IfG.CC -
Institute for eGovernment

The National Computing Centre (NCC) has set up an open source laboratory to test the viability of the technology for public sector organisations, it has announced.

The laboratory is part of the Open Source Academy, funded by Whitehall under its e-innovations programme. NCC is running the academy in a consortium which includes four councils and local IT body Socitm. The aim is to help public sector bodies evaluate open source alternatives to proprietary solutions in an "independent test environment", according to an NCC statement issued on 17 June 2005.

As a result of the report’s findings ORG cannot express confidence in the results for the areas we observed. This is not a declaration we take lightly but, despite having had accredited observers on location, having interviewed local authorities and having filed Freedom of Information requests, ORG is still not able to verify if votes were counted accurately and as voters intended.

An open source solution enabling councils and registered social landlords to deliver video-based interactive eGovernment services is set to be made available through national government procurement frameworks in October.

Since November 2003 residents at the Carpenters Estate in Newham, East London, have been testing the prototype system to access a range of digital services.

The government has announced plans for nine public sector trials of open-source software.

Open source software in schools can offer a "cost effective" alternative to proprietary IT but needs "careful planning and support", according to a report by the government's education IT body.

The pilots were run in partnership with a number of government bodies earlier this year and sought to assess the viability of using Open Source Software across central government departments and the wider public sector.

The project report from the study "Open Source Software in Schools: A study of the spectrum of use and related ICT infrastructure costs" demonstrates that although the implementation of OSS in schools needs careful planning and support, the use of OSS can offer a cost-effective alternative to proprietary software.

This has to be essential reading for anyone involved in e-Government and public sector IT in the UK.

More than 500 local government organisations will be able to access the latest Ordnance Survey digital mapping and geographic data with the signing of a new agreement today.

Topographic, address and integrated transport network data are among a wide range of products that will be available for use in providing better front-line services, reducing local government costs and improving local and strategic decision making.

Landplan Data enables detailed analysis of project sites from 1 km² to 25 km² anywhere in Great Britain based on up-to-date survey information.

It is the largest scale of Ordnance Survey raster data to show contours, providing an excellent overview of the lie of the land. Fences, field boundaries, road names and buildings are also included.

John Oughton, chief executive of the Office of Government Commerce (OGC) was speaking at the GC2005expo conference on 21 June 2005.

He confirmed that the OGC was already on the way to helping government deliver two thirds of the target of efficiency savings of £3bn for 2005-6.

The Office of the e-Envoy's attempt to involve the private sector in delivering public services threatens to exclude smaller businesses and start ups, it was claimed on 11 June 2003.

Councils that have outsourced their IT don't perform as well as those running an in-house service, according to the latest research from Socitm.

The report shows that user satisfaction is 13% lower among councils with outsourced services than in those with more traditionally run IT.

Experts say the government must learn lessons from past IT failures as the value of outsourcing IT contracts head for £16bn.