The controversial tale of two KPU's tale
The controversial tale of two KPU's tale
Vishnu K. Mahmud, Contributor, Jakarta, vmahmud@yahoo.com
There was a little controversy a while back, when the Indonesian
General Election Committee or KPU (www.kpu.or.id) held an open
tender for bids to establish the Information Technology
infrastructure for the 2004 General Elections.
It was hoped that the election results could be sped up
electronically by "wiring" the provinces with computers for
efficient vote tallying.
However, according to ICT Watch (www.ictwatch.com), an
information and communications technology non-governmental
organization, the tender documents provoked many questions as
they seemed to favor a particular hardware and software brand.
The documents called for hardware solutions armed with 4 x
Itanium2 1.5 GHz processors, Smart Array 5i Plus controllers
and/or embedded Integrated Lights-Out (iLO) that support multiple
operating systems.
According to ICT Watch, only one hardware vendor in Indonesia
possesses these explicit specifications.
Of course, there are many ways to draft system requirements
for tenders -- although some organizations would simply draft the
business processes to be implemented and call for solutions from
professional IT consultants.
But they usually don't specify a particular hardware or
software solution since it is the bidder's job to provide the
client with an adequate solution, at the right price.
Take, for example, the system requirements of Virginia
Polytechnic Institute and State University (www.vt.edu) in the
U.S.
Virginia Tech (VT) wanted to create a supercomputer cluster
out of a large number of off-the-shelf computer components to
help attract lucrative research projects in areas such as quantum
chemistry, computational biochemistry and cell cycle modeling.
Yet, they lacked the budget of government or corporate
institutions, who spend tens of millions of U.S. dollars on
computer hardware.
By "clustering" personal computers together, Virginia Tech
hoped to have the processing power of a supercomputer at a
fraction of the cost.
VT had to consider the basic needs of the system, its goals
and effectiveness as well as the total cost of ownership --
including the potential location of the computers, cooling
systems, electricity costs, maintenance personnel and other
considerations for hosting a stable of computers to work together
as one.
They thought about what the supercomputer should be able to
do, instead of how. Speed and cost were the primary concerns for
the university and they did not choose a hardware or software
vender right off the bat as their choice had the potential to
skew the system requirements of the cluster, forcing the
university down costly proprietary paths without alternative
solutions.
After going through various hardware vendors, Virginia Tech
eventually found their solution: the Apple G5 (www.apple.com),
launched in September as the world's most powerful personal
computer.
They considered that the 64-bit G5 desktop computer had the
potential to form one of the world's most powerful supercomputer
clusters. They ordered 1,100 Dual processor G5 computers and have
since been installing and connecting the PCs into one giant
network.
VT's supercomputer cluster, unofficially called "Big Mac", is
expected to break into the top 10 of the top 500 supercomputers
in the world (www.top500.org). There are even reports that the
Big Mac is ranked third at 9.55 teraflops (trillion calculations
per second).
The faster supercomputer in the planet is Japan's Earth
Simulator, a monster of a machine consisting of 5,000 processors,
operating at 35.6 teraflops. Compared to Earth Simulator's hefty
US$350 million price tag, the 2,200 processor Big Mac is a
bargain at US$5.2 million.
The latest list of the top 500 is due to be released on Nov.
17 at the International Supercomputer Conference.
VT's open-ended requirements allowed the school to build a
powerful supercomputer using a computer system that others have
never even considered. Yet all their hard work may soon pay off
with an established respectable global ranking -- and profitable
research grants.
Looking back at the KPU tender process, which was recently
repeated, the hardware specifications may have locked out
potential vendors from offering quality solutions at a more
agreeable price. Questions also remain concerning the software
side.
In an open letter, I Made Wiryana (http://wiryana.pandu.org/),
a Linux advocate, lamented the KPU's decision to use proprietary
office software for their computers. Open Office
(www.openoffice.org) is widely known to be mostly compatible with
the world's leading (yet costly) productivity applications, with
an agreeable price (free).
Yet Wiryana notes that the software specifications called for
expensive office applications for the thousands of computers to
be set up around the nation.
It's a pity that other alternatives were not considered as
they may have saved the taxpayers a lot of money.