Public sector embraces open source
Kablenet.com
Published: 02 May 2007 10:14 BST
A snapshot survey organised by Kable and sponsored by Red Hat shows that just over a third of respondents are actually using open source, and close to another third are giving it consideration in their plans for the future.
The results indicate a growing confidence in the technology, in which the source code of the programme is freely available for use or modification. Its champions have argued that it provides a more economical approach in the long term than using proprietary operating systems and software.
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In a poll that drew 182 responses from all areas of the public sector, 35 percent said open source was already in partial or widespread use in their organisations. Meanwhile, 14 percent said they were considering its use, nine percent were testing the options and three percent evaluating the options.
It still has to make an impact on many organisations, however, with 34 percent saying it was not in use.
Web-based applications are regarded as providing the greatest potential, with 25 percent of respondents identifying these as the type which would be best suited for open-source solutions. This was followed by PC applications with 17 percent, server and off-the-shelf applications with 14 percent each, bespoke systems with 13 percent, and public sector-focused applications (such as revenue collection) with nine percent.
Respondents identified a number of significant benefits, the largest of which were cost savings (26 percent), reduced reliance on a single supplier (21 percent) and flexibility (19 percent). Speed of development, security and interoperability also scored significantly, with nine percent each.
There are, however, a number of barriers to the implementation of open source. Concerns over support and maintenance, with fewer technicians having an understanding of open source as opposed to proprietary systems, were regarded as the most serious problem by 22 percent. This is related to the perceptions of risk around the implementation, which was identified by 17 percent as the main barrier.
Others were: lack of technical understanding with 12 percent, interoperability issues with 11 percent, existing lock-in to a specific supplier with 10 percent, an unproven business case with eight percent and reliability with six percent.
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