After a few dramas, the census report is out! Hopefully this will be a great tool for the industry and community to dispel some myths and get Open Source well and truly on the national business, government and education agenda!
Check it out!
Finally the time has come for the Australian Open Source Industry & Community Census Report launch! The event itself will be on April the 1st in Sydney city. All details are on the event page here. Please RSVP to come along and hear from special guests and about the report which will be available as a free downloadable pdf after the launch. Drinks and canapes will be available.
We’re really pleased because we’ve already had some really good media coverage of the Census. Five articles so far 
For me anyway I have always loved maps, but never really got around to digital mapping much. The Census has given me a perfect opportunity to play as we wanted to map where the Open Source industry and community is roughly located (by suburb for privacy reasons) and for comparison throughout Australia. I’ve had a lot of fun!
The first major challenge was figuring out how to represent the data I had (suburbs, postcodes, etc) into useful data. KML, which is a markup language for this kind of stuff seemed to be the answer along with Googlemaps, at least to start. I found a great little tag called “address” that seemed to make my life easy, until I figured out after an hour or two that it only works in GoogleEarth, not GoogleMaps. Ah well! So now I had to figure out how to change addresses to latitude/longitude information. Enter Batch Geo Code! This website is so simple but so great. You input data and it feeds you back longitude/latitude info, which I could then script into a KML file and voila! A beautiful GoogleMap with all the suburbs represented!
I can’t post the maps yet, but when the Census is released in late February there will be a lot of great information like this Also, a bit of it will be chatted about at linux.conf.au.
The Australian Government Information Management Office (AGIMO) released a simple two page synopsis of their investigation into the use of FOSS in Federal Government agencies recently. They also have several interesting papers about FOSS on their Open Source software page. Some snippets include:
86% of agencies have a positive view of OSS and expect its usage to increase over the next 5 years
Agencies understand that by adopting OSS standards and solutions they could protect their investment in ICT systems, data and software
Agencies indicated their desire to be both vendor and format independent, with the high level of flexibility available to them by using OSS leading to an environment of innovation and transparency
And then the kicker:
OSS vendor support is perceived as problematic and was indicated as the biggest challenge facing OSS adoption by respondents.
Hopefully the soon to be released Census will help overcome the biggest challenge facing FOSS adoption in Government, and then 2008 will be a serious power year for FOSS in Australia The report is due out in late February, and some teasers will be presented at linux.conf.au.
On Thursday night we were very pleased and honoured to receive the NSW Pearcey Young Achievers Award! Jeff and I are the first duo to receive the award and it was a real surprise for us
We dedicated this award to the Open Source community we continue to serve, the many inspirational people we work with from all around the world, the people who support us, and my wonderful parents who have provided so much inspiration and advice We also want to dedicate it to the rest of the Seven team, of which we were only 2 people. Seven were the people behind linux.conf.au 2007, the best lca ever.
Also speaking at the award presentation was Pearcey Foundation chairman Ian Dennis who said ever since Trevor Pearcey built Australia’s first computer in 1948 in Sydney, Australia has been leading the world in computers.
“We were bloody good at IT then and we are bloody good at IT now,” Dennis said. “The Pearcey Foundation is about recognizing the fact that we are still damn good in IT and telling people about it.”
Story by Rodney Gedda, Computerworld
In our acceptance speech Jeff also gave a thank you to the Hon John Della Bosca (who couldn’t be there due to being in parliament), who is one of three NSW Ministers to mention Open Source in parliament (courtesy of Hansard).
The Australian Open Source Industry and Community Census 2007 closes in two days, so please get in and complete the Industry Census for your company, and/or the Community Census for yourself, and please let other companies or community members know.
The aim of this project is to raise the profile of our industry and community, so stand up and be counted! Companies have the option to be included in a business directory that lists your skills, contacts details and spiel only, and individuals have the option to be in the running for a GP2X gaming unit.
The report will be freely available in February and distributed to Government and the general public.
Jeff and I completed an Australia wide roadshow a couple of weeks ago visiting every capital city in Australia and showing off the local Open Source industry as well as pimping our Open Source Industry and Community Census (stand up and be counted!). The event went really well and we have a full write up about it on our website along with the slides and links to companies that participated, and an audio recording of the presentation.
Many thanks for all those who came along, helped out, and participated in the breakfast events. All up we were very pleased with it, and have had feedback that it has helped restart the conversation about Open Source with Government and businesses all around Australia. It was a good test run for doing similar kinds of events in future and helped us understand the relative levels of interest and capability right around Australia.
Last month saw the first ever Open Source Western Australia Symposium. It was an excellent event attracting over 60 CIOs from Government and top companies in WA to head about Open Source. Jeff and I had the pleasure of attending and speaking at the event, and it was great to see such a diverse crowd of CIOs so interested in Open Source.
One of the things mentioned at the event was the recently launched Open Source WA survey, which emulates the AGIMO Open Source survey done earlier this year. The OSWA survey is for all users of Open Source in WA, be they Government, business or education, and calls on all users of Open Source software in WA to fill in the survey to help create a clear picture of the Open Source usage and needs of business, education and Government in WA. Waugh Partners is helping run the survey (on Open Source software) and afterwards to provide analysis of the anonymised data.
The organisers say there will be audio available from the event within the week, so keep an eye on the Open Source WA website! There was a news article about the event in PCWorld, which is mainly an interview with one of the speakers, Craig Nielsen from Red Hat.
The group behind this initiative is the Western Australian Supercomputer Program, which was funded by the Western Australia Department of Industry and Resources to run the event. WASP have also been involved with the Perth Linux User Group and basically ran the Perth Software Freedom Day event, which was excellent! Great work guys!
Jeff and I are now just over halfway through our national “Meet the Open Source Industry” roadshow.
It has been an excellent turn out in most cities, with great numbers in Brisbane, Darwin and Adelaide. Canberra wasn’t as well attended as we accidentally planned the event the morning after the long weekend, and Sydney was a little low on numbers due to over-busy Sydney people being slackers.
Tomorrow is the Perth event, and then next week is Melbourne and Hobart, all of which are looking great. Soon, we’ll publish slides from the roadshow including the Open Source companies we introduced all around the country!
Today is the Open Source Western Australia Symposium, a collaboration between the Department of Industry and Resources and the Western Australian Supercomputer Program. I helped them with some of their speakers and WASP have also created a good relationship with the Perth Linux User Group, which is cool. WASP even ran the Perth Software Freedom Day event.
Today they are also announcing the first major research project into the use of FOSS in the Western Australian Government and market, based on the national AGIMO survey into the use of FOSS in Federal Government earlier this year. Waugh Partners is running the survey and assisting with the analysis, which we are pretty excited about.
So the short of it is there is a lot happening, and we need to blog more regularly (hint, hint Jeff)
Jeff and I launched the Australian Open Source Indsutry and Community Census less than two days ago, and already have over 60 completed community responses and 20 completed industry responses,as well as a further 50 people sign up. Wow! Thank you everyone who has contributed. Please pass the word around and lets try and really make this a true census
Just to clarify a point, the target audience of the research project is a) people/companies in Australia and b) Australians overseas. It has an Australian focus specifically so that the final report (which will be freely available to download) will help educate and inform Australian Government, corporates and education about the realities rather than the perceptions of our industry and community locally. Hopefully it will reflect the strength, diversity and opportunities presented by the Australian Open Source industry and community, so everyone needs to stand up and be counted
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