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Australia, China and Snowboard Shops Use Linux
Miscellaneous stories about Linux usage today: the Australian government has allowed (but not required) its agencies to switch to Linux. China is apparently going to go all-Linux for the 2008 Olympic games in Beijing. And business2.com has a story about chain of snowboarding shops (and other businesses) deploying Linux cash registers and desktops.
Linux being adopted in more places isn't necessarily a victory. If it performs badly, they will just switch back to Windows or UNIX. I hope, really, that they have decided on Linux because they believe it's the best tool for the job, and not simply to cut costs or to rebel against Microsoft. If Linux is the right tool for the job, only then is it really a victory. I would be cautiously optimistic about Linux being used on more and more places.
Ironic, considering the Chinese government's stance as a champion of the repression of independent belief systems...
... because announcing "we will go Linux" if your quite visible, causes Microsoft to fly in Steve Ballmer to give an offer you can't refuse. Just like Telstra.
This sort of coverage is great news,
I've been going around trying to convince my clients that Linux is a viable corporate alternative ( see here) and every story avocating its use for political (free speech), environmental (recycling and making those old 386s usable again), societal (adding value to people in third-world countries) and technological (A Globally Wide pool of people with diverse ideas rather than those in Redmond) as well as valid business reasons (increases profitability, adds value, reduces costs, etc) make the Linux argument even stronger.
We need more of the "I switched to Linux because it was good for my business model" rather than "I switched cos Microsoft was mean and horrible to me so I took my ball and went to another park" because mean and 'orrible Microsoft will just replace the usual suspects with new friendly (and more insidious) faces and rebrand themselves as the NEW microsoft and pull those customers back in again (Hey look they said they were sorry and I can go back to the park again).
Action
I just gave a linux presentation to a partner vendor company of ours yesterday. The one thing you have to remember is that neither one our companies produces commercial software. Both of our business's are in the manufacturing areana. We showed them our manufacturing terminals running kde and our custom applications and needless to say they where shocked at the simplicity and capabilities. The only thing they cared about was the incredible way it brings computing everywhere at a very low cost. Being a manufacturing company it allows us to expand our computing environment at little cost. During a rough economy this allows us to take deep product cost cuts to take business from our competitors. The use of linux is a competitive advantage, plain and simple.
Got Code?
Is that a yes or a no? It's hard to tell. I'd have to guess by your qualification of "the majority of cases" that it's a *yes.*
.well, no time at all actually. Not to mention the fact that if it's "abandoned" * it still works.*
.that "feature" kinda goes "Poof," don't it?
.and it works! Hell, if they stopped "maintaining" it it could even be a boon because now you'ld have a working and *long term stable* product.
Nor were we contextually discussing the majority of cases so I'm left to assume you took this as an opportunity to make your point irrespective of the topic, per se.
I can tell you for sure that if I were a Chinese government agency the idea of running propriatary American code would spook the living bejeezus out of me. I'd also put forth as a hypothesis that * the government of China* has a peck of programer power at its beck and call. Just as an educated guess mind you.
There are crack programers beyond the American shores. Linus is a Finn. Alan Cox is English. The two most obvious cases that come to mind.
The Chinese developed the A-bomb, H-bomb and ICBM's all without American aid at all. I'd hazard they've got a person or two who can manage to find their way around in postgres and Abiword. I'd wager even their lowliest "steno pool girls" could manage to whack out a memo in vi. Just because it's become culturally "de riguer" in Santa Monica to pass "meet me for lunch" notes as PowerPoint presentations doesn't mean the whole world works to those standards.
Governments are one of the *prime* "customers" for which having source is more often a valuable feature than otherwise.
As for point of sale systems that, oddly enough, is a field I've actually worked in. Point of Sales systems are almost *invariably* developed in house, either as a propriatary product for resale to vendors, or by the vendors themselves. One of the reasons MS has begun it's "shared code" program is directly due to the demand from such developers for code access. Point of Sale systems have been one of the fields that open source OS's have made the greatest inroads into specifically because of the availability of code down to the lowest level. Developers of Point of Sales systems aren't "abandoned" of support. It's *their* code. What worries them most is being dicked around by *their OS supplier.* What's more, those vendors that buy their Point of Sale systems from a developer almost invariably * demand source* as part of the sales contract to protect themselves in case the supplier goes under.
Point of Sales was perhaps the worst example you could have chosen.
Now the fact of the matter is that I don't give a hoot about actually having the source code to vim personally. I guess this is "the majority of cases" you're talking about.
On the other hand, because vim *is* open source and uses open formats for its output * it doesn't matter a hoot to me* if the developers "abandon" it. Transfering my data to a new "vendors" product takes. .
You see, most of the time people suffer when a code maintainer has abandoned them is *because* the code and it's file formats are propriatary!
Ironically in my own businesses I've more often suffered *because* the code maintainer of a propriatary bit of software kit continued to "develop" it.
Trust me on this one. I know. If you're running your *own* small business and the cost of your software being "maintained" by a propriatary vendor is coming out of your *own* pocket instead of going to food on your table you become really, really aware of the "feature" that Open Source software offers.
emacs doesn't break. emacs writes perfectly good internal memos and business letters. I've never had an ascii text file rejected because someone couldn't open it under their OS. ascii doesn't change its "file format" every three years to force me to buy a new text processor. If I need a "feature" in emacs I can either add it myself or have one of my people do it ( I hire smart people). If I need something fancier than plain text emacs produces nifty HTML and XHTML.
Just one download and I had all my text processing needs taken care of, essentially, forever!
I rather fancy the government of China has considered *these very issues.*
What is the number one "feature" most people claim for MS Office. Why, that it shares files with . . . MS Office.
Well, if you are a government, and you have the power of fiat to declare yourself MS free. .
All of a sudden Kword looks mighty tasty. .
But then, as you have the grace to admit in your closing, you weren't talking about facts anyway. Now were you?
KFG