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back to article UK.gov digi peeps hunt open source chief

The British government’s Digital Service is looking for a chief penguin to head up open source. GDS has created a brand-new position for an individual to conduct open source technology projects, adoption and working practices for the government's IT arm. Moreover, the chosen candidate will be charged with forging …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Tough job..

    Since Tony Blair invited Bill Gates & Co to take over the ship there have been aggressive political plays to prevent any return to sane use of government money (not in the least by consultancies who make a lot more money from development and maintenance of Microsoft based projects than they will ever make using Open Source, which is where part of the stubborn resistance is coming from - all IMHO, of course). I reckon whoever takes up this challenge better ensures they wear a stab proof vest to protect their back.

    That being said, the situation is not entirely hopeless but to illustrate the nature of the job, just check how far the adoption of ODF as document standard has penetrated into government. If it was a love affair, this amount of penetration would be commented on by the phrase "is it in yet?"...

    8 1 Reply
  2. Anonymous Coward
    Windows

    Hmm....

    What could go wrong running HMRC, DWP, DVLA on shareware?

    1 17 Reply
    1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge
      Reply Icon

      Re: Hmm....

      "What could go wrong running HMRC, DWP, DVLA on shareware?"

      A lot. Which article were you commenting on? This one was about open source.

      9 3 Reply
    2. Cynical Observer
      Reply Icon
      FAIL

      Re: Hmm....

      WIndows User demonstrates lack of understanding in software models?

      Open-source software (OSS) is computer software with its source code made available with a license in which the copyright holder provides the rights to study, change, and distribute the software to anyone and for any purpose. Open-source software may be developed in a collaborative public manner.
      Shareware is a type of proprietary software which is provided (initially) free of charge to users, who are allowed and encouraged to make and share copies of the program, which helps to distribute it. Shareware is often offered as a download from an Internet website or as a compact disc included with a magazine.

      Perhaps your comment was stimulated by the US Navy story from earlier today - there was lots of copying and re-installation in that apparently....

      8 0 Reply
    3. Teiwaz
      Reply Icon

      Re: Hmm....Shareware???

      What decade do you think it is, the 1990's???

      Tell you what, you draft a white paper on the benefits of using Mind Reader for DOS for Gov. departments.

      I rather liked Mind Reader in the 90's.

      4 0 Reply
  3. Buzzword

    Common standards

    with government code being open source it should be easier and cheaper to extend and modify.

    That's fine in theory. But who hasn't rocked up at a new job, taken one look at the legacy code, and decided to burn the whole lot and start again?

    (Pro tip: never ask "who wrote this crap?"; it was invariably the person who you just asked.)

    10 1 Reply
    1. Teiwaz
      Reply Icon

      Re: Common standards

      Upvoted for the Pro tip.

      'invariably' crap in house code has never been reviewed by anyone other than the author and it's only metric is that it was 'on time and to budget'. Sometimes the author knows it was a crap solution done on a tight deadline, but since it worked, the budget for improvement was denied.

      Open Source would ensure at least crap code would be spotted and flagged.

      7 1 Reply
      1. eswan
        Reply Icon

        Re: Common standards

        "it's only metric is that it was 'on time and to budget'."

        Or, more often, 'in your spare time for free'.

        2 0 Reply
      2. LewisCowles1
        Reply Icon

        Re: Common standards

        This is such a myth. Open source means you have access to change the code should you need to. The pure garbage often spouted about it's quality for end-users is acknowledged by many to be an academically espoused benefit.

        0 0 Reply
    2. Doctor Syntax Silver badge
      Reply Icon

      Re: Common standards

      "But who hasn't rocked up at a new job, taken one look at the legacy code, and decided to burn the whole lot and start again?"

      Sometimes just running it through the C pre-processor pass was enough. Some people had strange ideas about using macros.

      2 0 Reply
    3. David Roberts
      Reply Icon

      Re: Common standards - who wrote this crap?

      You can also be pretty certain that when you move on, the next person in will react in exactly the same way.

      1 0 Reply
  4. David Pollard
    Pint

    Cheers to the Lawyer from Lima

    It almost looks as though one could be cautiously optimistic about the future of government computing. Pint+ for whoever managed to bring this about, and for David Villanueva Nuñez whose outstanding work in Peru must have helped.

    http://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/05/19/ms_in_peruvian_opensource_nightmare/

    There's something fundamentally democratic about sharing code, which is similar to sharing research results and understanding in science: everyone ends up better off. I hope that the trend towards open source will continue into the education sector.

    8 0 Reply
    1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge
      Reply Icon

      Re: Cheers to the Lawyer from Lima

      Upvote and thanks for the link. An excellent read.

      2 0 Reply
  5. keithpeter Silver badge
    Windows

    "I hope that the trend towards open source will continue into the education sector."

    One employer...

    Applications available on Windows client PCs: OpenOffice, GIMP, Inkscape, Firefox, Chrome (not Chromium). Alongside MS Office, Adobe CS and a few others.

    Server based applications: Moodle VLE and various internally produced applications ('insourced' if you like) that move data in and out of Moodle and proprietary 'business applications'.

    It is a start...

    1 0 Reply
  6. streaky

    If..

    I planned to stay in London long term (I absolutely don't) I'd be all over this like a rash, sounds like an interesting job.

    0 0 Reply
  7. MT Field

    Still no proper penguin-based alternative to the Exchange/Outlook combo that all organizations of any size are addicted to.

    0 0 Reply
  8. LewisCowles1

    As wonderful as open-source is and as much potential as it has to help "everyone". I think more than the general public, the government will seek assistance from other governments undertaking similar works for the real government-level benefits people with an understanding of this domain bring. Having launched a few GDS projects only to find there were undocumented dependencies or processes, I think there is some way to go yet before joe public can help their own government to meet their needs.

    0 0 Reply

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