Russian association of the open source RASPO

Non-profit partnership of assistance to development of the open source (RASPO). Its mission is assistance to development of Open Source, in particular, assistance to implementation and promoting of the open source in Russia, to development of the domestic industry of the software based on an open source code and free licenses and inclusion of Russia in the world market of software development.

Members of partnership

List of members of RASPO^[1]:

1. ОАО VNIINS of V.V. Solomatin
2. ФГУП MNII Integral
3. ООО Corus Consulting
4. ЗАО Lanit
5. ЗАО Links
6. ОАО LINUKS INK
7. ЗАО Meson.Py
8. ООО 'National center of support and development' (NCPR)
9. ООО Pingwin Software
10. ЗАО Rosa
11. ООО Open Technologies Integrator
12. ЗАО Nordavind
13. ГК Naumen
14. ООО "Center of Security of Information"
15. ЗАО "Wizardsoft.Py" (LinuxWizard)^[2]

Submitted applications for participation in work of Association:

#Canonical (Ubuntu) #Mandriva #RedHat #SUSE #Крок

Heads

• From the date of foundation in May, 2010 till September, 2011 Ivannikov Victor Petrovich was the president of RASPO.
• Since September, 2011 - the president of RASPO Korotkov Andrey Vikentyevich.
• Yulia Ovchinnikova is the acting the president of RASPO.
• Since 2015 the president of RASPO (Fund of business development on Open Source 2.0) is Sergey Bush

History

2009

The Russian association of the open source was created in May, 2009. During creation of association her founders meant that it will become "the conciliatory and expert platform" for the participants — players of the market of the free software. The uniform body from the industry consolidated by a position on key questions was necessary also to the state: it is always more productive to conduct dialogue with association, than with a set of rather small companies.

2011

RASPO was included into a phase of split at the beginning of September, 2011 when the association was left by the developer of a domestic distribution kit of the same name of ALT Linux. On the same day from a post of the head of association the academician Victor Ivannikov was expelled.

On September 12, 2011 it became known^[3]that RASPO asked the Ministry of Telecom and Mass Communications and the head of the Kremlin administration of Sergei Naryshkin to cancel one of tender lots on creation of the prototype of the National Software Platform (NSP) announced on August 15, 2011. The letter which copy Vedomosti has is signed by directors of seven companies entering into RASPO — VNIINS, "Links", Linuks Ink, "Мезон.ру", the National center of support and development, Dew and Pingwin Software. The co-owner of two last — the former Minister of Communications Leonid Reiman: "Dew" was founded by him for participation in the state tenders, and Pingwin is controlled by NGI fund in which Reiman is a large co-investor. Naryshkin Maksut Shadayev's assistant headed one of departments in a ministerial team of Leonid Reiman earlier.

The employee of the press service of Presidential Administration did not hear about the letter of RASPO. And the Ministry of Telecom and Mass Communications received the address from RASPO even in the summer of 2011, the representative of the ministry says. Naryshkin does not know to it of the letter.

Requirements of tender are formulated so that their accomplishment leads to monopolization of the created software products, authors of the letter consider. For example, conditions provide creation of the uniform "reference operating system" that, according to members of RASPO, can limit competitive environment, and it contradicts including to the recommendations of presidium of council for development of information society at the president (it is headed just by Naryshkin). The presidium of this council really approved creation of Scientific Production Enterprise based on the existing domestic developments "on condition of the competition between them", follows from the text of its solution (Vedomosti has a copy). Besides, RASPO have claims to completion dates of the project.

So, the tender documentation takes away on Research and Development and creation of a prototype of Scientific Production Enterprise of 16-30 days that, according to members of RASPO, is not enough. Then only 230 people should be engaged in the project of Scientific Production Enterprise, and is not present at one developer of the free software so much, they write in the letter. Also to them it is not clear how it is possible to develop the system prototype which is already conforming to requirements of FSTEC and FSB: on passing of certification in these departments at least half a year is necessary.

The idea of creation of "the Russian Windows" is discussed by officials since summer of 2010 However, already then it was clear that a system will be not quite Russian: it should be based on already existing distribution kit of freely distributed Linux operating system. 490 million rubles budgetary funds are allocated for domestic development in 2011-2012.

The Deputy Minister of Telecom and Mass Communications Ilya Massukh promised that Scientific Production Enterprise it will be ready by the end of 2011. Among participants of tender he called ASP Linux and ALTLinux companies. Later desire to participate in the project was declared also by the French Mandriva which large investor is the same NGI fund with Reyman's participation. The Ministry of Telecom and Mass Communications already explained to members of RASPO the principles of formation of requirements to works on creation of Scientific Production Enterprise, the representative of the ministry says. Requirements of tenders, according to him, do not limit further use of the alternative software products developed under other state orders in any way. So, it is impossible to speak about the market monopolization and there are no bases for canceling of tender. The CEO of Sirius concern under control of Russian Technologies (owns 25% of stocks of ALTLinux) Leonid Ukhlinov agrees from the Ministry of Telecom and Mass Communications: now on money of the state only one of operating systems is created, nobody prevents other producers to propose to the market alternative solutions.

On September 16, 2011 CNews, based on information of sources in the industry reported that applications for an exit from RASPO are written by several more participating companies.

On October 7, 2011 it became known that RASPO at own will left three academic institutes at once: IPIS (Institute of Problems of Information Science), IPS (Institute of Programming Systems), SRISA (Institute of system researches) and the developer of processors of the Elbrus family the MCST company^[4].

The left RASPO, did not begin to explain the reasons of the solution publicly. So, the CEO of MCST Alexander Kim described motive of an exit from association "as lack of perspectives of presence at it". The head of ISP RAS academician Victor Ivannikov, having confirmed to CNews an exit of the scientific research institute from RASPO, did not begin to comment on its reasons too.

Hypothesis of a mass outcome from association the source close to events in RASPO stated CNews. According to him, an exit of many members from the organization was provoked by changes in the structure of the management of RASPO and the new policy of association.

According to the interlocutor of CNews, in board of RASPO the core of the affiliated business companies integrated by proximity to the former Minister of Communications Leonid Reiman was created: Pingwin Software (Dmitry Komissarov), ROSA (provided by Yulia Ovchinnikova) and "Мезон.ру", the Russian distributor of the French Mandriva belonging to Reiman (provided by Pavel Frolov). Recently their interests are supported by the head of Linuks Ink Leonid Soms and the representative of VNIINS Ilya Svirin who are also entering into board.

After formation of the "okoloreymanovsky" core which received the majority in board, RASPO became the tool for support of its commercial interests (for example, in tender on creation of prototypes of elements of a national software platform Penguin and VNIINS acted as "candidates of RASPO").

Pulling of a blanket not too is pleasant to participants of association who do not receive the benefit, and it is not pleasant at all to the academic organizations which wanted to see in RASPO not only club on mastering of budget money, but also the expert platform of the Russian community Open Source. Therefore when the president of RASPO academician of RAS Victor Ivannikov began to interfere with plans of the affiliated companies, it was replaced with the current head Andrey Korotkov (the first deputy minister Reyman in 2002-2003), and leaving association of all academic organizations turned out to be consequence of "domino effect", the interlocutor of CNews says.

2012: The development plan for Scientific Production Enterprise in 2012-2013

On May 17, 2012 the Russian Association of assistance to development of the open source (RASPO) submitted for discussion the action plan on project implementation of creation of the National software platform in 2012-13. It includes the offers designed to solve effectively the tasks set for Scientific Production Enterprise within the state program Information society and orders of the Government of the Russian Federation No. 2299-r about transition of federal executive authorities to the open source.

The plan transferred to RASPO to the Ministry of Telecom and Mass Communications of the Russian Federation includes 8 points. The association suggests to carry out Research and Development in such directions as:

• development of infrastructure and basic elements of Scientific Production Enterprise of production quality on the basis of prototypes of the information systems prepared in 2011;
• development of standards of Scientific Production Enterprise and means of automated verification of compliance to standards;
• development of set of the specialized application standard project solutions (SPS);
• development of a stack of program components for deployment of cloud platforms based on Open Source and also implementation of a row applied the Russian Labour Party in the form of cloud applicaions.

For the stimulation of producers of the free software and higher education institutions training specialists in the field of Open Source it is offered to select 50 grants for total amount not less than 750 million rubles.

Among measures of organizational character It should be noted training of government employees in work with a basic packet of Open Source and holding the regular actions directed to promoting of Open Source among the existing and potential users (exhibitions, conferences, round tables, publications in media, transfers on radio and television).

Producers of a computer hardware (domestic and foreign) it is recommended to oblige to equip the released devices with drivers for ensuring their work together with the systems of Scientific Production Enterprise.

As a result of implementation of this plan the Fund of algorithms and programs filled with working samples of basic system components (operating systems and the infrastructure systems), the main applications for needs of public authorities in the form of basic standard project solutions (document flow, budgeting, project management, the systems of collective work, processing system of citizens' appeals, etc.) and specialized application solutions for needs of OGV should be put into operation (ZAGS, Electronic ZhEK, Electronic municipality, Electronic school, "the electronic situational center for prevention of emergencies", etc.).

In May, 2012 according to RASPO, prototypes of operating systems, database management systems, development environments and assemblies of the software and also a set of the application solutions ready for inclusion in the structure of Scientific Production Enterprise were submitted within the Svyaz-Expokomm 2012 exhibition at the RASPO stand.

2015

In July, 2015 the president of "Russian Association of the Open Source" (RAOS) selects Bush Sergey — the director of lab321 group. Sergey has more than 25 years' experience of management of difficult applied IT projects and more than 10-year work experience in staff of different Russian banks (Otkrytiye, Sobinbank, Plus-Bank, Compatriots). In particular, Sergey Bush held a post of the vice president of the corporate block in Otkrytiye bank, directed department of marketing, analytics and technologies.

Attraction in the structure of RASPO of final customers and consumers of Open Source will become the main priority of work at the present stage, the new format of interaction of all Open Source community thereby will be provided. The basic principles and the ideas of a new format are recorded in "Manifesto RASPO 2.0".

Not only representatives of the IT sector (as it was earlier), but also users of Open Source from business should be a part of the updated association, told in association. Members of RASPO will get access to regularly updated list of the verified professional participants of the market of Open Source developers, integrators, SaaS providers, consultants and training centers. They will be given an opportunity to develop solutions of the tasks in community same (on the industry, tasks, etc.) consumers. Besides, members of association will get access to service of express consultations by forces of the Russian and international Open Source communities — i.e. to Hot line on problems flowing Open Source projects and on all questions connected with an ecosystem of Open Source in general. Also will provide to members of association methodological support, prototyping of solutions, comparison of alternatives (including on the basis of the proprietary software) and also access to the advanced practicians and comparative industry figures of use on the market.

Thus, Open Source community as "collective vendor" will have in Russia an official representation capable to guarantee to representatives of business results of work and also to provide professional support and consulting, emphasized in RASPO.

In turn, the representatives of the IT sector who joined RASPO will receive direct contact with business customers and active work of RASPO of their attraction and also an opportunity to develop solutions for the customers as a part of uniform Open Source community and separate communities on specialization.

Besides, for the solution of applied tasks of members of association, prototyping and ensuring activity of the working groups under the auspices of RASPO creation specialized Open Source Laboratory and "the Russian Fund Open Source" is planned.

2016

since January, 2016 RASPO is reformatted in Fonda of business development on Open Source 2.0^[5]

Notes