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Acting MA CIO Appointed, ODF A Go
Andy Updegrove writes "Massachusetts has appointed ITD COO Beth Pepoli as the acting CIO of the Commonwealth. At the same time, the Governor's Communications Director, Eric Fehrnstrom, has made the clearest statement yet that it is ODF that the new CIO will be implementing: 'There have been no changes in the commonwealth's published OpenDocument rules, and we are still on track for a January 2007 implementation.' We reported on the resignation of Peter Quinn in December.
I didn't RTFA, but FWIW, ODF was nearly FUBAR.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
This just in; the BRG is MK in the PRTW while the outgoing CTA is now fully assumed to be BFPLF.
Can someone provide a quick summary of what ODF means for MA, and a timeline of events that has led up to this story so far? I keep seeing it mentioned, and yet no one ever goes into detail about why it matters.
Am I the only one who couldn't get to that "Reported on this before" link?
I'm sure I can't be the only one here who finds the continual blurring of lines between "state"/"country" and "corporation" a bit unnerving.
With spending like this, exactly what are "conservatives" conserving?
Groklaw has the skinny, and a comprehensive history.
What it means for the commonwealth of Massachusetts: sovereingity.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
"Acting MA CIO Appointed, ODF A Go"
I need help! I understood that!!!
The race isn't always to the swift... but that's the way to bet!
I need help! I understood that!!!
I think it could have used another 'Go':
"Acting MA CIO Appointed, ODF A Go Go"
I want to drag this out as long as possible. Bring me my protractor.
How's Stalin and his Free Software Movement?
If you'd of read the FAQ and TPS Report you'd be ITK and not MIA.
If big boobed women work at Hooters do one legged women work at IHOP?
until i realized the author meant to say "AMACIOA,ODFAG"
in which case i understood perfectly
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
I tried printing it off but all it said was PC Load Letter and I don't know what that means.
sigfault. core dumped.
"Excuse me, sir. Seeing as how the V.P. is such a V.I.P., shouldn't we keep the P.C. on the Q.T.? 'Cause if it leaks to the V.C. he could end up M.I.A., and then we'd all be put out in K.P."
It's "no one," not "noone." Who the hell is noone anyway?
I don't think there will be a year of Open Source of a year of Open Document. I think there will be years marked by battles of Open source and open document formats. We've been fighting these bloody battles of Open source and Open Doc versus Closed source and Word Documents for years now, and every year I think the battles intensify as more and more casualties mount on both sides.
2006 will be another year of fighting for F/OSS and ODF survival. So here's too a new year in the trenches.
OpenDocument is a published set of standards for office-type documents.
This differs from the Microsoft Office formats in that they're fully documented, legally unencumbered, and reasonably easy to make use of (something the MS Office formats are, in spite of repeated claims of being "open", have never actually been in any substantive way.)
This is important to the Commonwealth (= State) of Massachusetts as it recognizes it will need to be able to read it's digital files for decades, indeed centuries, into the future. MS Office and like applications have proven to be unable to read documents written by versions only a few years old.
However it is hoped that by adopting a non-commercially-controlled standard files will be able to be read by applications yet undeveloped, from any vendor or source, without legal complexity.
The other advantage is this also "levels the playing field" for all other applications by breaking the MS Office Format lock, and will thus enable government entities and those they interact with with stop paying the "Microsoft Tax".
Microsoft has complained that this format excludes their products. It doesn't, they can develop a converter the same they have for all of the other competing formats their products read & (sometimes) write to.
Microsoft has also taken steps to get their formats also set as a standard. Whether whatever ECMA eventually publishes is actually useful is an open question but has been clearly driven by this situation.
Microsoft has also employed their PR & lobbying arms, having front organizations distribute disinformation about OpenDocument, it's effects, goals, etc.
The most visible supporter of Massachusetts adopting OpenDocument was a civil servant, Peter Quinn.
He was recently investigated for possible misuse of funds. This story received unusually prominent coverage by the leading local newspaper, on their front page.
The without-cause finding received little coverage but the employee decided he wasn't interested working under this level of personal attack and has left civil service.
The State Governor is about to run for US President and has a history of w ^H h ^H o ^H r ^H i ^H n ^H g accepting campaign contributions from interested parties, then making dubious appointments and policies.
It was widely suspected the Governor would be announce a convenient policy change after Peter Quinn left (costs to run for President!)
This story is that the policy won't change. Or at least, that is the story today. How aggresively the policy is implemented is another question, or if this policy will even stand once general attention to it has waned.
The other good news is that many other levels and jurisdictions of governements have identical concerns about using MS's formats and are themselves considering alternatives, open formats, etc.
I don't read ACs: If a post isn't worth so much as a nom de plume to its author then I wont bother either.
Well, that's good to hear. I was starting to wonder if the new interm CIO would be a friend of Redmond and would start to turn MA against ODF. Good for them to stick to their principles.
It is not our abilities that show what we truly are... it is our choices.
Correct me if I am weong, but ODF is only used by OOo and Suns Staroffice (which is the same thing, in a box, with phone support), so even though the format is open, which is undoubtably good, isnt it just locking into Sun because no one else reads / writes ODF?
Is it just me, or have the editors failed to link to their own article properly! C'mon guys, getting a 404 for your own site is not cool.
Who is John Galt?
Eric Fehrnstrom ? Is anyone else thinking he sounds like the Professor's Arch-nemesis from Futurama...
Something is not right.
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1908369,00.as p
David Coursey from EWeek has an interesting opinion piece on this subject. From the article-
"Is it the responsibility of citizens to change what they're doing for the convenience of the government? Or should government seek to meet the needs of the largest number of its citizens?"
RmSnwBrdr, The one and only! "Life SuX! Get a F@#%ing Helmet!" -Denis Leary
"Use the Preview Button! Check those URLs!"
Anything that the government makes use of should be open-source. The only exception I can think of is where it would be a national security risk in doing so, which isn't likely the case here. As long as I pay my taxes, I should have the right to view gov't-created documents without needing to buy software in order to do so. Not to mention I shouldn't be paying my tax dollars to Microsoft; they've gotten enough of my money in the past as it is.
How are sites slashdotted when nobody reads TFAs?
The state has a responsibility for all of its citizens,
not only for the lazy majority!
it would take, what, an extra 10 seconds to type the damn thing out?
If you ignore good information just because it comes from an anonymous source then you are only sabotaging yourself. There is no other outcome to the situation than you having a smaller pool of information to look at, so your view is narrower than that of others. You may think you are avoiding a lot of garbage but I guess you will never know if you completely block it out. You even need to understand the point of view of the enemy to win at war.
Twinstiq, game news
Here's my best stab at a commercial analogy for the ODF debacle.
Imagine you're the procurement guy for a mid-sized company. Not huge, but not insigificant either. You use some product from an outside vendor, which everyone pretty much agrees sucks, but uses anyway. You recommend to your boss one day that the company try to negotiate with the vendor to make it suck less, and if they won't do this, dump the vendor for some alternative.
So the vendor, which is a company bigger than yours, gets wind of your idea. They don't want to change their product for you, saying your company is too small for it to be worthwhile. But they also realize that other companies are watching what happens to yours. So instead they have one of their higher-ups call up your company's CEO and try to get you fired.
That's pretty much the whole deal as I've watched it; when you compare it to an equivalent situation occuring the private sector it seems pretty ridiculous.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."