If you follow my post you know already that I believe open source software (OSS) will get a boost this year from the fall out of the financial crisis and potentially a subsequent increase in business process outsourcing (BPO). I read an article today from BBC's Maggie Shiels that reported President Obama has asked Sun co-founder Scott McNealy to author a white paper on "Why Open Source". In the article Scott is quoted as listing the benefits of OSS as more cost effective and productive than proprietary software and that OSS improves security, provides higher quality SW at lower costs and has higher reliability. He also says that he doesn't want to see the government get "locked-in" to one specific vendor or company. He goes on to suggest that the government should "mandate" the use of OSS in the government (I'm not so sure about that, but he has a right to his opinion).
The concept of switching to more OSS is sound and interesting on several levels and could have an additive effect to the other factors I've mentioned before on OSS adoption. The President has committed to cutting wasteful spending and this type of initiative just might be one of his cost cutting exercises. I'm not advocating the wholesale replacement of existing systems but what I do find compelling in this is the opportunity to reexamine each agencies strategy and find ways to improve quality and productivity while cutting costs. Personally I have some experience implementing software in a government agency, including an assignment as the engagement manager for the PeopleSoft ERP implementation at the US MInt in 1997 (yes, that is proprietary software, that's not the point). From what I've seen projects that focus on modernization, eGovernment initiatives, efficiency and increasing productivity while leveraging OSS when appropriate could indeed provide the advantages Scott mentions.
Looking beyond the potential for improvement for the government though, a move by the government to use more OSS would have a very positive impact on OSS growth. It would help reduce some of the mis-perceptions about OSS that have been barriers to its widespread use and help give more credibility to the model. Just the idea that the President is thinking about such an initiative will help with adoption IMHO. It will be interesting to see how this develops over the coming months. Now the question is, who's writing the white paper for the Obama administration on the advantages of using SaaS based solutions?
