitted by State Senator John Carona, to require the state to consider open source and open standards as part of the acquisition of software. Texas, like many other states, has a budget crisis going on. If this passes, I believe it could help the state save a lot of money. Texans need to make sure their state representatives and senators know they want this to pass."

3 of 193 comments (clear)

  1. It's funny by pclminion · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Funny how the economy goes in the toilet, and all of a sudden state governments start realizing that Microsoft is really a band of highway robbers. And this isn't the only announcement in recent weeks that a state is seriously considering switching things over to Open Source software.

    I wonder if Open Source could contribute to an economic comeback in any way.

  2. Open standards most important by bluGill · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I don't mind them picking any closed source solution so long as it has sufficant functionality and guarenties so that they know it will work right. However I do have a problem with ANY solution that is not open standard based. microsoft doc format works okay, but it limits your ability to choose a compititor. In effect your next bid for who supplies word processors either has to have perfect microsoft compatability, or you need to account for a team to open every current document and save it in a standard that the new program can read.

    By contrast if they require an open standard as default, today they can use Word, and tommorow switch to wordPerfect, and next year Staroffice might win the bid for who supplies word processing software. Even better than can be a mixture. Most people would be served just fine with kword or openoffice, but a few people need as use those features in microsft word that isn't provided in the alternatives. With a standard file format you mix and match as you wish. Today you can already provide Photoshop to those who really need the best, and Gimp to everyone, since picture formats are open. Word processing formats should be too.

    Even though I mentioned file formats above, that isn't the only place where open standards are better. At walMart I can buy several different memory card readers. Some support 3 different formats, some 5, and some 6! If you happen to buy the 6 port version you can read most formats today, but not all. By contrast there is already a good open standard memory card interface: USB, and every new comptuer has it so there is no need to buy any adaptor. (Some of the memory cards read by the reader might be considered open, but they are not everywhere so it is hard to call them standard. This should be a considereation too)

  3. Zingers in the proposed bill by john.r.strohm · · Score: 5, Interesting

    There is a beautiful zinger in the first section of the proposed bill. Paraphrasing slightly:

    "For all new software acquisitions, a state agency shall avoid the acquisition of products that are known to make unauthorized transfers of information to, or permit unauthorized control of or modification to the state government's computer systems by, parties outside the control of the state government."

    If memory serves me, Microsoft's click-wrap licenses, and the Windows XP activation process, and their auto-update processes, do EXACTLY that sort of thing.

    Also note that the bill's definition of "open source software" requires "(E) freedom to make and distribute copies of the software; and (F) freedom to modify the software and to distribute the modified software under the same license as the original software."

    This would seem to exclude Microsoft's "Shared Source" hogwash.