Introduction to Free Software - SELF | Sharing Knowledge about ...

© FUOC • P07/M2101/02709 93 Free Software
present is almost captive). And in all events, the final cost for any of the ad-
ministrations involved would never be more than if a proprietary model had
been adopted.
Are these scenarios science fiction? As we will see later, there are timid initiati-
ves in similar directions to the ones described. In addition to helping to create
and maintain an industry within the sphere of the purchasing public admi-
nistration, free software offers more specific advantages in the public domain.
For example, it is the most efficient way of having software developed in mi-
nority languages (a basic concern of many public administrations). It can also
help a lot towards maintaining strategic independence in the long term and
ensuring the accessibility of the data in public administrations' custody for a
long time. For all of these reasons, public bodies are increasingly interested in
free software as users.
Some cases related to German administrations
In July 2003 the first stable version of Kolab was released, a product of the Kroupware project.
Kolab is a free IT help system for group work (groupware) based on KDE. The reason
for mentioning this project is that originally it was a tender by the German government's
Bundesamt für Sicherheit in der Informationstechnik (BSI - translated as the Federal Office
for Information Security '). This tender sought a solution that would interoperate
with Windows and Outlook on the one hand, and GNU/Linux and KDE on the other.
Of the submitted bids, the joint proposal of three companies, Erfrakon, Intevation and
Klarälvdalens Datakonsult, was awarded the contract, with their proposal to provide a
free solution partly based on software already developed by the KDE project, completed
with its own free developments, resulting in Kolab.
In May 2003, the Town Hall of Munich (Germany) approved the migration to GNU/Linux
and free office suite applications for all desktop computers, about fourteen thousand
in total. The decision to do this was not purely financial: strategic and qualitative aspects
were also taken into consideration, according to the authorities. In the comprehensive
analysis that was carried out prior to making the decision, the solution that was finally
chosen (GNU/Linux plus OpenOffice, fundamentally) obtained 6,218 points (from a maximum
of ten thousand) as opposed to the little more than five thousand points obtained
by the "traditional" solution based on Microsoft software.
In July 2003, the Koordinierungs-und Beratungsstelle der Bundesregierung für Informationstechnik
in der Bundesverwaltung (KBSt), under the German Ministry of the Interior,
made public the document Leitfaden für die Migration von Basissoftwarekomponenten auf
Server- und Arbeitsplatzsystemen [107] ('Migration guide for the basic software components
of servers and workstations'), which offers German public bodies a set of guidelines to on
how to migrate to solutions based on free software. These guidelines are designed for the
decision-making party to evaluate whether a migration to free software is appropriate
and how to carry out the migration if that decision is made.
6.2.2. Promotion of the information society
Public bodies spend a lot of money on incentives to encourage IT spending.
This is a formidable tool, which can help new technologies to expand in soci-
ety. But it is also a dangerous tool. For example, it may not be a very good idea
to promote society's use of the Internet by recommending a particular navi-
gator encouraging one company's de facto monopoly position, because in the
long term this could be negative for the society that we are trying to benefit.