A Study on the choice of free & open source software for government sector enterprise applications in Sri Lanka

Abstract

This document presents a study on the selection of software for government sector enterprise applications. Many factors could influence the choice of software in government sector enterprise applications. The research is based on the following problem: what factors influence the choice of software for government sector enterprise applications, in the Sri Lankan context. Information systems (IS) projects in several selected government sector organizations have been studied in depth during the course of the research. Around 30% of the investigated government sector information systems projects have been found to have used FOSS. Several factors have been identified to have affected the choice of software for government sector enterprise IS. Out of these, technical compliance, cost, bidders/developers expertise and maintenance/support options were some of the most commonly indicated factors. Cost was highlighted as an important factor in a majority of the investigated IS. However, the analysis revealed that cost did not influence the choice between FOSS and proprietary software, when implementing the IS. This was quite unusual given the common perception that FOSS is used to lower costs. It was concluded from the analysis that certain other factors including bidders/developers expertise, technical compatibility with legacy proprietary systems and maintenance/support options override the cost factor, when selecting software. Based on the analysis and conclusions, several recommendations have been made to leverage on the benefits of FOSS in government sector enterprise. IS. These recommendations include ways to achieve cost advantages, especially in large scale replication. It is recommended to nurture a FOSS ecosystem and to develop internal FOSS expertise within government organizations, in order to leverage on the advantages of FOSS in government sector enterprise IS.