
The benefits of migrating Gov.uk Pay’s codebase to the Gov.uk Design System - joelanman
https://gdstechnology.blog.gov.uk/2018/12/21/the-benefits-of-migrating-gov-uk-pays-codebase-to-the-gov-uk-design-system/
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fredley
GOV.UK really is a testament to what you can achieve when you inhouse and
centralise provision of Government IT based on Open Source principles, instead
of different departments outsourcing different bits to different agencies with
no real unifying system (what we had before, and still have in some areas of
Government).

For those who are unfamiliar, GOV.UK's mission is twofold: to provide a set of
standards for Government IT services - so in theory no Government IT service
can be deployed without signoff from GDS - and a set of tools they build
themselves that provide a platform to deliver Government services really
easily - e.g. GOV.UK Notify provides a single service for sending texts and
emails from Government services, so that every department doesn't need to
build their own (slightly different) implementation.

It's a huge win for citizens and a massive cost-saving overall for Government.
Sadly there are always those who will attempt to tear it down (because they
want to use IBM X or Microsoft Y, perhaps because their friend's Christmas
bonus depends on it, but more likely because the organisational changes
required to think of your department as providing a service to people, rather
than requiring them to do things for you is too great).

Bravo GDS team for another step in the right direction.

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K0nserv
[http://gov.uk](http://gov.uk) and other UK government websites that has had
involvement from GDS(Government Digital Services) are some of the best
websites I've seen. They are lightweight, to the point, accessible and still
look good. If the whole web was more like UK government sites I'd be very
happy.

Cool tidbit: gov.uk only loads a single third party script(GA)

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noelwelsh
Gov.uk is, in my experience, really really good. I find the design clean, the
functionality easy to use, and the text clearly written. I'm currently setting
up a business in the US and the contrast to US government websites is very
apparent.

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Bucephalus355
Similar effort underway by the USDS in the United States.

Really want to underline how cool the USDS are. They remind me of the Smoke
Jumpers who in the 30’s really helped build out the forest fire fighting
capability of the government in Montana. It was from that experience that the
D-Day invasion ultimately relied on with paratroopers. They are a real crack
squad that has survived now 2 totally different administrations so their
prospects seem high for the future.

[https://v2.designsystem.digital.gov/](https://v2.designsystem.digital.gov/)

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sns989
Want to correct that the U.S Web Design System was built by a USDS sister org,
18F under the GSA/Technology Transformation Services
[https://www.gsa.gov/about-us/organization/federal-
acquisitio...](https://www.gsa.gov/about-us/organization/federal-acquisition-
service/technology-transformation-services)

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mikekchar
I think one piece of context that's possibly missing from these GOV.UK stories
is how long the people involved have been working to get into the good
position they are in now. I remember going to a talk (probably at XPDay in
London) about 5 years ago and being impressed by the huge amount of
organisational work they had done already. They were saying that they were
expecting really good results in the years ahead, but that it was a massive
challenge to solve all of the people problems up front. If any of the GDS team
are reading, I'd love to see some more blog posts about how the non-technical
hurdles were overcome.

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maxxxxx
I wonder if they have long-time engineering and management staff. It seems to
me that a lot of government (and large enterprise) projects fail or are
inefficient because they get outsourced to some company that does the work but
the organization doesn't really learn anything. Every few years everything
starts from scratch.

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toyg
Yes, GDS have plenty of full-time employees - actual geeks, not just managers.

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maxxxxx
"not just managers."

That seems to be the real problem of orgs who do a lot of outsourcing. They
have a lot of managers who can't really judge the work and not enough experts.

