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."
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?
All roads lead to Linux!
Good to see they're giving up bad software for lent.
ThunderBird. Nuff said.
Veni, Vidi, Vici
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
...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!"
...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.
"The only intuitive interface is the nipple. Everything else is learned."
-Steve Jobs
(OK it was actually Bruce Ediger that said that, but Steve Jobs sounds better)
Very interesting.
Then we really could call non Linux users heretics.
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.
Surprisingly, whenever an icon was added to the desktop there was an outbreak of confusion and mass hysteria, and more training was required.
/. 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.
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
But to the normal user, a new icon is a terrifying thing. "OH MY GOD, IT IS DIFFERENT!" is a standard reaction.
- - - - - - - - - - -
I am a programmer. I am paid to produce syntax not grammar. Deal with 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.
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.
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.
All roads now lead to Linux??
Cyde Weys Musings - Scrutinizing the inscrutable