Public Procurement and Open Source 79
Steve writes "Open code in public procurement is an interesting take on free software and open source software in a federal or state environment. Pawlo: 'It is time that public bodies and governments look over their public procurement policies. The policy should guarantee competition, not stifle it.' Thinking of the latest Bill Gates rant this make sense."
A major problem (Score:5, Insightful)
Basically, it comes down to accountability. When the RFP responses come back, the government agency needs to see that there is a clearly defined orginization that it can access to resolve issues. If they see 'free' or 'open source', red flags will go up. "You mean anyone can change this? No thanks"
It's a standard way of thinking for government agencies. They will never adopt open source unless it first becomes general practice in the commerical sector.
Re:A major problem (Score:1)
Re:A major problem (Score:2)
But even if they did start responding, my guess is they would run into a brick wall. 'Liiinnn-Ex?.... is'nt that for hackers or something?' (not my words.. but the assumed words of a procurment department)
Re:A major problem (Score:2)
When the people who spec the requirements determine that Open Source is what they want, they'll writeup RFPs that require that the Source be provided and that they'll be able to make changes and still get support. Then, companies like RedHat, SuSe and Covalent will be able to respond adequately.
Today, I would guess, that most RFPs for these kinds of products spec complete Solaris systems complete with Web Server/etc (which may be why Sun feels iPlanet is an important product for them, it may get thrown out in favor of Apache down the line, but it does fit the requirements of RFPs) or MS solutions. Nothing to which the Open Source support companies could adequately respond.
Re:A major problem (Score:1)
In all debates about free and open software, a giant omission recurrs. There's no admission that the vast majority of software written *isn't* for distribution at all. It's custom work, for one installation, and the money paid is for the work, not the software. And the best reading I can see is that the GPL largely doesn't apply to that kind of work, because it never goes anywhere else. Does the user get the source code? Yup. Can they make changes to it? Sure. (If they do, it may break something that they'll have to pay to get fixed, but they're allowed to.) Can the user distribute it? Sure, but they're responsible for it thereafter, not the developer.
Yes, I do work for IBM. But this isn't an endorsement of a particular vendor, just that there's a whole market huge market that hasn't reeally been connected to free software before because the organizations doing the requesting haven't really wrapped their minds around the idea that they can buy work instead of software.
Re:A major problem (Score:2)
Maybe I'm just totally confused, but that argumentation is so stupid in my eyes, just because anybody _can_ change this, doesn't mean the software they used it changed by anybody. But is provided and serviced from the entity they bought it from. Or the software they give to "consumers", either the software is unaltered, (hash key matches) or you loose all support, it's the same as opening my TV and ironing a new transistior to a place where I think it will do some good.
I can change assembler code of released products also, it's just ultmativly more work and time consuming, but does that change anything on it's support?
Re:A major problem (Score:2)
Who said people in procurment are smart... or even rational. But, to their credit, they can close html tags.
Re:A major problem (Score:2)
Re:MOD PARENT DOWN (Score:2)
Re:A major problem (Score:2)
It all starts at the top [netcraft.com]. I see it happening.
Re:A major problem (Score:1)
Having worked for the public sector, I agree that the lack of appeal of free software comes down to accountability, but not as represented by this post. The gist of the problem is that public employees don't want to be accountable.
The true killer feature of proprietary software for public administration is that when things go wrong, all it takes is for the people responsible to point at {Microsoft, Oracle, PeopleSoft, whoever} and scream "it's not my fault, it's their software that's buggy", and since that is one of the many accepted "facts of IT life", they're off the hook. With free software, on the other hand, they cannot do this.
Mind you that this technique of flinging blame around does nothing to actually solve the problem, but keeping the system up only comes a very distant second after keeping they asses of the line with a bare minimum of effort.
Re:A major problem (Score:1)
It's going very well. I'm not allowed to talk much about it though.
However, we were actually told from the beginning to use open-source by the government. Adoption does not seem to be a problem.
Why should the use of open software (Score:1)
The FSF, EFF and associated bodies just want to lobby open software into federal institution. This in fact avoids open competition because the software is choosen by political considerations not by qualitative ones. Competition has nothing do to with the question wether to use open software or not, but with the terms how these decisions are made.
So dragging the open vs. close software issue in is rather ridiculous.
Procurement people are least qualified to procure (Score:4, Insightful)
Its not very likely to happen, mostly because of the FUD factor, and that, IMHO, Microsoft is a "sure thing" at least in terms of keeping their jobs. For example, choosing Windows over Linux -- the buyer knows Microsoft will be around tomorrow, and thats what everyone knows, so damnit, if it costs more and its insecure, its what people want and expect. Except the people "in the know."
It comes down to the people who need the software to sit down and convince the buyers why this or that open source package is comparable, if not superior.
Re:Procurement people are least qualified to procu (Score:2)
On the data side, we like to set standards. Often we will get this: "I want X software, or I want X hardware." In my state, this is illegal (but this happens all the time). We are careful to re-write RFPs to include the little line 'or equivilent'. This opens things up to alternitives.
But in the end, most vendors are going to accomidate the perceived wishes of the government agencies, which is pretty much the Microsoft/Office solution. Open source might be better, but it's a wild card that most government orginizations ar'nt willing to consider.
Re:Procurement people are least qualified to procu (Score:1)
- Yo Grark
Who to purchase from...RedHat, BestBuy, a local Reseller....what do you mean this is free software? How can we spend taxes blindly if we use free software?!?
Re:Procurement people are least qualified to procu (Score:5, Insightful)
After doing some intensive research, we found a package that satisfied our current and future needs. Top of the line dual processors, maxed-out memory, dual RAID controllers, the fastest harddrives, etc, at quite a nice price
So we write up the paperwork and send it off to the procurement folks. About 9 weeks later (this is considered blindingly quick in the federal govt) The boxes finally arrive. Upon opening them, however, we discover these aren't the systems we requested. They had less memory, and more importantly, no RAID nor harddrives. We contact Procurement to let them know there has been an error. A week later, they call us back to inform us that there was *no error*. It turns out they took our request, and duplicating our effort, researched what was available. Taking it in their hands to decide what was best for us, they found and ordered these 'comparable systems'. Total savings: $39 per server.
Long story short, we had to purchase everything else we needed seperately. Your tax dollars at work...
The procurement system in the government has long been known to be broken. It's a system that was designed for the industrial age to acquire massive quantities of commodity goods. Applying this obsolete system in the 'Information Age' betrays its shortfalls:
In the end it's just another means of creating pork, only much more difficult to see
Re:Procurement people are least qualified to procu (Score:2)
Don't get the government involved (Score:3, Insightful)
The typical government computer user can barely use basic microsoft products. And before you counter with "well linux is easier" remember the computer background that most of these people have. A home pc for checking email and that's about it.
When open source can offer some real compatablility and uniformity then maybe using it in government applications can be feasable. Right now, it is not even on the table
Re:Don't get the government involved (Score:1)
There is no uniformity - except the color of screen.
Look and standard and uniformity in macros in Word, Excel, Access - there is none.
MS does not even have their own programs comply with their standards for third parties to get the MS logo on the package. Look at File and Print services in Word and Excel.
Why you may ask (most likely not) because since MS does it differently - it makes the barrier higher for a competing program. Actually impossible. You can not match MS functionality and get the MS logo on your box.
Re:Don't get the government involved (Score:1)
Re:Don't get the government involved (Score:2)
The feds are hardly a microsoft-only shop, though obviously they license enormous amounts of Microsoft software.
Re:Don't get the government involved (Score:2)
They certainly aren't in government service because they like or have any knowledge of computers!
I agree that government, perhaps more than most organizations, needs the ability to provide a uniform, easily administered desktop and applications, which are the same for everyone, everywhere. Unix lets you do this, via the X-term/compute server route. Windows doesn't. And that is pretty much that. Yes, I am aware that there are kludges you can use to accomplish something like this on windows, but it's difficult, expensive and non-standard (i.e., non-MS).
As you pointed out, the government employees really have no computer experience nor ability, so there is no question of them having extensive MS-centered knowledge. They are clueless, and you will have to train them on the specific buttons they will need to push for their specific jobs, whatever platform and applications you provide, be it Mac, Windows or *nix. By going with a *nix platform, you are really giving up nothing except the kickbacks from the salesmen, and I suspect that has far more to do with the original topic (Which was ``WHy Not Use Open Source'') than this sidetrack.
UNIX? (Score:1)
formats (Score:3, Interesting)
It seems that this is "merely" a matter of enforcing existing standards. But then, I am not a bureaucrat.
We need a new moderation category. (Score:2)
What's the big deal ? (Score:1, Insightful)
Noone competes for competition's sake people !
Maybe on a game server, but not in the business world !
If I compete, I want to win, that is I want to put an end to the competition so I can profit undisturbed with highest margin possible.
I admire Microsoft for realizing a monopoly, killing competition and getting away with it !
It must be a cool feeling, that after all these trials and findings of your dirty tactics, there are still customers who happily bend over and buy your crap.
Why push the GPL? (Score:2, Flamebait)
Does everyone's brain turn off the moment the letters GPL are typed together?
Re:Why push the GPL? (Score:2)
I don't imagine it's an explicit public policy goal in Michigan for your specific company to make as much money as possible. If GPL-ing the software would price you out of the market, then the gov't could either procure your software w/o the GPL, or go with a competitor that can provide more public interest oriented licensing than you can.
GPL doesn't have to be an absolute requirement, it could merely be a factor... just like price and quality. All other things being equal, it seems to me the government has an interest in promoting the sort of cross-pollination and collaborative environment that free licensing encourages, _especially_ in software it will be investing substantial monies, employees' time and training.
Re:Why push the GPL? (Score:1)
Re:Why push the GPL? (Score:2)
The government doesn't own SQL Server, DB2, Oracle or other databases. They aren't written specifically for the government, granted, but something my company writes may be written in such a way as to keep the base system ours and/or open, and the customizations specific to the agency would become their property.
A nice speech for competition (Score:2, Interesting)
OpenSource is not allways that easy to install and use and interoperable as Microsoft product are. Support is not as well available. If we think in terms of competition on the desktop, OpenSource falls flat on the belly.
This is not something, which can be fixed by speeches. We need to cooperate and coordinate better, we need to have better interoperability with de facto standards (and isn't any standard a de facto standard?).
What the government can (and should) do, is to take care, that the interface definitions are open and without patents or copyrights. That's it's typical role. Everything else is up to us.
Windows-Interfaces should be open and public - all of them.
File formats of Word, Excel, Power Point etc. should be open and public.
I think, it's time to come out of the religious-like discussion and go for competition. We have the pole position in the server market and a very good base in the schools and universities - next areas to tackle will be desktop and then quality, documentation and support.
Geee, an OpenSource AG!!! With Linus for core development, Taco for press relations and me as janitor!
Re:A nice speech for competition (Score:2)
To take some words right, you use "OpenSource" in the wrong way. You should mean general GNU Source or anything like that. Any product for windows _could_ be OpenSource, which has nothing to do with easy installation, it's just a matter of trust.
And get the difference between FreeSoftware and OpenSource Software, OpenSourced software must not be free (merely most times it is) Infact GNU is _free_ software.
Re:A nice speech for competition (Score:1)
BSD is the open source model to use. (Score:4, Insightful)
The TCP/IP stack, which has been adopted by just about everyone, to great benefit is the prime example.
The GPL folks can use the BSD code, as can MS, and the rest of the commercial world. If the taxpayers have paid for the developement of the code, it should be free across the board from there, as its paid for.
Re:BSD is the open source model to use. (Score:1)
Peru and OpenSource (Score:5, Informative)
Peruvian Congressman Villanueva has proposed this law [200.37.159.7] (in Spanish. Use the Fish [altavista.com]) that will change the way Peru buys its software. The origin of the Law and it's "travel" within the Peruvian Congress is in this timetable [gnu.org.pe]
Congressman Villanueva's Law will ask for any software to be bought by the Government of Peru to provide data in open formats. It will also ask for the source code and the hability to modify the code, to adapt it to the necessities of the Peruvian Republic.
The idea behind this is (liberal translation from Spanish):
"We, the Governemnt, cannot allow any company -foreing or domestic- to ship software that can hide spyware. We, the Government, cannot allow a private company to own the data that belongs to the People of Peru. We, the Government, have special needs and obligations: provide the best 'bung for the buck', allow any Peruvian to audit the source code of our applications to make sure there's nothing hidden that endangers Peru, and to make sure that the data is available even if we change the software supplier. Any software that do not abides by this law will not be used by any Peruvian Government agency".
Also, check what Microsoft Peru [gnu.org.pe] had to say about it. And what Congressman Villanueva answered [gnu.org.pe] to them.
Go, Peru!
Re:Peru and OpenSource (Score:1)
Isn't that what a lot of prostitutes try to offer?
I know this is off-topic and possibly even trollish, but hell, what's the use of having karma if you don't spend some every now and then.
the Bill Gates rant... (Score:2)
Right idea, but reversed.
It's more like... thinking about this, the latest Bill Gates rant makes sense. The last thing billg wants is for the broader public interest in licensing terms to become a public procurement policy question. His rant was a response to the threat of discussions like this, not the other way around.
Re:the Bill Gates rant... (Score:2, Insightful)
You know what is really, really odd about all the Microsoft ooga-booga attempts to scare people is that it is really unsophisticated. It always points back directly to their paranoia, their agenda. I wonder why people don't see that?
Of course Open Source is going to hurt him. It already is in South Korea where the government has punted Windows. Sure, it's not much, about 100K seats, but it's a start.
Same thing with the EU and even the UK where government bodies for the first time are required to look at open source alternatives in the bidding process. That's right, they were not before. And we know that governments generally (perhaps ours excluded) have to go with the lowest bidder of acceptable quality.
Gates must be crapping his drawers for reasons we already know. He should thank his lucky stars that desktop/client-side Linux has not takne off. Otherwise he would already be face down in the pool.
The process isn't designed for open source (Score:4, Insightful)
In my experience, the purchasing process itself discourages open source software. This isn't through malice, and it isn't even necessarily that management needs someone they can make responsible for problems. It's more of side-effect of the rules established to ensure open and fair use of public money. Other jurisdictions have their own rules with their own quirks, but I'll bet a lot of my experiences are common to others.
For example, in order to be invited to submit a proposal, the vendor usually needs to be on the state's vendor list. The state requires this to be sure that vendors are qualified and legitimate - they don't want some bureacrat's buddy to hijack a bid through inside information. To get on the vendor list, a company must usually approach the state and provide qualification documentation. Large companies have sales and marketing groups that seek opportunities like this. They follow up with whatever is necessary to become a qualified vendor, just for the potential chance to be approached and asked for a bid someday. Open source interests don't have the resources to do this on a wide scale.
Another obstacle for open source is the proposal process itself. When we issued an RFP (Request for Proposal), we typically provided dozens of pages of requirements and specifications. To ensure a level playing field for all vendors, every vendor had to provide a response for every one of our requirements, and every vendor had to rigidly follow every rule: deadlines, format of response, number of copies, and often some sort of up-front money as a performance bond.
As you can guess, responding to an RFP can be expensive. You can't just mail in a brochure with a price list. A compliant response routinely required 50 to 100 pages of information. A response to a major RFP might contain two or three binders full of information, much of it custom-written to answer our specific questions. Even worse, we required that the vendor submit one complete copy for each person on the procurement committee, as many as ten or twelve copies (up to 36 binders total). In other words, responses came in boxes, not envelopes. That's a lot of up-front expense for a slim chance of giving away software.
Other hurdles included mandatory in-person vendor conferences for each RFP, extensive reference requirements, contractual and legal requirements for vendors (are open-source interests prepared to certify EEO, ADA, OSHA, etc. compliance?), and on and on. In short, a massive bureaucracy of rules, regulations, and requirements, all enforced to make sure that the government agency can document that their public dollars are spent fairly and effectively.
The paradox, of course, is that this process is so burdensome, it actually only rarely results in effective use of money. Even worse, because the process is so convoluted, it is more ripe for abuse by insiders who know how to play the game.
The good news is that it is possible to bring open source software into government. The whole procurement mess only takes over when you try to buy products. If someone within the organization takes the initiative to make a decision, to select, download, and implement "free" (as in beer) software, there is no purchase, so there's no purchasing process. For example, while I worked in government, I brought in sendmail and Elm for our e-mail system. (I also had a lot of fun with Nethack, but that's another story.)
If you want to use open-source software in your agency, your best bet is to just do it. The formal purchasing process is heavily slanted towards expensive products from large companies with deep pockets. Your only other hope is getting someone like IBM to propose the open-source software as part of a package of hardware and services.
Re:The process isn't designed for open source (Score:1)
I write proposals for IT work in the Federal government. We sell services to several agencies, mainly focused on web application development. When we propose a solution, we look at what the needs are and devise an appropriate response.
The response takes the form of saying, "We'll use product A, product B, and product C, and we'll customize them to serve your specific requirements" (because every agency needs its commercial software customized). Any of those products could be open source: the server OS, the database, the development platform, the application server...
And because they're open source, we're often less expensive than our competitors (who might use, say, WebSphere when we'd use JBoss). Price being a big consideration in government, this is significant.
Our company trades on our 'technology agnosticism.' We're partnered with Microsoft and Oracle (and IBM, to some extent), but we pick and choose the best software for the job. We've already used MySQL, Linux, PostgreSQL, J2EE, and all sorts of other open source technologies and tools to complete projects for the government.
Of course, we also use Oracle and Microsoft when we need to. Introducing these products is important to government when they want assurances of accountability (even though those assurances are completely mythical most of the time; do any of us know of any instance when Microsoft has said, "Yeah, sorry about your failed project. Our marketing folks kinda overstated the capabilities of our product"??). Combating this kind of management thinking takes more than technical argument. Confidence in open source will take time and experience to build. We can only help that along by using open source wherever we can in the meantime.
Right now, open source cannot compete if it's a marketing dogfight based on product. But it can compete when technological and cost constraints are analyzed closely.
RFP writers often can't write. (Score:2)
It also seemed to discourage critical reading.
Here's a sample of some questions which needed addressing (keep in mind that the RFP was really designed to get services out of people, because regardless of what anyone was saying, *everything* needed to be customized):
Question #4
What OS does your product run on?
Question #15
What operating systems do you support?
Question #23
We require products to run on NT and/or AIX.
The last question there wasn't even a *QUESTION* - it was a statement. This was a rather large organization, and to not even be able to write a coherent document spoke volumes about the potential crap we'd have had to dealt with. I felt like replying that yes, our product runs on NT (3.51) just to get a reaction, but I doubt it would have been received well.
The Italian government doesn't like open source (Score:1)
No comment.
Re:The Italian government doesn't like open source (Score:2)
I browsed through the Microsoft Word document and it says in two places "the operating system cannot belong to the OpenSource type ".
Even, though, IMHO Linux could really do the job (support for Webspher, RISC architecture, JFS, 5 aprtitions, big amount of RAM...).
Crazy!
Also, wasn't there an initiative in Italy to try to move away from Microsoft products? I remember reading something about it.
I don't get it (Score:1)
So I glued the CD to a small dinner plate to strengthen it, but it wouldn't fit in my drive until I hammered it in.
But this didn't work anyway (it wouldn't read the damned CD, and I put in in the right way up and everything), and now my CD drive is broken. Don't buy 52x CD ROMs, they're dangerous!
Cygnus / RedHat Support Models Can Work (Score:3, Insightful)
POSIX tried this in the 80s (Score:2)
Too bad, especially since Microsoft Office hadn't really taken over the world - Word was popular, but so was Word Perfect, and both were relatively ugly and usually character-based WYSIWYG rather than fully GUI-based.
Get to WORK!! (Score:1)
In the case of the Federal Government, the Website http://www.fedbizops.gov/ is an archiac maze of half understandable requests for bids, which require a decent project manager to target and follow up on. It might take 2 people nearly full time to navigate this sites IT requests and to follow these up. Is it possible for Free Software groups to actually work through this process? Why yes. But it's a lot of work, and it must be initially done without pay. LUGS would need to organize to hammer on this. And that's the rub, Free Software users are essentially lazy unless a project stimulates them.
In addition, Free Software leadership seems to be uninterested in the economic interests of Free Software users. They seem to believe that if anything other than 'Freedom' is motivation to work with software that it undermines the movement. I hope that someone can begin the process of showing the FSF, and other groups that you must look after the economic interests of Free Software users if you are to protect and guarantee the 'Freedom' that Free Software is to guarantee. If people are to be enabled and Free to use Free Software, then they MUST have REASONABLE choices and opportunity to opt for using Free Software, and that means the WORK MUST BE DONE, and the economic benefits must be properly doled out to supporters in the trenches of the Free Software movement.
With NYLXS [nylxs.com] in New York, we are desperately trying to address these issues, and in fact, the paper, "The Path from Here" is written to largely address this issue and rally the troops. Let's all hope that we NYLXS and tohers succeed in their efforts, and that Free Software can become truly unshackled and the economic engine it's founders envisioned
Ruben
Has MS Antitrust Case Impacted Vendor Qualif? (Score:1)