[LINK] forge.gov & forge.mil

[stephen at melbpc.org.au]

The future of the (US) government forges

The GSA is currently planning  forge.gov which is widely assumed to be 
based on  forge.mil the much-discussed collaboration platform from the 
Defense Information Systems Agency, or DISA. 

forge.mil is a pretty incredible idea: a single destination for testing, 
certification, and software development in the Defense Department.

It sounds obvious, but the idea remains revolutionary. 

For the first time, there would be a single repository for source code 
that could be shared between the hundreds of agencies, commands, and 
programs in DOD. 

Developers would be able to share their work in a familiar, web-based 
environment. If you’ve used SourceForge, you get the idea. 

The DOD is the largest consumer, and one of the largest developers of 
software in the world. 

Much of this software is redundant, locked up by vendors and integrators, 
can’t work with other software, and nobody remembers how to maintain it. 

There’s no doubt forge.mil was long overdue.

It’s dangerous, though, to assume that forge.mil is a useful template for 
forge.gov. 

I think forge.mil could lead forge.gov down the same road as core.gov and 
other failed attempts to encourage source code reuse in government. 

To understand why forge.mil can be useful and simultaneously poisonous to 
forge.gov, you have to first understand how the DOD does software..

COTS vs. GOTS .. http://onepeople.org/node/2159

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Cheers,
Stephen