Slashdot Mirror
UK Gov't Considers Expanding Open Source Use
IonPanel writes "BBC have a story about the use of open source software at the heart of British government policy. The UK government is now running trials at both government and local level, citing the world-wide effort of a community of programmers fixing bugs and free upgrades as the reason. And all this despite the good friendship between Bill Gates and Tony Blair. There will be quite a few worried faces at Microsoft over the next few months ... Lets hope it's another Munich!" The experiments -- a joint effort with IBM, run by the Office of the E-envoy -- will "cover a range of departments, from the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister to the e-envoy's office itself."
The real reason is probably simple: Money
Not money as in saving by using open source, but saving money as in getting Microsoft and other vendors to drop their pants, because open source is considered, and acknowledged as a competitor.
Regards,
--
*Art
Tony Blair may be pro-Microsoft but each department has its own budget and makes its own IT decisions. I've seen invitations to tender that specifically require programs to be COM based which makes it a MS easy win. Others require that the supplier have reference sites in the Government already (easy for EDS and Accenture) while others look for a fit with existing Linux/Apache skills. Tony Blair loves Microsoft but open source is alive and well in the UK public services.
1000s Warcraft Gold while you sleep
While "we" are all making fun of mr. Stallman, his original idea (to create a user base for Free Software as to ultimately create a legal platform and status for it) is finally seeing the first tiny steps towards a result; recognition by governments is a good first. This should also (partially) explain his hammering on the GNU brand, as to promote the ideas behind the project on moments as these. You never know what they'll pick up in new legislation just because they've heard of it and find some kind of sense in it.
Now of course this post seems like an open invitation to start another pro-/ anti-RMS GNU vs. BSD bash riot on Slashdot, but I honestly believe that most of that has been said before (duh!). All I wanted to do is put this single point of credit towards mr. Stallman, independent of any other credits he should or should not deserve in your eyes. (Let's see if this keeps you from throwing some old mud on Slashdot...)
"We can confirm that Debian does *not* ship the version with the trojan horse. Our version predates it." [CA-2002-28]
Personally I keep hoping that open source usage will eventually increase to the point that people stop the continuous rewriting of essentially equivalent pieces of software that happens all the time right now. In my current job we aren't even allowed to look at what other groups on the same floor are doing...
Just imagine how much further the software profession could advance if more people would build on each other's work instead of reimplementing everything themselves. I'm not suggesting that open source would solve the NIH syndrome ("not invented here") people so often exhibit, but at least more widespread open source availability would tip the balance towards more and easier reuse.
- Lower class people like secretaries and clerks use computers
- Some of the people who have something to do with them, like Mr. Gates, apparently have lots of money and should be kept onside.
I imagine if the thinks about it at all, he now thinks that computers are a matter for the civil service. The person who matters is Gordon Brown at the Treasury, a man who famously used to phone journalists up at 10pm because of something interesting he had worked out from a spreadsheet. And his approach could be summarised very briefly as:- Will this work?
- Will this save money?
- Will this affect UK jobs?
The people to convince about FOSS are in the Treasury, and as they tend to be the smartest people in the UK government, there may be some chance of making it work.Panurge has posted for the last time. Thanks for the positive moderations.
This time, however, the company pushing open source is IBM and they know how to sell well-rounded finalized products.
BOO! TERRO
"Another Munich" has a certain undertone in British public life: there ain't ant of us hoping for such a thing - a day of infamy to coin a phrase. But that's another issue...
I used to have quite a senior job as an adviser to a British cabinet minister in this administration and, unfortunately, he was completely computer illiterate (although a very good and sincere man - there is life beyond computing, folks). My attempts to promote FOSS alternatives to our superglued use of MS got nowhere. What was clear was Britain was in love with American capitalism and American capitalism == Bill Gates.
Even those who saw MS software for the rubbish it was (and it is crap) thought the alternative was Mac. Very sad.
This is not simply an issue of Money, as many have suggested here, as govermental office in the UK get substantial discounts on MS products (although obviously not as cheap as gettng them free). One of the real reasons for looking to open source products is the issue of control. If the tools of goverment are so complex and opaque that the goverment rely on an outside, foreign source, who really runs the country? In theory at least with an open source solution the Goverment could cut ties with the original developers and get another group to develop. ALso the goverment could employ its own developers to ensure the software is not full of "spyware" - in the original meaning of the word in this case!
Here in the UK the goverment is seriously looking into the introduction of ID cards. The infrastructure for this would be run on computers. I for one would be very concerned if a very large, very powerful, foreign (albeit allied) company was given the tender to install such a system. He who controls the information, controls the world....
-- "Can't sleep, clowns will eat me!"
Government (central and local) in the UK is very focused on process rather than delivery - partly because of scandals, partly because we have very tight auditing mechanisms. It's the reason that IT projects by government often come to nothing, incidentally. But the point of the project is that local authorities and central government departments will adopt nothing unless they're certain it's been tested and validated by someone who has some kind of authority. That authority used to be the US government, but things are changing and now the UK government has its own agenda - a Good Thing.
"This is why men never share their feelings; because women always remember." -Just Shoot Me.
When you're buying commercial software you get some or all of....
;-)
Go to the URL, find the name and email of the primary author of the software and send him an email. In your email, explain the situation and invite him for a consultation. Offer to pay airfare and expenses and, perhaps, a small consulting fee for the day. Your total expense for this will be insignificant compared to the procurement costs for commercial software.
What you will find is that the person who shows up is an absolute expert in the software (he wrote it), will be happy to work for you as a consultant making your improvements and bugfixes (guaranteed to be competent, since he wrote it) and will probably leave you on that day with a fully operational and configured system at your location, for the cost of his visit.
If you would prefer power-point presentations from a salesman who probably has never really used the software that he is selling outside of presentation environments to be followed by incredibly high licensing costs, delays and lock-in consultants at outrageous prices that cannot even modify the software that you bought, take the proprietary course that you mentioned.
But I sincerely hope, for your sake, that you will give my suggestion a "go around".
The reason that it can be true that 1+1 > 2 is that very peculiar nonzero value of the + operator
OpenOffice can substitute Word+Excel+Powerpoint. But there is no groupware application in OpenOffice.
Mozilla Browser typically substitutes IE. Mozilla Mail can get all email and some contact management functions from Outlook. But Mozilla Calendar is far from being capable to substitute Outlooks's Tasks and Meetings, first of all as Mozilla Calendar is a personal not-networked application. Besides, no any equivalent of Public Folders in Mozilla.
I understand that it is not Mozilla's or OpenOffice's fault - it's all about lazy calendar server programmers. Just kidding. Seriously - there is no any well working open-source calendar server around yet. I guess without calendaring server there will be a lack of calendar clients - exactly what we observe now.
Of course the lack of calendaring clients from open-source has been already compensated by available web-based calendaring applications. But, I am sorry, that doesn't work, unless it's integrated with webmail, and as for today, there is no any opensource suit combined BOTH well-implemented: mail and calendar.
All said above is about open-source on win32. But Linux can add a little to it: Evolution doesn't work with any open source calendaring server - again, as there is no such.
Less is more !
a visit from a salesman
- A guy who lies for a living.
product brochures
- Glossy lies are somehow more true.
a demonstration from an expert in the product
- Like you know enough about the product to see through the half-truths.
documentation
- OSS usually has documentation that is useful. Not Doucumentation which is more marketing than useful.
comprehensive on line help
- hehe, they say you comming didn't they?
a road map or new features release plan
- Which has little or no relation to what actually happens in the future.
clarity as to what you do and don't get in the support contract
- Which clearly states "If it's your fault It's not our problem"... Mysteriously everything prooves to be your fault.
I've been on the recieving end of muppets like you. I support the software that you buy thinking it's the dogs bollocks after getting awed by the marketing pitch. Headache after headache. All of which could have been avoided if by employing somebody with half a clue and asking them what they think.... BEFORE YOU MAKE ANY PURCHASING DECISIONS.
My personal perspective is that with OSS you see it all - warts and all - right from the start. Allowing you to make an informed decision. Commercial software relies on half-truths and misdirection, and guys in flash cars who tell you exactly what you want to hear.
I'm not saying OSS is the bee's-knees. But I'm sure as hell saying the quality of marketing has NOTHING to do with the quality of the software. But hey, OSS is free. Setup a test system, have a go, see if it does what you want...
Do you mind, your karma has just run over my dogma.