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White House goes open source

The White House has voted in open source as its official website moves away from proprietary content management software.

By Dave Stevenson, 26 Oct 2009 at 10:26

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The US government's official presence on the internet, www.whitehouse.gov, has moved from proprietary content management software bought during George Bush's second term to open source-based CMS Drupal.

The site re-launched on Saturday with an understated refresh to its front end but sweeping changes behind the scenes.

Speaking to the Associated Press, the White House's new media director Macon Phillips said "we now have a technology platform to get more and more voices on the site. This is state-of-the-art technology and the government is a participant in it."

The introduction of Drupal to whitehouse.gov is likely to be a major test for the popular open source software as the US government's website is a target for hackers. In July this year, a White House spokesperson described attacks on the site as "frequent".

However, Dries Buytaert, Drupal's creator and project lead, described the Obama administration's adoption of Drupal as "a perfect match for President Barack Obama's push for an open and transparent government."

"This is a clear sign that governments realise that Open Source does not pose additional risks compared to proprietary software," he added.

Buytaert, whose company, Acquia, was responsible for the development of the new site, said he was "thrilled by the idea that Drupal can help governments provide greater transparency, higher velocity, and more flexibility."

The Obama administration is famous for its use of the internet and social media during its presidential campaign in 2008. It used outlets such as YouTube, Digg and FaceBook to co-ordinate its attempts to win over voters with enormous success.

The White House joins a growing army of large organisations using Drupal, although it is arguably the highest-profile. Other Drupal clients include CNN, Greenpeace, NASA and Yahoo.

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10 comments

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What about the UK?

It's great to see "The White House" adopting an open source product for it's website. This follows hot on the heels of the news from the London Stock Exchange, which ditched Microsoft's secret, proprietary .NET framework for an open GNU/Linux alternative. I'm seeing Xavier Rolet, chief executive of the London Stock Exchange, tomorrow, and I hope to find out more about his decision making process. It's a pity that, despite all our Government's mutterings about open source, nothing much seems to be happening. It does genuinely appear to be starting to open up its data to the public by getting developers involved in the process, but we still have Companies House forcing people to adopt secret, closed source, proprietary systems in order to file on-line accounts.

By 6tricky9 on Tuesday Oct 27

6tricky9

With respect, sir you're an idiot! You clearly know nothing about .Net. Its perfectly possible to develop an open source project using a .Net language. There's even a completely open source development environment for it called Mono. It unlikely that the issue of whether LSE trading software was open source or not was the primary reason for the LSE's decision, there would be many factors to consider. You seem to be confusing open access to information with open source. They're not one and the same. If you are really seeing Xavier Rolet tomorrow I would stick to topics you know something about, IT is clearly not one of them!

By jyvais on Tuesday Oct 27

RE:

@jyvais: I'll ignore your abusive comments, which were totally unnecessary, especially as you know nothing about me, or what I do. Let's deal with the facts instead. Yes, Mono is a free implementation of the secret, proprietary C# and VB.Net languages. The problem is, as always with Microsoft, one of patents. The free software community has only the word of Microsoft, a serial law breaker, that there will be no future patent enforcement involving C# and Mono. This promise, however, has been less than all encompassing, omitting crucial Windows libraries. So, why rely on Mono and Microsoft when we have other alternatives? Regarding open source and access to data, if you'd read my post carefully instead of going off on a rant you would have seen that I do *not* confuse the two. What I *did* say was that there appeared to be little happening in Government circles on the open source front, but that on the "access to data" front things were starting to happen. Finally, and as I've already explained, when I see Xavier Rolet today I will be asking how he arrived at the decision to throw out .Net in favour of GNU/Linux. I feel that this direct approach will produce more reliable data than the ramblings of, what I'm assuming to be, a .Net developer who feels under siege.

By 6tricky9 on Wednesday Oct 28

@6tricky9

Sorry but your arguments are not cogent. Ok, where do I start? Here goes... 1) Comparing .Net to GNU/Linux is like comparing Apples and Oranges. Its a bit like comparing Java to Windows, one is a dev environment the other is an OS. 2) Open source and free software are not the same thing. Did you know that the free software movement not only eschews Windows (obviously) but doesn't recommend most of the major Linux distros either? So Linux does not equal GNU either! 3) As far as I can tell, the new software being used by LSE is not Open Source - just go to their website and try and download a copy - you can't! 4) LSE bought the company that produces the new software for 30 million dollars. How is that free? 5) From what I have read, the LSE is purchasing a new product that they think is better than the old one and which will save them money, its just a straight business decision, not part of a crusade. Its a blow to Accenture and MS but that happens all the time in business. 6) This is also to do with Globalisation and the exploitation of lower labour costs - the new supplier is based in Sri Lanka. 7) The LSE's IT Director is on record as saying that the decision is not a rejection of .Net! 8) The new suppliers are Oracle partners. Oracle are not renowned for giving stuff away!

By jyvais on Wednesday Oct 28

RE:

@jyvais: Although you have desisted with your abuse I'm afraid that your arrogance is still very much in evidence. As I said before, you know nothing about me or what I do and yet you feel that you can lecture me on matters of which you clearly have a limited grasp. From your continued rant all you have succeeded in doing is showing your complete lack of knowledge of free and open source software and the various open source licences. Why don't you go and read a copy of the GPL, for example, before commenting further and posting false information? Here are some of your errors: Can free software be sold? Yes, that is a freedom. Can I download a copy of somebody's free software from their system? No, that is an abuse of their freedom. Can I run free software with proprietary software on the same computer? Yes, that is freedom, although not recommended. For your enlightenment here is a copy of the question that I asked Xavier Rolet yesterday --------------"The London Stock exchange recently supplanted its Microsoft .Net framework with an open source GNU/Linux alternative. I'd be grateful if you could give us some idea of the thinking behind this dramatic move and how *you* feel that it will benefit the London Stock Exchange"--------------and his answer can be paraphrased in the following manner -------------- "To remain competitive we knew that we had to upgrade our system as the existing .Net framework was not up to the job...We took six months to evaluate the alternatives...Our new GNU/Linux system has given us significantly reduced costs, a huge speed advantage, and improved scalability."

By 6tricky9 on Thursday Oct 29

@6tricky9 Take 2

True I don’t know who you are and I don’t actually really care. I am responding to the comments you have posted. From those comments I surmise that you are a MS hating free software zealot. That’s fair enough, it takes all types. But you seem to me to be mis-representing what was a cold business decision taken by the LSE on financial grounds as some sort of altruistic leap into the free software camp. From what I have read the LSE have been using a package called TradElect developed by Accenture an MS partner. For whatever reason, LSE are not happy with the costs and performance of this solution. After evaluating 20 alternatives they’ve decided to adopt MilleniumIT software. As far I can tell, this software has been developed in C++ and runs on Solaris (not GNU!) and Linux. LSE will be paying 30 million dollars. You are presenting this very simplistically as GNU/Linux triumphs over .Net. As I said, .Net isn’t an OS so that comparison isn’t valid. There are many reasons why the MilleniumIT solution is faster than TradElect. For starters, the design and architecture of the software will be one big factor. Yes the underlying development environment will be one factor also. A system written in compiled C++ is likely to be faster in some situations that the managed .Net or Java equivalent. I guess the really interesting question is, if MilleniumIT was ported to run under Windows, how would that compare with the Solaris/Linux solution speed wise? I’m not anti Linux per-se, I just don’t buy into this we must all use free software because anything proprietary is evil nonsense. Particularly in business, there are a myriad of factors to consider when choosing the right solution, sometimes the underling cost of the OS is a very minor part of the overall project costs. You can find an intersting discussion about it here; http://linux.slashdot.org/story/09/10/06/1742203/London-Stock-Exchange-Rejects-NET-For-Open-Source?from=rss

By jyvais on Friday Oct 30

@6tricky9 Take 3

"Can I run free software with proprietary software on the same computer? Yes, that is freedom, although not recommended." I love that line it made me smile. So did say to Xavier Rolet: "Dude, I know you've just paid 30 million for your new software but running proprietary software on GNU/Linux isn't recommended, so how about you give it away free to all yourcompetitors. That would be so cool man...." I can imagine what his response would be :-))

By jyvais on Friday Oct 30

RE:

@jyvais: You really must stop putting words into my mouth so that you can have a further rant. I've never used the word "evil", I've never said that nobody should use proprietary software, I've never said that the LSE decision was anything but practical, in fact, I said that it was. These are all constructs that you have set up in order to marshal some sort of argument against me. Furthermore, as I've already spoken with Xavier Rolet I don't need any additional musings about the LSE trading platform from you. However, in a further effort to help you widen your knowledge base (although this is proving incredibly difficult as you still don't understand the notion of "free" software) you should understand that Linux is just a kernel and GNU provides the tools. These tools are variations of the standard Unix tool set deployed by most, if not all, of the unices -- Solaris, BSD, Hurd, OS X, etc, etc.

By 6tricky9 on Friday Oct 30

@6tricky9 - Last Take!

"I've never said that the LSE decision was anything but practical, in fact, I said that it was." Funny that because that's not how you presented things in your original post. But I am glad at least that you now realise that there are many factors involved when choosing a major business application. And many if not most of those factors have little to do with philosophical debates about whether "secret" proprietary software is always bad and open free software is always good.

By jyvais on Saturday Nov 7

RE:

There you go again -- I've checked my original post and there's nothing "philosophical" about it; it's just a statement of facts. If you wish to have an intelligent debate with somebody then you really must learn to counter what they have said rather than counter what you *wished* that they had said.

By 6tricky9 on Tuesday Nov 17