Download - Community SUmmit: Legal & Licensing / Public procurement of open source software / Walter van Holst
Dutch government perspectives on procurement
Walter van Holst
Open World Forum, September 22nd, 2011
Programme
● Introduction
● Nederland Open in Verbinding/Netherlands Open in Connection
● What works/doesn't work?
● How can cooperation between OSS communities and government be improved
● How can OSS communities benefit from public procurement
For the sake of disclosure
● Legal consultant at Mitopics (http://www.mitopics.nl
● Seconded part-time to NOiV (http://www.noiv.nl)
● Vice-president of EDRi (http:www.edri.org)
Netherlands Open in Connection(not my translation)
● Dutch government programme, started in 2007:
● Improving interoperability
● Vendor lock-in reduction
● Level playing field on the software market
● 19 so called “lines of action”
● Programme office
● Programme ends in fall 2011
Context
● Growing need for flexibility
● e-Government
● Demographics
● Unbalanced relationship between government and vendors
● Public sector usage of closed standards influences private sector:
● Example: Internet Explorer only websites
Lines of action
● By 2010 every governmental body has established a policy on OS & OSS
● OS shall be required in procurement
● A “powerful impulse” to OSS by affirmative action
● Comply or explain
● Line 15: policy on releasing software developed for governmental bodies as OSS
Interoperability through open standards
● The standard is adopted and will be maintained by a not-for-profit organisation, and its ongoing development occurs on the basis of an open decision-making procedure available to all interested parties (consensus or majority decision etc.).
The standard has been published and the standard specification document is available either freely or at a nominal charge. It must be permissible to all to copy, distribute and use it for no fee or at a nominal fee.
● The intellectual property - i.e. patents possibly present - of (parts of) the standard is made irrevocably available on a royalty- free basis.
House of Thorbecke
● Centralised:
● 14 ministries
● Autonomous administrative agencies
● Agencies & Services
● Decentralised:
● 12 provinces (also vote for the Senate)
● 430 municipalities
● 26 water management authorities
Outside the House of Thorbecke
● Over 5000 primary schools
● Secondary education (about 1300 schools)
● Tertiary education:
● 14 universities + 40 other institutes of higher education
● Hospitals
● Healthcare institutes (long term care)
IT expertise in municipalities
● The typical IT department in a municipality is about 3-5 FTE
● The IT department will be part of facilities
● The head of the IT department usually has a technically oriented trade education + Microsoft certificates
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Lessons learned (1/2)
● this is more than ('simply') an ICT issue:politicians and administration must be convinced,procurement staff must be informed (educated?)
● requirements for tenders must be accurately detailed,formats and text examples are welcomed
● policy ('comply or explain') is merely the starting point,implementation of standards is an ongoing procesand requires effort and endurance of all parties
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Lessons learned (2/2)
● development and management of (open) standardsrequires involvement and flexibility of all parties
● especially for semantic standards, require::● agreement upon definitions (↔ legislation)● any change in policy, law etc. may affect standards
● substantial benefits for interoperability: semantic standards
What doesn't work? (1/3)
● Telling people that Microsoft is the problem
● (likewise about Oracle)
● Saying that OpenOffice.org is better than Microsoft Office
● Saying that free software fixes all your IT problems
● Assuming that people care about IT
What doesn't work (2/3)
● Assuming that IT in government is operating smoothly and is managed professionally
● Assuming that strategy automatically translates into tactical and operational actions
● Implementing free software without considering dependencies on proprietary standards
What doesn't work (3/3)
● Telling people that their tendering practices are lousy without providing alternatives/praising good ones
● Claiming OSS is cheaper when we just don't know the costs of the current systems
● Claiming OSS is cheaper when licensing costs are less than 10% of IT-expenditures
What works? (1/3)
● Explaining necessity of open standards and usefulness of open source software
● Having a roadmap towards vendor independence
● (and proper enterprise architectures)
● Communication
What works (2/3)
● Improving procurement practices
● Great interest in sharing code among governmental institutions (reuse)
● Creation and maintenance of new (semantic) open standards
● Communication
What works? (3/3)
● Organic approach to change
● Procurement is a potential ally
● Clear goals:
● Agility through vendor independence
● Communication
What are genuine obstacles?
● Lack of coordination between process 'owners', IT and procurement
● We only want applications running on ACME databases
● HR may have gotten its 'best practices' to assess employee performance from ACME corporation
● This is about organisational change, not about technology
● Non-specific reference architectures
● IT is not necessarily perceived as strategic in public administration
● Has anyone actually read the Microsoft font licenses?
How can coordination with communities be improved?
● Participation in a community requires skills/knowledge valued by other community members
● System integrators can add value to the interaction between end-users and communities
● Communities of like-minded user organisations
How can communities benefit from public procurement
● Mostly: they can't
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Questions?
● [email protected] or [email protected]
● +31 70-8887952
● http://www.noiv.nl or http://www.mitopics.nl
