Slashdot Mirror
Rome Moving to Linux
fmstasi writes "La Repubblica, one of the main Italian newspapers, reports shortly about an interview (in Italian) with Mariella Gramaglia, Communication Councillor at the Municipality of Rome. They are planning to start soon trying Linux on the desktop: 'The first tests will concern e-mail, address book software and sharing systems', she says. The Councillor also says that motivations are political rather than economic: 'In the short term, the money saved on license will have to be spent on training'. It seems that there haven't been any reaction yet from Microsoft: 'At Microsoft they know how much we esteem them', she says; 'for example, they are sponsoring a campaign to spread the use of computers among the elderly. And we'll keep on cooperating with them on other projects'. Maybe Microsoft also appreciates that there is (yet) no project of migrating all the clients? The Municipality has about 9,500 clients, so an eventual migration project would be slightly smaller than the one taking place in Munich."
the link in the article is broken: this is the correct link
that some large organization moving to Linux on the desktop is not considered news anymore.
A horse will be appointed governer!
...
They are planning to start soon trying Linux on the desktop:
The subject would suggest that it has been chosen to switch to Linux, but as we can see they are just going to be 'trying it'. How many people have 'tried' switching and given up under pressure from Micro$oft?
print 'Hello world!';
http://compbrain.net
Don't expect to see this right away. After all, the Roman network wasn't built in a day.
(Sorry.)
tc>
Most Americans don't understand science, and they wouldn't like it if they did.
Hopefully we can shift London to where Rome was before and finally get some decent weather.
Avantslash - View Slashdot cleanly on your mobile phone.
Sounds more like they're trying to coerce Microsoft into giving them free training among other things. I'm not sold on their direction towards Linux based on the statements.
Rule #1 -- Politics always trumps technology.
I live in Rome, Georgia, and I have to say that everyone here is switching to Linux nonetheless. Well, not everyone, but my large list of friends. =)
It's a fact that things that piss us off, we do not like to continue to use. And well, you know how Italians are... Sorry Microsoft; better them use a different product than yours, than them holding a Godfather-shootout in your HQ in Redmond.
"Instant gratification takes too long." - Carrie Fisher
How long before the US government starts to notice how much foreign countries are saving with OSS?
The US government forgoing M$ would surely be the death knell of Micro$haft W1nbl0ws.
"Those of Microsoft know the esteem that we have for they"
"The Common one of Rome ahead slowly towards Linux"
Can you move from M$ to Linux and still kiss M$ ass in the same article??? For the first time I really noticed it in an article.
Evolution or ID?
Roman Gnome in Rome... right?
Are you Corn Fed?
Interesting notes such as "money saved on liscencing will have to be used on training. When will the linux desktop and desktops in general get to the point that they are so intuitive that training won't be requried? Judging by my own experience helping new computer users - not any time soon. While the interface may seem intuitive to you and me, to the complete computer newbie - it is still a challenging jungle.
"Science is about ego as much as it is about discovery and truth " - I said it, so sue me.
be a penguin!!
All roads lead to Linux!
When in Rome, do as the Romans do!
Hopefully I didn't put any [] around my words.
You know we are Italian :)
Good to see they're giving up bad software for lent.
ThunderBird. Nuff said.
Veni, Vidi, Vici
Seems to me the City is playing the "we're trying out Linux" card in as a means to publicly complain about Microsoft.
At Microsoft they know how much we esteem them.
Riiiiight. They "esteem them" enough to tell the media they are trying something else.
This has been a tactic tried and true by other customers - it gets Redmond back to the bargaining table, to knock thier bid down a few euros, just as long as they send Tux away.
The problem with socialism is that they always run out of other people's money. - Margaret Thatcher
When I first read the slashdot writeup, I thought, "So, the Roman Catholic Church is taking a political stance againce Microsoft. This should be interesting."
:P
I guess it's because I was just reading about Gibson's The Passion (which the Vatican seems to like, despite it being horrifically violent), and seeing this happen would be really quite funny.
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
Why is Munich the frame of reference for Linux on the Desktop when the region of Extremadura (Spain) moved 80,000 desktops to Linux nearly 2 years before Munich even announced its intentions?
More time should be spent on understanding how they did it and why they have had such good results. The move has been an incredible success with copies of Linex (the debian-based distribution they created) being given away when you buy the newspaper.
And schools have transitioned to it. The key, I believe, was localization. They switch the name of openwriter to "Cervantes", the famous Spanish writer, author of Don Quijote. They did the same for all of the applications and streamlined the installation to a process that makes it dead easy for anybody to install it.
Finally, the government is subsidizing the use of linux in rural areas for first-time computer buyers by paying for a chuck of a linux-compatible computer.
So why isn't this being talked about is the greatest mistery to me. Linux is on thousands of government, school and private desktops today. And it works!
Pragmatism as an ideology is not particularly pragmatic in the long term. Keep it in mind when you dismiss Free Software
Ummm, duh, is the Pope a Linux user?
After reading the article, those involved are being quite realistic about this test. They are investigating changes for political reasons, but they also expect long term monetary savings.
From the article: (emphasis mine)
This is good for the viability of Linux on the desktop. Object studies of using Linux for desktop machines will highlight weaknesses that can be addressed.
the_crowbarHave you read the Moderator Guidelines
Arise oppressed masses, cast off your start button of enslavement, GOD IS WITH US!
Rome didn't switch to Linux in a day, ya know!
FLR
The Italians I know use thise same tactic with women.
They tell the women they are with how much they love and adore them while they are working a deal with some other woman.
Evolution or ID?
...Roman guards, under orders from Lineius Torvalds, seized Billus Gates as he camped outside the city. Formal charges are yet to be announced, but already crowds of Linux zealots are picketting the courthouse with signs that read "Penguify Him!"
Largo, Florida (400), Munich, Germany (14,000); Extremadura, Spain (80,000); Thailand (up to one million subsidized PCs to low income people, with 160,000 already shipped) and Rome now. Do you see a trend here? Massive deployments are taking place, mostly in the public sector, I think Linux has a bright future as the main option for tax funded massive deployments.
now we'll have Roman Catholic Zealots join forces with the Linux Zealots?
...the Huns, Visigoths, and Vandals are running XP. It is said that some of these barbarians are running Windows For Workgroups, but that is just too horrible to believe.
Then we really could call non Linux users heretics.
While I suppose, it is good for the people, when the government uses free software, I am afraid that the free software developers might become dependent on The Government.
Wired had a short article on by Bruce Sterling: Wired News: Extremadura Measures: Linux
I'm using Linux in Rome, NY. So's my roommate.
We also have lots of Italians here, too.
I came. I saw. I Konqueror-ed.
Maybe because no one really cares for Extremadura, not even in Spain!
Did anybody else find themselves reading the article like they were practicing for a role on the Soprano's?
I didn't do it on purpose, but halfway through the article I thought to myself "Self, why are we reading with this ridiculous accent?" Crazy, huh?
> when the region of Extremadura (Spain) moved 80,000 desktops to Linux
Uh, maybe because it didn't happen?
(I'm not saying it didn't. Just that it stands to reason that if there really was a 80K Linux Desktop Deployment, we'd WOULD be hearing about it. Mailing out 80K CDs != moving 80K users to Linux)
Last I heard about the Extremadura deal, it took them 6 months to get Printing working.
A prominent cardinal enters the Pope's chambers with good news and bad news.
The good news, he tells the Pontiff, is that the Vatican has received an email from God himself!
The bad news is that they've traced the IP address to an ISP in Salt Lake City, Utah.
You are in error. No-one is screaming. Thank you for your cooperation.
Speaking of confusion, why are all people getting upset about the violence in Gibson's movie when the whole Hollywood cinema industry glorifies violence in so many other movies?
Is it the specific context in which the violence occurs? My recolllection is that this part of the Bible deals with a lot of violence, including horrific methods of killing people...
Et tu, Mariella?
Here is another from LWN: LWN: Linux in Spain
It's pretty clear this is an (empty?) threat to get Microsoft to give them some deals.
Nothing to see here, no real migration in progress.
"Live Free or Die." Don't like it? Then keep out of the USA
I have no idea what you are referring to. But Linex is very much alive. You can download it here.
http://www.linex.org
And the distribution is actually very decent. I have also seen it widely used in schools.
Pragmatism as an ideology is not particularly pragmatic in the long term. Keep it in mind when you dismiss Free Software
Links:
Linex (their custom distro): http://www.linex.org/ (in Spanish); here's Google translation to English
Reprint of a Wash. Post article
a Wired article
The real question is why you, who appear passionately interested in this topic, have not provided any links with relevant background information.
I'm mildly curious, but the merely curious are lazy. Certainly I'm not sufficiently interested to sift through all the press releases and mailing list posts to actually find more than the first couple of nuggets of digestible information.
If you already know something about the project, you are much better placed than I to do a little background research. Go for it!
Miguel de Icaza has some interesting comments on the Extremadura deployment.
In fact, the success of LinEx is being so great that it inspired other spanish communities, so that in Andalucia they've got Guadalinex. In Malaga, Andalucia, there was recently an Open Source World conference. There, about 5000 copies were distributed. Further 100.000 copies of Guadalinex will de distributed in 2004. Free software is alive and well in Spain, thank you :) We didn't get the press because Ballmer didn't visit us to offer 90% discounts.
My journal. Mainly about freedom.
I submitted a number of stories about the project to Slashdot on this project and its implementation. It was never deemed newsworthy.
Pragmatism as an ideology is not particularly pragmatic in the long term. Keep it in mind when you dismiss Free Software
Quintus: People should know when they are conquered.
Gatesius: Would you, Quintus? Would I?
<insert witty linux comment here>
Et tu Linux?
I was hoping it was "Rome" meaning the seat of the Catholic faith. If the Vatican went Linux it'd be hard to call Linux users Commies.
So why isn't this being talked about is the greatest mistery to me. Linux is on thousands of government, school and private desktops today. And it works!
Because it not only had the interest of the nerds, it also had the interest of the clasic newsmedia. It was like a battle between Linux and Microsoft. Munich is also a larger and well known city. It holds the Octoberfest. If it were Madrid, then it would have been noticed. And sometimes newsstories just do not make it. The reason is that they were written or presented poorly.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
A rega nun ce famo pija per culo da sti quattro americani zozzoni, roma regna!
Seems like you're training them that if, when an icon appears on the desktop, that rather than just getting on and dealing with it, if they react with confusion and mass hysteria, they get a day off from their regular job for cushy training.
Rich
I was going to make this same point... Linux isn't the be-all-and-end-all of operating systems. For a lot of people, Windows simply does the job better/faster. Is it really that hard to accept the idea that people still using Windows aren't being "pressured" in some way by Microsoft? Maybe they just like Windows better! Deal with it!
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
Aha! Using the threat of a competitor to negotiate lower prices and/or better products/services: I remember something like this... wasn't it called "free competition"?
Eradicating or substituting MS completely is not an easy task (at the moment, maybe not even a possible one), but at least breaking its monopoly seems a target soon to be reached.
And this is really greater news than some PCs migrated to Linux!
...I'm all for more intuitive interfaces ;)
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Said Steve Ballmer, reeling from being penguined in the back.
It's no surprise--they are Socialists. It's good PR.
What an instructive discussion! To see what the rest of the world (but mainly Americans, I suppose) thinks of us Italians is really amusing! Mafia, sopranos, the Pope, ancient Romans... Lol & lol. (Think also about pizza, icecreams, spaghetti, Venezia, mandolino and "That's amore!" please). Sociological instructive, yes. About Linux in Municipality of Rome... well I hope it's true, but you know... we are in Italy. Maybe the son of my son will see it. Ciao bella.
I wonder what type of wm they will use for the desktop. ?
OH MY! Such an EGO! I'd tell you to go fuck yourself, but you seem to already be doing that.
That might well be true, if they had actually tried using something else. It's always amazed me how people will just refuse to even consider anything else than MS Office/Windows/IE/Outlook. If a menu is a different colour, it's a showstopper.
Because they installed Debian, which is not commercial. Like it or not, software procurement goes in the "business" section of the newspaper, and that section is mainly information about the successes and failures of companies in doing business. Munich gets reported because it is a deal with IBM and SuSE, so we hear about how these companies are being successful in the sector. Extremadura isn't a big success for any corporate entity (as far as I can tell), nor a particularly big failure for MicroSoft; it's a great success story for the region, but that's only regional news.
I personally think that it's a much better example of adoption of OSS; Extremadura is actually using the freedoms that RMS goes on about to change the things they don't find right about the software, rather than treating the software as proprietary software sold on reasonable terms. But this won't be interesting to the newspapers until somebody in Madrid notices that Extremadura has better IT on a smaller budget.
... OpenOffice.org is adding mouse gestures.
It seems to me that they are setting themselves up for disappointment, or they want to get MS to give them a discount on Exchange and Outlook..
No big deal: in Rome, they're used to this.
org.slashdot.post.SignatureNotFoundException: ewg
I think this is normal human behaviour and does not only apply to people's choices in computing. It starts with essential things like food: A lot of people often aggressively refuse to even try a little bit of a dish they don't know causing people to complain that they don't get a good Schnitzel with fries in Bangkog. Stupid ? Maybe. Human ? Very.
Well from the reviews I read, the people opposed to the degree of violence are saying that you lose the point of Christ's teachings (love for fellow man, compassion, etc. ) when you focus so completely on the gore and violence and not much else. Christ's suffering is just one piece of the puzzle.
Also, in my personal opinion, the manner in which the suffering is portrayed may be off. As awful as Jesus suffered, if we think back in ancient history on all the different travesties of torture and cruelty inflicted, I'm almost certain that others have suffered more physically than Jesus. To me, the worst suffering is psychological. If Jesus was God then he got to see how his ultimate insights and compassion that he shares with his most beloved creation (mankind) is thrown back at him with scorn and contempt. It's analogous to being tortured and killed by your own favorite child. If all the movie stresses is bloodshed, then the treatment of the suffering becomes shallow imho.
'Course I'm just commenting on what I've heard about it so far. I'll form my true opinion about the movie when I see it this weekend.
Happy people make bad consumers.
They switch the name of openwriter to "Cervantes", the famous Spanish writer, author of Don Quijote. They did the same for all of the applications and
I don't know about you, but I'd find it quite confusing if every application was named "Cervantes".
I read a lot about Extramadura, and it's only now you mention it that I realise what a huge disparity there has been.
I'm just guessing, but maybe it was because Extramadura was a victory for Free Software rather than a victory for Open Source. On the other hand, perhaps it was because nobody had ever heard of Extramadura (even me, and I've been living in Spain for two and half years).
I think it's maybe more the first reason then the second. Remember the excellent Chilean and Kenyan positioning papers that were so well written and made such a mockery of MS? It never received the same amount of attention either. Perhaps for the same reason many ignore RMS -- though I agree with them on that one.
Can't really put my finger on what I am trying to say exactly...
If/when the Feds move to Linux, you'd likely see state govs move to. Don't forget that a fair number of state offices exist to provide services "locally" that are paid for by the federal government. As such, much of their job is communicating with the feds, which means file formats, etc....
Now, it's also possible that some states are leading the way on this, especially as they've suffered more from budget issues lately. What we really are going to see is that it will both come down from the Feds and move up from local & state govs.
I don't think you should underestimate the impact of government as a customer/user base. They are one of the largest employers, nationally and in states. This would be a huge number of licenses for MS to lose.
But also...these people would start thinking about using at home what they have at work. And soon, it won't be just techies anymore. It'll be grassroots consumers. MS could keep their corporate licenses and still lose big, because they give volume discounts to those accounts. If they lose consumers, who don't get those discounts, they lose a larger revenue per license.
Because all the big distributions allow you to install LaTeX..
The Vatican using Linux and knowing there are Cardinals (wearing red skull caps) on staff to use it brings on a whole new meaning to "Red Hat Linux"
You may now groan.
It's about time we undo this. Why should we let some dubious "global economy" dictate our units of measure? We're happy with pounds, inches, feet, miles, pints & gallons!
see the commercial]
meaning something like esr could have said:
"The republic will not be dominated"
-- for undocumented cisco commands, take a peek @ dotu
Funny how people can be two-faced, isn't it? There seems to be some controversy about The Passion movie, with some saying it blames Jews for Christ's death...though Gibson (and the Catholic Church too) has repeatedly said it wasn't Jews, it was all of us. People rightly indicate that we shouldn't collectively judge the Jews...but somehow it's still fair game to assign the actions of some Catholics and try to assign them as the action of the whole Church?!? Please be more careful about making such associations.
the babelfish translation is horrible in some points. here are some corrections
Beginning from May, the free software will enter in Campidoglio
The Gramaglia city council member: "political Choice, not against Microsoft"
The municipality of Rome moves slowly towards Linux
"We want to give a contribution to the diversification"
by ALESSIO BALBI
ROME - "We clarify at once: we are not against Microsoft ". Mariella Gramaglia, city council member, appointed to the Communication, of the Municipality of Rome, wants to place in the just perspective what many see like the next slap arranged from the open source movement to Bill Gates and associates: beginning May, Linux will begin to replace Windows in the computers of the administration of Rome, placing Rome on the same road of Monaco and others that, in Europe and the world, have decided to entrust themselves to the free software.
A big hit for Linux and its supporters. And the risk of one ugly smack for the pockets and the image of Microsoft. But the Roman one is however only, for now, a cautious and gradual experiment: "the first tests will be on the e-mail, on the agenda software and on the data sharing", the Gramaglia city council member explains. Also, the forum and the newsgroup that the citizens use to communicate with the Municipality (through the Web portal) will be been involved in the experimentation.
Opening to Linux, the Campidoglio (=the house of Municipality) wants to supply its contribution to the debate on the diversification and the entry of new actors in the market of the software. "So far , ours can be defined one political choice", declares Gramaglia. A choice that, in this case, has met a bipartisan agreement: "the debate on the free software has been carried ahead from parliamentarians of the left, like senator Cortiana and the Folena member of parliament", explains the city council member. "But also in the right (and I think of minister Stanca) the importance of introducing open source in Public Administration is emphasized".
Political issues apart, passing from the proprietary software to free one would translate in a good saving of money for the community. "But this probably will happen only in the medium term", specifies Gramaglia. "In the short term, what it is saved on the licences is spent in the formation of the staff, that will have to learn to use the new instruments. There are 9500 employees, nowadays, that use the computers ".
Surely, for Microsoft, the perspective of losing the returns of the licences in an apparatus of these dimensions does not have to be pleasant. Someone is complaining? "Absolutely not", the city council member answers. "Those of Microsoft know the esteem that we have for them. As an example, they are the sponsors of a communal program for the computer science schooling of the elderly. And they will continue to collaborate with us on other plans ".
(26 February 2004)
Let's look the reasons not to switch to Linux:
If you look at all these problems, you can sum them all up into a single problem:
Linux isn't very well established on the desktop yet
But with every migration, this problems becomes smaller. With every migration more software is ported. With every migration, more people gain Linux knowledge and mindshare. With every migration others can just "copy" them with much less risks.
One niche after another, Windows will go and Linux will come. The 3d-modelling world already has switched to Linux on the desktop. Now it seems that government desktops are next.
And as I already said: With every migration, reasons not to switch to Linux diminish, so the whole thing snowballs until Linux dominates the niche (and in the long run all computing).
So I expect that a few pioneers like Munich and maybe one or 2 other big cities go from WinNT4 to Linux. When Windows 2000 is discontinued (IIRC about 2006 or 2007) a lot more will migrate to Linux and will be able to do so much faster because you can easier avoid mistakes when it has been done before and of course because lots of software is already ported. Then after Windows XP is killed (2010?), I'd expect the majority of government desktops to run Linux.
I knew Linux was good, but I didn't know it was a country now.
Wouldn't it be easier to bring Linux to Rome?
Mike van Lammeren
It will challenge your head, your brain, and your mind.
Arividerci Microsoft...
All roads now lead to Linux??
Cyde Weys Musings - Scrutinizing the inscrutable
Wikileaks, no DNS
In 2004 AD, Rome shall be saved from the invasion of the Borg by another type of birds: PENGUINS!
I'm sorry, the number you have dialed is an imaginary number. Please rotate your phone 90 degrees and dial again.
Steve Balmer must be getting some serious jet lag by now. Altough I bet hes damn glad he coughed up the cash for a private jet!
Rome using Linux eh? Just remember, when in Rome....
I think this is normal human behaviour and does not only apply to people's choices in computing.
It may look like NHB to you, but in my part of the world we call them "morons.
Cheers,
That's a great news, and im glad to see they are going to spend money in training, have you ever seen how people goes to work at such offices? they make everything like if they are robots themselves and if something breaks the routine is a drama. Also is funny, to see you fighting with Italian words...eh remember that Cristoforo Colombo was Italian.. Just people, dont be racist (as some post demonstrated) cause we dont have nothing to envy ;)
DIA is the force that fights various mafia clans (ndrangheta, cosa nostra and more recently the Albanian, Russian and Chinese mafia) in Italy.
We haven't publicised this much and we by no mean imply that they are using Linux, but they seem happy to receive these lessons :-)
Ms Gramaglia opened our LinuxDay Event last year and has been interested in the free software movement...
I feel like we should have a giant map with battle lines on it, and maybe some little plastic penguins marching across it.
"Germany is freed", "we've captured rome"
anyone want to photoshop a map?
Whoever marked this as off topic needs to get off the computer every once in awhile and actually read a book. I knew that and I'm in junior high.
When Rome, do as the penguins. Use Linux, it's the Appian way!
In the near future
A city moves to Linux: not news
A city moves to Windows: now THAT'S news.
If tits were wings it'd be flying around.
I'm with you there; but as a former boss of my mother used to say: There are two kinds of people in the world: assholes and super-assholes. The same applies to morons, I'm afraid. ;-)
Because there is nothing intuitive about working with a piece of hardware running software designed by another person.
Heck, there i nothing intuitive about dealing with other people, specially in today's diverse world.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
.... should be moderated as what they fear.
I was going to do so, because I am frankly tired of this behaviour, but better to make the point.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.