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Telstra To Put Linux On Desktop
StArSkY writes "The Australian has an article today outlining how Telstra, Australia's largest Telco, is switching to Linux and open source on the desktop. Their pilot has been quite successful, and improved stability has been noticed. On trial are Star Office, Gnome, Mozilla and Wyse. Spending AUD$1.5 Billion a year on IT, means Telstra using Open Source is a massive boost to Open Source developers and support professionals. Not mentioned in the Article is that Telstra also just Dumped IBM Global Services, and will be running IT in-house again! Telstra will be hiring Linux-savvy people I think..."
He was already here and obviously failed his mission.
No doubt there is also motivation by Ziggy Switkowski to keep improving their profit margins to make up for their low share value.
n sf /0/A315C020E468EDB5CA256BD1000FBBB6?OpenDocument
Telstra 1 Shares were offered around $3.60 (Australian), and peaked in late 1999 at $9.15 (Australian).
Telstra 2 Shares were offered at $7.40 (Australian) in late 1999, and are currently trading at just over $5.00 (Australian)
http://bulletin.ninemsn.com.au/bulletin/eddesk.
Share Info.
Hmm... I heard a whisper about this earlier, and there were suspicions earlier when I read the Financial Review and was told that they need to halve their IT spending.
I don't know if Telstra are doing this because of the benefits that Open Source could provide, or cause they've been told to save money.
I just hope that they get it right for once. They seem to have enough trouble with their Microsoft products.... (the school's system in South Australia -- run by Telstra -- was down for three hours due to the Blaster worm on Monday, as was a number of Telstra dialup and e-mail....)
This company's infrastructure is (going to be) made up of many different types of systems and platforms, each interoperating.
This is a win for everybody---well, except for HP-UX, which they're dropping.
The point is, each different type of system has filled an important niche. Linux for the thin client front-ends and the financial database, Solaris for the web server and for scalability, and Win?? for "the simple stuff." (Can you say "role reversal?")
Well, some of those specifics are off, as I need sleep. But I think I conveyed my general point here.
Duuuude... it's symbiosis... so beautiful, man...
Yep, I did some research, and found the article in the Financial Review. (mentioned in earlier post)
Telstra to Slash IT Bill in Half Interesting.
Not sure about telcos, but lots of universities use OSS heavily, and even a number of banks (with the proud exception of PestWhack) here in Australia are linux-friendly or at least non-linux-hostile.
Seems to me that the biggest sticks in the corporate mud for insisting on Microsoft are the Federal and State governments. I'm sure it's not because of the advice they're getting from their IT mavens.
SMH article about indian company that looks to get deal
Yay me!
Downloads from Linuxiso.org; also has pretty cheap "buy disk" links if you're on a modem. Also see Distrowatch.
lots of universities use OSS heavily
In my line of work I've had a lot of contact with universities, and I must say I've barely seen a whisper of open source usage. Perhaps there are small departments here and there who are getting into it, but if so I'm yet to see it. Good on them if they are, however.
a number of banks (with the proud exception of PestWhack) here in Australia are linux-friendly
I'll put my hand up to being a Westpac customer, and I must say that I've never had any problems using their online banking, either on Linux or Windows (using both Opera and Mozilla Firebird on both operating systems). I have heard of people having lots of problems trying to do online banking on Linux, but I can't say I've ever heard Westpac's name mentioned in conjunction with that. FWIW, I think that Westpac's online banking is quite good compared to that of its competitors.
the biggest sticks in the corporate mud for insisting on Microsoft are the Federal and State governments
This is a landscape that is changing quite rapidly in Australia. The South Australian government is actively trying to pass a bill mandating that all government departments use open source software in preference to Microsoft, et al, where practical. A number of other state governments, including Queensland and (I think) Victoria are watching the case with interest, and if it is a successful program, will more than likely move down the same path. I'm sure it won't be long before this sort of publicity reaches critical mass and other government and corporate entities start to take notice and make the shift.
Having said that, it wouldn't come as a surprise to me if I learned that MS, or other software companies with vested interests in government/big business, started offering financial incentives for these organisations not to switch over to open source...
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Telstra has outsourced their IT to IBM GSA which is jointly owned in Australia by Telstra, IBM and Lend Lease.
IBM Australia recently bought out Telstra and Lend Lease and so no IBM GSA is totally owned by IBM.
The outsourcing contract remains until 2007.
Telstra's parting with IBM GSA is probabely as much Telstra's decision as GSA's. I don't want to go into the history too much, but basically:
Telstra had a subsid. company named Advantra. Advantra was a SME outsourcer. IBM owned 1/3, Telstra owned 1/3.
IBM has a subsid SME outsourcer named IBM GSA. IBM owns 1/3, Telstra owns 1/3.
Both of these companies had a role in the support of Telstra desktops and resources. Things have changed. Advantra has since, after a name change, been integrated back into Telstra, after IBM dropping it's investment in the company. GSA has become a legacy problem for Telstra, who are looking to insource again. GSA is also looking to insource (as Telstra handles significant portions of GSA's services to customers).
It's just a cleaning up exercise.
Two quick points
First - I am also a Westpac customer and I have not had any major problem with Westpac's on-line banking. When I first tried, Mozilla wouldn't render a number of links along the navigation sidebar down the left - that has now been fixed. I also find that a number of browsers (Safari at least) don't quite render the column widths correctly when viewing all your accounts. Slight inconveniences but still a workable system.
Second - the South Australian Government is not actively trying to pass a bill mandating that all government departments use open source software in preference to Microsoft, et al, where practical. Rather the Australian Democrats have put forward a Bill giving preference to OSS (i.e. use OSS unless OSS will not perform the task you want done properly). This is being driven by a South Australian parliamentarian (can't remember his name). At a federal level Australian Democrat's senator Brian Greig is pushing for something similar.
I come from a LAN down under
Where the packets flow and routers chunder
As far as I am aware, if they do not re-distribute the changes they make in binary form, they are under no obligation to re-distribute changes in the source either.
Did anyone spend time to read the article?
Yeah, well - I have too, at work, at Telstra.
A couple of years back we were told we'd be fired if we were caught using linux on the desktop at work (I wasn't caught). Funny how things change.
Actually, given that it's likely to be internal use only, there's no legal requirement for them to contribute any of those source changes back. They're only required to distribut source for copies that go to external users.
On the other hand, it's very much to their advantage to contribute most of their source changes back to the community, if it gets folded back into the main source tree. When that happens, it means that they don't have to keep track of the changes when they upgrade versions of the software, and support on those changes will tend to get done by others.
Free Software: Like love, it grows best when given away.
Pssst. They haven't switched yet ;)
I'm a contractor to Telstra employed as Level 1 desktop support.
:P), but objectivity soon flies out the window with a subject people are passionate about.
;)
I think if Telstra roll out Linux/Citrix thin client environment to 85% of their desktops, they will need a massive training campaign to educate their workforce. (I am sure the difference to power users will be easily surmounted - let me continue)
When I ask 50% of Telstra employees to open windows explorer and go to the C drive, I receive a 10 second silence, and I then confirm they are in internet explorer. I ask them to go to help and about to check the version and they ask where the help menu is.
Non-IT Telstra staff have a standard bell curve of IT savvy, with the bulge about in the middle, being about the standard of my Mum who is a school administrator. I have made the suggestion to my team leader that Telstra really need a computer driving license module added to their internal e-learning intranet. There are plenty of basic computing skills that are non-existant in a large percentage of the workforce.
I cringe at the prospect of Telstra employees trying to migrate to a Linux desktop. Although I'm employed as L1, I reguarly do L2 and Lan admin work too. I have installed Linux on a few of my home PCs and played around with configuration stuff, but it's going to be a decent job to train me to the level of support I offer for Wintel. Apparently we have 2000 IT staff - that is a pretty big job.
All the desktop and file/mail/ras server and network support is done in house by Telstra employees or contractors. IBM GSA look after all of the host and web-based applications (there are 100s). I think Telstra aim to retire their fleet of netware fileservers and replace with win2K clusters as nw attached storage. Perhaps there is a linux NAS solution? I don't know about migrating all nt servers to 2k - this was touted in 2000 and T balked at the huge licensing fee. I think T have an exception to the retirement of MS support for NT.
I would be surprised if support of host/web applications would be migrated back to Telstra - I think Telstra is simply selling their share in IBM GSA but keeping the support contract.
As a level 1 contractor I get 21 bucks an hour. My electrician and other trade mates get 28 to 40 bucks an hour. It is a good, cosy job, but we miss out on some decent benefits given to permanents. It is definitely not a long term career move, but it looks good on my resume and I am regulary one of the top performers.
I understand negativity towards any large corporate with a monopoly, there are some valid concerns about performance of broadband and a monopoly et al (NB - I have nothing to win bigpond
Large companies take a long time to move, think of an aircraft carrier or an oil tanker
VMWare is a migration step, and a good one at that. There's nothing wrong with running VMWare in that role. For the migration step at Telestra, they will be running applications off of NT Terminal Server or Citrix.
What you miss is, that with these options, they are saying that it is more cost-beneficial to go with Linux, even if you have to support a bare-bones NT install as well. That's saying a lot.
Engineering and the Ultimate
You are incorrect. The GPL says that redistribution within an organization does not count as redistribution.
Engineering and the Ultimate
From the FAQ - http://www.fsf.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#GPLRequir eSourcePostedPublic
"The GPL does not require you to release your modified version. You are free to make modifications and use them privately, without ever releasing them. This applies to organizations (including companies), too; an organization can make a modified version and use it internally without ever releasing it outside the organization.
But if you release the modified version to the public in some way, the GPL requires you to make the modified source code available to the program's users, under the GPL.
Thus, the GPL gives permission to release the modified program in certain ways, and not in other ways; but the decision of whether to release it is up to you."
According to the authors of the license, "internally within an organization" does not count as distribution.
Engineering and the Ultimate