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If Software Is Funded from a Public Source, Its Code Should Be Open Source

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Re: If Software Is Funded from a Public Source, Its Code Should Be Open Source

#151

Post by jsymolon »

Consultant32452 wrote: post #53
ianwalter wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, open source IRS software. Tax breaks for bug fixes!

What do I get for sending in a malformed e-file that breaks the mainframe? There's some REALLY old code in the IRS processing systems and it would surprise me if any of it stood up to modern security designs. Also, you don't want to reveal how you determine who to audit.

> who to audit.

Doesn't have to be complicated, pull 10% of the "simple" forms, 90% of complicated.

Simple forms would be the 1040EZ, 1040s w/ std deductions & no other "business" forms.

Re: If Software Is Funded from a Public Source, Its Code Should Be Open Source

#152

Post by natechols »

m0zg wrote: post #146
analog31 wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It should just be a giant function: def foo(**kwargs): return how_much_you_owe

It really should be a provably unambiguous ruleset that would take in the person's circumstances and numbers and spit out a number, yes. I understand that your post is a joke, but that'd be an _awesome_ thing to have for everyone, especially if coupled with some adversarial tech to find and close loopholes. Which is, ironically, why this isn't going to happen.

I've always assumed that Intuit lobbying alone will be sufficient to kill this idea.

Re: If Software Is Funded from a Public Source, Its Code Should Be Open Source

#154

Post by m0zg »

natechols wrote: post #152
m0zg wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really should be a provably unambiguous ruleset that would take in the person's circumstances and numbers and spit out a number, yes. I understand that your post is a joke, but that'd be an _awesome_ thing to have for everyone, especially if coupled with some adversarial tech to find and close loopholes. Which is, ironically, why this isn't going to happen.

I've always assumed that Intuit lobbying alone will be sufficient to kill this idea.

I think Intuit is just a scapegoat in this case. Incomprehensible tax code is a rich environment for corruption.

Re: If Software Is Funded from a Public Source, Its Code Should Be Open Source

#156

Post by coryrc »

unreal37 wrote: post #105

An unpopular opinion I guess, but the article is saying if you receive government funding, it should be open source. That's more than just government employees making code. It's also any company, individual or agency that even accepts $1 of public grant money or any external contracts. We're talking about hundreds of thousands of coders who's daily job is partially funded by the government having to push their code p…

Yes, you should need to make it open source. There's no reason to have a different backend for every town in the USA; less work for you to do and less money to be spent redundantly.

Re: If Software Is Funded from a Public Source, Its Code Should Be Open Source

#157

Post by Wowfunhappy »

GlenTheMachine wrote: post #143
Wowfunhappy wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The bigger problem, though, is that much of the US government just isn't technically set up to release software (as opposed to documents). Setting up a git repository, in the DoD, is an utter nightmare. Every single patch has to be pushed through a public release process that can take weeks or months and involves review by as many as ten to fifteen different offices, few if any of which even know anything about sof…

When we do release code, that's more or less how it works. The issue is that, basically 100% of the time, anything being released to the public has to go through a release process. If you produced it as an employee of one agency (eg the Air Force), but if was paid for by a different agency (eg DARPA), then it also needs to go through a similar release process on the sponsoring agency's side. Typically, this has to ha…

It doesn't strike me as a huge loss to society if source code updates are only released, say, once per year. It's not ideal but it's not terrible either.

(Of course, if the updates aren't happening at all because of opaque internal procedures, that's a different story.)

Re: If Software Is Funded from a Public Source, Its Code Should Be Open Source

#158

Post by logfromblammo »

m0zg wrote: post #146
analog31 wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It should just be a giant function: def foo(**kwargs): return how_much_you_owe

It really should be a provably unambiguous ruleset that would take in the person's circumstances and numbers and spit out a number, yes. I understand that your post is a joke, but that'd be an _awesome_ thing to have for everyone, especially if coupled with some adversarial tech to find and close loopholes. Which is, ironically, why this isn't going to happen.

This might work:

  x = gross_income / median_income;
  if( x
Math.ln() is the log function for base e, and Math.li() is the logarithmic integral function.

The constants are based on the income at 50 times the median income having a marginal tax rate of 50%, and the median income having a marginal tax rate of 0%. Marginal tax rates above 50% asymptotically approach 100%. There are no loopholes or exemptions.

If the median income is $32k, and you earned $31k, your tax is zero. Your only obligation is to report your gross income honestly, so that the median income is calculated accurately for next year. If your income is $96k, your x = 3.0, your y = 0.1656, so your tax is $15.9k . If your income is $1.6M, your x = 50, your y = 18.74, so your tax is $600k . If your income is $32M, your x = 1000, your y = 657.5, and your tax = $21M.

The only effective ways to reduce your tax would be to reduce your income (as reported) or raise the nationwide median income, such as by paying your lowest-paid workers more in the previous year.

Seems fair to me.

Re: If Software Is Funded from a Public Source, Its Code Should Be Open Source

#159

Post by vharuck »

staplers wrote: post #64
jamessantiago wrote: post #50

At the very least publically funded code should be open between government departments. There seems to be a lot of internally developed work that is unnecessarily replicated or lost just due to having no obligation or available resources to share or collaborate. Maybe there needs to be some system in place to have some sort of internal NDA or need to know check, but this seems like a good first step.

You're assuming government code even uses proper documentation or version control..

It's easier to justify these practices when they have the real payout of reducing duplication.

Re: If Software Is Funded from a Public Source, Its Code Should Be Open Source

#160

Post by lowercased »

kemiller2002 wrote: post #125
ar_lan wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to work in a state government job as a student intern, and they said they wanted an internal directory for some various tasks. You can think of it like an inventory manager sort of website, purely on our intranet. The mad lad my lead was, said we would need a database for retaining some of the basic data we needed to keep track of. Nothing all that special, just a few tables, and by nature nothing sensitive wo…

I used to be a contractor and worked on a web application distributed across multiple web servers. We needed a state server at the time to hold some cached information and share it among the servers. Now there was a rule that said a web server was not directly allowed to communicate with the database. Okay I get it, that makes sense. The state server we were going to use to store some application metadata had the wor…

I'm having to switch CentOS servers over to RHEL servers because... support(?)

Some state work got in trouble a few years back because they'd updated guidelines that no applications could be on the same machine as a database server. Enforced separation, for security. Having enough staff and management to distribute that message to people dealing with the apps and servers didn't seem to be a requirement, however. And... when I was given this mandate, I had to ask for another server, then told there weren't any available, and I'd have to wait for several weeks, and I probably should shut down the current service (which had run for 3 years this way, well before the guidelines were in place).

Navigating govt IT stuff is crazy. About half the people I've encountered are between competent and really talented, and the other half don't understand the basics.

FWIW, if the web server can't communicate 'directly' with a database... what process do you use to communicate between them? Some sort of proxy? Or something else?

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