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@nilesh

Public money public code makes sense to me.

@nilesh What India’s already achieved in this domain is quite remarkable, digital IDs and payment systems that most countries could only dream of. Maybe Switzerland and Europe should copy that example.

@dcz @nilesh Security will always remain a moving target, for any system indeed. A powerful personal account of how UIDAI helped stop local officials from shaving low income workers salary is also a pretty decent return. Progress isn’t linear, as they say.

@isaka @nilesh The happy path is by definition happy. Those who are negatively affected should arguably be weighed more. There were more blunders: epw.in/engage/article/aadhaar-

"Some are too sick to get Aadhaar (like Gangi Tuti), or immobile or bedridden (Kapil Paikra has been bedridden after a road accident in 2009 – before UIDAI began issuing Aadhaar numbers), and so, are unable to get it. Sometimes people apply and just never hear back."

www.epw.inAadhaar Failures: A Tragedy of ErrorsSeveral instances of practical difficulties that people across India have faced in accessing welfare schemes show the magnitude of the problems inherent in the Aadhaar project.

@dcz @nilesh Fully agree, the unhappy path should never be downplayed, unacceptable that those negatively impacted wouldn’t get proper support. You’re totally right about that.

@nilesh I recommend Falcon by CrowdStrike. It's the best protection against any thread, unless when being updated.

@nilesh Meanwhile, the German SAP lobbyist that is still acting like he's the chancellor tries to blackmail the countries to buy into the Microsoft cloud…

@nilesh

What is needed is a law that says abandonware (ie things like Windows XP & Windows 7 that are "no longer supported") should be made open source, so that software that will not run under later versions can continue to run and the data continue to be accessed.

@nilesh Not all public softwares. Only these in the federal administration. And subject to limitations.

@nilesh That's not really true though. It only states that software specifically developed for the government has to be released open source. They can (and will) choose closed sourced software for specific things...

@aramloosman @nilesh for generic things, you mean? Like documents, spreadsheets, or presentations that don’t need any specific Swiss federal government functionality?

@nilesh I am not sure if I've understood your question correctly, but it does not really depend on the type of software. The main thing comes down to the baseline "Public Money - Public Code".
But of course this wont be trivial to do. Security concerns can be one aspect, as well as cheaper, bought-as-is software (think MS365) which are not feasable to develop.

@aramloosman @nilesh the law mandats that Software developed for the government must be opensourced. It doesn't say the go has to use opensource.