LinuxSA Mailing list archives

  From: Anthony Symons <ant@sa.pracom.com.au>
  To  : Richard Russell <richard@yellowgoanna.com>
  Date: 26 Nov 2001 16:03:47 +1030

Re: Good news maybe ?? IT Minister

I just did a few checks on some governments sites..

I was using opera.

sa.gov.au told me my browser didnt support some of the features of the
site, and then redirected me to http://text.sacentral.sa.gov.au/ which
worked fine.. so thats OK.

http://www.fed.gov.au/ gave me a 404:

Not Found (404)
Original request: /%22/KSP/
Not found request: /%22/KSP/

but worked fine with netscape.

According to www.netcraft.com/whats they www.fed.gov.au are running:

Solaris
Netscape-Enterprise/3.6 SP3

Also:

The site www.sa.gov.au is running Apache/1.3.19 (Unix)  (Red-Hat/Linux)
mod_jk mod_ssl/2.8.1 OpenSSL/0.9.5a on Linux

So I guess we cant pick on their sites...

Ant

On Mon, 2001-11-26 at 15:38, Richard Russell wrote:
> And I finally get around to a second draft...
> 
> ----
> 
> Dear Senator Alston (Minister for Information Technology and
> Telecommunications),
> 
> [can someone advise on the correct way of addressing? "Dear" sounds
> too cosy to me, but maybe it's correct]
> 
> Firstly, congratulations on your winning of Government and subsequent
> re-appointment as Minister for IT and Telecommunications. We, as IT
> employees, employers, students, hobbyists, academics, programmers,
> systems administrators and users take great interest in what happens
> in this portfolio, as it affects us directly.
> 
> The thing that unifies us, apart from our links with the IT and
> Telecommunications industries, is our common interest in Open Source
> and Free Software. This includes the operating systems Linux and BSD,
> the world's most popular web server, Apache, the Netscape/Mozilla
> browser, and many other packages. These packages are used all over
> the world, in business, government and academia, as well as in a
> growing number of homes.
> 
> We choose to use this software in preference to commercial offerings
> for many reasons, including cost, quality and (most importantly)
> freedom. The licences on these packages free us from the confines of
> restrictive (and expensive) software licencing agreements, and allows
> us to modify and improve the software we use as we see fit, thereby
> benefiting thousands of other users, while we also benefit from their
> modifications. [1]
> 
> However, we are concerned about the some of the directions that the
> Government's IT policies have taken in recent years. Three major areas
> of concern are:
> 
> 
> 1) That access to Government online services is restricted to users of
> specific commercial software (often Microsoft Windows with Internet
> Explorer or Word).  We find that some Government sites block users of
> alternate operating systems or browsers, or that the sites are
> customised to use special features of specific browsers, and are
> unusable unless that browser is used. This effectively makes the use
> of those services subject to the users having purchased the specific
> software required, when there is no inherent advantage in doing so.
> 
> Examples of blocked sites:
> <could some people provide three or four Fed govt egs?>
> 
> Examples of sites that don't work correctly on all (most?) browsers:
> <ditto?>
> 
> Examples of services with other restrictions (eg MS Word etc only):
> <ditto?>
> 
> We request that the Government adopt a policy that all online services
> are accessible to users no matter what their choice of operating
> system or browser. This allows more people to use Government services,
> and it encourages competition in the software marketplace. Acheiving
> this would require no more than building these sites according to
> established standards. In some cases, it would require only the
> removal of the code that restricts access.
> 
> 
> 2) That Government IT contracts are often exclusive, to the detriment
> of competition. This includes moves such as standardising on specific
> desktop or server operating systems and applications. In many
> situations, this means that innappropriate tools are being used simply
> because they are standard, and it certainly reduces competition in the
> industry.
> 
> Examples:
> <again, could people who know please provide relevant egs?>
> 
> We request that the Government adopt a policy that all contracts are
> designed to foster competition, and encourage the best solution for
> the problem at hand to be used, as opposed to requiring a single
> solution for all classes of problems. Diversity should be encouraged
> in Government IT, for the dual purposes of fostering competition and
> developing a more resiliant infrastructure -- it is an accepted fact
> that while uniformity can bring some cost advantages, it accentuates
> any weaknesses to the point where a single weakness can leave an
> entire organisation vulnerable to the one threat, as has happenned a
> number of times this year (viruses and worms such as NIMDA, Melissa,
> CodeRed and others).
> 
> 
> 3) That Government software projects themselves are usually closed
> source. We believe that by encouraging the release of source code for
> Government-sponsored projects under an open licence, not only will the
> community benefit from the use of this code, but the Government will
> benefit from the community's use of this code. This applies
> specifically in cases where the code being developed can have some
> wider application, but even in cases where it won't, there is no
> disadvantage in releasing the code.
> 
> We request that the Government adopt a policy that all new (and
> preferably old) software projects undertaken by the Government have
> their code released to the community under an open licence (eg GPL or
> BSD). This is a situation where the collaboration between Government,
> community, and even other Governments would result in a win-win-win
> situation.
> 
> 
> Thankyou,
> 
> Sincerely....
> 
> 
> 
> [1] A brief introduction to Open Source and Free Software:
> 
> Open Source and Free Software have existed in various forms for about
> as long as software has existed. Much of the original internet was
> developed with Open Source software, and much of the present internet
> runs on it now.
> 
> The differentiating factor between Open and Closed software is the
> license. Closed software is usually released as a "shrinkwrapped"
> product, and the licensee is heavily restricted in how they can use
> it. For example, if the user finds a problem with the software, or
> finds that it requires some modifications to fit their purposes, they
> are prohibited from changing even their own copy of the software. In
> contrast, Open software allows the user free reign on how they use the
> software. In most cases, it comes with no fees, and with the explicit
> condition that if the user is to change the software in any way, they
> must contribute that change back to the community. In this way,
> software benefits from many many people's input, and any problems are
> usually found quickly, and the fixes made available almost
> immediately.
> 
> ----------
> more of my own comments...
> 
> I don't know if I actually fixed this up at all, or just modified it.
> People with comments, please feel free to make edits, and I can see if
> they make sense to me :)
> 
> It's still too long (IMHO), and too verbose, possibly too
> jargon-filled...
> 
> I left telstra etc out, as I think that's a topic for a separate
> letter.
> 
> Ditto for education.
> 
> Main thing missing is the EGs...
> 
> Thanks for criticism last time -- I ignored some of it... 
> 
> Any more comments? Anyone want to re-write this in 1/2 a page?
> 
> rr
> 
> -- 
> Richard Russell
> Yellow Goanna Pty Ltd
> e: richard@yellowgoanna.com
> m: +61 412 827 805
> f: +61 8 8462 2362
> 
> -- 
> LinuxSA WWW: http://www.linuxsa.org.au/  IRC: #linuxsa on irc.linux.org.au
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> 
-- 
Systems Administrator       
Pracom Ltd.             
+61 8 82029074 -=- +61 402 100 671 
anthony.symons@sa.pracom.com.au

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