~kanarip

I've finally recovered some of what broke down earlier this week. Long story short:

• The CPU of my web-/file-/mail-/dns- server is fubar, and the only other Pentium 4 CPU that I could find would not work
• I used the x86_64 CPU and mainboard from slevin (my girlfriend's desktop PC)
• Pulling out and stuffing back in the hardware wasn't difficult, but took me some time anyway (I did not have the right tools, go figure)
• Upgrading -slash- migrating Fedora 10 i386 to Fedora 12 x86_64 as you can imagine took me even longer, only to find out that a lot of configuration and other stuff relevant to various services were incompatible.
• The first thing I wanted to restore was email, and so I did (including external DNS), and then I left it all behind to do some other stuff.
• Now I've gotten around to rebuilding php-5.2 for Fedora 12 so that Drupal would actually work. Various kinds of functions Drupal-6.x uses are deprecated in php-5.3, and
• I had to restore name services internal to my network as well (the Pentium 4 CPU I got from this other machine made this other machine not boot up anymore)

The fun! ;-)

I was at a round table session a few weeks ago, where consultants and advisors to local governments in the Netherlands (there's around 400 of them, and then some) discussed "Nederland Open in Verbinding", an initiative by state-secretary Frank Heemskerk with the Ministry of Economic Affairs to get government agencies of all kinds to realize the value of using Open Standards, and inherently (but not primarily) appreciate the value of Open Source software (ergo Free Software, because the rest is Crippleware).

It was the first time for me to talk on such a level, very non-technical, hypothetical and on the policy side of things. Normally, I work on design, development, implementation, administration, innovation, what-have-you, but all from the technical perspective.

Let's finally burn down the list of notes I've taken from that session.

Like within any other organisation, the main factor that influenced the atmosphere during our discussion was money. Not value. No sir! Cold hard cash, of course.

Apparently, or so I was told, government agencies wonder what the TCO on a thing such as OpenOffice.org would look like.

While I'm sure there's plenty of people out there that can whip up a comparison sheet from the top of their heads (and so I told them), that's not the issue I take offense with.

The actual issue I do take offense with is that while asking for a TCO on OpenOffice.org, it seemed that none asking for such a TCO analysis had ever done the exact same thing for either alternative product; most prominently Microsoft Office '97/2000/2003, or even a pending migration to either Microsoft Office 2007 or 2010. If you don't know what the costs were, why are you asking for comparison to what the costs might be should you use the product at zero licensing price? The next big money burning factor was considered to be migration costs.

Going down the list of examples that crossed the table; The next issue was migration off of, say, Microsoft Office (regardless what version), to OpenOffice.org. This one made me laught out loud, since such migrations are part of every single Microsoft Office release you upgrade to, with -in the case of Microsoft Office at least- the added danger of actually 1) being forced to upgrade, and 2) losing data in ways that cause you to never be able to read it again.

I emphasized that regardless of the piece of software used (you write your own if you will), the most important thing was the use of Open Standards, and every single governments agency's choice to either "use or explain". "Use Open Standards or explain why you can't or won't", is what the federal government initiative is trying to tell the other government bodies.

Either way, the choice to use Open Standards or Open Source Software is up to each individual government body. While there is no actual enforcement of the "use or explain" guidelines, the motivation to make a well-founded decision based on facts is moot. The way this is going down now merely creates awareness about the existence of an alternative technology, whether a piece of software or an open standard, you could use. The well-foundedness of the decision is quickly annihilated using false rumors and assumptions, though, and there's noone out there to tell them about the facts.

Moreover, and this is where I was truly shocked, the overall consensus seemed to be that Open Standards amongst themselves are difficult to implement and be compatible. For one, someone said, there's more then one version of the Open Document Format. This poses a problem, since Microsoft Office 2007 SP2 only implements ODF 1.1 (and so will Microsoft Office 2010 from what I can see in different preview builds), and so maybe could not deal with ODF 1.2. Not realizing that this is actually a Microsoft Office problem, I wonder if this is how it is going down;

Customer: Yeah, so, give us your offering.

SupplierA: Sure. Here's costs, they're easy. Remember that when you pay less, you get less, huh? There's also benefits, but only for Microsoft Office, primarily because we make it so extremely easy for you to get back at us and give us more of your money. In return, we'll only implement the one true version of this Open Standard, because you know multiple versions of an Open Standard are just going to confuse you, right? So, well, here's the contract, sign at the bottom please.

SupplierB: Our version of the product works wonderfully well with Open Standards, it is free of charge and you only start paying us when our phone rings. You can sign this contract, or look around for a better value proposition. On top of that, we are compatible with all versions of Open Standards and you'll never notice a thing. No transition, no migration, no hassle. If you're dissatisfied, there's no clause stopping you from getting what you get from us somewhere else.

Customer: So, SupplierB, are you saying I can take your product and use it at a zero price license? That all my problems go away? How much trouble am I going to be in and what solving those problems going to cost me? That I can just upgrade the software without a defined project involving migrations and consumer education? That I can just leave and go to your competitor? You must be freaking kidding me. SupplierA, you have a pen?

Long story short, the consultants and advisors to government bodies and other government agencies and organisations are in a position to make sure a conscious choice is being made, by matter of policy. They are in a position to emphasize the true facts and false rumors, and create some incentive to at least consider a particular implementation over another, despite the initial cost -if any more significant, in favour of the long term value. Because that's what this is about finally. Money. The tax payer's money, no less.

At the moment I'm writing this, I am in Canada. Even though I haven't been able to explore the country as I would normally do, I have the impression that Canada is more similar to the US than I expected it would be. I think having a healthy life style is more difficult over here than in the Netherlands. On the other hand, how often do I go out for dinner and worry about the amount of sugar and fat in food in the Netherlands? And from the supermarket I just visited I can tell that there is enough fresh food to prepare a decent dinner myself.

Well, let's talk about something I do know instead of the impressions I have gathered over the last few days: FUDCon, the reason I am in Canada... I expected a group of computer geeks, but this was certainly not the case. If I would have give some thought about how social fedora contributors would be, the social aspect would not have been as much a surprise to me. I mean, these people operate in a community and they would only be valuable contributors if they can understand what others want and explain their own views on what the future of a project should be like. Hence, no loners.

At times it does cost me a lot of energy to find the things I'm interested in, because frankly I honestly don't care about the technology side. I mean, what do I care about computer-related stuff such as Ruby? (a project my boyfriend can talk about for days. Luckily, he knows not to talk to me about this stuff) What I do care about is the vision behind open source, how it can be applied in other fields, the reason people devote a lot of time to free software projects and last but certainly not least what a part of my boyfriend's life looks like (what kind of people he meets, what the activities at a conference are like and what makes him tick).

So, what have I learned? Well, I'll start with the basics I already knew. This way it may be more easy to understand where I come from. First of all, let me introduce you to the Fedora project (http://fedoraproject.org/). Fedora is a Linux distribution. Unlike Windows and Mac, Fedora is free and open source. And don't get me wrong; free definitely does not mean it is free of cost though I do run software that I can get at zero price. What it does mean is that one has access to the code, can freely modify it to one's liking and can distribute the modified code. The Fedora project is all about these modifications and sharing the (modified) software with others most prominently upstream. Great minds think about how to solve bugs, incorporate features and discuss the future of a software project. Non-technical people (like myself) can also contribute to the project by, for example, filing a bug report or request a new feature.

Up to now, my only contribution was to request a feature with the words: “will I ever see you [Jeroen van Meeuwen] again in the living room?”(https://fedorahosted.org/revisor/ticket/136). I must admit, I do not really consider this a contribution. Mostly, I just do not care enough about bugs as am easily satisfied as a user and instead of filing bugs I myself adjust when software works a bit differently than I expect. The only program I use enough to care about is the GIMP. So maybe I will get involved if there is something with this program... WTH, I might even be learning how to program software if it is important enough to me. I mean, if I do not try to change the program to my liking, I should not be allowed to complain about it. And as a side effect, I might do the other users a favor that may have the same problems as me. To me, as a user, this is the strength of Free and Open Source software; The possibility to get involved, get your problems fixed, your expectations met, all as part of this upstream process, so that others may enjoy the solution(s) or feature(s) as well.

I would say the main advantage of Free and Open Source software is the inherent transparency that allows you to fix bugs that annoy you (or others) and add interesting features. However, I'm not like the people that write code. As I understand, they mock around with the code just for fun. And why is it fun? Because it is a challenge. And of course, with this method of working you are able to excel and learn from others, since the community will respond on your actions. And though I do not understand why you would be interested in excelling in this type of activity I do understand the motivation if I think about my interest to work in the field I'm most interested in (let's just say I don't have a 9-to-5 mentality).

What I have learned at FUDCon is some technical stuff such as how to file a bug report.

• Where?
  Bugzilla.redhat.com, bugs.kde.org and/or bugzilla.gnome.org (it does depend what you need to report. To really get involved with the GIMP I would directly go to the upstream GIMP website, same thing applies to the other software projects in Free Software).

• What kind of information is wanted?
  What package it belongs to, what version of fedora you are using, whether it is a RFE (request for enhancement) or a bug report, a screen shot of the problem/ error, what hardware you use. In case it was a bug also information such as: what you were doing when it went wrong, what you think should have happened and try to reproduce it. Hence: a lot of information. Don't be put off by this, because filing a report without this information could be just as valuable. Of course, I won't deny that it is more likely that the bug gets fixed when more information is available. I mean, the developers should be able to understand enough of the problem to deal with it. A good way to get a problem solved is to provide all information a developer might need to reproduce the bug on his development workstation.

Another thing I have learned is that Free and Open Source Software is absolutely not free in costs since maintenance is expensive. I mean: time is money, right? A lot of very enthusiastic people work for the fedora project and this is the only way that it could work. Without a doubt it is nice to hear people talk about this since it simply means that they are extremely passionate about something. They all think that anybody could do it. And maybe they are right. The only question is: do you want to spend time to figure this out? Needless to say, everybody answers this question differently. All I ask of you (if you are not a contributor) is that you set aside your excuses and answer the question honestly. If you can't be honest to yourself, think about what this says about you. Do you feel morally obliged? Or do you want to spend your time on something that is more important to you?

So, what about the money stream in a Free and Open Source (FOS) world? Instead of paying for the product one would pay for a service done by skilled people. If a company wants to have the software designed slightly different the company can wait and wait and wait and meanwhile hope that their request or bug report gets enough attention from a skilled developer. This, however, may not be the most efficient and effective way to deal with a problem or deficiency. Hence, why not pay someone to do it for you? In addition, pay someone to maintain the system as well. That is how in a FOS world someone obtains money: getting paid by doing a service rather than selling a product. Don't get me wrong it's not all about the money. I, however, do think that money is a helpful tool for trading one's spare time for the stuff he/ she wants to obtain regardless of whether that is an experience or material stuff. Anyhow one thing does become more difficult in a FOS world. Ever since other people think for us users products are made that we got used to. In fact we don't really know what we need or what we want, because that has never been an issue. Hence, in an FOS world it suddenly becomes important that one realizes what it own demands and wishes are, that one can communicate this with the person that will work on this and that that person is able to understand the demands and wishes. At times another person to help (with this process of realizing the needs and with a clear communication between the user and developer) would be a wise idea. Another thing that can be handy in this process is to make a simple sketch of how things will finally look like. Think about a mock-up for a website. More honest feedback will be given then. After all, people realize that it is relatively easy to make changes in a sketch whereas it is not so easy to modify a written code accordingly to the feedback. A piece of useful advise for a design is that one should group different objects when a design is (almost) done just to protect the design. Since accidentally moving one tiny object is not as noticeable as moving a whole group of objects. Honestly, this is a bit besides the point, the point is that in a FOS world people are still able to make money, but in a different way in which communication plays a huge role. The reason I speak of world and not software is that this story does apply to software as well as other fields such as science. Instead of access to the code, one would have access to raw data in science.

Of course I heard an awful lot more. Mostly technical stuff, like that RPM 5 is worse than RPM 4 and only to be used for one package. But hey: do you care about this? Or how certain patches are required for such and such? I know I don't care so let's stop writing right here.

With a little help from my friends (Andreas Thiennemann in particular), I managed to get my hands on a piece of equipment I was planning on buying anyway; a netbook.

Here in Canada though, these things are particularly cheap.

Next on the list of things to do is:

1. Never boot anything but a superior version of the greatest Operating System on a piece of equipment as cool as a netbook. The first thing that Acer will attempt to boot is a Windows Vista based eRecovery Suite in order for you to install Windows XP Home. I rest my case.
2. Download Fedora 12.
3. Check the list of things you need to know before trying all kinds of things to make the foo work. In my case, I found this page very useful. For one, it helped me boot Fedora ;-)