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Challenge to Transfer IT Power in MA
Andy Updegrove writes "Linda Hamel, the General Counsel of the Massachusetts department that is struggling to establish ODF for state use, has prepared a challenge to those in the State Senate that would strip State CIO Peter Quinn of his power to set IT policy. Her analysis graphically describes why a task force of political appointees has no business telling more than 2000 IT professionals what to do."
Her analysis graphically describes why a task force of political appointees has no business telling more than 2000 IT professionals what to do.
I'm glad that somebody has a clue. Micromanagement is obviously the job of your Pointy Haired Boss.
I sense those in the state senate have shiny new Swiss bank accounts. Its funny how much Senators care when they are paid shills.
So the ODF opponents couldn't win their arguments to stick with MS formats, so instead they try restructuring the Government of MA??? This is just plum sick!
This is a case of a monopoly trying to close off competition to a competitor who does it free of charge. THAT is what the case comes down to.
That is what our federal government is. Drug companies support the FDA for quasimonopoly power. Radio conglomerates support the FCC. Teacher's unions support th DOEd.
Where do we differ?
I asked the office of the secretary of state if there was an alternative format since I could not edit the document for electronic submittal. I was told (actual quote) "Our only suggestion would be to locate a typewriter; most likely at your local public library."
The rest of us have to contend with IT management that have little to no IT experience, skill or qualification, why should the MA state IT dept be any different?
All available data suggest that regardless of any of this, the sun will still come up tomorrow.
Your post makes no sense (absolutely no sense) in light of the fact that Microsoft is the monopoly and this IT professional is not just arbitrarily deciding on an actually open standard (which Microsoft's format is not) but following the recommendations coming out of a competitive bidding process. And, by definition, an open standard nobody owns cannot be a monopoly. That would be like claiming oxygen is a monopoly because we all have to breathe it.
that no matter what decision is made in Mass., it *WILL* affect similar decisions around the globe. Even if the 'govermment' of Mass. decides to do things in a completely hair-brined way, others will see it for what it is. Not every state has a setup where the position of state CIO is in question, or could be.
The simple fact that this is becoming a 3-ring circus of zealous charicatures means that it will continue to be an issue around the globe for longer than it takes Mass. to cash the checks from Microsoft. More likely than not, if MS wins the 'contract' battle, another virus will put paid to the value of that decision. Even if ODF is not firmly established in the Mass. IT arena, it is gaining ground elsewhere, and this circus just gives more publicity to the reasons for having ODF in the first place.
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
http://blogs.sun.com/roller/page/korn/LargePrintWe blog/20051113
I'm not fat, just big boned...
While its obviously not the whole story, this move does have all the classic fingerprints of a sourcing effort shooting for savings through leveraged negotiations with vendors. With control of all the
"(1) procurement policies by commonwealth agencies, constitutional offices, and other government entities concerning computer hardware and software, cellular telephones, personal data accessories, and other information technology devices"
the single office in charge of contracting can force standardization and negotate discounted contracts. Combine that with implied savings from standardization of technologies and resulting reduction in support costs and you get a nice presentation at the end of the year that you can show all your bosses showing you saved the state $X million. With that level of spending the $X is going to be a mighty big number.
If its not something like that then somebody better make very sure any contract signed is arms length - the next most obvious rationale would be lining one's pockets.
EVERY SINGLE COMMENT 'dada21' makes appears to be anarcho-capitalist in some way, for good, for bad.
The 'free market' --in this case, everyone stuck on Microsoft proprietary formats--IS NOT FREE IN ANY WAY.
If it was up to dada21 the USA would abandon all of its social programs. Does he understand that this is not the state governments telling companies what to do, it is their own damn internal policy?
"Taxachusetts"? Ever been to Europe, buddy? Alabama (failing schools, shitty roads, ridiculous poverty) is not the centre of the universe.
Nice troll.
Take off every sig. For great justice.
Regardless of your opinion on the subjects, there is the war in Iraq, Social Security, Health Care, Education, the Economy and about a dozen other topics that deserve some attention before anyone should be cusading for a new document format.
I'm not exactly sure what the state of MA IT Director has to do with any of these topics, but choosing a standardized document format would be right up his alley. Unless of course MA's Head IT Guy has a Super-Gov-MegaBot which can cure everyone, end wars, fix SS, Education and the Economy in one fell swoop...
I only need the Preview button when I haven't used the Preview button.
Lawrence Person (lawrencepersonh@gmailh.com (remove all "h"s to mail)
http://www.lawrenceperson.com/
Am I the only one who can't follow this article? It has no introduction... so I have no way of knowing what it's trying to say.
microsoft was found to be a monopoly in court. This pretty much means they are acording to legal definition.
There is no hope in saying it isn't so, the sky is blue only when you can see blue.
Your analogies aren't quite applicable. The difference is that this is for the IT department of the state. That is, this is policy affecting only the government, not the governed. It's a support department.
The FDA, for example, approves drugs for general use by all people and companies in the US. On the other hand, this CIO approves (for example) operating systems for use by the government itself.
For these to be comparable, it would have to be more like "FDA approves drugs for everyone, and this CIO decides what OS every computer in MA (owned by the government or in your basement) will use".
These are not the same thing. When the government builds a bridge, the choice of whether to use concrete or plastic or chicken femurs IS left to the professionals. That's more on par with what we're dealing with here.
And if we focous all our attention on the "more important" things, after we are done with this round of "the war in $country, Social Security, Health Care, Education, the Economy and about a dozen other topics that deserve some attention", we will discover that all the little things have broken while we were crusading. Just because something isnt THE issue of the day doesnt mean it doesn't need to be taken care of.
Microsoft is NOT a monopoly? Who locks vendors into their software? Who tried to block other media players on their OS? Who committed numerous acts of perjury at their antitrust trial?
Therefore Microsoft is not a monopoly? Ooh, I know this one. A-prioristic Randroid "reasoning." Your syllogism is missing a middle term.
And your epidermis is showing. ;-)
Shop as usual. And avoid panic buying.
How is enforcing the use of an open standard a tyranny? Isn't allowing a convicted monopolist to have any say at all in what a jurisdiction adopts more of a tyranny?
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
All your examples and the whole issue of monopoly is irrelevant. The OpenDocument debate isn't about govt. telling private companies what to do. It's about govt. setting internal policies for itself. There are lots of techies who'd like control over their own desktops, but how far would they get if they tore into their bosses for unfairly creating a Microsoft monopoly within the company by standardizing the enterprise on Windows?
The last time I was in an IT position as a developer/data analyst at a fortune 100 company, myself and the other memebers of the team kept saying, "Hey ******, things are technilogically bad here, and the IT department agrees, we really need to step things up and make the following 5 changes: ", (then we listed 5 boring, but neccessary changes).
So after that, ****** decided to hire a team of IBM consultants to determine what the real problem was. They promptly had a meeting with us, where we shared our 5 changes that needed to be made, and were told a week later that IBM came up with 5 amazing outside-the-box changes to turn the company around.
A year and a half later, I'm at a different job where I make the decisions, and ****** is in the same position they were before, with more and more money being poured into consultants while the IT professionals remain unheard.
And, just another warning about IT professionals: I had a boss once that refused to allow me to install a Linux-based webserver, and instead poured over $800 into software simply to run IIS. It took a few weeks to get the software in, another week to get it configured, and yet another week to lock it down tight and get the file permissions to run properly. (keep in mind IIS kindly ignores windows file permissions on a fairly random basis, at least from my experience.) Now that that IT Professional has left to do ASP development elsewhere, I spent 3 days learning how to set up a linux webserver and lock it down, and 1 day actually carrying out what I learned. It has thus far cost us nothing, and we have yet to get a virus.
IT professionals are the #1 target it seems for Microsoft donations, so its no wonder most are drooling over Microsoft Office software. Most individuals I've worked with (even the Microsoft Certified Developers) have chosen Open Source solutions this past year because of how much they've developed, and how easy they are to work with. Maybe we need a bureaucratic geek to make the decisions anyway, since the self proclaimed IT Professionals either aren't doing such a hot job, or don't have the power to make these decisions anyway.
One last bit of info: forcing the use of non-proprietary software for developing publically available documents should be federal law by now, IMO, and using proprietary software should be considered obstructing access to the public domain. Why not tear down the wheelchair ramps while we're at it? And if Microsoft is truly non-proprietary in their new XML format, then let's use that too, but don't side with a single vendor when a globally available standard is sitting there, free of charge, easy to implement, waiting to be taken advantage of.
Most for-profit vendors have always been just that, For Profit. Most Open Source solutions and free-domain solutions set forth by not-for-profit organizations have been just that, Not For Profit. If something isn't for profit, and isn't for political gain, then odds are it is strictly being developed for the betterment of society. I guess the honest question now, when confronted with accepting the logically obvious decision, is "Why start now?", to which I say, "To make up for lost times."
"Now the trouble about trying to make yourself stupider than you really are is that you very often succeed." -C.S. Lewis
So basically, from the featured article, an "amendment" to an economic bill can result in rather severe changes to how the various parts of the MA government can operate? Somehow this seems familiar, we've seen these things happen before in the EU and elsewhere in the US when certain big mono- and oligopolists wants something which is not quite within scope of the currently proposed legislation, something that would be more obviously suspect if proposed as a separate bill.
Perhaps it is time for general ban "riders" and "amendments" that change the overall meaning of some proposed regulation, unless their consequences have been evaluated, or perhaps just an overall ban: if a bill is to be changed or augmented, it has to be cancelled and reintroduced from scratch. Something needs to be done about rampant law-making in general, this part of governments have been allowed to run riot and overwhelm the judicial processes. In MA as elsewhere.
Of course, this would just be another law, adding to the mess...
SIGBUS @ NO-07.308
This is a political issue at heart.
I fully support ODF as long as the licensing allows incorporation into closed source software.
I believe Microsoft is attempting to control the situation using legal mechanisms that are standard when dealing with government.
I think ODF would save me dozens of hours a year in State document filing.
But I don't think the problem is with MS. They're using loopholes set by the State and taking advantage of the power conferred to the politicians. Government has too much power, and this power is being legally manipulated.
You do not understand basic economics. A monopoly can certainly occur without force due to, for example, economies of scale.
A good example of a natural monopoly is the market for electricity and water. A monopoly can most efficiently deliver these services, so a free market will result in a monopoly. No government involvement is needed for the monopoly to occur.
Government regulation _is_ needed, however, if electricity and water to be priced at economically efficient levels. A private monopoly will price electricity and water at the profit-maximizing level, which because of monopoly power is higher than the price should be from a social standpoint.
vi ~/.emacs # I'm probably going to Hell for this.
"There is no hope in saying it isn't so, the screen is blue only when you can see blue." Fixed your spelling error.
---- Liquid was a patriot ----
I laughed at your response. I usually get attacked when I denounce copyright as I believe data can't be protected in any way once released to the public. Your reply sets software as physical property.
Let me paraphrase reply:
Who locks vendors into their software?
I can lock employees and vendors to my business with a non-compete agreement.
Who tried to block other media players on their OS?
If software is property, I can restrict who uses my land.
Who committed numerous acts of perjury at their antitrust trial?
I believe the fifth amendment protects all speech from perjury crimes.
While it's true that Microsoft does not meet the textbook definition of a monopoly (being the sole seller), no one questions that they dominate the market to the point where they distort it. Adam Smith himself was very concerned about any firm that controlled more than 40% of the market, because it could use its weight to control prices unfairly. So, not being a monopoly in the strict sense hardly means that Microsoft is just another player in a free market.
What if I do the same thing, and I do get different results?
"It is funny how anti-government geeks can be when it matters to them and how anti-freedom they can be when it is about controlling others. In "Taxachusetts" regulations are especially violent professional opinion and private rights."
Off-topic. We're discussing how Massachusetts manages its own employees. IT workers who do not work for the commonwealth will not be affected either way.
"Now, when someone recommends that bureaucrats set IT standards, it's tyranny!"
Did you even read the summary?
Microsoft is NOT a monopoly? Who locks vendors into their software? Who tried to block other media players on their OS? Who committed numerous acts of perjury at their antitrust trial?
Locking vendors into your software isn't a monopolistic practice, it is common every day business practice and has been since time immemorial. You propose instead what? That Microsoft create and give to the world standards that anyone can write to for any platform? That's like telling Hardinge to create and give to the world a universal spindle standard. Standards are adopted by force of market, not idiotic movements.
Microsoft has every right to do with their OS whatever the Hell they wish and it is their job to respond to market forces or go out of business. If you want Linux to be adopted, make it as easy to use for the common user as Windows XP. It isn't, and won't be, because it is dominated by "hard is beautiful because it lets me show off because I have insecurity issues" geeks. XP isn't. My mother-in-law can maneuver through Windows XP Pro and Office XP like a speed demon. Ten years of training would be needed for her figure out how to find xorg.conf to change her monitor resolution and not fark it up. Most of the people thinking Linux is on par with Windows are either seriously delusional or too young to remember the lack of productivity in offices on DOS prior to Windows. It's MS' OS and they've cornered the market simply by putting out a better OS that at its worst is still better than Linux when it is slightly cranky. A truly farked Linux box is masochism delight.
They lied at an antitrust trial? Who farking doesn't? Since when does that create a monopoly?
Dada is right. It takes force and coercion to create a monopoly, only government can do it, and our government doesn't put a gun to anyone's head to make them buy Windows. They just want an OS that doesn't suck and Windows doesn't suck. Again, a committed Fedora Core user who can build apps from source and fix dependency Hell in his sleep is telling you this. But then, I happen to be a former programmer from back when we knew to write apps for real people to use and not whatever we bloody well felt like and screw the useability or common sense. Linux has "screw the common user" written all over it. Of course, it would given that it descends from Unix, arguably the dumbest thing ever conceived this side of OS/2. That no one is trying to make Linux into a monopoly doesn't make it better than Windows which only has the share that it does because it doesn't suck in comparison.
Why is this so hard to understand for the geeks of today? If we ran things years ago like you're trying to have them now, there'd be none of the nifty engineering and technological marvels there are because we'd have built whatever we felt like instead what the CORPORATIONS and the END USERS PAYING THEM wanted. And you'd not have PCs, the Internet, or anything else you use while taking them for granted to write your socialistic twaddle non-sequitr missives on Slashdot.
If my grammar and spelling are off, I am [distracted/tired/careless] (take your pick)
Unless you need to READ any of the documents your state makes available, or you need to electronically SUBMIT any documents to the state government. I would say that's a whole lot of governed people being affected.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
20/20's John Stossel discovered that privatized water and electricity is safer, cheaper and more abundant.
If MS sold strictly direct-to-consumers, I'd be concerned. They don't. 12,000 retail companies are not forced to sell Windows/Office. They're asked to by their customers.
The only thing worse than pure, unfettered bureaucracy is pure, unfettered capitalism.
Both are essential to keep each in check.
This is a boring sig
If you're trollling: Nice one, you got me to respond.
If you're not: RTFA
The link is not to a temper tantrum from a "techie"; it's to a blog, which links to a well-reasoned argument from an ITD lawyer who lays out both why Quinn was within his discretion as head of the ITD and why centralizing all IT decsionmaking in Massachusetts is a bad idea.
Quinn is NOT making a huge change for all citizens: the citizens can use MS Word if they want to, submit Word documents to the Commonwealth if they want to, and receive Word documents from the Commonwealth if they request that format. All this says is that when the Commonwealth goes to archive these documents, it will archive them in ODF 1.0 or in PDF 1.5.
vi ~/.emacs # I'm probably going to Hell for this.
Funny, my last name IS Dada. Also, I post under my real name (see my e-mail address?). What's your name? Why are you afraid to show it?
So you're both basically saying that documents made by the government should be readable by the people? In Massachussetts, what percentage of the people are using Microsoft Word or Adobe PDF, and what percentage of them are using software that support ODF?
Hear, hear. I agree. We should be concentrating on the important stuff and not worrying that we are being taxed more and more to support forced upgrades in software or locked into a single vendor who could change thier prices or pricing model at any time knowing there is nothign that could be done about it.
If we fix all this other important stuff, the money saved alone should allow us to pay for anyhtign that might come from using a single vendor in all our data retention needs. Why waist it on wars or improperly funded educational systems when we can give it corperations that will eventualy donate alot of software and other materials to the schools.
I don't care if we they use microsofts new and improved word 3000 format if they open it up enough so that common people can easily obtain the tools neccesary to read and write in the format. This means supporting linux, Mac, Unix, Ultrix, jeff's newOS and whatever else is availible to the pulic. While microsoft wouldn't need to provide the support or the programs, the ability for the support to be there should exist.
The format war isn't a crusade for open document, it is a crusade for open government, an idea that a indevidual who may not be wealthy can esily obtain the materials neccesary to do business with the government. This business could be settling the estate of a loved one, paying thier property taxes, or attemping to see what thier property taxes will be next year, it could be anything. Average citizens shouldn't have to buy/pirate/goto someone who did, some expensive software program to enjoy the benefits of government. Anythign the government offers should be redily accessable to all reguardless of thier ability to drive somewere or spend a huge amount of money on software. It is supposed to be for the people not for the people that can afford it. An open document would provide a way for the poor to redily access the services of government as well as give pricing competition.
If microsoft or whoever makes the best tools that support an "open document format" I'm sure thier product would still be used. As it is, the objections from the big companies are more to the fact that they didn't develope it and why aren't you going to pay us anymore. I wanted to say so much more about this but i feel i have winded the pipes here. There is realy so much more to it then the surface can show. Your probably rite in that those other problems are a little more important. Sadly i think they have fix them as much as they are going to.
Who controls the British crown? Who keeps the Metric system down?
Who keeps Atlantis off the maps? Who keeps the Martians under wraps?
Who holds back the electric car? Who makes Steve Gutenberg a star?
what do you mean this only affects the government, NOT the governed ? read that back to me ...
Question Authority before IT questions You
Every customer of mine in Massachusetts is scared crapless than they'll have to invest in new software in order to assimilate state documents into their software systems. This is way more political than just setting an inside-the-house standard. I'm against both Microsoft and Massachusetts on this one. Every document I receive from my State (Illinois) is subpar to what I get from private companies. I can't imagine the cost to try to make every department follow a standard that isn't supported by 90% of my customers.
Government has too much power
OK, in general I agree, but in this context this is a completely asinine thing to say. The government SHOULD have the power to decide what file formats work best for their purposes, and they should NOT be expected to simply accept whatever format any citizen decides they want to use.
To be honest, it really isn't clear what side you're arguing for, and frankly you're really just coming off as a raving lunatic and conspiracy theorist.
I fully support ODF as long as the licensing allows incorporation into closed source software.
Um, ODF is an open STANDARD, which means there is no licensing. It's just a specification, which you are free to implement under any license you like.
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.
I'm too busy worrying about children starving in Africa to trouble myself about your petty issues.
*worry*
*worry*
I was thinking of Microsoft locking PC vendors into selling only Microsoft OSes with their boxes, the derided "microsoft tax." I wasn't referring to standards.
Yeah, Microsoft has the right to do whatever they want with their OS, true. However, I was thinking of how Microsoft was found guilty, I believe, of trying to sabotage Quicktime on Windows95, issueing updates that were meant and designed to break the program, and delivering cryptic and literally baseless error messages, in order to turn users away from quicktime and towards Windows Media. Who cares about Linux, you jumped to a conclusion about what I was thinking of.
I don't know where you get the idea "only government can create a monopoly." Since when? Only governments can create vertical monopolies, or horizontal monopolies? Again, as a Mac user, I wasn't thinking of Linux when I penned the post stating factually that microsoft is a monopoly.
I didn't say anything socialistic as you accuse. I believe in voting with your wallet, and my money goes to Apple instead.
There is a lot to be said for elected officials making these choices. But will they look out for our best interest?
Until all business, non-profits, and unions are prevented from lobbying, they can not be trusted to have our (the voters) best interest at heart.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I'm against both sides of the debate. There is no reason for the state to force any standards. If the customers of the state (the governed) request two formats (en masse), the state should oblige them. Why should the state say "This is how it will be" if the governed is saying "We want PDF, we want Word, we want ODF."
Microsoft is nuts to not support ODF, but I understand their reasoning. They don't support any creative commons licenses in their product. I think they're back about a decade in this thinking, but it is their right to do so.
In the end, the consumers are the governed and they will need to be appeased. How many users currently run ODF-compatible software? How many businesses? My customers are fearful that this mandate "for the state only" will cost them hundreds per desktop (in labor, software and future licenses) so they can be compatible with state demands.
The fifth amendment protects a person under oath from incriminating himself, i.e. a right to remain silent. Microsoft didn't do anything of the kind; they lied in a court of law by presenting "evidence" of how much slower a IE-less Windows ran, and the prosecution proved and forced them to admit that the video was doctored. Self-incrimiation and trying to lie under oath are two very different things.
Also, I reject your fallacy of trying to redefine what I say as some sort of land analogy. I said nothing of the kind. See my reply in the cousin thread.
I moved to the USA from the UK, and I pay more (percentage-wise) tax here in CA than I did in London, and that's *after* going to HR-Block to get as much off as I can. I averaged around 38% in the UK (after expenses and including national-insurance), and here my bill is more like 43% after federal and state tax.
Going to buy a house in the New Year (been saving all year for the deposit - $800k for a house is almost as bad as London!) so I'll get a larger tax-break then, but I rented in London too...
Simon
Physicists get Hadrons!
Most companies, people who have called the IT department because they could not figure out how to turn on their computers will set IT policy or will mandate technology shifts because they got sold by someone that sounded good. Meanwhile, the IT people who actually know about the stuff are forced to impliment bad decisions knowing it will usually cost more and mean more work for them.
And if they absolutely, positively WANT TO use Microsoft Orifice, well, they can always "SAVE AS" word format.
Sheeeesh!!!
So if I want to submit documents to the State I should be able to use any format I want? And its up to them to figure out how to read it? So I should be able to say "I want to submit my tax returns in World Perfect v2 format" they should have to listen?
Microsoft is nuts to not support ODF, but I understand their reasoning. They don't support any creative commons licenses in their product.
Uh, its a standard, there is no license, Microsoft doesn't seem to have a problem supporting things like TCP/IP.
I have mod points and I was about to mod you into oblivion for that remark. If the goverment doesn't set any standards about how to submit documents how can they ever hope to read those documents. Under your proposed system, I could create my own binary format which is actually created by dding /dev/random to a proper length. I could then submit it claiming it to be my tax return or any other of a myriad of documents. With out some standards of communications there is no communication.
"We Don't Need No Truthless Heros!" - Project 86
> 20/20's John Stossel discovered that privatized water and electricity is safer, cheaper and more abundant.
:)
What do you mean by "privatized"? The providers weren't regulated at all? I didn't say the government had to _provide_ water and electricity - it probably would be best if they didn't - I said they had to _regulate_ it. I'm pretty sure all drinking water in the U.S. is regulated by the FDA or EPA anyway, so there can be no such thing as "privatized" water. Furthermore, what do you mean by "more abundant"? That makes no sense unless you don't have running water or you're suffering brownouts all the time. And I'll agree that California set the price too low for a while
> If MS sold strictly direct-to-consumers, I'd be concerned.
Why? Retailers are in a different market. If one company were selling bananas it wouldn't matter if we could buy the bananas from Walmart, Kroger, or Tom Thumb.
> They don't. 12,000 retail companies are not forced to sell Windows/Office. They're asked to by their customers.
This is irrelevant. Microsoft is a big monopoly, and a lot of retailers sell their products to a lot of people who want to buy them. So?
Monopolies are inefficient partially because they charge too much for their products. $450 or however much it costs for Office is a lot more than it costs to copy the disk. Same with $200 for Windows. If people who would be willing to pay for the cost of making the physical CD do not have the products because they aren't willing to pay what Microsoft charges, there is inefficiency in the market.
vi ~/.emacs # I'm probably going to Hell for this.
Then again, there's the commerce clause which states:Clearly, if the states adopt incompatible document standards, there would be a problem. Ostensibly, Congress dealt with this issue when it created the National Bureau of Standards and left standardization issues to them. However, in this case, there's clearly a set of deep pockets wandering around trying to influence Congress to take a special oversite interest in this particular standard.
How to counteract somebody handing out millions of dollars? Talk to your congressperson.
Back when Clinton was pushing the Clipper chip, I put together a group of technologists and setup a meeting with my local congressman. We told him why Clipper was a bad idea and why people needed strong encryption. Once he understood that banking and trade could be adversely affected if people couldn't be sure their purchases were secure, he agreed to vote against the proposal.
There were lots of geeks doing the same thing across the country and the Clipper died as a result. It can happen again.
The problem is that these organization you mentions while not able to vote do comprise a great amount of what makes the state work. Placing a created entity's opinions above those of a real person is a problem but they should be without any imput on the matters.
I do question the powers they have though. stoping them from imputing altogether would be much like employers only increasing profits by 2% and employies demanding a 15% increase in pay each year. Eventualy someone isn't going to have any money. The same would be true if corperations didn't have any say in governemntal offairs. As it stands, i think they do have too much say but cuting thier say out isn't the answer. (i don't know the answer that works either)
There is no reason for the state to force any standards.
How about saving money? Merely by standardizing they will save money, even if they choose the most expensive option. Or are you also against saving tax dollars?
As for your repetitive licensing mantra: Your customers are uninformed, and apparantly so are you. You might want to do a little basic research before you go spouting off about things. Or, you know, you could try actually reading the responses you get.
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.
On one hand, MS did get a start into the position they are in due to free market forces. On the other, they have abused government force to finish getting there. However, their practices are not really the point in this one. What is important is that public information should not be in a proprietary format.
However, State ITD is not really going about this the right way. You need to have discussion, specifications need to be drawn up, you need to write an RFP and go to bid, etc. They chose a format without going through the right steps. They didn't necessary choose the right thing, they simply choose the thing they liked. In this way, government is very different from business.
Personally, I agree that OpenDocument is the best option out there. It's a fully opened format that can do everything that needs to be done. That's why I'm changing to the format. If all the Towns are lucky, DLS will change away from MS formats. Maybe then the garbage Excel sheets loaded with subtly broken VBA will go away.
As far as dada21 and the government reduction, etc, there is a good point there. You can track many of the problems in the US to government taking a problem, "fixing it" and then continually having to "fix" the "fix". At the very least, all of the social programs at the Federal level should be dismantled. They are unconstitutional, and far outside the scope appropriate for the programs. The US is not a socialist country, it is a federalist republic. The concentration of power at the Federal level is in direct opposition to that.
Alabama is also not the only place like that, by any means. The Federal has stripped the populace of their money, removed power from State and municipal governments, and uses that tax revenue to control the lower levels. Much of the populace is hovering just above poverty, many schools are failing, and roads are pretty crappy all around. You can blame a lot of that on government forcing things at the wrong level. The people responsible for the work don't get to be involved with the decisions, and don't have the ability to collect the funding to pay for it without "help" from above. It's a recipe that guarantees failure.
The government doing it is usually not the right answer. The Federal doing it is almost always not the right answer. There was a very good reason that it was severely limited by the original Constitution.
And if each citizen asks for their own proprietary format, they should be forced to provide them? All the untold millions of formats?
... will cost them hundreds per desktop
Your argument is absurd, go sit in the troll corner for 15 minutes.
My customers are fearful that this mandate
Really? So are they stupid, are you misinforming them, or just overcharging them for what is free software?
You are so off the mark I hardly know where to begin. The CIO is appointed, get over it. There are lots and lots of people hired by state government to carry out the business of the state. It would be a disaster if a state CIO had to raise funds and campaign for office.
The decision to adopt ODF was not an arbitrary CIO decision. A process was followed to identify the needs of the Commonwealth. Then there was a panel composed of industry representatives, (Microsoft, Sun, Novell, Redhat and others were all there.) PDF and ODF were determined to be the best fit for document formats that meet the needs of the Commonwealth. Being open formats, they are well documented, they will be readable generations from now, and their openness ensures that Massachusetts can accept bids from a variety of vendors. There's also a big piece about converting data from legacy systems.
As for the elected officials being concerned with the document format --- consider if the IT department does nothing. Within a few years everyone will be creating MSXML formatted documents, with no input from elected officials, and what's more to the point, with absolutely no examination of the implications of that format change.
"If the ELECTED officials want to form a task force of qualified industry specialists to analyze a change in THEIR state that will affect the people they represent they are not only entitled to do so, but should." -- Did you read the article? The task force consists of 8 people, possibly 3 of whom will know anything about technology. Of those 3, two will be representatives from industry -- one in IT, one in telecom. The remaining 5 people all have other full time duties. The point of the fine article is that the CIO is being strongly supported by the General Counsel to the department that will be affected by the ODF document policy. (In case you didn't realize it, the move to ODF was a policy decision within the Executive Branch, the response is coming in the form of an amendment being considered by the Legislative Branch-- an amendment which, according to general counsel, will effectively paralyze the Commonwealth.
So getting back on track here, keep the following points in mind. (1) Mass. ITD did something well within their mandate, and they did it in a public and proper way. (2) A member of the Mass. legislature became upset or fearful, perhaps due to influence from a large corporation's lobbyists (3) In response, an amendment with far-reaching effects on the commonwealth's ability to conduct business was attached to an unrelated bill. (4) A department whose job is to point out the implications of government decisions has weighed in against the amendment.
In summary, this is a good thing. Whether you are for or against vendors actually meeting the stated needs of their customers, you must agree that an ill-considered amendment to an unrelated bill is not the best way for a legislator to deal with his fear of change.
My name really is Jay, and I really am heinous. Do I pass your test?
Slashdot - where whining about luck is the new way to make the world you want.
Locking vendors into your software isn't a monopolistic practice, it is common every day business practice and has been since time immemorial. You propose instead what? That Microsoft create and give to the world standards that anyone can write to for any platform? That's like telling Hardinge to create and give to the world a universal spindle standard. Standards are adopted by force of market, not idiotic movements.
Microsoft has every right to do with their OS whatever the Hell they wish and it is their job to respond to market forces or go out of business. If you want Linux to be adopted, make it as easy to use for the common user as Windows XP. It isn't, and won't be, because it is dominated by "hard is beautiful because it lets me show off because I have insecurity issues" geeks. XP isn't. My mother-in-law can maneuver through Windows XP Pro and Office XP like a speed demon. Ten years of training would be needed for her figure out how to find xorg.conf to change her monitor resolution and not fark it up. Most of the people thinking Linux is on par with Windows are either seriously delusional or too young to remember the lack of productivity in offices on DOS prior to Windows. It's MS' OS and they've cornered the market simply by putting out a better OS that at its worst is still better than Linux when it is slightly cranky. A truly farked Linux box is masochism delight.
Your post and extreme libertarian viewpoint (and that of the more ultra extreme version, the political anarchist), has a decidedly machavelian ring to it.
Let me preface by stating that I tend to agree with the core fundamental values of libertarianism; I believe a society is generally better off if the reach of the powerful, what it takes the form of restricting the lives of others, is as limited as possible. But, as many wiser than myself have noted throughout history: "All things in moderation"
The notion that any entity, individual or corporation, has some untennable right to use any and all means available in the quest for profit is based on a world-view that doesn't quite mesh with reality. Now, I don't believe you are saying something so extreme, right? I mean, presumably, you would be opposed to allowing a corporation to commit bodily harm as part of their "domination strategy." Assuming your viewpoint is at least that reasoned, what about less direct forms of manipulation (coercion)? Should a company, if capable, be permitted to "blacklist" employees of the competition; e.g. sully their names such that they find future employement difficult if their current employer becomes insolvent?
The point is that there must be a line drawn somewhere , if only because certain members of humanity have a weakness for exploiting others to the detriment of society. It is an overly-simplistic view which considers force to only exist at the end of a gun barrel; that's simply the most direct and final form of it.
If a company or individual has primary control over an essential supply chain, they have the ability to force distributors into exclusively using their product; simply by virtue of the fact that by severing the chain the distibutor will suffer economic disadvantage to the point of being unable to continue operations. This is exactly why we have anti-trust regulation. Not that there is anything inherently wrong with being a monopoly (depending on how you got that way), but the moment you start leverging that as a tool of force to combat existing or new competition, rather than competing on the merits of product alone, you have stepped over the line into societal antagonism.
Got a little unresolved anger there, don't you? It takes force and coercion to create a monopoly, only government can do it, and our government doesn't put a gun to anyone's head to make them buy Windows. It doesn't necessarily take force or coercion to create a monopoly, but it's illegal to use monopoly power to maintain market dominance. If a company gets into the business first, or buys out its competitors, or corners the supply of a necessary raw material, or makes the best widget, it may naturally monopolize the market. IIRC, monopolies aren't even illegal in and of themselves. It is the abuse of monopoly power to control the market (and hence, to maintain the monopoly) that is illegal.
I think it's entertaining how you go on about the end users paying corporations for what they want. Isn't the state of Massachussetts a customer? Don't they have a need that can not be met with an encumbered document format? Mass is a big customer. Anybody but Microsoft would be falling all over themselves to ensure that Massachusetts gets an open format.
And your last paragraph just makes me laugh. The PC propogated in large measure because IBM's competitors could make inexpensive clones. It's the opposite of monopoly power. The internet exists because a number of different ideas came together in a useful way -- among them, US defense department and university researchers needing a communications protocol (TCP/IP) and Tim Berners-Lee being interested in document sharing. And yeah, Al Gore was actually responsible for some of the legislation that changed the web from a defense research network into what it is today.
But hey, none of this really matters very much. In fifty years, we'll either be huddling around post-apocalyptic trash fires to keep warm, or computing will be a ubiquitous utility.
Why? Are you saying that a corporations input into gov. will actually increase the gov's intake as well as lower their cost? From everything that I have seen, when a corp. inputs into a gov. the gov loses money (and possibly a few politians will get rich).
In addition, if a company wants to deal with the gov. they can interact with none elected employees.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
well heres a no-brainer, why the goddamn hell waste millions on buying M$ Office when they could use a FREE 80meg download of OpenOffice again for FREE, and as a side note: I use it myself, and it has damn near every feature MS Office gives you and then some, like a one-touch button on the word processor to turn it into a PDF... the ONLY TWO things MS Office has that I actually use are the auto-correct/dictionary, and the readability report after a spell check.
well?
"Those who cast the votes decide nothing. Those who count the votes decide everything" -- Josef Stalin
In Massachussetts, what percentage of the people are using Microsoft Word or Adobe PDF, and what percentage of them are using software that support ODF?
So what you're saying is that because we use a closed format today we should use it tomorrow. And because we use it tomorrow we should use it the next day? And so on ad infinitum?
Sometimes you need to make a short term investment for long term gain. This is one of those times.
The same applies to any organisation with vendor lockin, on an upgrade train or lacking needed transparency.
---
Paid marketers are the worst zealots.
Well, this won't be implemented over night. There will be a transition period that would probalby take as long as it would to convert all the states existing documents. I havn't seen a timeline for it but one should asume a grace period of as long as it takes for the state to comply.
I would wager that by the time they had to change, Microsoft would have support in a new product as well as it being close to thier products end of life cycle anyways. Ever try to open a document created in word 2003 with word 98? There comes a point in time under the existing system when they will be forced to buy new software. With open an open format, they would have a little more control over when that time would be and how much it would cost.
You should be turing this into a time were you could show your customers that you can think ahead. Give them piece of mind in knowing your someone who can think outside the box and turn thier lemons into lemonade. I'm not sure what you do for them. I am sure that somethign positive can be made of this though.
Just what the people in our government should be worrying about right now is ODF, who the hell cares what kind of documents they are using or are going to use. Regardless of your opinion on the subjects, there is the war in Iraq, Social Security, Health Care, Education, the Economy and about a dozen other topics that deserve some attention before anyone should be cusading for a new document format. I mean seriously, there are so many other more important issues on the table...
It hasn't occurred to you that switching to open standards such as ODF could save the government money, thus making more money available for all that other stuff you think is more important?
Besides, what do you propose that the Massachusetts State CIO do about health care?
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
Somethign people forget is that this isn't going to be overnight. This change will take the state some time to work out. The amount of time would probably outlast microsofts refusal to support the standard as well as thier existing products life cycle.
If it takes 5 year to implement, chances are most users already heavily invested in microsofts format would have replaced thier computers due to hardware failures. Ever open a document created in word 2003 with word 98? Thats about 5 years. This transition isn't as bad as people are making it out to be. It isn't like a switch is going to be thrown tomarrow and everyone will have to run out and buy something or close shop.
People fear change for vaious reasons. This was first made evident to me when i decided to quit my first job and start a new one. I was actualy hired at several places before I overcame my fears and made the jump. Working at a restaurant, we had a menu change were recipies were reworked to save money and the negetive reactions from employies were more related to fears about if they could still perform thier job as easily as they used to. It wasn't it is better made this way, it was i can do it easier this way. This is verry simular. It is change people are seeing the worst in and are fearing. simple increments can be made and the jump isn't as hard to do, it is baealry a jump at all.
In certain matter yes. I the case were corperations are using the governemtn as thier clients the answe would probably be no.
I guess my point could have been state differently. That is if a company opens a plant in this state, they should have some input to the laws and regulation being made in that state. This doesn't mean the state needs to be thier customers rather they are customers of the state. They use thier services and protections as any indevidual might but have a greater impact to the economics of the state. They deserve some input into the workings and governing of the state simular to the people of the state.
Imagine what would happen if a silly law passed that allowed all felons to carry concealed firearms. You being upset over it decide to move to another state without such nonsence laws. Now imagine the impact on that state and the people living in it. Now imagine you are that company and you employ 200 people and consider the difference in the impact. We can substitute a silly law with tax increases or workers benifits or exesive insurance requirments or public tranportation policy.
Alot of every day policy has effects on companies residing in the states that don't directly do business with that state. To remove thier imput altogether (like some would enjoy) could stiffle thier ability to profit and provide the jobs and tax base the state enjoys.
my 2 yen ...
excuse me, but Microsoft wasn't convicted for "monopoly". monopoly could be legal. they were convicted for defending their monopolistic position with illegal means. you can read more here:
http://www.usdoj.gov/atr/cases/f4400/4469.htm
and i thought everyone knew that ...
Think about it. Every medium size to large office with PCs is going to need IT people. I'm surprised they can handle a whole state with just 2000 people. You got DMVs and all those systems, State Troopers with laptops, state tax people, heath care services, the Governor, Lieutenant Governor and all their people, Attorney General, the lottery people, weights and measures. I could go on. Think about all the services that the state provides. Its huge. Needless to say its a lot of computers, networks, and people who probably are not too good at using them. This day in age where the most savy people are not using Microsoft, its important everyone can exchange information.
Think of how much it must have cost MS to "influence" all the people needed so that restructuring a state legislature isn't dismissed out of hand. To say nothing of the PR groups, the pay-for-pay reporting (mentioning no names, Boston Globe) and all the rest of it.
Anything Quinn might have wanted - it would have been cheaper to just give it to him. The fact that this wrangle is still going on suggests that this isn't about negotiated discounts or personal profit. Especially since Microsoft's preserving their highly lucrative office software monopoly with its 75% profit margins remains a far more plausible explanation.
Oh, and speaking of the Boston Globe, did you know they printed complete retraction of the smear job they did on Qinn? Right in the back where no-one would see it, but printed nevertheless. With all the current attempts to smear Quinn, I think any genuine dirt would have surfaced by now.
Lacking any actual wrongdoing, the best they can manage is cheap innuendo
Don't let THEM immanentize the Eschaton!
Yeah, a lot of people are not grasping that.
First off, you have to keep in mind that a corp never decides to be some place. They have no mind. Instead, it is a CEO (or sometimes a committee) that decides it. So where does a CEO move a company to? Where they like to live. Here in colorado, we lost a lot of company HQ due to the fact that during the economic downturn, they would look out of state for executives. No problem except when the exec was CEO. In just about ever case, the CEO said that they would move to Colorado, but once in as CEO, they decide to travel for awhile. After about 6 months, they would announce that the company HQ was moving to right where the CEO lived. More often than not, it was based on family or amenable living condition. That means low taxes, low real eastate, good schools, etc, (and not necessarily in that order).
About the only thing that a state does that impacts it, is the taxes (of which stock holders care more about, not the employees, unless they are major holders) and amenities that enable a state to bring in good employees.
Finally, while I was suggesting that a company should not be able to lobby or pay an elected official, I do belive that individuals (i.e. the humans that vote) do have a right to see their represenative/senator. That would include the CEO and other execs. Sadly, reps. not only allow, but push the lobbyists so that they get loads of money for elections.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Consider what percentage of these people have illegal copies of msoffice..
Consider that new people are being born every minute...
By using ODF, the barrier-to-entry is reduced to the price of hardware, the entire software stack can be obtained for free. Hardware being a tangible good will always have a production cost associated with it and there's nothing the state can do about that..
By using msoffice anyone who doesn`t already have a copy will need to buy one (in order to remain legal) and may end up spending more on that alone than the cost of hardware capable of running openoffice.
And then you have the poor backwards compatibility associated with msoffice, people will need at least the same version as the documents they're reading were created with, and may need exactly the same version because msoffice even has poor forwards compatibility..
So those people without the requisite version will also have to spend money to upgrade, and in doing so may also need to upgrade windows and their hardware.
Using msoffice will force any citizen who wants to read the documents to:
a, have a modern enough computer to run the current version of windows or macosx ($200 new, cheaper used)
b, have a current version of windows or macosx for it (or have it included in the price) ($100)
c, have a current version of msoffice ($400)
Whereas, using ODF will force citizens to:
a, have a reasonably modern computer (but not as modern as that required by msoffice) ($200 new, cheaper used and could use older/cheaper machines)
And citizens who already have the current version of msoffice and the hardware necessary to run it will need:
a, a free download of openoffice.org ($0) or a copy on CD ($13.95 from amazon)
So why should those of us who don`t have msoffice be forced to spend a considerable amount of money and possibly switch platforms to save those that do have it a few minutes downloading openoffice.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
It's its simplest term, an IT professional is someone who gets paid for doing IT. That can mean a useless guy who's crammed up to pass some exams, or a guy who can proverbially make square pegs fit round holes with software.
A lot of IT pros that I know take a professional view of software. They want to build the best solution. That can mean OSS or closed, paid for software. I concur with what you say - many are now looking at OSS solutions.
There's also no conflict between profit and OSS. I built a site for someone and used OSS for profitable reasons. All the software (Apache, PHP, MySQL) was free, hosting was a lot less of a struggle to set up and the support costs have been almost nil. Not only that, but OSS development changes based on developer needs. Languages like PERL and PHP evolve over time. That means that your investment in them as a developer is not wasted, where a closed-source solution can mean a company deciding that they want to ditch a tool and rewrite the world, leaving developers with no choice but to climb a steep ladder of learning of cost and risk, for no real-world benefit.
The other thing I like with OSS - tools don't become expired with the new version of an OS or the next version requires an OS upgrade - these mean I can keep a stable environment that I am used to - reducing downtime/retraining time and raising productivity. I partly do this to reduce the frustration of development, but this also means I can develop faster and with more stability - and that's good for the bottom line.
People should add up all the lost time with certain closed solutions compared with the advertised productivity gains. Having to replace developer skills in one language with another language costs the equivalent of months of lost time in retraining (retraining takes a lot longer than just the two weeks on a training course - it takes time to get used to all the ways that the new environment "works" in all it's subtle little ways.
Better yet, devise your own format and create a program to read/write it..
Then charge an extortionate fee for it`s use.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
Maybe moving to an open format will help health care it allowing free/open software to be developed that use the free standard to devise ways to improve health care and save money in the long run over expensive upgrades.
Technology can be good and used to better the lives of mankind/(people everywhere). Improvements shared can improve lives in other areas, especially when people get to the point they see the only way they can improve is by helping others.
Why on Earth are you wasting your time posting on
Lesbian Nazi Hookers Abducted by UFOs and Forced Into Weight Loss Programs - -all next week on Town Talk.
Sorry, but I need to pick a nit. It seems that the nudge-n-wink was directed to the legislature, in an effort to deprive the executive branch of their IT autonomy. I know people here are eager to dump on "this administration", whomever that may be at the time, but this time, "this administration" are our heroes.
Anyone else think the guy at pictured at the link looks like Melvin Frohike of the Lone Gunmen? :)
[ home ]
Agreed. It's hard to take seriously. I'd link the relevant Penny Arcade strip, but I can't seem to find it.
As usual, Microsoft is acting more like a crime syndicate, than a corporation.
Microsoft doesn't care that everyone can see what they are doing. On the contrary, Microsoft wants other politicians to get the message, which is, "Do what we want, or there will be consequences."
And it will probably work, at least, for a while. Most politicians would rather deal with criminals, than have their jobs threatened.
But it won't always work. Many people, including politicians, don't take kindly to extortion.
This will only add to the growing sentiment to avoid Microsoft, and its products, altogether. A growing number of businesses and political jurisdictions will have the guts to stand up to Microsoft, and choose other alternatives.
Eventually, the day will come when even the most cowardly politicians and CEOs will feel emboldened enough to say no to Microsoft.
how the government can be bought - IT professionals chose a solution based on an open standard and not on a vendor's product so it's CITIZENS can have access to their documents without having to buy a certain software product. What a concept.
But now they get restructured and told what to do because microsoft has some politicians in it's pockets.
Sure makes our forefathers proud doesn't it? Glad my dad fought in WWWII so these greedy politicians can sit on their fat arses and tell people how to do their jobs when they have no clue on how to do it themselves.
Anybody that doesn't think microsoft is running the government here in this instance is a fool and should wake up and smell the coffee. It pisses me off that more people aren't pissed off about this and let this happen.
I think you'll find that teachers unions have some major beefs with the DOE lately, eg as pertains to NCLB. A few years ago the secretary of education even called the NEA terrorists for not being more supportive of federal policy. I'll totally give you 2 out of 3 though...
Small, as in 13th largest by population? Granted, 6.4 million doesn't really compare with CA's 35.9, but small? (http://www.factmonster.com/ipka/A0004986.html)
All: Who controls the British crown?
Who keeps the metric system down?
We do! We do!
Karl: Who leaves Atlantis off the maps?
Lenny: Who keeps the Martians under wraps?
Alien: We do! We do!
All: Who holds back the electric car?
Who makes Steve Gutenberg a star?
We do! We do!
Skinner: Who robs cavefish of their sight?
Homer: Who rigs every Oscar night?
All: We do! We do!
I feel fantastic, and I'm still alive.
It's become obvious that the politicians in MA have no power at all to set IT policy, hence the crap thrown at Peter Quinn (he's the one they want to be bribing). They would, in effect, have to pass some sort of legislation that would dictate the use of Microsoft Office, or that would define Microsoft's formats as some sort of open standard so Office could continue to be used. However, trying to legally and legislatively do something about that would be rather messy and wouldn't stand up to scrutiny.
I really don't know why IBM, Sun, Novell and others aren't throwing money and pressure at this. It is worth quite a bit of money to them.
If you're a resident of MA- please take the time to write your Senator and Representative to express your support for Mr. Quinn and the ODF. You can look up your representatives here: http://www.mass.gov/legis/citytown.htm
Here's what I've sent to my Senator. The letter to my Rep added that as one of the few Republicans in the House he might want to take this opportunity to distinquish himself....
Hon Steven Panagiotakos
Room 218
Boston, MA 02133
Dear Senator,
I am writing to express my support for the recent efforts of the Massachusetts CIO, Peter Quinn in his drive to ensure accessibility for the citizens of Massachusetts. I'm very disappointed the Senate would consider ignoring or altering the recommendations of Mr. Quinn and his staff. The citizens of Massachusetts deserve to have unfettered access to the electronic records of the state. Our state has an opportunity to step out and obtain widespread recognition for leadership; we should not succumb to backroom deals or crooked politics- it is vital we follow the recommendations of Mr. Quinn and adopt the Open Document Format for all documents and publications. I value our freedom to choose and do not wish to be subject to the whims of a monopoly. The adoption of the Open Document Format is an important step in taking back the information paid for by our tax dollars. What is paid for by all should be accessible to all and no alternative is acceptable.
Respectfully,
As an OS/2 programmer, let me respond to some of your comments: Of course, it would given that it descends from Unix, arguably the dumbest thing ever conceived this side of OS/2. Back when OS/2 was in it's 1.3 version (15 years ago), it was being used to control store systems (IBM's 4600 series registers) and end user banking systems (4700 teller terminals and ATM's). When MS-Dos 4.1 came out, when installed or re-installed on a PC with OS/2 installed, it would report "You have OS/2 installed. There may not be enough room to install DOS. Would you like to remove OS/2?". This when installing a single floppy image on a FAT partition with 2+GB free. Together, MS-Dos and Windows 3.1 required less than 5MB to install and run. In addition, I had created a transaction processing system which utilized 3 processes, each running 8 threads, to run an automated dispatch system. One process received dispatch requests and communicated status on an ongoing basis to requestors connected through a VAX. The second opened calls an monitored status on an IBM Mainframe, connected via 3270 controllers. The third kept status updated on DB/2 SQL based databases in 3 locations nationwide. Meanwhile, the company had a NT3.51 testbed which would bluescreen while sitting idle. Which O/S was more capable? I also had occasion to create an assymetric multiprocessor complex for doing massively paraless processing. One processor (the control processor) controlled up to 64 others which would each receive a packet for processing through a neural network. This system ran successfully on OS/2 and *nix* systems (not only Linux, but also Solaris on E4K to E10K systems). Which O/S was more capable? If IBM's sales force had not totally neglected OS/2 (and followed the NEXT model of pricing operating system software) the system would probably still be around. Of course, since you were going to pay for windows on a new PC whether or not you were going to use it, IBM's pricing model priced it out of the end-user market. Keep in mind that, 15 years later, the primary way of repairing a broken windows install is to wipe and reinstall. The Windows model of placing any and all software in system directories, along with leaving write permission open in same, allows and promotes software which can seriously compromise system operation with no safeguards. The extension of this model (the System Registry) makes removing misbehaving software extremely difficult. The fact that a program which needs to be able to open up a TCP/IP port above 1023 requires system level privileges indicates extremely poor programming practice suited only to a non mission critical system that only one person should use. This describes ALL VERSIONS of Windows to a "T".
And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.
John 8:32(King James Version)
I can agree with you assesment as along as the CEO could reasonably voice an opinion as CEO and maybe a different one as a citizen. But then thats the same as the company having a voice.
Sometimes what is good for the company and I contend that more then taxes could effect a company's disposition, Might not be exactly whats good for the oficcers of the company for various reasons. The company pay taxes just as the CEO does. It should have somewhat of a voice. I'm not thinking it should eb a big voice but then how do you determine how big of a voice is neccsary when the government's policy could effect the 200 employies working there. 'even when the company's position is at odds with the officers position. (think profit verses family or public image verses censorship. Lots of differing reasons)
You propose instead what? That Microsoft create and give to the world standards that anyone can write to for any platform?
That's basically what Microsoft has done -- the Office 2003/2006 XML formats are documented and can be implemented by anyone willing to accept their patent grant.
(Reading these discussions would be a lot less frustrating if people actually kept up with the news instead of talking about the situation 3 years ago.)
Whenever I hear the word 'Innovation', I reach for my pistol.
>> a task force of political appointees has no business telling more than 2000 IT professionals what to do.
Yeah, but that's not going to stop them. They stick their noses into all kinds of places they have no business, from the design of shower heads to the rules of baseball.
Holy shit. Graphics? She is sure to convince them with pictures.
This is clearly a case of state Seantors attempting to alter the executive branch's good faith efforts to run IT in the interests of the citizens. So mod this up, the grandparent post was wrong to blame the executive branch.
Think global, act loco
Actually it's quite easy to grasp -- Microsoft supported TCP/IP because it made Windows compatible with a huge number of existing systems, routers, and networks.
Right now, basically nobody uses ODF, so there's very little customer demand (except for MA). The only people who care about the format are non-MS customers. So regardless of the politics, it is just a very low priority feature for most MSO users.
Whenever I hear the word 'Innovation', I reach for my pistol.
People joke that Louisiana is the northernmost bananna republic. I hope not to have to welcome Mass to the club, but turnabout is fair play.
The more I think about it, the more Microsoft looks like the United Fruit Company. The only differences are that the United Fruit Company actually built real infrastructure, like railroads, and you can only grow a bananna in the tropics. It looks like you can farm PCs and treat their users like peons at any latitude.
Let's see if a great US state with some of the best IT staff and best universities for IT in the world can resist bribery and persue excellence. If they can't, no one can. That's what this is all about. The world is watching and M$ is desperate to "demonstrate" that IT experts want M$ junk.
What's funny is that their demonstration proves only that M$ is used only because it's forced on people by idiots.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Please look at the OpenOpenOffice project The plug in is already under way, at least if you have network access or are willing to install OpenOpenOffice locally. OpenOffice can already read & write Microsoft formats, so it makes sense to leverage this in the OpenOpenOffice solution. Of course, this doesn't help if Microsoft decides to sue OpeOffice for implementing MS Office Open XML, but that would result in a seperate firestorm of criticism for Microsoft, espeically overseas. The OpenOpenOffice solution is simple (as in elegant, not as in brain dead) & should be done long before January 2007. A cottage industry for OpenOffice is already underway.
Think global, act loco
What does this have to do with document formats? If you're claiming equal access, people that need wheelchair ramps don't have a choice. Running OSS is.
I spent 3 days learning the differences between Linux web serving and Windows web serving. I have been using linux for a few years, and the Windows 2003 webserver was the only Windows server in the server room. Everything else was linux based or Netware based. The IT Professional was a Microsoft fanatic, and refused to learn anything new, and left me with a bitter taste because she ignored the reccomendations of myself, other staff members, the previous person in her position, and the department that shared the server room with us. Because she was officially our LAN Administrator, our department listened to her. Now we are left with a server with nobody knowing how to fully support it, and she did not document what she had done to get it working.
I was exaggerating, yes, about getting the webserver up and running, but it did take 2 weeks to have the software mailed to us, because we are a not-for-profit university and we had problems with getting the software from our vendor without paying taxes. The IT Professional I was talking about then spent an extra 2 weeks getting the server up and running because it was not as simple as she thought. I have gotten IIS servers up within an hour just fine, but she was learning how to have multiple IPs on the same machine, and was trying to learn ASP so she could make the applications herself.
The point of the post was that there are 2 very common types of IT Professionals, and 1 very rare type:
Common Types:
1. Very intelligent, but ignored by their manager.
2. Very gullible/opinionated, and listened to by their manager.
Rare Type:
1. Very intelligent, and listened to by their manager.
So the point is, to avoid fanatics (both Open Source and Closed source), it sometimes helps if your organization gets together and chooses a standard to follow.
I think that more than one person should be involved in the research of what document format to choose, and that it should be opened to the public forum. I find it amusing that a non-IT individual is saying a bureaucrat should not make the decision for 2000 IT professionals, but by blocking this decision, the non-IT bureaucrat is doing just that. Unless, of course, all IT departments in the government offices in MA are using whatever each individual IT Professional feels like, in which case there could be any number of file formats floating around.
All in all, I think a decision should be made, and IT Professionals and the general public should be involved in the decision. IT Professionals, who have a $430 copy of Office 2003 Professional handed to them free-of-charge, should not be enforcing that as a standard that individuals who clip coupons for a $0.30 can of chicken noodle soup are going to have to follow.
"Now the trouble about trying to make yourself stupider than you really are is that you very often succeed." -C.S. Lewis
To me the format of a doc is secondary to whether or not I can get access to it in the first place. Private companies such as Westlaw have almost total control of the document store such that getting the information you need in the first place is so expensive that the average Joe cannot afford it.
I'm assuming you meant MS-DOS 4.01. I (my parents) bought my first computer in 1989 (about 16 years ago). It was a 80286 and it did NOT have a hard disk drive. I had to boot using a 5.25" floppy drive to DOS, and then using 3 floppies I would load up Prince of Persia 1 to play with.
A few years later (about 3) my older brother and I were debating if we had the money to buy a shiny new computer, should the hard disk drive be 40 Megabytes or 60. I told him "if we get a 60MB hard drive it will store all the games and programs we use and we'll have lots of opportunities to expand in the future". He argued that 40MB would have been "more than we will ever need".
Now.. At that time there weren't any 2GB drives, according to Wikipedia the first 2GB hard drive was introduced in 1995 to the consumer market . I'm going to assume that you were working at a huge corporation at the time that had access to such huge amounts of storage. What would a corporation like that need MS-DOS 4.01 for anyway?
A message like that was probably a sound decision by the engineers who worked on MS-DOS, as consumers did not have enough room to have more than one OS installed at the same time (my friend had a 80486 with *gasp* 10 Megabytes hard disk drive in 92/93).
If you can't mod them join them.
Right - that's quiet the practical outcome of not moving to ODF. Thank you for your very well-thought analysis.
You should also be aware as it's been posted here on /. before that Word, Excel, and PowerPoint formats are being standardized. But I suppose since it's from Microsoft is isn't really open and the ECMA is just lying through their web site that will eventually post the standard.
The top-most post in this thread is close to being right but should amend how geeks get all upset when IT comes into play. It should state that geeks get upset when open source is at stake, not just general IT.
Maybe you should read the news more often, but the Office 12 formats for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint are being standardized through the ECMA just as the CLI and C# were and still are with new versions of either. Or is it just that /.'ers world is crashing down around them since now that Microsoft is producing open standards they have no argument left?
The grandparent post is stating what should be obvious: this is how the government works. People elect officials (who may appoint other officials typically based on their beliefs and ideas) as the governing body. Deel with it. It's not a dictatorship. If you don't like it vote differently next time, or at least go out and vote if you don't.
I worked in corporate IT (at a huge bank) for 17 years, and --thank God-- just quit 6 months ago, EXACTLY for these kinds of power-plays by the IT-ignorant.
The worst part of these situations is that the whole process of centralized IT decisions is generally started by well-meaning managers who are appalled at anecdotal evidence of inefficencies, failures, and (in some cases) out-and-out corruption. Then the whole thing gets out of hand and turns into a "the geeks at IT don't know how to manage technology and align it with the organization's goals, so we have to tell them what to do at every step of the way."
Then the cycles of silver-bullet management fixes don't stop, and actually overlap: one "solution" hasn't even shown its possible benefits when the next one comes along. Management overhead then starts eating up more than half of IT's time and efforts, in a downward spiral.
The MA Commonwealth people have to see that micromanagement via committee (a.k.a. "task force") simply Does Not Work.
Committees are good for doing meta-management: setting agendas and guidelines, and using feedback to see if those guidelines are helping people follow the agendas. As part of that guideline-setting process, the committee MUST delegate responsibility, and permit ostensibly extra-agenda actions to be carried out, providing that the person who is doing that action has a way of proving that it really does follow the agenda, and it must permit them to prove it AFTER the fact. This is so people can do their job without waiting in line to get a bunch of signatures. If in fact the actions prove to be irrelevant to the agenda, then the bright IT guy will get sacked, but then the majority of IT guys who are following the agenda will be able to do the Right Thing without sitting on their backsides waiting for paperwork.
Well, in a nutshell, that's why I left corporate IT: I got tired of wasting time on committees and sitting on good ideas because too many people were covering their derrieres aginst the day that the centralized task force/committee/whatever will "(p)review" their projects. BTW, I was no bottom feeder in the IT department: I was two steps below the CIO/CTO, so I saw this up close and personal.
Very nice. Most people don't seem to catch that the furthest extreme form of "libertarianism" becomes anarchy and that not all force is blatant.
Also by his argument the mafia would be a completely legitimate business and that government was wrong to come in and oppress the expression of the free market.
I am not in anyway affiliated with Max Cannon
The fact that in most companies you get a couple of technical "architects" who think they know what they are doing, who establish some policy or "framework" as we like to call them and tell the rest of us to go implement it.
Actually, I was pointing out that noone seeems to be grasping the fact that ODF is an open standard, you don't need to license it. I've seen at least 10 posts where people mention licensing ODF.
Humor is hard. Cynical humor is harder.
But seriously, are you a troll? Microsoft's effort to have it both ways with the ECMA stamp of approval after the fact is not the same thing as responding affirmatively to a large and valued customer's request for a feature. I actually read some of the background leading up to the present article. Did you know that Mass ITD considered MSXML as a possible standard? There were a few problems with it, (1) apparently it wasn't available at the time (2) It's not being back-ported to existing versions of MS Office (at any price). (3) Most importantly. It's not (so far) an open standard in several ways: there is some MS specific binary data in the format, and there is some patent and licensing nonsense that takes away control of the data from the state of Massachussetts. The state has a data retention responsibility that is truly mind-boggling. Why should they wait around for ECMA to "eventually publish the standard" when there are useable published standards available today? I think it's great that the implications of data formats are being considered at all.
At the end of the day, the CIO has to do what's right for his employers--the executive branch of Massachussetts state government, and by extension, the citizens of the commonwealth. And if you look at the background a little bit, you'll see that he has tried to do that. Is the decision to standardize on ODF/PDF the correct one? If the legislature doesn't shoot itself in the foot by paralyzing its information technology infrastructure, maybe we'll get to find out. What is truly amazing here is that legislators have gotten into the act in the way that they have-- I attribute it to fear of the unknown.
And by the way, support for an open standard isn't the same thing as Open Source. For example, MS Word can save as ASCII text, that's a de facto (if not ISO) standard format, but as we both know, Word is a proprietary application.
just tell them the truth,
1. OpenOffice is free software, you can just download it or you can buy it on a CD to install for about $14.00
2. Anybody that can use Ms Office can use OO, OO does look a little and is organised little bit different, so people who just memorized click sequences might have a little learning curve, people who actualy learn MS Office have little dificulty.
3. People who learn OpenOffice, and MS Office are better in MS Office than people who only know MS Office are.
4. OO can output PDFs which most people can't modify
5. OO doesn't force you to pay for upgrades every two years or so.
OBTW if you want great looking documents, don't use a word-processor use a desktop publishing program, right tool for the right job
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
This is a case of politicians legislating something they dont understand.
When has that ever stopped them before? I've talked to one of my state legislators at length, I was actualy driving him arround in a jeep and we were talking about legislation he sponsored for POW license plates on cars so I asked him "Germans are our allies now but were our enemies not too long ago, so would a German Soldier held as a POW by the American government be eligable, or a Russian Soldier was our allies in WW II but are our "enemies" now (this was back in the cold war days), does he get one?" He had never thought about it that deeply, but was a sincere and intelegent person. The reality is that our legeslators have been way over their heads for a long time and have relied on experts to help them with legislation and far to many times the foxes have been guarding the hen houses; we are actualy lucky that the foxes have been pretty honorable for foxes, things could easily be much worse.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
Are you kidding? Maybe you have a different meaning for 'support' than I do.
Just what the people in our government should be worrying about right now is passing a law to create a new level of beurocracy to strip routine operational and efficency decisions away from the appropriate department heads and experts. Regardless of your opinion on the subjects, there is the war in Iraq, Social Security, Health Care, Education, the Economy and about a dozen other topics that deserve some attention before anyone should be cusading for a new document format. I mean seriously, there are so many other more important issues on the table...
It is obscene that some representatives in the Massechusettes legislature are trying to wage some battle to prevent departments from using the best and most appropriate document formats.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
AC: Um, no. What he's saying is that the PEOPLE should decide what format they use, not some asshole in an appointed position who the people never elected or chose.
He was appointed by an ELECTED executive. That means the PEOPLE entrusted him to make various decisions on their behalf, particularly in regards to details of government operation. Whether or not they approve of this particular choice shall be a factor in Romney's next election campaign.
Your complaint applies equally well to any kind of representative democracy (and of course, nonrepresentative democracy is too cumbersome to be workable with modern technology)
Whereas, using ODF will force citizens to:
Since the mandate is only that they use ODF, and not STOP USING any other format, it will force them to do exactly nothing. There will naturally be a long period of transition when the government continues to accept MSWord files, and merely keeps the official, archival copy in ODF.
That period will almost certainly last longer than the typical hardware-upgrade period you mention.
OM: Microsoft is not a monopoly. Only force can create a monopoly -- and only government can legally use force.
And the government exercises force on behalf of Microsoft to "protect their intellectual property". Therefore Microsoft has force, and what's your problem?
Only force can create a monopoly
No. Only property rights can create a monopoly. Force is only necessary insofar as it protects property rights.
In any capitalist system and field with a nontrivial economic barrier-to-entry, entities will increase their marketshare at a rate proportionate to their capital (ie, their existing marketshare). Monopolies will be the natural result of market force.
The unnatural part is that any monopoly which occurs will spontaneously be destroyed when the rest of the population decides to infringe on their property rights. Only if a government acts to protect their "property" can the monopoly survive.
Yes, I did mean "4.01" (my mistake). I worked for a company which was tasked with, among other things, performing a remote (as in cross-country) upgrade from DOS 4.01 to DOS 5.0 as a pilot project. We all (inside the development group) had 6GB drives loaded with 4 different operating systems (2 RTOS's, DOS, and whatever was appropriate for our environment - mine was OS/2).
And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.
John 8:32(King James Version)