ery.djunaedy

Fudding minister

No, there is no typo error in the above title. And, no, it is not a dirty word either. I just made up the word

According to The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing, FUD is a marketing strategy adopted by big companies that instills fear, uncertainty and doubt in the minds of potential customers who might consider the competitors products. The idea is to persuade the potential customers that the good things would happen if they stick to the products of these big corporations, but bad things could happen if they choose to migrate to the competitors’ products.

FUD is clear in the statements of Information and Communication Minister Sofyan Djalil the detik.com report when he said that the government would not be able to operate if we move to open source today. He further elaborated the three reasons why: firstly, that the computers in the governments offices need to be upgraded before migrating to open source. Secondly, the government employees are simply incapable (of using the open source softwares). And thirdly, the software support to use peripheral equipments like printers is not adequate.

While nobody has ever suggested that any migration in the computer system would be without problems, to suggest that the government would stop functioning is ridiculously naive for a minister in-charge of IT affairs of the nation. It is even more bizarre if we consider that such statement was delivered in front of the official session with the parliament. The statement that should have been prepared meticulously apparently covered with FUD. This article tries to provide relevant information to that should have been provided to the minister by his staff.

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Does the computer needs to be upgraded to run open source software? An immediate answer: NO.

Any novice user who try to install Linux would have read this fact plain and clear: Linux can run on an old and cheap machine. If you cannot install Windows XP on an old computer, Linux will run happily on it. Of course if you require the X-Windows system, (comparable to the windows interface where you can click your mouse on) than you need a better machine. But that does not mean an upgrade. If you can install a Windows operating system, than that same machine is capable in running open source operating system.

Is any civil servants across the nation capable of using the open source software? Another immediate answer: YES.

Compared to proprietary software (like MS-Words), the open source software (like OpenOffice) has an equal chance of being mastered by anyone, civil servants or otherwise. Put your child in front of OpenOffice. If the child has ever used MS-Word, I am willing to bet that the child would be capable to produce a document similar to what he or she would produce with MS-Word. If somebody is found incapable to use the open source software, then this person would be equally incapable to use similar software under Windows operating system.

One of my colleagues sent an email to our mailing list telling his experience in helping a client to migrate to open source. It has to be a policy decision on which tasks that really needs Windows operating system. It turned out that 80% of the tasks in that office does not need Windows, and can be done with open source system. Then when it is decided to migrate, they planned for a one-month program. It took them only three days: first day of chaos and confusion, second day of many questions, and a third day of random questions here and there. After that: business as usual.

For me, it was a brave call for him to make. But nobody has ever suggested that the government office has to go through a one-day chaos like that. And nobody has ever suggested that it should happen overnight.

A lot of good things happening in the open source world. It is now possible to run a complete system (similar to Windows system) out of the CD. Absolutely no installation is required. Just put the CD on the system, and it runs like a charm.

If any government office is serious about implementing open source system in the office, there should be a policy decision to ask all of the government employee in the office to run one of those CDs. I suppose there would be a lot of questions, but give it half a day and I am willing to bet that anybody who is capable of using MS-Word would be able to produce the same thing using OpenOffice.

Is it incredible? No, said my colleague. Nothing more than a few clicks here and there. We are talking about a user, and thats what they do: to use it.

Of course you would not expect them to install anything on the computer. A user should not worry about installation of any software in the computer. A user should not worry about installing a printer or a scanner. That is the job for an IT administrator. If there is not IT administrator in the office, many people out there are more than willing to do it, and many of them are willing to do it for free.

If the Ministry of Research and Technology office can migrate to the open source system, it is not because they are all computer geeks that would adjust in a snap to a new system. Most of them are like most of us: users, not computer administrators. It is a misconception that the migration is successful because they are more computer literate.

What made it successful is a policy decision. At some point, the employee of that office was not allowed to be in the office if his or her computer still has software other than the open source software. If the other government offices are serious about open source, there should be a policy decision. Otherwise it will only be a joke.
And the last one: does open source system lack of support for peripheral equipments (like printers, scanners, etc)? Another immediate answer: the minister must be talking about 1997.

In old days, there are a lot of frustrations among new users of Linux to simply make the peripheral equipments work. Back in 1999 I even have a problem to make Linux to recognize my monitor. But today is 2007.

I would not say that the open source system would recognize all equipments. But if it is a popular equipment (for example a scanner with popular brand), somebody should have written a code so that the open source system could recognize the equipment. Furthermore, the open source community is growing. That means that the newer printers and scanners would be released with the support for open source system.

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The question remains: what made the minister botched up so badly?

Well, there is no immediate answer to that question. And this article would not lead you to speculate.

What we can safely conclude, with all due respect and good intention to the Minister, is that FUD can happen to anyone. There is no point in tracking who has fudded the minister, but what is more importantly is for the minister to show that the FUD is not working.