The state named Solutions First and Systems Integration Services (SIS) on its open-source panel for government agencies along with heavyweights such as IBM, Sun Microsystems, Red Hat and Novell. While both Sydney-based companies are relative newcomers to the industry and have around 11 employees each, the similarities end there. Solutions First targets the small business server market, while SIS tackles desktop deployments.
Starcom is the other small business on the open-source panel. The company does not list Linux amongst its specialities, although it partners with Citrix, Hewlett-Packard, Novell and IBM.
The inclusion of the three local companies support sentiments shown in the government's original tender documents -- prior to setting up the panel -- which expressed the desire to support small business.
David Kempe, Solutions First founding partner and senior engineer, told ZDNet Australia that while IBM and other big companies would target larger agencies and bigger deals, they wouldn't touch small players "like the mental health institute down the road with five seats".
SIS principal consultant Marc Englaro said his company had a skillset that wasn't available elsewhere -- even within large vendors such as Hewlett-Packard. "The traditional Linux specialists are very much server-oriented people," he said.
Solutions First general manager Andrew Kempe -- brother to David -- said the panel fulfilled several needs for the NSW government and one was to help keep track of Linux deployments. Since the suppliers have to brief the Department of Commerce on which agency was using Linux or open source-based services, officials will be able to keep tabs on those deployments, he said.
David Kempe said Linux enthusiasts within the government were driving some informal adoptions of open-source software.
"They might have installed Debian on 20 boxes and said: 'This will work' -- and it has," he said. But nobody would "officially" know about it.
Both Solutions First executives cited Cameron Parle, the official administering the open-source panel, as a strong Linux advocate, who, according to David Kempe, even ran Linux on his laptop.
"You can't discount the amount of effort that someone like Cameron Parle has put in in this area," he said. "Or the effort of someone in the Department of Justice, who has gone and used Linux -- but it didn't appear on the budget, because it didn't cost anything."
The NSW Judicial Commission recently announced it had developed a new Linux-based application called Judicial Information Research System.
David Kempe said the NSW government would probably use the open-source panel as a test case for Linux and open source deployments. "This is a big test for them, they're going to watch it closely.
"They're going to say: 'How realistic is it that agencies can actually adopt Linux?' That is, [how realistic is it] to migrate from an office of Windows-based systems to Linux-based systems, what about the desktop, the server side, etc?"
However, SIS' Englaro said the NSW government understood Linux and open-source software well. "They seem to be thinking the right way about this," he said. "Even though some of the questions [in the tender documents] were a little odd -- a bit left field, in general the noises they were making seemed to indicate that they understood what was required."
Purveyors of lock-in and digital secret sauce are encouraged to check their dictionary for the word "harbinger".
This won't be a silver bullet for gummint IT problems, but it will give a lot of people the official seal of approval on regaining control of their department's IT.
Congratulations to both the government functionaries who've worked so hard to make this happen, and to the selectees, who seem to be members of the Open Source Industry ****ociation. Are any other states listening?