Innovation with Open Source: The New South Wales Judicial Commission experience. MyGOSSCON 2008. Mr. Murali Sagi Director, Information Management & Corporate Services, JUDICIAL COMMISSION OF NSW, SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA

1. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
Innovation with Open Source
Murali Sagi PSM
Director, Information Management and Corporate
Services
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2. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
Presentation Outline:
 Role of the Commission
 Critical business applications
 Why open source software?
 Lessons learned
 Key success factors
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3. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
Role of the Commission:
 Provide ongoing education for judicial
officers
 Assist courts achieve consistent sentences
 Examine complaints against judicial
officers
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4. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
Critical Business Applications:
 Judicial Information Research System
 Case Management System
 Offence Code Management System
 XML Publishing System
 Network Infrastructure
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5. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
Judicial Information Research System
 Over a 1000 users
 Web based application since 1994
 Over 450,000 legal documents
 Over 500,000 sentencing statistics
Software
 Linux/Apache/Postgresql/PHP with a custom
search engine written in-house
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6. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
Case Management System
 Operates in NSW District Court, Drug
Courts and currently being implemented in a
large government department for fine
enforcement
 First implemented in 2002
 Relational Database of 208 tables
 170,000 lines of PHP code
 Tested for case load of 2.5 million cases and
45 million financial transactions
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7. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
Case Management System Architecture
 Client/Web Browser
 Apache/PHP server
 Postgresql DB server
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8. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
Offence Code Management System
 Sector wide application used by Courts,
Police, DPP, Corrective Services, Legal Aid
and others
 Operates on Open Source Software since
June 2006
 Relational Database of 50 tables
 50,000 lines of code (J2EE)
 61,000 separate Offence Codes
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9. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
Offence Code Management System Architecture
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10. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
XML Publishing System
 Used to prepare Bench Books, Legislation
and Case Summaries
 Single Source
- All documents stores as XML
- Can convert to HTML, PDF, PostScript, RTF
- Uses XSL Style sheets for different outputs
 Software
- XML Mind XML Editor with DocBook DTD
- CVS – version control system 10

11. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
XML Publishing System Architecture
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12. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
Network Infrastructure
Authentication:
 Single Sign-on via LDAP/Samba
 User Information stored in Open LDAP Tree
Email Server:
 Postfix SMTP daemon
 Courier POP3/IMAP4 access
 IMP WebMail access
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13. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
Linux Servers:
 WWW/FTP/Email Server
 Print/Proxy/DNS Firewall/Intrusion Detection
 Samba Domain Server/CVS/File Server
 Database and Application
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14. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
Why open Source Software?
 Choice
 Value
 Quality
 Standards
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15. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
Lessons Learned
 Steep learning curve
 Require broad skill sets
 Availability of support
 Choice of vendors and hardware
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16. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
Key Success Factors
 Willingness to take risk
 Right mix of experienced and new workforce
 Creation of a learning and prototyping
environment
 Agile Development Methodology and Extreme
programming
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17. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
Conclusion
Using open source software in a business
environment is challenging but if you use it
appropriately it will deliver enormous benefits.
The Commission could not have achieved its
outstanding success with technology without
the flexibility and tools for innovation offered
by open source software.
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18. Judicial Commission of New South Wales
Questions
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