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."

Comments

Angling for free training

[southpolesammy]

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.

Re:I can't wait for the day

[FVK]

It may be sooner than we all imagine. There could be a turning point if MS doesn't get control of this virus and sucurity problem. I work for small business and home computer users, bottom of the barrel stuff maybe, but even on this level people are fed up with Windows and strongly considering OS X, if not Linux quite yet.

On a corporate level, if Linux is up to the task, and the myriad costs associated with Windows are more than the costs of switching and retraining on Linux, well... maybe I'm just dreaming.

Does anyone else think MS's future position seems less certain than ever?

Re:When in Rome

[RetroGeek]

Surprisingly, whenever an icon was added to the desktop there was an outbreak of confusion and mass hysteria, and more training was required.

Why is this surprising? Most users use a computer as a toaster, and mostly by rote. Imagine if tommorrow morning your toaster has a new lever on it labelled "PBT 1.0". What is PBT? It is Perfect Brown Toast. But did you KNOW that?

Most users are afraid of this thing called a computer. Here on /. we are comfortable using comnputers, but more importantly we are the curious and adventurous types. Changes do not faze us. We start a new program, without a manual, and can still get a pretty good feel of how to use it.

But to the normal user, a new icon is a terrifying thing. "OH MY GOD, IT IS DIFFERENT!" is a standard reaction.