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Massachusetts Adopts Open Standards Strategy
prostoalex writes "The state of Massachusetts at a meeting of state information officers adopted a broad-based strategy to move to open standards. The strategy does involve Linux among other open standard solutions, while moving away from Microsoft-based platforms is one of the decisions. State Administration and Finance Secretary Eric Kriss insisted that decision was made on technical grounds and had nothing to do with antitrust investigation of Microsoft by the state of Massachusetts."
BOSTON (AP) - Massachusetts, the lone holdout state still suing Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) for antitrust violations, will become the first state to adopt a broad-based strategy of moving its computer systems toward open standards, including Linux, the rival operating system to Microsoft's Windows.
State Administration and Finance Secretary Eric Kriss said Thursday that the decision, adopted at a meeting of state information officers, was made on "technical grounds" and had nothing to do with Attorney General Thomas Reilly's pursuit of Microsoft.
In the technology industry, the term "open standards" refers to nonproprietary software. Microsoft's software is considered "closed" because application developers and other programmers don't have free access to the blueprints.
Kriss said the state's decision was driven by a desire to reduce licensing fees but also "by a philosophy that what the state has is a public good and should be open to all," Kriss told The Associated Press. He characterized the decision as the "most visible concrete action by a state government" to move toward open standards.
A Microsoft spokesman had no immediate comment.
Microsoft is facing increasing challenges from Linux, which has been developed over the past decade by a global community of programmers who share their work on the condition that it be redistributed freely. It has become appealing to cost-conscious companies looking for an inexpensive means to run their servers.
Government agencies from Germany to France to Peru have adopted or are considering Linux-based software as a cheaper alternative to Microsoft products.
From the article: Microsoft's software is considered "closed" because application developers and other programmers don't have free access to the blueprints. Microsoft blueprint: 1. Make money! I don't think I've ever seen source code/standards called that before...
Interesting that the article focuses on the "cost" issue of Linux while skirting the inherent problems with soverenty and transparency that proprietary software poses to governmental institutions.
I have really been thinking about getting much more involved in linux (and BSD, etc.) consulting lately, but there hasn't (isn't?) a huge demand in my area. People are generally more concerned about being able to open Word documents without a problem etc.... and feel it is worth it to them to pay the MS tax.
This comes as great news to me (not because I live in Mass.) because it is paving the road for a lot more job opportunities to open up - which in my opinion is a mutually beneficial thing for the government and the populous.
They probably are unbiased, however this couldn't have hurt. There is a reasonable amount of pressure to support Corporate America, and make a biased decision in favour of an American-made product. Antitrust certainly helps open the doors to other discussions.
State Administration and Finance Secretary Eric Kriss insisted that decision was made on technical grounds...
Like the virus that got into the government systems recently and caused them all to be shut down? Then again being the state of MA, maybe they thought they could tax the virus to death before it did any harm...
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Reducing the cost of IT is always a good thing, even for the wealthiest states.
If you can save money on IT, maybe you can redirect it to health care or education or better unemployment benefits or debt reduction or even (*gasp*) lower taxes.
Most government bodies have no choice but to move away from closed source, propietary standard solutions. They have an obligation to keep public records available for very long periods of time. (READ CENTURIES). Theres no way they can live with periodic knowledge meltdowns from propietary providers going under or the occasional platform shift.
Microsofts methods of locking your data to their apps will ultimately be seen as intolerable.
stop calling us taxachusetts :)
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How long before a bunch of open source revolutionaries are seen dumping Windows CD's into the bay?
You know you're a geek if you've ever replied to a tagline.
The reporter unfortunately slanted the story as MS vs Linux. The state says it chose "open standards, including Linux" -- which seems to imply that it's closed standards that are taboo. If they're talking about file formats, network protocols etc. it is of course the sensible thing to do, since you're not vulnerable to losing your documents if the program is no longer supported, and you're not compelling everyone you communicate with to use exactly the same software as you do. Big difference between this and saying that they're only going to use Linux, which makes it seem as though they're retaliating against MS.
Unlimited growth == Cancer.
By using free, open standards, they are able to choose the best tool for the job, whether that be open source or closed source.
Instead, consider the antitrust investigation conducted by state officials as "The Education of the Great State of Massachussetts" in all matters of Microsoft business practices.
They have some learning under their belts, and it shows.
Even worse than Word, how about publishing stuff in Word Perfect 6.1 format?
"In the technology industry, the term "open standards" refers to nonproprietary software. Microsoft's software is considered "closed" because application developers and other programmers don't have free access to the blueprints."
Proprietary software can also adhere to an open standard. The idea of an open standard is an open interface (file format, API, etc.) that allows sw for various vendors to interoperate. This way you don't even need to see the source to write complementary or competing sw, you just need the spec. Open standard and open source are not synonymous, although the former is a subset of the latter.
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I am glad others are noting the difference between open standards and open source. Currently there is a significant segment of businesses working in the "commoditization market" for open standards. Here are some I can think of off the top of my head:
- Red Hat Linux
- MacOS X (sort of, since it's based off BSD)
- XML based content management systems
- Microsoft Office 2003 (hehehehe... well they do support some XML output but it's not all that open either)
I believe that many organizations are still leery of implementing open source systems for fear that it's "too complicated" or there is no guarantee of service for them. Red Hat is certainly making good off of this very concept, and I'm sure many other companies are following suit.
Is this a good thing? Probably, at the very least in the short run. I'm glad there are some projects that remain pretty easy to use/install and are entirely free (i.e. Mozilla) but other technologies aren't quite there yet, and that's okay.
For example, a content management system is probably tough to make into a "simple" product. There are many open technologies to aid in building dynamic web sites but they take a significant amount of customization. Consulting companies or even 3rd party vendors of software pitch in by trying to make the process easier to take on.
(wow... this is my first post on slashdot. Hope this was ok reading for some...)
I know PLAN is a four-letter word to management types, but a change like this can't be made overnight or they will fail. They first need to do a full scale study of their state's Goverment computer needs and then seek out the solutions on Sourceforge, perhaps even file a few "Ask Slashdots" too. They'll find some big holes that will need to be filled, and they need to plan around them for a time.
But...Once one state has a mostly OSS system up, The other states can copy away. I'm sure each state has it's own unique methods to implement individually, but states often need to interact. Once it is proven that Mass. can interact successfully with the Feds, other states, & businesses, then many more people will take them seriously.
Hopefully a states-funded OSS software group could form. They could implement the protocols, patch bugs, etc. I've always wondered why the states haven't 'ganged' up together to implement standards on their own...especially to get off the Federal $$$ Teet!
Another example would be public education. We've had nearly 100% available public education for more than 75 years now, yet it's still not really standardized with no created pool of knowladge to draw from. It would seem that OSS would be a solution to that issue as well. The actual material for kindergarden-college soph courses hasn't really changed much [you have to get well thru college before you learn anything "new"]...but schools spend huge amounts of their budgets on new books, software, etc EVERY YEAR..money that should be going to teacher for teaching. Imagine if every Kindergarden teacher simply submitted 1 coloring sheet to the pool. Or if each Science teacher submitted 1 unique experiment or Pop quiz. The sheer quantity would dwarf what's available now!
POSIX, to which Linux partially adheres, is a formal, de jure standard for an operating system. Windows, by it's prevalance and the varied implementations (9x & NT families), is sort of a de facto standard, but I'm stretching my definition there just because I can't think of a more solid example.
C, C++, and SQL are examples of formally specified languages, each with a detailed ISO description of what a language calling itself "C" or "C++" has to be compliant with.
Python is a de facto standard language, because there are several implementations that provide the same interface (the original C based Python, the later Java based Jython, and experimental variants such as stackless Python). Although there isn't a formal description of what a "Python" language has to be like, there is the original reference implementation that the other variants strive to adhere to.
Perl is not a standard language, because there is to date only one implementation, and there is no formal description of the language. This is changing with the Perl6 effort, with a formal description of the new version preceding the actual implementation effort, allowing for the possibility of future, formal implementations as well. As a side effect, to maintain backward compatibility there is going to be support for Perl5 on top of the Perl6 runtime engine -- at that point, Perl5 will be promoted to a "standard" language, but until that happens, the term can't be applied.
The situation with Perl most closely resembles the situation with Linux, in my opinion. Just as Perl is mainly defined by what Larry Wall has wanted it to be, Linux is mostly defined by what Linus Torvalds wants Linux to be -- and the fact that many people contribute to the evolution of the language doesn't change the fact that the major effort has been essentially driven by one individual in each case.
Now you're right that, "standard" or not, Linux is unquestionably open. But you start out by asserting that Linux is "by definition" a standard, and it seems to me that this suggests a lack of understanding of both the definition for & examples of de facto or de jure standards -- because Linux, open as it is, just doesn't fit either of those definitions. It's open, sure. It's flexible, of course. But it's not a standard. It just isn't. To argue otherwise is just ignorant, and causes the rest of your [otherwise sound] argument to seem less strong than it should be.
Moral: don't say "$foo is, by definition, $bar", unless "$bar" really is defined as "$foo". If you build up your argument around such an easily falsifiable point, your whole argument can collapse :-)
<rant />
Future rants: Slashddot posters that begin their comments with "I have to {agree,disagree}." No, they don't -- you all have free will and some stranger's Slashdot commannd should never be enough to compel you to do anything. Man that phrase is a pet peeve of mine... :-)
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My small business (not to be posted here for fear of being /.ed :) caters to other small business with low cost linux server solutions and out-sourced IT Services. Unlike other states where I have lived... there is actually a very strong market here.
Massachusetts has the second highest per-capita income in the US @ $37,710 (only CT is higher, at $41k, and NJ is a few hundred bucks behind; NY rounds out the top 5), which does distort the taxes per income.
One thing to remember are that Massachusetts has, IMHO, the most intelligent tax code in the country (flat income tax and a limited sales tax at basically the same rate).
Another factor is that Massachusetts is the only wealthy state with a near-Californian devotion to direct democracy (and the fact that we can actually govern ourselves in turn says something, I think, about the relative intelligence of California and Massachusetts, but that's neither here nor there). The main effect of this, with regard to taxation has been the 2.5% law which limits the rate of growth in property taxes to 2.5% per annum while providing a means for that to be overridden if necessary (an annual referendum or town meeting is required to sustain an increase). Recent referenda to reduce the state income tax to 5% from 5.95% (successful) and abolish the state income tax (got 47% of the vote) have and continue to keep the General Court and the Governor of the Commonwealth on their toes.