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Background and existing policies
What work has already been undertaken?
7. In 2004 the OGC reported on its trials of FLOSS in government. The trials set out to gather information about implementing FLOSS in the public sector through a number of live case study situations. The report concluded that:
- FLOSS is a viable and credible alternative to proprietary software for infrastructure implementations and for meeting the requirements of the majority of desktop users;
- the main obstacles to widespread implementation of FLOSS are the current lack of complex functionality in desktop applications and the lack of business products to compete with large-scale proprietary enterprise-level products;
- FLOSS can generate significant savings in hardware and software costs for infrastructure implementation, and reduce the licensing costs and hardware refresh requirements for desktop implementation; and
- adoption of FLOSS, particularly for the desktop, requires investment in planning, training of users, development of skills for implementation and support, and detailed consideration of migration and interoperability issues.
8. Following on from these trials the Open Source Academy ( OSA) 3 was formed by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister ( ODPM). The OSA is an e-Innovations project that brings together a partnership of English local authorities and other organisations to promote the use of FLOSS in the UK public sector. The OSA aims to encourage the use of FLOSS by demonstrating its benefits and providing best practice advice and guidance from those local authorities who use open source in the development of their ICT systems.
9. As part of the OSA initiative the UK National Computer Centre ( NCC) announced that it would provide public sector organisations, aiming to adopt FLOSS, with a laboratory for testing this technology. This independent test environment allows public sector organisations to evaluate open source based application to proprietary solutions. Local administrations have the possibility to prove the viability of FLOSS applications and to experiment with different configuration scenarios finding a technical basis for a migration towards FLOSS. Access to the lab for public sector organisations is free.
10. However, despite these initiatives, a report by the University of Maastricht in 2005 into FLOSS4 found the UK to have a below average proportion of local government FLOSS users: 32.1% of all software users compared to the 78.7% European average. Further information about open source developments across Europe is available on the Open Source Observatory website at europa.eu.int/idabc/en/chapter/452.
11. The Society of Information Technology Management ( SOCITM) has also undertaken exploratory work to determine the suitability of FLOSS for use in the UK public sector. In April 2006 it published a report on the viability of Linux as a business desktop operating system - Linux On The Desktop. The report found that FLOSS products can provide a suitable operating system in a business environment, however compatibility with existing hardware and software applications should be thoroughly tested.
12. In a Scottish context the open source based office suite OpenOffice.org has been translated into Gaelic 5. The language project was funded by the Scottish Executive through the education body, Learning and Teaching ( LT) Scotland, and in 2005 it equipped schools in Scotland with the adapted software.
13. Central Scotland Police ( CSP) migrated to an open source office application suite and began work to develop an open source electronic document management system ( EDMS) as part of the OGC proof of concept trials, announced in September 2003. However, after a review of its ICT infrastructure in late 2004 the force reverted to a proprietary office solution and halted work on its open source EDMS. CSP cited that it would achieve better value for money from off-the-shelf packages and these would allow for better interoperability between its systems and those of its partners.
Related policies
14. The Scottish Executive's public service reform agenda sets the challenge of transforming Scotland's public services around five key values:
- increased personalisation and choice;
- quality and innovation;
- efficiency and productivity;
- joining-up; and
- accountability.
In addition, the shared services consultation, A Shared Approach to Building a Better Scotland, confirmed that the delivery of high quality, user focussed and innovative public services in Scotland has been a key priority for the Scottish Executive since the creation of the Scottish Parliament in 1999. Shared services is one of the five workstreams within the Scottish Executive's Efficient Government Plan and therefore is a significant priority.
15. The effective use of ICT is vital to achieving world class public services in Scotland. ICT solutions which are based upon commonly agreed, open standards and specifications are a prerequisite for joined-up, shared and efficient public services. This is set out in the Openscotland Information Age Framework ( OSIAF), which is the Scottish Executive's framework supporting the use and development of common standards in public sector ICT systems.
16. The Scottish Executive has undertaken a public sector ICT scoping study. The study has gathered data on the ICT landscape, and the resources used to deliver it, across the Scottish public sector. The data is being used to provide a clearer understanding of the interoperable opportunities and to allow the articulation of possible actions to make step changes in improvement over the next 5, 10 and 15 years.
17. The UK Government published its Transformational Government Strategy in November 2005, which confirms that three key transformations must be achieved - redesign of services to be citizen and business centred, shared services and professionalism.
18. The European Commission's i2010 (Information Society 2010) initiative also recognises that open and inclusive ICT standardisation is a key factor in achieving interoperable e-government services. This is set out strongly in the European Interoperability Framework which cites the use of open standards and specifically FLOSS as key components for the successful delivery of pan-European electronic government services.
19. The Scottish Executive is broadly supportive of these related initiatives and is working to ensure that the architecture supporting Scotland's public services is developed in a way which prevents barriers to sharing e-government applications and best practice.
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