Prisons go for open source

By RICHARD WOOD

The Department of Corrections will go live in two weeks with an open-source content management system to provide an intranet for its 4500 staff.

Open-source software is free to licence and is developed by a global "community" of programmers in their spare time.

IT manager Derek Lyons said the intranet system, using the free OpenCMS software, would replace a mixture of static web pages and ordinary database access. Its purpose was to improve access to internal information, such as manuals, and there might be an opportunity to add other functions such as forums.

The development has been under way for two months and has involved the conversion of web pages to data in an Oracle database, which will feed OpenCMS pages.

The announcement of the Government open-source project comes hot on the heels of questions from the Green Party over the justice sector's views towards the increasingly popular technology.

Last week, Associate Minister for Justice Rick Barker launched the Justice Information Strategy 2003-2006, which aims to improve data flows between departments, identify sharable information, create databases and improve governance structure.

It replaces the 1996 strategy, which was primarily about replacing the Wanganui Computer System with departmental systems.

In Parliament, Green MP Nandor Tanczos asked Barker whether he had considered directing the justice sector to investigate the use of such "non-proprietary" software "given the international reputation that non-proprietary software has for cost-effectiveness, stability, security and for being easy to manage".

Barker agreed with Tanczos' point, but said no, because such software was more complicated to use.

Tanczos said there did not seem to be an awareness of open source at the top levels of the Government, despite guidelines that it should be considered on an equal basis.

The Green Party is still formulating its policy on open source but Tanzcos said he would keep raising the subject "so that when software decisions are made [by departments], it is in their minds".

He said open source was compatible with Green Party principles because of its community, collaborative and non-proprietary nature. He said it was also cost-effective, challenged monopoly control and made computing more accessible.

The Herald established that within the justice sector the Department for Courts is not looking at open-source software at the moment. A spokesman said it was focused on "bedding down" the much-delayed $36 million Case Management System, which was due to be rolled out by the end of November.

The Ministry of Justice had no open-source software plans at present. The Department of Corrections had no software plans beyond the OpenCMS implementation.

Derek Lyons, of the Department of Corrections, confirmed the policy was that open source was to be considered against other software in the ordinary course of a software decision.

"We look at the total cost. We are interested in not just the initial purchase price, but implementation, support costs, compatibility with the existing environment and reliability," he said.

Some Governments internationally have legislated to encourage or mandate the use of open source.

In April, State Services Commission e-government head Brendan Boyle sent a letter to government department IT procurement staff about open source and produced a briefing paper for department chief executives.