Quebec Govt Sued For Ignoring Free Software 388
Mathieu Lutfy writes "The CBC is reporting that 'Quebec's open-source software association is suing the provincial government, saying it is giving preferential treatment to Microsoft Corp. by buying the company's products rather than using free alternatives. ... Government buyers are using an exception in provincial law that allows them to buy directly from a proprietary vendor when there are no options available, but Facil said that loophole is being abused and goes against other legal requirements to buy locally.' The group also has a press release in English."
Don't waste my money! (Score:5, Insightful)
Ok, I'm not Canadian, but this applies to everyone when their local government is pissing away money for no good reason.
It's one thing for a business to choose the more expensive option, the people making the choices must eventually answer to their stockholders. Well, as a voter, I'm a stockholder in my country. Wasting truckloads of money for no good reason means I'm going to vote your ass off the board of directors.
Most of the time, alternatives such as Openoffice.org are more than adequate for the job (and usually a better choice). Sometimes there are special needs which will allow for an exception, e.g. a large investment in Excel macros that are essential and very expensive to convert.
Local schools seem to be the worse offenders. They constantly bitch and moan about lack of funds, then piss away a pile of cash on a site license for Microsoft Office so they can teach their word processing course. Openoffice.org (and a few others) are perfect for the job. They are free and the cover everything necessary to learn word processing - which should be covering typing skills and how to lay out a well designed document - not how to use a specific product.
Not sure about Canadian law but (Score:4, Insightful)
Don't you have to be somehow affected by defendant's actions to sue them? Is the Quebec's open-source software association harmed by this directly? Or do they have a plan to sell tech support contracts once the free software is installed?
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:5, Insightful)
If it is true they haven't even evaluated the other options the complaint is valid.
Re:Tech support. (Score:5, Insightful)
Most large organisations including government provide 90% of their own tech support. Microsoft, in practice, provides none. At least it's like that where I am. The only "support" they provide is helping to ensure all of the machines are licensed properly.
So if a local government can't figure out that they can take save the $25 million they have spent on licenses by training their IT staff or supporting local business, they really aren't intelligent enough to be working for the government.
That whole support argument is bullshit, as is the TCO argument that gets bandied about.
Re:Tech support. (Score:5, Insightful)
Bull. Paid tech support for custom/specialized apps is one thing (the company I just left made a very significant percent of their revenue from support and maintenance), but that's just not the case for MS Office. And having paid for MS software in the past, I'll let you know that the only "support" I ever got was from someone named "John" in $randomOutsourcedCountry when I needed to re-activate the damn thing because apparently a system upgrade is a novel thing that nobody had tried before.
Ironically, those 'support' issues went away when I stopped paying for MS software, and obviously also haven't been an issue since I stopped using their stuff entirely.
Don't get me wrong - support is a legitimate concern for some software, even some from MS. But when it comes to Office software, that support is coming from the IT guy, not Microsoft.
Re:Tech support. (Score:5, Insightful)
Typically very little tech support from MS is included with the license. That's the "beauty" (for MS) of their pricing schemes; it's basically a money pit. First you get hooked on the software, then the support, then the proprietary formats help keep you locked in. It's like quicksand.
Again, incorrect. There are a several good open source vendors who offer excellent support. But quite often OSS shops find they need very little outside support. I would expect most schools to fall in that category, though I have no personal experience working in that sector.
Re:Tech support. (Score:2, Insightful)
That's true. But the people who call the shots think differently. To them, business solutions are more reliable than open-source ones. What is better doesn't matter -- it's what management thinks is best.
$25 million (Score:5, Insightful)
If they went to FOSS, they could take the 25 million they spent on M$ licenses (in 08 alone!) and pay local Quebecois to provide support. In fact, that's their whole grounds for bringing the case to court.
From TFA: "Quebec's public administration refuses to even consider and evaluate these options...the regulation implies that public markets have to enhance the local economic development as well as the Quebec technologies....From February to June 2008...sales of proprietary software for more than 25 million dollars"
Sounds like good case to me. My parents actually worked in the kind of local government that would be using this software, and I'm here to tell you, the transition would go fine. The fact is, most of them barely bumble their way through no matter WHAT software they use (on their outdated machines). All they use is a word processor, email, and maybe a spreadsheet and simple database. Just the basics.
This from TFA actually kinda scared me...scared because I'm worried about how far the US is falling behind other countries when it comes to tech: "In the Netherlands, the public administration, one of the most modern in the world, has decided to forbid the use of proprietary software in the public sector."
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:5, Insightful)
School's get absurd discounts on software I believe and MS software does connect well together. For example open office updates would need to be controlled separately from MS updates (which are possibly centrally managed).
In my personal opinion it's also a lot harder to fuck up a windows network setup and windows networking is a lot more intuitive (ie: you need less knowledge to passably manage it). I've had to recently deal with a school's linux network and I feel like gouging out both my eyes with a spoon. The rats nest of possible programs, setting, distros, incompatible utilities (ie: this works with X, Y and Z but not your version of Z) and so that is possible of linux alone makes me want to gouge out one eye.
Re:Tech support. (Score:1, Insightful)
Exactly. Which is why Red Hat fills a niche: they have a corporation behind their software.
Seriously, though, it's government. You're not going to have competent people running things.
Re:Tech support. (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't really know. I do know public education contains some of the most laughable IT staffs in existence, though.
I would take a guess that it's all about the feeling of security. Managers (or whatever government equivalent) are going to feel safer with business solutions rather than open-source alternatives because of support for bugs or other problems. If MS Word screws up, you call Microsoft. If Open Office (using it as an example) screws up, what then? There's no business guarantee that OO will respond in a timely manner to the problem.
I've worked in a school so I've got a bit of experience here.
Laughable IT staff or not (and there is a glimmer of truth in that), managers (or whoever has the role of managing IT - often a teacher) does indeed get the warm fuzzies from buying as much as possible from big companies like Microsoft.
Furthermore, there's another angle. It's fairly common to find that the companies that supply schools (and here I'm talking about primary/secondary level education in the UK) don't tend to supply many businesses and vice versa. The companies that do supply schools will tell you that this is because they specialise in education and can offer better support more appropriate for schools. Many of these companies have been supplying schools for many years and are more-or-less 100% Microsoft shops. Guess what they put in?
Anyone who's any good at IT and has worked in a school will know that this is complete bullshit and that there are dozens of small consulting companies would love to have a few school contracts and could do a perfectly good job for a lot less. However, in the valley of the blind and all that.... there are plenty of schools that believe they're getting a good deal because they don't have anyone on staff who knows enough to tell them otherwise.
Re:special needs and government (Score:3, Insightful)
Competitive bidding should be the norm, and exceptions to this rule should be rare. Once a spec is given and bids are in, there'll be an obvious choice.
When time or special circumstance doesn't allow bids, there certainly needs to be a detailed report on the reasons one vendor was chosen over another. Someone needs to put his ass on the line and say "Symphony, StarOffice, Openoffice.org, and Gnome Office don't meet our needs" for reasons a, b, and c. When an accountant comes back to audit the department, he'll back those up or pay the price.
And I just use double-<br>s instead of paragraph tags.
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:3, Insightful)
RM machines is a complete scandal in the UK. Originally they developed machines from scratch like 380Z and Nimbus. Then as those lagged behind PCs they switched to making PCs. But schools still buy their Wintel PCs from RM, despite the fact that there is no reason for single sourcing, apart from tradition.
And I suspect that RM's founders are well connected in educational circles.
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, IMO amateurs shouldn't be sysadmins.
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:5, Insightful)
Any third party app installed on windows needs to be updated seperately... A linux distro on the other hand will typically supply all the apps you're going to require and update them al centrally.
As for all the myriad of possible distros, you just standardise on a single distro across the board and use the apps supported by the distributor.
The problem of incompatible versions happens on windows too, and is often worse, even microsoft apps can have incompatibilities with each other and as soon as you throw third party apps into the mix the problem gets much worse, but the apps supported as part of a linux distro will typically be tested fairly well together. Also since the linux apps are far more likely to use documented formats, the chance of third party apps working with them is higher too.
Re:Tech support. (Score:2, Insightful)
Agreed. And I would imagine many managers don't have highly refined IT skills, either, which is why IIS is still used instead of Apache. Or why Windows is still used for servers in the first place.
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:5, Insightful)
Unfortunately, many professionals shouldn't be sysadmins either.
One side of the coin is that folks with honest training and experience can sift through a wide range of possible technologies, then find and properly maintain the best one for the situation. The other is that the amateurs have a motivation for easy, so seem less likely to dig themselves incredible, embarrassing, money-sucking pits...
And this is government. If you're not cynical about the kind of professionals they hire, you're not paying attention :)
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:1, Insightful)
One of the major problems is that open source software like OpenOffice.org and most Linux distributions are seriously lacking good UI design and usability [mpt.net.nz]. I know there are geeks who will argue that they're easy to use, but the problem is that a lot of open source software has been designed by geeks, for geeks. (Although, I will admit that Vista has also become largely unusable in many ways)
I don't blame them for opting for more usable alternatives, despite the cost and security problems with Windows. But I think taking legal action to force them to use free software is the wrong approch. I think the right approach is for the open source communities to improve their development methods and spend more time designing usable and attractive software.
Re:You Linux nerds disgust me (Score:4, Insightful)
Example? I can't count the number of times I had to eventually save my OpenOffice file as a Microsoft Word Document and opened it in Word only to find that I had to do a whole bunch of reformatting before sending it to the library printer!
On the other hand, I can't count the number of times I have saved my Microsoft Word file in Microsoft Word format and open it in Microsoft Word only to find that I had to do a whole bunch of reformatting before sending it to the printer (changing of the restarting of numbered lists is one particular thing that isn't always persistent through a save-and-load cycle, and with Office 2007 paragraph indentation isn't always persistent either).
I have to use MS Office for work, but I keep a copy of OO.o on my computer because it's far better than MS Office's recovery mode at recovering corrupted MS Office files. Sure, I usually have to sort out some formatting in that case too, but I'd sooner reformat a 20,000 word report than scour through trying to remember all the critical changes since the last backup.
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:4, Insightful)
1) used for other government programs
2) used for training
3) used for local support
4) used for enhancing the software for new features
5) used for lining the wallets of local
entrepreneurs.
6) used to buy textbooks, etc.
How the hell did you miss that one?!?
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:1, Insightful)
A lot of jobs in India will cease to exist too.
(wow, slashdot is mindreading, the captcha is: parasite)
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:4, Insightful)
You cannot simultaneously claim that switching to non-Microsoft costs more, because of the salaries involved and claim that it doesn't create more income for IT workers.
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:5, Insightful)
In this case, I think the meaning is "create thousands of jobs IN CANADA, as opposed to Seattle. Even if the expenditure is similar, governments should prefer to spend their money on their own constituents (who will also pay tax and return a good proportion).
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:3, Insightful)
You forgot
6)Cutting the taxes of those who pay them.
Re:Hey, here's a question (Score:2, Insightful)
It so happens that a lot of qubecoise are better at french than english. Linking them a french-speaking relevant page seems like a nice gesture, much like you'd link the relevant original-language story beside the english one if the news originated in e.g. sweden.
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:4, Insightful)
Someone has to be paid to write software. Money you are spending on MS Office is being used to pay Microsoft employees. If you use OpenOffice.org and you need a new feature or a bug fix, then you can pay anyone with the right skills to provide it. If a major government branch is using it, then it is reasonable to assume that local software companies will invest a little bit in making sure they have someone with at least a passing familiarity with the OO.o codebase (or, failing that, someone who can acquire said familiarity quickly when a lucrative contract appears).
If you need a new feature in MS Office, then your only option is to upgrade to the next version, which involves sending a pile of money to the USA. If you need a new feature in a Free Software program then you can employ someone locally to add it. This keeps the money in the local economy, which is good for the government since they then get a cut of it back when the workers are paid, another cut when they spend it, and so on.
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:3, Insightful)
If someone had pulled their finger out in 1985, who knows, Google or Yahoo may have been British
In 1985, the government was paying half of the cost of any computer with a certain set of capabilities. The BBC had just released The Computer Program, which gave a detailed introduction to programming. The BBC Micro, which is what most schools spent their grant on, came with a programming language which supported recursion, direct access to I/O addresses, a built-in assembler (so you could write compilers relatively easily in it), and a load of other fun features like a teletext mode which we used to write some bulletin board software for a machine that went in the entrance to the school attached to a big screen and allowed people to post notices.
It wasn't until the '90s that the ball really got dropped. The BBC was a great machine with a full educational ecosystem around it, but it had no successor (the A3000 was better technology, but didn't have the same support from government or from the BBC).
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:2, Insightful)
Speaking from personal experience, when you're a school district and the Board of Directors has only allotted $25k in yearly salary for your sysadmin, you get an amateur.
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:3, Insightful)
More importantly...
Kids will break and/or steal machines (or their components which are smaller and easier to hide), using worthless computers (old machines make great thin clients on the cheap) or thin clients which are useless without their server reduces the likelihood and cost of theft.
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:4, Insightful)
7) used for hiring more teachers in math, sciences, and phys-ed so you canucks don't become dumb lazy fatties like we Americans are becoming.
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:5, Insightful)
You realize of course that this statement can be applied almost universally to undermine the value of any kind of trade. For example, wouldn't it be better if my town harvested its own trees for building the new police station rather than importing lumber from some far away place like Canada? After all, it keeps the jobs and the money local. No, the reason trade is beneficial is it fosters competition, and it allows for specialization, which in turn drives efficiency. Software is no different from any other industry in this regard. Just because it's *possible* for local people to write/modify office software doesn't mean it's a wise course of action. In fact, I shudder to think about every local government hiring/contracting with local software engineers to add this-that-or-the-other feature to a fork of Open Office. The last thing I would want is my local government getting into software development. They struggle to fill potholes for goodness sake.
what a crock!
First off, you don't get much more efficient than ready-made software that's free out of the box, and which-- on this scale where the govt is spending 25 million on MS licenses-- provides a cheaper and more convenient means of implementing any missing or needed features.
A software contract to "tweak" an oss project that comes close would be a one-time fixed expenditure for less money than they spend annually, and maintaining a core team to "maintain" the resulting code would entail minimal cost, assuming the community doesn't pick that up after.
Finally, there's the fundamental assumption at the general level here which is fully out of place. Trade promotes efficiency and specialization in an ideal environment.
In the real world(tm), what free trade does is destroy the middle class of developed nations which have human, labor, and consumer rights laws by severely diminishing the capacity for labor to organize and compelling governments to "compete" for the attention of multinationals.
In the long term it has other deleterious effects, creating a fundamentally unequal playing field in which new startups will never be able to compete on a local level because of economies of scale, save for whichever nation is "lowest" on the wage and labor/human rights totem poles at the time.
I love all the "starry-eyed" conservatives/libertarians who claim FTA's are beneficial in any long-term sense.
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I thought Microsoft was a monopoly? (Score:4, Insightful)
Microsoft clearly fits the definition of a monopoly.
Don't think so?
Do a little research on Standard Oil, which was broken up in the United States under the Sherman Anti-Trust Act. Standard Oil was not the only oil company in the United States at that time, nor were they the only one that operated gasoline stations. However, their market dominance was such that they were within the definition of a monopoly.
There are other OS, mail server, and office suite vendors out there, to be sure. However, Exchange has a 65% market share (probably more in the global 2000), Windows has 90% of the desktop, and probably more than that in business desktops. Microsoft Office has about a 90% market share, too. It has been so successful, in fact, that "Excel" and "Word" have become generic words in the lexicon of many people. I regularly encounter users who think "Excel" is what you call a spreadsheet program. I have NeoOffice on my wife's Mac and and she calls its spreadsheet Excel all the time. This has become very common.
Yes, Microsoft has a monopoly. You don't need 100% market share to have a monopoly. You just need so much market share that the market is no longer anything like a level playing field for others. The fact that some competitors have been able to survive or even make headway anyway is not testimony against Microsoft being a monopoly or even for a level playing field, but rather testimony to the quality and tenacity of those competitors.
Granted, Microsoft has jumped the shark, but it's still a powerful monopoly.
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:2, Insightful)
I don't know where if you are talking out of your ass or have some personal resentment about the situation. Let me correct your facts.
Actually, our written french is almost identical to international french. We do speak french with a different accent and have our very own slang, but anyone who speaks french here can be well understood everywhere French is spoken. I'd say the situation on that particular angle between Québec's and France's french is quite similar to US vs UK English.
If you are saying that being identified as a foreigner through your accent, skin color or religion may lead to being treated differently by some people, then I think this is the case pretty much everywhere. Sadly.
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:1, Insightful)
Usage support. Maintenance. 3rd party modifications to the software. They could hire people to do these functions of buy these services from 3rd party professionals.
It's not at all an emotional argument but instead how Free Software works. You're not dependant on monopolies. You can do what you like with the software, or if you cannot do it yourself, you're free to hire anybody who can to do the job for you. You're not a slave to the one company like with proprietary software.
Not exactly rocket science to figure out which model is the way it should be done.
This guy is right (Score:4, Insightful)
I have seen this in action. It is amazing what it can do even with one pathetic P4 and a couple gig of ram.
It really gets rolling with a quad core server and 8 gig. (I can build one of these for mere hundreds of $$)
You can even have the whole class doing 3D modeling with blender. Imagine the cost of doing this with proprietary software and without thin clients?
Also, upgrading is so cheap. The cost of upgrading everyone is just the cost of the server. (and that is under a grand)
I have found that just the LABOR cost of procuring 30 new desktops, imaging, configuring and deploying them is more than the cost of a new LTSP server. YMMV
Re:Don't waste my money! (Score:3, Insightful)
OK, I am an OS whore (I try EVERYONE that comes across my path), so I will bite.
The linux distro's may be a little lacking on uniform look and feel throughout the ecosystem, but they are not really lacking in usability vis a vis MS Windows. The UI is usually selectable anyway.
(My four year old daughter does not even notice the difference between Linux and Windows... She thinks the screen just looks different because they are different computers, just like our cars look different. She uses them equally well)
1. My opinion, Even Microsoft's best (Windows XP) is the WRONG OS to use as an alternative to slam Linux with. XP is not THAT good.
2. Even apple users suffer from non uniform appearing apps.
Paradox - How can you claim OO.org lacks a good UI design when it is almost a clone of the MS software you seem to hold in such high esteem.
I have heard more OpenOffice bashers criticize it for being a clone of Word, they think the look and feel was stolen almost verbatim, not allowing for potential improvements.