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Databases Programming Software United States The Almighty Buck

Gov't GSA Office goes MySQL 143

Posted by CowboyNeal from the gov't-approved dept.
comforteagle writes "MySQL has won a five year contract with the US General Services Administration office putting it in yet another government office on top of NASA, the Dept. of Def., Los Alamos National Labs & the Census Bureau. This additional win allows around 70 Government customers to purchase and deploy MySQL."
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Gov't GSA Office goes MySQL More

Gov't GSA Office goes MySQL

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  • Isn't MySQL Free (Score:2, Interesting)

    by gamepro ( 859021 )
    What exactly are they paying for?

    • Re:Isn't MySQL Free (Score:3, Interesting)

      by suwain_2 ( 260792 )
      What exactly are they paying for?

      Are you familiar with the workings of the US Government?
    • You obviously have never read the MySQL license agreement, my friend.
    • Service, support, extensions to the software base platform, deployment assistance, design assistance, professional schema optimization, cluster verification, usage licensure for baseline requirement satisfaction, the list goes on and on...

      You do realize that open source companies have to turn a profit, right? This sort of thing is usually how it's done - produce a product then make the client pay you if the client is unable to maintain it themselves (or if it's just cheaper than to hire such a person.)
  • "MySQL has won a five year contract with the US General Services Administration office..."

    ...did the US General Services Administration office win?
  • Honestly, who doesn't call it DoD? Even scientists do!

  • I don't get it! (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Chalex ( 71702 )
    What stopped them from deploying MySQL before?
  • Wake up tomorrow and sell Perl/PHP contract to government.

  • GSA is not just another office (Score:5, Informative)

    by hedronist ( 233240 ) * on Friday January 13, 2006 @01:03AM (#14461179)
    GSA is not just another gov't office. Once you are on the GSA Schedule, then many other government offices and agencies can simply buy your product without any additional paperwork. This means that the on-ramp to MySQL just got *much* easier for many groups in the U.S. govenment.

    To quote: "With the GSA contract, GS-35F-0131R Schedule 70, government customers will be able to purchase and deploy MySQL through Carahsoft Technology Corp. The GSA schedule is effective Dec. 20, 2005 through Nov. 19, 2009."

    See the magic words "GSA Schedule?" This is a Very Good Thing(tm).

    • Re:GSA is not just another office (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Agreed. I work for DISA, and generally the most exotic thing I see a year is 2-3 deployments of Postgres (whihc is great on its own). It will be interesting to see if it gets any penetration within the DOD arena, more so if the amount is enough to require STIG documentation.
    • "government customers will be able to purchase and deploy MySQL through Carahsoft Technology Corp."

      Who is "Carahsoft Technology Corp.", and how much will they be charging the government (and therefore, US) for installing a Free product?

  • Negotiating a GSA price/dealer is NOT "deploying" (Score:5, Insightful)

    by ScentCone ( 795499 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @01:04AM (#14461184)
    This is certainly useful, in that it makes the product available to Federal users at a known (and, since it's on a GSA schedule, typically better-than-average) price. But when a reseller negotiates to be the GSA dealer for an item, that's all they've accomplished. That's NOT the same as actually talking an agency into using the product. We also want to be careful not to draw the wrong conclusions. When they say that NASA is using it, that means it's one more tool in NASA's toolbox. Some people might get the impression that they're using in lieu of other DB engines, rather than along side of such.
  • Choosing to go with a database that doesn't support foreign keys.

  • This is an opportunity (Score:5, Insightful)

    by core plexus ( 599119 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @01:46AM (#14461347) Homepage
    Flamers aside, this is yet another example of an emerging opportunity, much like this story I just read about doing business with Intelligence Agencies [suvalleynews.com].

    "The federal government will spend in excess of $400 billion with contractors this year and over $100 billion is expected to be spent with small businesses. Now business people from all over the U.S. can learn first hand from the experts how to capitalize on these business opportunities with federal government agencies without leaving their own offices"

    Sounds good to me.

  • News - Sort of (Score:5, Interesting)

    by HardCase ( 14757 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @02:14AM (#14461446)
    MySQL is on the GSA schedule - but thousands upon thousands of products are available on the GSA schedule. Just being on the GSA schedule isn't particularly dramatic, though. And the headline (and even the summary) are quite a bit more breathless and quite a bit less accurate than the real story.

    -h-

    • Re:News - Sort of (Score:4, Informative)

      by magores ( 208594 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @08:20AM (#14462421) Journal
      Hardcase hit the nail.

      As a former Contracts Administrator for a computer oem, I may be able to shed a little light on how all this works.

      Basically, if your product (toilet paper, paper clips, software, whatever...) is on the GSA schedule, then the various government agencies are allowed to purchase it. If your widget is not on the schedule, then they can't.

      There are a number of ways around the rule of "GSA-Buy, No GSA-No Buy", but that is the way its suppossed to work. For those that are curious, here are a couple of ways the various governemtn agencies can get around the GSA...
      1) This is probably the easiest way to get around this rule - Simply buy the widget via a different contract (schedule=contract). Your favorite toilet paper isn't listed on GSA, but it is listed with XYZ MAS? And, it "just so happens" that your agency is allowed to buy via XYZ? Go ahead and buy all you need.
      2) Another "popular" way to get around the rule is for the agency that needs whatever product to write their request in such a way that only 1 particular product can meet the specifications. Government rules allow for such exceptions. "I don't care if its not on the list! Our agency simply MUST have toilet paper that is produced in Walla Walla, Washington by non-caucasion midgets with two left hands." Ta-Da ... Your TP is on the way. Writing the specs this way is extremely easy when the TP sales rep writes the specs for you. Oops... I mean, the sales rep makes "suggestions". Having them write it would be (cough, cough) illegal.

      Now, lets assume that your specific government agency strictly abides by the GSA, and your favorite TP is on the GSA schedule. Here's what happens, more or less...
      1) Agency writes up their needs. (2-ply TP, blue flowers, single roll wrapped)
      2) They submit their needs to a buyer.
      3) Buyer looks at the GSA list.
      4) Buyer chooses whatever the heck s/he wants. - "Least Cost" is the typical over-riding factor in the decision.

      It's not particularly hard to have the buyer buy the specific TP that you want. It may be more expensive in actual dollars, but "look at the customer service! Surely that's worth something!"

      Everywhere above that I mention TP, substitute MySQL... Its the same. Its a product.
      ---

      I'm rambling, so I'll wrap up now...

      -If anyone in government really wanted MySQL, they could have gotten it with or without GSA.
      -Now that MySQL is on the GSA, so what? People won't "buy" it on a whim. Someone has to sell it. (And I mean "sell", in a used car type of way.)
      -That 5 year contract? It's really a 10 or 15 year deal. Extensions are easy.

      ------
      ------

      I've over-simplified quite a bit, and I should probably have defined MAS, RFP, RFQ, SAS, etc. but I don't want to ramble anymore.

      -----

      Have fun.

      M
      • Sorry to reply to myself, but I forgot to mention....

        -"Product" contracts with the government are different than "service" contracts.

        If I remember correctly, Schedule 70 is for "product". I must assume that MySQL includes service with the product, or they also have a service contract.

        If they have a service contract "in addition to" the product contract, then I assume that the service one will be the bigger moneymaker, and therefore should really have been the main point of the story.

  • You've gotta hand it to 'em (Score:5, Funny)

    by brogdon ( 65526 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @02:20AM (#14461466) Homepage
    After years of exhaustive, painstaking, and expensive study, our government has finally devised a method to buy something that's free.

    I hope it at least comes with a $600 wrench or something...

    • Re:You've gotta hand it to 'em (Score:4, Insightful)

      by duffer_01 ( 184844 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @08:06AM (#14462387) Homepage
      Man, would everyone stop saying it is free. Just because you don't have to pay for the software doesn't mean that you won't pay for support or for the commercial license if you need to hide your source code.
      • Please mod this guy up. Before Fedora, Red Hat was free too, but plenty of organizations PAID for it, and they didn't get this kind of bashing.
      • Bingo! You hit the nail on the head. Support and the ability to hide/bury/dispose of the source code is important and worth the money spent. The open source nature the other side of the software has provides faster development and vetting of errors faster (typically) than closed source software.

        As for the cost, often the gov't goes to extremes to keep the cost low even while maintaining certain specs to ensure safety and reliability of equipent in harsh environments. I work in the Aquisition field and u
  • The government has a GSA [wikipedia.org]? Even with such a homophobic President? And they're not using a Microsoft product? I think hell's about to freeze over.
    • The K Street Project must be distracted getting legislator's family members into cushy jobs financed by no-bid government contracts. Otherwise an abomination like this would never have slipped through.

  • MySQL at SCALE 4x (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Jim Winstead [socallinuxexpo.org] will be speaking at SCALE 4x [socallinuxexpo.org]. He will cover the new features in MySQL 5.0 and 5.1. You can get a discount on a full access pass using the promo code "NEWSP" or a free expo floor pass using "FREE".
  • Eager to serve the United States instead of letting some power-hungry turbonerds cause the BSOD that vaporizes the world (or corporate rivals), the Government once again has expunged the totolitarian empire from those who would attempt to undermind the national infrastructure or those nutjobs who think they are helping break down that enitity.

    The good news is that we won't have to worry about anyone with an XBOX360 playing TNW with NORAD's BURGR supercomputer.

    "The only winning move is not to play." --WOP

  • Standards, schstandards (Score:5, Insightful)

    by leandrod ( 17766 ) <l@dutras . o rg> on Friday January 13, 2006 @04:19AM (#14461792) Homepage Journal
    So even the US government does not really care anymore for its own standards. I guess Oracle will feel relieved with their 'ISO SQL 92 minus datatypes and a few other essentials' product. It kind of makes the efforts of PostgreSQL and others toward ISO SQL:2003 (hint: each ISO SQL standard cancels the former one) futile.
    • So even the US government does not really care anymore for its own standards. Anymore? Since when have they?

      Ever hear of Ada?

    • Those of you who modded the parent insightful really should have read this [mysql.com] first:

      Our aim is to support the full ANSI/ISO SQL standard, but without making concessions to speed and quality of the code.

      This is not just wind in sails. In fact, MySQL AB have on staff (and have had for a couple of years now) several highly knowledgeable and qualified individuals whose primary job is to work with the developers to maximise MySQL's SQL:2003 compliance, and changes in this direction occur with each release. (Yes, I

    • This is purely a matter of meeting the demands of your users. If you feel that a product should be punitively ignored because it fails to meet a standard that large numbers of users have no need for, then fine. Ignore it. The rest of us have work to do, and use PostgreSQL, Oracle, MySQL or whatever other database tool is the best fit for the job we have at hand. The moment you put your zelotry before the work, the work is called into question.

      I can't count the number of people who've seen me using Emacs at

      • This is purely a matter of meeting the demands of your users

        It is to protect the government and the general public from ignorant users that standards compliance is (theoretically) obligatory for vendors to the government. Users can't demand what they don't know or understand.

        I can't count the number of people who've seen me using Emacs at work, start to launch into some sort of vi-advocacy rant

        You are so incompetent you don't know standards from popularity.

        • "You are so incompetent you don't know standards from popularity."

          Actually, there's rarely a hard line between the two, but besides being an ad hominem attack slung at an out-of context comment, you failed to notice that I'd left standards discussions behind, and was discussing social phenomena.

          I was giving an example of the limiting nature of treating any set of choices as a set of polar extremes. For a long time, for example, Linux was not a fully POSIX-compliant system. It made every effort to be POSIX c
    • I guess Oracle will feel relieved with their 'ISO SQL 92 minus datatypes and a few other essentials' product.

      I'm sure Larry Ellison cries every evening as he swims through his five-story Money Bin.

      Oracle has decided that it would be worse to break all the legacy applications already running on Oracle DBs than to force compliance with the ISO standard. Can't say I blame them.

  • In other news (Score:5, Funny)

    by SmallFurryCreature ( 593017 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @05:24AM (#14461948) Journal

    Both Steve Ballmer and Larry Elison were seen throwing chairs and screaming, "We are a going to fucking bury the DoD, we did it before and we will do it again".

    The DoD was heard mumbling something along the lines of "you and what army" and went back to keeping democracy save for billionares everywhere.

    • Sorry to say, but I am not a billionare, and I am quite glad that the DoD is keeping democracy safe. If you don't live in the US, you more than likely still live in a country that the DoD or its predecessor saved.
  • Is this the first time this has happened, though? A quick look at the GSA Advantage site yields at least one [gsaadvantage.gov] or two [gsaadvantage.gov] results for MySQL database license vendors. Besides which, I don't see any MySQL products on the GSA Schedule mentioned in the article [gsaadvantage.gov], either. To be fair, it can take some time to update GSA's information, but it may be better for these folks to make public announcements after the t's have been crossed. Still, this is a positive step in the right direction for greater use and support of MySQL

  • And not a moment too soon! (Score:4, Informative)

    by woodsrunner ( 746751 ) on Friday January 13, 2006 @10:06AM (#14462899) Journal
    This morning, the NYTimes reports the GSA's website for contract bidding has been shut down due serious security flaws.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/13/technology/13sec ure.html [nytimes.com]

    "The security flaw, which could have permitted contractor fraud, was reported to the agency's inspector general on Dec. 22, but almost three weeks passed before the system was taken offline Wednesday afternoon. The General Services Administration is the federal agency responsible for procuring equipment and services, including computer security technology, making the lapse all the more striking. "This is the government entity responsible for letting contracts for security," said Mark Rasch, chief security counsel for Solutionary, a security firm. "Clearly the people who log in would know about security.""
  • Being on the GSA doesn't mean you sold anything, it just means you're on a list of vendors that it's easy for government agencies to buy from.

    I've seen a LOT of database installations in government, and in MySQL's market it's almost all MSSQL and Oracle. They may get a few buys, but so far those in the goverment I have seen running MySQL weren't the type to pay for support.
  • I certainly hope they don't use MyISAM tables. I'd like to think that the government likes stability more than speed.
  • MySQL now is on the GSA schedule which just means it is easier for government agencies to use them and they have a vetted and approved price sheet (Fair and reasonable is what uncle Sam calls it). Now they have to get out there and win some contracts before they will see any money.

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