Los Angeles to Consider Open Source Software

lientz writes "According to an article at FederalComputerWeek, the city of Los Angeles is considering using Open Source software as a cost cutting measure. From the article: "...city officials could save $5.2 million by switching to OpenOffice... rather than purchasing a Microsoft Office product at $200 per license for 26,000 desktops. The savings would go to a special fund to hire more employees for the police department, a major focus for city officials right now, he added.""

Comments

Heh

[Anonymous Coward]

Now watch microsoft drop that price from 200$ to 10$....

I can just smell it on the air.

Re: Heh

[Black Parrot]

> Now watch microsoft drop that price from 200$ to 10$....

I don't know about that. I called a press conference and announced that I was going to play Doom instead of Age of Empires, and I didn't get one red cent out of the cheap bastards.

Re:Heh

[goon america]

No, just watch a swarm of Microsoft lobbyists descend upon the city, donating enough to local politicians to equal the amount they would save in the city budget by switching to Open Office. This solves the real problem for both parties, which for the politicos is not the city budget but the campaign budget, and for Microsoft is not profits but control.

Re:Heh

[hdparm]

Nope, this is what's in the air.

Re:Heh

[oskard]

I bet MS will just create another study explaining why Linux is, in reality, a more expensive alternative to Windows. Same thing with OpenOffice to Office.

I don't exactly buy it, but I can see how training and technical support are necessary yet costly in the work environment.

Re:Heh

[Rhone]

Except the whole TCO crap is not an issue for an office suite the way that it could be for an OS. No one needs high-priced experts to administer OpenOffice for them. It is a drop-in replacement for MS Office, as long as you don't need perfect compatibility with MS Office formats.

Re:Heh

[TheGavster]

Microsoft is really all about the profits. If you can get a million in sales with a quarter mill of lobby money, its a smart move. Of course, this goes for any business (even the not-evil ones)

Re: Heh

[Anonymous Coward]

Calling mom & dad down to the basement is not what I would describe as "calling a pres conference" :)

Re:Heh

[RWerp]

And as long as you don't mind fixing various bugs when upgrading from OO 1.1.2 to 1.1.3. I don't use OO myself (I typeset my reports/notes/articles in LaTeX, and create short notes in Abiword), but I heard many stories of funny errors in OO. Yes, you need a professional to implement OO in the office.

Re:Heh

[jacksonj04]

I disagree. A major plus for Office in corporate environments is the fact you can configure it easily through group policies. Unless OpenOffice has a similar system which mysteriously provides its own low-cost trained admins, then there will still be a hell of an admin cost.

Of course, the fact it doesn't also cost $200 a seat is a big pro for OO.

Re:Heh

[LordOfYourPants]

The following is a satirical account dealing with the use of having an open office specialist on staff to help install upgrades.

Bob (City Official): We've already saved millions with Open Office. Let's upgrade it from 1.1.2 to 1.1.3.

BillPro: You will need me to help you

Bob: Don't we just install it?

BillPro: No, it requires taking care of so many more subtle details than that. What it needs is a professional to implement.

Bob: OK, we will hire you for $60,000 to support our OO upgrades.

BillPro: That is fair.

Bob: Umm, this doc I had with a beautiful table... what happened to it? It isn't beautiful anymore!

BillPro: This was probably caused by the upgrade from 1.1.2 to 1.1.3.

Bob: Didn't I pay you to make sure things like this don't happen?

BillPro: I am investigating a solution by looking over the source code. That is the power of open source: I can find out what's wrong and fix it for the council.

Bob: Fantastic! We should give you a raise.

----------------------

From: BillPro
To:
Subject: Hey guys

Hey guys, anyone know why tables don't show up right in 1.1.3? They worked OK in 1.1.2.

----------------------

From: AngryMan
To:
Subject: re: Hey guys

Fix it yourself. You can see the source. If you want a faster fix, donate some money.

-----------------------

Bob: Have you been able to fix it yet?

BillPro: I have been working on it and the good news is that it will be fixed soon, but the bad news is that you will have to wait for the patch I "created" to be put in the next OO upgrade. Until then you'll need to sit tight until the fix is released.

Bob: Why did I hire you for this? I could have sat tight without you.

BillPro: Think of me as a comfort blanket when stuff doesn't work.

Re:Heh

[Master Bait]

When will those politicians learn to take Microsoft's money and then go right ahead and get open source software in spite?

Re:Heh

[FuzzyBad-Mofo]

This solves the real problem for both parties

What about the other party involved, you know, the one which pays taxes? This kind of action hurts society because the funds which would have gone to hire more police, etc. are now donations to be pocketed by politicians. Kind of reminds me of the Roman Empire.

Re:Heh

[Anonymous Coward]

$200 is nothing ... what do you think it will cost to retrain each of the 26,000 employees? Three hours each (VERY CONSERVATIVE) * 26,000 = 78,000 hours .. assume the average hourly wage is somewhere between $20 and $25 per hour, you're looking at $1.5M just to retrain - and that doesn't even take into account lost time (someone has to cover the shifts during retraining), lost productivity (you think they're going to be as fast on OO as on MS Office for the first few weeks/months/years?), and lost backward compatibility (how many foxpro databases are laying around in legacy systems that OO won't open correctly?).

Re:Heh

[canuck57]

Now watch microsoft drop that price from 200$ to 10$.

And Microsoft security will put feet on the street...

Maybe Microsoft will offer the mayor a stock option...

Re:Heh

[morcego]

I beg to disagree.

Yes, your view is somewhat correct, but simplist.

Just because you are selling 1Mil doesn't mean you are profiting 1Mil.

Considering how much Microsoft spends on marketing, lobbing, lawsuits, employees, failed products, I would say their profit margin is around 20% tops (maybe not even that much).

So, to break using a quarte mil on lobby, they would have to sell at least 1Mil AND a quarter. Of course, that would still be good business, since they would not be loosing and money, and would be able to collect the real profit down the line, by maintaining market control.

I remember a particularly interesting case here in Brazil. The major bank around here (public bank) was looking to provide its customers with a given product. Two companies reached the end of the tests, Microsoft and another one. The product in question was Microsoft Money. The non-microsoft producted ended up being the best choice. So, what did Microsoft do ? Gave Money for free, thus winning.

It all ended up in court. Last time I checked, the other company was dropping the case, because Microsoft was able to push it so long they(the other) were running out of money.

Now, back to the subject, it is even possible Microsoft will be giving Office for free to LA, even tho USA laws are a bit more hard on things like this. Then again, who knows.

Re:Heh

[NanoGator]

"as long as you don't need perfect compatibility with MS Office formats."

That's actually the reason we didn't use OO at my previous job. It wasn't so much a problem adopting it internally, but we communicated with outside people as well. (This was two years ago, though. Not sure if it's still true today.)

TCO could actually matter in the case of "I spent too much time trying to make this work with another person."

Re:Heh

[Jason Earl]

Los Angeles is big enough that they can simply force people to switch. That's what really scares Microsoft. Microsoft knows that everyone has to deal with the government, if OpenOffice.org formats become de-facto government standards then MS Office is dead in the water.

Heck, a savvy politician could easily gain points by simply "giving away" OO.org CDs. A little rhetoric about open formats, "unprecedented public access to government files," and a reminder of the $5.2 million that is now being spent on police officers people and the switch could generate a lot of public approval.

Eventually Microsoft might even have to create OO.org import and export filters :).

Re: Heh

[Anonymous Coward]

Did you announce that you were going to play it on 26,000 machines?

Re:Heh

[HanB]

It all ended up in court. Last time I checked, the other company was dropping the case, because Microsoft was able to push it so long they(the other) were running out of money.

Typical. Ever since the Xbox it became so obvious that the only thing they do is trying to harm the fair chances of others.

If I could convince the CEO of such a company to stick with his initial decision. To make him realize that he's killing the only chance of having a fair competition with this stupid decision.

Next time there won't be no OpenOffice deal, next time there won't be no Open Source people. And guess what M$ will do when there is no competition... They'll make you pay double to make up for the last time you threatened to walk to the competition and it ``costed'' them so much money.

Re:Heh

[Monf]

Now watch microsoft drop that price from 200$ to 10$....

Nah, M$ will just send their "license enforcement" goons to city hall to ream as much money from LA as possible before they lose the business...

Re:Heh

[Anonymous Coward]

That's what the Chinese government did. They took 750 million from Gates, held a big press conference with him, and then went back to pushing Linux and oss.

Re:Heh

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem is that L.A has already done its own TCO study.

Re:Heh

[meyerj88]

I love competition. Microsoft Office is way too expensive. Maybe this will make them lower their prices.

Re:Heh

[arekq]

You are comparing cost for one seat of MS Office with cost for 26,000 seat of OpenOffice. Don't you think it's a little unfair?

It's about time...

[Anonymous Coward]

they understand it.
Cut costs on the Windows license too.

Negotiating Ploy?

[mordors9]

It just sounds like a good way to get M$ to lower their licensing fees.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[drakethegreat]

Still its hard to compete with $0 dollars cause you just have to download OpenOffice. Its not like a word processor requires any support. I've never seen one fail and they aren't complicated to use. So what does microsoft have to offer with a payed product?

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[mordors9]

The general acceptance by the world as THE office suite? Most school systems use MS Office for teaching students, so the possible employee base is more likely to be familiar with it than OpenOffice. And no I am not a MS fan, I use Slack for my home desktop. But you have to accept reality, while hoping it changes.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[fiddlesticks]

> Its not like a word processor requires any
> support. I've never seen one fail

hmm..

*me remembers trying to run star office a few years ago*
*me thinks about Word on Macs*

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[britneys 9th husband]

And 99% of those employees probably aren't doing anything all that complicated with their word processor anyway. Offer a half day training session on OpenOffice, give everyone a quick reference card or something on "how to do common MS Office tasks in OpenOffice", and you're done. Then offer more advanced training to the 1% that need it.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[DanThe1Man]

Would the be useing the "Good Cop" or "Bad Cop" Negotiating Ploy?

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[trewornan]

I downloaded, installed and started using OpenOffice without the slightest difficulty, I can't understand why anybody who can use Word would need training to use swriter. When you first start you might spend a few seconds here and there looking for a particular menu item but it's trivial and it takes no time to get accustomed to the minor difference. As far as I can see this BS about training costs is just that.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[Grax]

I think the preferred solution would be to provide a large donation to the OpenOffice project. They could still save $4.2 million per year and the $1 million would be good for the project and buy valuable development time they could use to implement any features they needed for their environment.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[TykeClone]

It's LA...

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[EnronHaliburton2004]

Its not like a word processor requires any support

"Where's the grammar checker?"

I dare say, the grammar checker is the one thing that keeps me on MS Office. Fixing my stupid wording wording mistakes as i type along is incredibly valuable. Spell check is great, but I really want the grammar checker also.

It's so transparent in Word (And it works in Outlook 2003 now) that most people barely even notice it, and would really start to miss it when it is gone.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[Detritus]

I've seen Word fail on occasion, things like crashing, corrupted output files that can't be read the next time you need to edit the file, formatting that disappears or goes berserk. I've read many horror stories from people who try to use it for large and complex documents. Then there are the people who use OLE and VBA to automate processes.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[dustmite]

I've seen Word crash often. In particular Word (2000, I'm not sure about newer versions) used to have hundreds of problems when working with master documents. In fact, it just didn't work, it was so horribly broken, they'd obviously pushed it out the door incomplete.

The main reason Word needs support is because it's bad, not because word processors inherently need a lot of support.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[magefile]

As a sibling of the parent noted, why not donate some (say, one million dollars) to the Open Office organization as a bounty for adding certain features - including, perhaps, a grammar checker.

Or we could fix this friggin' educational system of ours so we don't *rely* on the damn thing.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[Requiem Aristos]

Yes, but you actually /looked/ for the missing menu item. Most of your average users will see that the option they want is missing, and will sit there waving their flippers like a thalidomide baby until they get a half hour retraining session for that one option.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[Lehk228]

sit there waving their flippers like a thalidomide baby

Can I steal that line?

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[zootm]

If you're posting on Slashdot, you've already set yourself as a level above the technical competence of the "problem" cases here.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[EnronHaliburton2004]

Or we could fix this friggin' educational system of ours so we don't *rely* on the damn thing.

Couldn't you say the same thing about word processors in general? Nobody *needs* a word processor. People just need to learn how to write correctly and legibly.

I use a word processor and grammar checker because it makes my life easier. That's what computers are supposed to do.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[Detritus]

For any word processor, there will always be questions like "how do I do X?", where X isn't in the manual or obvious. Which brings up the question of manuals. I recently upgraded to Office 2004. I got a pretty box and a CD. No manuals, paper or electronic, were included. I can't remember the last time that Microsoft provided manuals with Office.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[xenocide2]

So then, how Did Microsoft Office end up defeating WordPerfect?

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[killjoe]

That's so cool. The idea that open source software will hurt the profitability of Microsofts monopoly products is the beauty of market forces at work.

Unfortunately for MS this relentless downward pressure on their profitibility is not going to end and indeed will increase with time.

Their stock price is already pretty much stagnant so I see no good reason for anybody to invest in MS stock if they are interested in growth.

All around bad news for MS which means good news for everybody else.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[Anonymous Coward]

See but I don't understand the bullshit story "oh, the schools only teach this word processor over here..." What bullshit. When I started using computers, there was a word processor that came with the Vic20. I learned how to use it in about 5 minutes. I've used 20 different word processors since then (and even more text editors). They all work 90% the same. The first three weeks are highly productive. It's only the really obscure stuff that you have to actually look up. OpenOffice is more than 99% 'the same' in keystrokes and functionality. Saying 'oh, in order to write a sentance you need to use a Ticonderoga number 5 pencil, otherwise nouns aren't nouns and verbs aren't verbs is (bullshit). Why do people keep parading this sort of crap around? Oh, you completely have to relearn how to even get out of bed in the morning if you use a different word processor, cause its all different" : bullshit!

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[trewornan]

Word's "grammar checker" is appalling.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[Anonymous Coward]

I clicked on your sig and got this. Might want to address this...

"Either your network or ip address has been banned from Slashdot ...due to script flooding that originated from your network or ip address -- or this IP might have been used to post comments designed to break web browser rendering. Or you crawled us with a rude robot, especially one that doesn't understand RFCs very well.

blah blah blah.. just keeps rambling on from there, but I think you get the point.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[slam smith]

I think the better question is how did WordPerfect manage to lose to Microsoft.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[legirons]

"Most school systems use MS Office for teaching students"

Things like that change as if blown by the wind. The lifecycle of a "school software" fashion isn't even as long as most people spend learning it.

It must be only 14 years now since I was taught a RM (research machines') desktop publishing system on an early PC, which was eerily similar to programs on the BBC-B which we'd used previously.

A couple of years after that, we were using software on the Archimedes A3000 computers, which had its own word-processor software (and a lot of freeware and shareware - popular magazines were still printing source-code in each issue)

Different labs at that school were just getting PCs, but since it was MS-DOS 5, we were actually using databases and word-processors written by a teacher in our school, since commercial software was either not available, or not usable.

At home we were using Ami Pro, the best word processor available. In fact I remember being marked-down on an exam question asking "what's the key to initiate a spellcheck" because the examiner had assumed WordPerfect for DOS, and I had assumed Ami Pro for Windows 3.11

After school, I left for the "real world", and got a job somewhere they were using WordPerfect. The macro system was a mess on that program, but they were replacing it with Microsoft Word systems.

At university, MS-Word seemed to be the standard, until we tried to group-edit a 200-page thesis on "university standard" old machines, and couldn't write more than a page before it locked-up in protest at the document size. On the first project we perservered, cursing Word all the time. On the second project, we discovered LaTeX (the real standard for university word-processing)

Now I'm working again and we use Word. But it seems like every sensible company is converting to OpenOffice. And presumably once AbiWord gains features, it will succeed OpenOffice (because it's ground-up Free Software, as opposed to a late conversion, so inherantly better technically)

Could you have said even 10 years ago what word-processor I'd be using today? Why even care what's being taught in schools? (and conversely, why should schools care what's currently being used in industry)

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[Jondor]

Don't know about the rest of the world, but around here (the Netherlands) office was installed for free on every new computer. Well, we didn't hear about that one before uh? Of course the fact that WP's windows version sucked big time didn't help either. Especially since windows, yes you guessed it, was free with every new pc..;-)

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[AvantLegion]

>> Couldn't you say the same thing about word processors in general? Nobody *needs* a word processor. People just need to learn how to write correctly and legibly.

Stupid argument of the day!

So you can write on a piece of paper and make that one page magically go to multiple people? No, step away from the Xerox machine, you don't *need* that.

Word processing is about a hell of a lot more than just legible writing. It's about making a data document and all of the flexibility that allows. A data document can be copied without limit. It can be edited without re-writing the whole thing over again (documents can be dynamic things instead of static things that have to be tossed out when change occurs). It can be searched in seconds.

I mean, did you even *think* before posting?

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[Zeinfeld]

Still its hard to compete with $0 dollars cause you just have to download OpenOffice. Its not like a word processor requires any support. I've never seen one fail and they aren't complicated to use. So what does microsoft have to offer with a payed product?

I remember when we used to pay $2000 for a word processor that didn't do a tenth what Open Office does.

Most people only use a fraction of the power of Word, but if you need functionality where OpenOffice is 'not quite there yet' $200 a seat to get it is small change.

The real TCO calculation has to be in terms of user's time. If my company tried to get us to switch from Office then the departments would simply declare UDI from the IT dept and buy it themselves. It costs $200 per day to keep the lowest paid office staff on premises. In addition their salary, stock options and benefits you have the cost of the building etc.

The bottom line is that if it takes Suzie in accounts a week to work out open office then I have lost a lot of money on the deal. If Suzie needs to call the support desk or get someone to help same thing.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[Rob_Bryerton]

The cynic in me would like to agree wholeheartedly with you. Even if this is only a negotiating ploy, it's still overall a good thing IMO. In the end, Microsoft will profit less, all the while spreading the word (or introducing people to the existence) of OSS.

Note that I have no problem with Microsoft making money; it just seems like using their software (and the ensuing upgrade treadmill) in a Gov setting seems fiscally irresposible, not to even mention the security implications.... but I digress

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[morcego]

So then, how Did Microsoft Office end up defeating WordPerfect?

I would say the WordPerfect (for Windows) managed to defeat itself.

Same with OS/2. After all, IBM was selling PCs with Windows. Talk about coordination. And yes, I was working for IBM at the time, and saw it happen.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[mpe]

And 99% of those employees probably aren't doing anything all that complicated with their word processor anyway. Offer a half day training session on OpenOffice, give everyone a quick reference card or something on "how to do common MS Office tasks in OpenOffice", and you're done.

Would these people get even this much training switching between different versions of MS Office. There is no single entity called "MS Office" any more than there is a single entity called "MS Windows". That's before you consider corporate branding and customisation.
Odds on a sizable proportion of that 99% wouldn't know "how to do common MS Office tasks" in the first place. For whatever set of "common tasks" you cared to choose.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[mpe]

Yes, but you actually /looked/ for the missing menu item. Most of your average users will see that the option they want is missing, and will sit there waving their flippers like a thalidomide baby until they get a half hour retraining session for that one option.

Unless they are all using MS Office 97 under Windows 9x or NT4 they are likely to be doing this all of the time anyway. Due to the "feature" of the system rearranging menus Microsoft came up with.
Let alone that the menus and toolbars in MS Office have been reconfigurable for quite a while.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Every now and again I turn Word's grammar checker back on for a few seconds, just for a laugh. To date, it has picked up precisely zero grammatical errors in my writing, and approximately 10,000,000 false positives.

(Incidentally, was that repeated word intentional as an example of the sort of silly mistake you find the grammar checker picks up for you? If not, then I will grant that you might find it useful...)

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[Anonymous Coward]

But you have to accept reality, while hoping it changes.

How is it supposed to change, if you accept it?

Perhaps you really mean that you're willing to put up with it until someone else changes it for you?

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[dustmite]

My own opinion is that most functionality in Word that isn't obvious is again because of bad design, and that a well-designed word processor again wouldn't require nearly as much investment in support/training because people would just naturally find it easier to use. A lot of features in MS Office are in really stupid un-obvious places or work in really stupid un-obvious ways. The problem is not that manuals are required, the problem is bad design. I think we've all just gotten used to thinking this is "how things are" though, that features are inherently in stupid un-obvious places in a word processor, that Word is somehow the "optimal layout" and "can't get better" and that it is us that just need to learn how to use it, and so we spend tonnes on training people to learn these "dumb" interface layouts and systems. There is so much room for improvement in Word in terms of making things more obvious it's just not funny. But because we're all so used to Word, we regard this as "normal", yet it only takes a little imagination to start thinking how much better things could be when using Word.

OpenOffice is no better. It makes me angry that they've seemingly tried to copy every bad idea that Microsoft had. "Feature X in Excel is retarded? Oh sure we'll copy it exactly, so it's just as retarded in OO". I suppose they do it though so that peoples existing investments in training (themselves, their employees, etc.) on how to do things in Office is transferrable to OO. In other words, everyone on the planet has now learned a particular dumb way of accessing feature X, so it's now a case of any new software having to adapt to where people have learned in their Office courses feature X will be.

Very few people question why things are they way they are ... they just want to learn how to do it, and whatever you tell them is the way to do it, they accept that as normal, and memorize it or write it down. If someone asks you e.g. "how do I send a Word document to someone via e-mail, and you tell them that you first do three handstands and then click there and there and there, they'll just blindly write it down and assume this is perfectly normal computer design, that sending documents must just inherently require handstands, and they'll do the handstands every time. OK, that's an exaggerated example, replace handstands with "long unnecessary overly-complex method on the computer", and the point is true in general.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[berzerke]

...Most of your average users will see that the option they want is missing, and will sit there waving their flippers like a thalidomide baby until they get a half hour retraining session for that one option...

I kid you not. I once had a user sit and stare at a black monitor for about 4 hours before saying anything. Didn't do any work during that time of course. Problem: She didn't push the on button in enough to click and power on the monitor. Sadly, she was later made a supervisor.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[dmneoblade]

I converted a 37-year-old hardcore Microsoft guy to Open Office this morning. Took me 2 minutes. Open Source: Yeah, its just that good.

Re:Negotiating Ploy?

[Anonymous Coward]

I've done this experiment more then once: Get a "semi-novice" computer user, (someone who knows a little bit of MS Windows and MS Office) Put then in front of Linux/Gnome and OpenOffice. They can't tell it's not Windows. Most users have to "hunt" around the menu system of MS Office to find things so they don't notice slight differences.

I'll bet they could switch all 26,000 desktops and only 1/2 the employees would notice.

Maybe now

[Kipsaysso]

They can consider how much money they are wasting on Microsoft OS's to.

Or maybe that one is a little further out.

OpenOffice Access

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm just glad they can use the Open Source version of Access to work with their MDBs. What's it called again?

Re:OpenOffice Access

[fmobus]

Well, they can now try a real RDBMS, like... like... oh wait

Re:OpenOffice Access

[Anonymous Coward]

I seriously doubt a government entity would depend on something as flimsy as an Access MDB file.

While it may be great for keeping track of your cd collection real applications are written with real databases.

Re:OpenOffice Access

[Espectr0]

I'm just glad they can use the Open Source version of Access to work with their MDBs. What's it called again?

Rekall

Re:OpenOffice Access

[cttforsale]

It's called
1. make your Access database an ODBC datasource.
2. Start any Open Office app and click Tools--->Data sources.

This is under MS Windows, which is what they're still using....

I know. Certainly not a replacement. But it is there...

Re:OpenOffice Access

[ptlis]

Er... Open Office Base perhaps? Included in the OO.o 2 preview releases it seems to be an Access-like front-end for a real RDMS, none of the built-in access bullshit which dies if there are greater than 5 concurrent connections to it.

Re:OpenOffice Access

[Anonymous Coward]

OpenOffice 2.0 (in beta very very soon), has a built in database application that will automatically allow folks to access (hah!) their access database information directly. The forms aren't brought over, but it's child's play to recreate them. The interface is incredibly easy to use.

And since the interface is very "access like", newer projects could easily be done in the new "Base" module with very little in the way of retraining.

Re:OpenOffice Access

[mpe]

I seriously doubt a government entity would depend on something as flimsy as an Access MDB file.

I wouldn't be suprised if plenty of organisations do "bet the farm" on all sorts of questionable things. Including MS Access, Office Macros, etc. Most likely justified as "the proper thing will be done sometime in the future."

While it may be great for keeping track of your cd collection real applications are written with real databases.

When it comes to proprietary software vendors all bets are off. If they can make money selling junk they will sell junk (with an EULA forbidding reverse engineering or telling anyone else anything the vendor dosn't want said about their product).

Re:OpenOffice Access

[aztracker1]

haven't tried it, but if it works with say sqlite as a built-in datasource (inside the jar/zip package), could be a drop-in replacement for access...

Typical tactic

[null etc.]

This is the typical tactic used by governments in order to get Microsoft running back to their doorsteps, courting them with low prices.

There's nothing to see here, move along.

Re:Typical tactic

[bkzitalsux]

This story ws covered on NPR last week (at least in the LA area). The reporter explained to the clueless what OSS was and the benefit of putting more cops on the street with the money saved. She then moved on talk about the "TCO" of going OSS, as if the status quo had none. Evidently coached (or brainwashed or funded) by MS or the reseller for the city.

I'd be amazed if LA were to switch. Pleased, but amazed.

Go LA!

[psamty]

Go LA!

Police is good

[Space_Soldier]

I would rather have more police officers than Microsoft Office licences. If the federal government did this, I wonder how many FBI agents, CIA agents, NSA agents, radiation-proof suits, and other goodies could be bought!

Re:Police is good

[killa62]

What I don't get is why the goverment didn't do this sooner... I mean, it's free, as opposed to 200 dollars, does the same things, and maybe has a little less support, but why in the world would the government buy overpriced microsoft products when comparable open source products are free?

Anyone have anything to share?

Re:Police is good

[Anonymous Coward]

switching to Linux & openoffice worked for me, i can afford many more rolls of tinfoil for making hats, and am working on tinfoil wallpaper too :^P

Re:Police is good

[wmspringer]

Three reasons:

1) People are familiar with MSOffice, so you don't have to train them on OO.o

2) People in charge assume that since MS is expensive and well-known, it must be better

3) OO.o doesn't make campaign contributions

Re:Police is good

[venicebeach]

Remember, these are Los Angeles police officers. Do you really want more of those?

Re:Police is good

[Neward Rylet]

What I don't get is why the goverment didn't do this sooner

Because it's the government.

Re:Police is good

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes. LA is seriously understaffed for a city of its size. That's one of the reasons for the attitude that some LAPD officers have that they need to hit first and hit harder to make up for the lack of numbers.

I would like to see more spent on better training, which might actually do something to fix some of the problems the LAPD has.

Re:Police is good

[Lehk228]

you...are...suprised that the government wastes money? you ust be new here*

*Here = planet earth and all of human history

Re:Police is good

[T-Ranger]

Training in the LAPD is the key. Gates (the LAPD one) has as much as admitted that the problems of the LAPD in the early 90s was its rapid expansion putting lots of new, poorly trained, officers on the street, led by only slightly more experienced and trained officers.

Re:Police is good

[GimliGloin]

I think the real question should be:

What the heck is the city doing with 26,000 desktops? Do city officials REALLY use word and excel THAT much? Are there THAT many administrative employees working?

GSG

Re:Police is good

[Anonymous Coward]

The mention of a 'special fund' shows that this decision is political, not driven by true cost-cutting.

Lets say they reduce the amount of costs in buying handguns - do they set that aside in a 'special fund'? They find a cheaper gas station - better put that in a special fund. Hey, they find recruits who will work for less money? Special fund!

[Yes, I'm an MS astroturfer]

The money is going to fund police?

[GNUALMAFUERTE]

- The government is the one that allows the existance of propietary software, and the first to damage Free Software (For example, with software patents).
- The government profits from Free Software
- Instead of giving part of that profit to HELP FREE SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT, it's given to other government-dependant institutions.

No intention to flame, but, how is this a good thing?

ALMAFUERTE

Re:The money is going to fund police?

[mabhatter654]

First, the State govt is not who deals with software patents and outrageous copyrights...although they have much more influence on the Feds than any OSS fans could ever hope for.

The real goal of govt "profits" for patents and such is to benifit the public...the State using OSS is a prime example of that technology comming back to benifit everybody. The state's interest is in benifiting people...not generating some kind of cash flow! If the state can do the same work with OSS and not have to pay a private company millions of dollars they can use that money for other things...again, the state's interest is in acomplishing the goals to help people [collect taxes, child support, protect environment, etc] It's a misguided history of the govt paying for everything from private companies to the exclusion of other voluanteer or public interest groups. The current administration's tendency to "outsource" everything under the sun demeans the true purpose of govenrment.

Re:The money is going to fund police?

[mattyrobinson69]

the use of open source software in large organisations (5.2M / 200 is a lot of licences) means 26000 people (thats a lot of people, did i work that out wrong) will get their first taste of free software, and perhaps some workers will think "hmmm, i'l get rid of that illegal copy of ms office at home and get open office since its legally free"

also, more mindshare = more developers

Re:The money is going to fund police?

[Anonymous Coward]

You're assuming that the use of software needs to result in "good". That's your problem.

This whole notion of free software being used for good is utter b*llsh*t. To bring up someone else's analogy, what are you going to do when a Linux-powered missile hits your house in World War 3?

There are lots of bad people using FOSS. On top of that, most institutions who support FOSS own the teams that contributed the core code. There is very little of this "global contribution" going on. It's a myth.

Re:The money is going to fund police?

[timmyf2371]

The Government as with any large organisation is always looking to save money and if those savings come as a result of saving the cost of an Office license over however many seats, then quite correctly they are right to reinvest the money into other Government departments.

A couple of important notes to remember are that:

1. This isn't profit - it's cost savings from a change of supplier.
2. Contrary to popular belief, the Government is not a charity and exists for the people as a whole.

Based on these notes, it would seem far wiser using all these cost savings to help the people as a whole rather than donating money to open source developers.

Re:The money is going to fund police?

[Monkelectric]

I don't live in LA -- but I live a couple counties away and as such am aware of a lot of the issues that go on there. The police department has been agressively seeking new funding. They recently proposed a half cent sales tax increase in LA county to fund new police officers. You can imagine how well that went. The police chief (whose name I cant recall ATM) spread a LOT of FUD about how people were going to die if they didn't pass this measure. I suspect this is actually the doings of a greedy police force.

Re:The money is going to fund police?

[gagol]

If I had money, I would fund you, no more war 3...

If I would be rich enough, I would bill everyone a good will bill, that everybody would be shure to follow. So Peace would become more thgan an idea, but idea it is.... and it should stay in our ear, so live with it people...

Yet another announcement

[bigtallmofo]

This is great that there's another announcement of a government agency considering OSS. Hopefully this one isn't a ploy to get cost concessions from Microsoft like so many other announcements apparently have been.

Re:Yet another announcement

[Kjella]

Of course it is. A basic intro to game theory.

Let's say the MS price is $50 mill, OO price $60 mill (including luser training, compatibility issue etc. etc. aka TCO).

If that was the case, why should MS give a rebate? They wouldn't.

Now let's the MS price is $50 mill, OO price $40 mill. Now they consider switching, MS comes in with a $35 mill offer.

The key words here are credible threat. To make concessions, Microsoft must believe the threat is credible. That means that the cost is actually lower. So it is rational for them to suggest it, rational for MS to make a counter-offer, and rational for them to accept it.

So don't worry. OO is closing in, and sooner or later the demanded cuts get too much for MS to accept. It is just a matter of time.

Kjella

Re:Yet another announcement

[mpe]

Now let's the MS price is $50 mill, OO price $40 mill. Now they consider switching, MS comes in with a $35 mill offer.

Microsoft then come up with some scam which means they get paid twice...

Re:Yet another announcement

[Jason Earl]

The more tricks that Microsoft tries to play, the better Free Software looks. In the long run if Microsoft plans to be competitive against Free Software projects like OpenOffice.org then it is going to have to spend more time making its customers happy and less time dipping its hands in their wallets.

If Los Angeles does decide to stick with MS Office then in two or three years time they are very likely to be in this exact same situation. The only difference will be that OO.org will be that much better. If Microsoft mistreats its customers now then the next round of upgrades will go very poorly for them. That's the best part about this situation. Free Software doesn't need hojillions of dollars in profits just to stay alive, Microsoft, on the other hand does. Microsoft has to convince its userbase to upgrade on a regular basis, or the company goes straight down the toilet.

as others have pointed out

[Raleel]

MS will lower their prices for the city gov't. there is no way they are paying full price. I'd be shocked if they payed more than $30 per license.

Macros

[tyleroar]

Gordon Haff, a senior analyst and IT adviser at Illuminata, said business value should be the main concern in transitioning to an open-source environment. "The decision-making for the state or local or federal government could be essentially the same as for a corporation," Haff said. "Does it save money when all the costs [are] taken into account? And that includes conversion costs, retraining costs, perhaps costs of getting and writing or converting software that doesn't run on an open-source platform."

That's a very good point. OpenOffice is great and all, but what if they have lots of macros written for the Office suite? Once OpenOffice has implemented compatibility with macros, there will be no reason to not switch. The other thing that occurred to me, is why do they feel like they have to upgrade? Why can't they stick with the version they have?

Re:Macros

[Anonymous Coward]

"Does it save money when all the costs [are] taken into account? And that includes conversion costs, retraining costs, perhaps costs of getting and writing or converting software that doesn't run on an open-source platform."

Those are one-off costs, as opposed to licensing proprietary software again and again. If you don't think it saves money when these costs are taken into account, you aren't looking at the right time frame.

Re:Macros

[toddbu]

"The other thing that occurred to me, is why do they feel like they have to upgrade?"

Hmmm, two things come to mind. #1 - For years, software vendors have been telling us that we need to update so that we get the latest and greatest features and for the most part we have bought into this theory whether it applies to us or not. #2 - Vulnerabilities in systems force them to be upgraded after their useful life expires. The definition of "useful life" is determined by the person who holds the code, unlike something like a car where the driver decides when to send it to the scrapyard.

Re:Macros

[Jeff DeMaagd]

The other thing that occurred to me, is why do they feel like they have to upgrade? Why can't they stick with the version they have?

One way software companies keep the "herd" in check is by introducing new features in such a way that it changes the file format, even if those features aren't used. That way, people that wouldn't otherwise upgrade would feel compelled to do so to read those files sent by people that own the new version.

Re:Macros

[killjoe]

Just because you find yourself locked into a vendor that does not mean you should just give up and bend over.

If these guys have locked themselves into office by using macros that's too bad. But they don't have to throw up their hands get reamed by MS every two years.

Re:Macros

[Stephen Samuel]

but what if they have lots of macros written for the Office suite?

Let's say that they hire 5 programmers solely to translate macros: That's -- what? $400K And when they're not translating macros, they can be producing new functionality.

why do they feel like they have to upgrade? Why can't they stick with the version they have?

Microsoft likes to push upgrades. Newer versions are vaguely (or noticably) incompatible with older version (the worst case was word 97 (or was it 95) which was downright hostile to older versions.) Because MS doesn't like to sell versions of Word other than the latest and greatest, once you start running into version inompatabilitis, your ownly real choice is to upgrade your current copies. The more copies you update, the more important it is to upgrade the rest of them..

Newer versions have new file formats and capabilities that don't work on the older versions. It also happens with Open Office, but updates for OO are free, so it's not a cost item. Micorosoft, on the other hand sometimes seems to take advantage of the process to push customers into the upgrade path.

Re:Macros

[Anonymous Coward]

OpenOffice does provide macro capabilities. There are some functoins that aren't 100%, but it's more than 95% compatible, with the last 5% needing 'tweaking'. As for 'Why can't they stick with the version they have?' This is Microsoft's forced upgrade. As Microsoft licences its software (it isn't sold: read their EULA), they 1. do not need to provide warranty. 2. can refuse to re-licence the software for another year. Microsoft hurds it's customers onto it's newer products by refusing to let then merely re-new it's licences. When Microsoft want's you to upgrade, you must (unless of course, you want to switch to something else...). They send the BSA shock troops (and lawyer) over to your company to ensure that you are in compliance of their licences, and all of their property (disks) are recovered. It's the Microsoft way!

Re:Macros

[Anonymous Coward]

This might surprise you but companies that provide open source solutions charge will charge over and over again, for upgrades and for support. Open source software does not mean "software that never versions". It's just a different development process that happens to be cheaper.

Re:Macros

[mpe]

Gordon Haff, a senior analyst and IT adviser at Illuminata, said business value should be the main concern in transitioning to an open-source environment. "The decision-making for the state or local or federal government could be essentially the same as for a corporation," Haff said. "Does it save money when all the costs [are] taken into account? And that includes conversion costs, retraining costs, perhaps costs of getting and writing or converting software that doesn't run on an open-source platform.">

These are issues with any change. The thing about Microsoft is that they like to enforce change according to what suits their timescale. So rather than comparing proprietary licence fees with "change costs". The actual comparison is more likely to be proprietary licence fees and multiple changes against one change.

Re:Macros

[Anonymous Coward]

How 'bout we just buy MS Office for the 3 people with the macros? 99.9% of M$ Oriface users don't use macros, you FUD-Troll.

Re:Macros

[idamaybrown]

In other words, it's their fault for using
more than the minimal basic features that
open office can emulate.

Re:Macros

[Anonymous Coward]

99.9% of M$ Oriface users don't use macros

ahhhh I just love made up stats like that.

Re:Macros

[killjoe]

In short yes. It's a mistake to treat documents as applications. Smart people and smart organizations know to save their documents in a non vendor specific format.

Re:Macros

[htd2]

That's a very good point. OpenOffice is great and all, but what if they have lots of macros written for the Office suite? Once OpenOffice has implemented compatibility with macros, there will be no reason to not switch. The other thing that occurred to me, is why do they feel like they have to upgrade? Why can't they stick with the version they have?

There are allready companies that will convert your MS-Office macros to StarOffice/OpenOffice macros as a one-time conversion.

This isn't always the answer because some of the MS-Macros use plugins that cannot be converted.

However a lot of the MS-Macros are unneccesary in OpenOffice/StarOffice this is because they are primarely aimed at taking data from some external source and stuffing it into a MS-Office formated file, typically word or excel. This is not really necessary in OO/SO because their XML file format allows you to do this directly without requiring macros.

As for versions, generally its support that drives upgrades these days in the windows space.

Re: You get what you pay for

[Black Parrot]

> Windows XP, Microsoft Office, and all the rest, these programs actually work.

Get an account, Bill.

Microsoft Response

[AfterSchoolSpecial]

"The savings would go to a special fund to hire more employees for the police department, a major focus for city officials right now."

Steve B. (Or Bill G.): "You see, open source makes you less safe and secure than windows products...oh wait...crap."

This is....

[Anonymous Coward]

awesome. Glad to see that at least some in the government in the United States is embracing lower costs. Of course, they won't give that back to the people, they will use it for other stuff!

VLK

[Anonymous Coward]

What the hell? Haven't any of these organizations heard of Microsoft's Volume Licensing program?

Re:VLK

[HermanAB]

Yeah, but you need a Microsoft Passport to access that site and the local passport office doesn't know what that is and can't find the Republic of Microsoft in the UN official list of countries either...

And a fine tactic it is.

[Noksagt]

The fact that Microsoft cowtows to tactics like this by lowering their prices gives legitimacy to OpenOffice.org. If MS didn't view F/OSS as a viable thread, they wouldn't lower prices--they'd pull strong-arm tactics and say "yeah--good luck with that. When your migration fails, you can come back and give us the same deal as we are proposing now."

Lowering prices not only validates OO.o as a useable alternative, but also proves that F/OSS is a truly disruptive technology--MS can't get away with charging what they want to anymore.

Re:And a fine tactic it is.

[n54]

Excellent point

And because it validates OO.o it also increases the chances OO.o will actually be chosen.

Re:And a fine tactic it is.

[behindspace]

I agree, OO.o was the best thing I ever migrated to. Everyong I know was acting like "you can't do that, you'll come crawling back to M$FT" I switched about 8 months ago, and have since converted my office, my friend who runs a computer shop (he now fully endorses OSS, and OO.o, Firefox, and Thunderbird come with all of his new computers, unless a customer wants to have M$Orafice and pay the $200+). The town of North Hampton NH is looking into the migration as well, same with the town of Methuen MA. sure, both these cities combined aren't even the size of a city block in LA, but still, it begins to prove the point that F/OSS does prove to be a powerful competitor to M$...

Re:And a fine tactic it is.

[GoofyBoy]

>The fact that Microsoft cowtows to tactics like this by lowering their prices gives legitimacy to OpenOffice.org.

The purchasers could have done this with any office suite. Its just that OO/OpenSource is the latest IT buzz word.

Purchasers were doing this before OO was around. And they do it in many different industries.

Writing up motions are nothing. Wake me up when they actually do something with OO.

Re:And a fine tactic it is.

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course FOSS is distruptive! It's illegal cloning with no culpable party. It's similar to saying "Los Angeles to reduce costs by only downloading ripped mp3s online instead of buying CDs."*

* understanding that most FOSS is cloneware.

Re:And a fine tactic it is.

[owlstead]

Or they will just wait until Open Office is dead, and continue to develop their product further. As long as people don't really switch, they will have the cloud to continue on. The problem would be solved if the government would make open standards (for the files as well as the scripting language) REQUIRED for companies to deliver a product. It's not so much the program they use, it's what they save it in. OO.o would not amount to anything if it could not read word, but MS is now patenting their document formats.

This is getting rediculous, my bank as well as my government is forcing me to use MS products, while at the same time sueing Microsoft for being a monopoly (EU). To sum it all up? Open Source: maybe; Open Standards: definately.

Re:And a fine tactic it is.

[jschoenberg]

You are assuming the end of the story is a cowtow. MS does not buckle under this threat, they never do. The sales story is actually fairly simple to make, if you compare OpenOffice to Office 2003. Even with cost as a factor...the transition to OpenOffice, the support of OpenOffice and the maintenance of OpenOffice all cost money.

Does anyone have a link to a reliable study that compares the maintenance cost of OpenOffice with MS Office?

Re:And a fine tactic it is.

[Jason Earl]

I don't know about maintenance costs, but the Dutch city of Haarlem switched 2000 desktops from Office 97 and came up with some pretty hard numbers on migrations costs: Here's the link.

And here's the relevant quote:

The city found its costs for training, development and migration to OpenOffice to be 50 000 euro, roughly 90% lower than its licence costs for an upgrade to Microsoft Office 2000.

Switching to OO.org clearly costs money, but so does upgrading to new versions of MS Office, and that's basically an ongoing cost.

Re:And a fine tactic it is.

[Noksagt]

MS does not buckle under this threat, they never do.

Yes. They

Even with cost as a factor...the transition to OpenOffice, the support of OpenOffice and the maintenance of OpenOffice all cost money.

As do the support and maintenance of MS Office. Retraining for switches might be a significant one-time cost, but then again there has also been historically signicant costs because MS Office has often been a vector for viruses and worms.

Does anyone have a link to a reliable study that compares the maintenance cost of OpenOffice with MS Office?

There are literally a ton of total cost of ownership studies out there. Some favor staying with MS. Others don't. It is complicated to accurately calculate. But most find the annual cost of running F/OSS is less than commercial software, not counting the transition costs. The real question then is how long you have to use a product that switching to it makes sense.

Re:And a fine tactic it is.

[jschoenberg]

Office 97? Office 2000? How about something with at least a comparison to one of the last two versions. However, I guess if you are using Office for basic word processing it makes sense to compare Open Office to Office 2000, since there is feature-parity between those two.

If you need business process automation rather than word processing, you'll have to pay for a license, even if it's Star Office.

Re:And a fine tactic it is.

[jschoenberg]

And features, to a certain extent. If they need business process automation, they'll need to look elsewhere than OSS. Even the OSS value-add vendors charge for this, while it is included as part of Office 2003 (Sharepoint, InfoPath, etc.). So comparing Openoffice to MS Office 2003 is probably unfair, because they are two different things.

If you are getting away with using Office 2000 right now, and don't have any need to improve upon that, then yes, it does make sense to use software that has the same features, but does not cost any money for the license.

However, if, in the future, you decide you need those features, then you will not likely find them in OSS, and you'll end up paying a license fee to someone anyway!

Re:And a fine tactic it is.

[Jason Earl]

Office 97? Office 2000? How about something with at least a comparison to one of the last two versions. However, I guess if you are using Office for basic word processing it makes sense to compare Open Office to Office 2000, since there is feature-parity between those two.

Why? Well over half of Microsoft's customers are still on these two versions of MS Office. OpenOffice.org isn't really competing with the newest versions of MS Office because those people have already spent their money.

If you need business process automation rather than word processing, you'll have to pay for a license, even if it's Star Office.

There is nothing inherent in MS Office that makes it a better fit for business process automation than OpenOffice.org. In fact, Microsoft generally pushes folks that want to use MS Office as part of a business automation process to upgrade to the more expensive "Enterprise Edition" of MS Office so they can use the fancy XML document types.

With OpenOffice.org you get XML document types by default and for free. Combine that with Zope (which handles OO.org formats natively, and has workflow support) and you are most of the way there (you just need some business rules). You certainly are farther along than someone who just has the standard version of MS Office.

Re:And a fine tactic it is.

[jschoenberg]

"There is nothing inherent in MS Office that makes it a better fit for business process automation than OpenOffice.org"

Wow, why don't you give me loaded shotgun while you're at it. If you think there is feature parity between Openoffice and Office 2003 then you obviously have not used the latter in an office environment. I don't know any OSS zealot that would agree with you. Most people admit there is a feature difference, but argue that companies don't need the features in Office 2003 (InfoPath, Sharepoint, etc.).

Re:And a fine tactic it is.

[Jason Earl]

Yes, InfoPath is pretty neat (of course it only comes with the Enterprise Edition and it requires a great deal of development work and piles of auxilary server software before it does anything actually useful).

You should take a look at some of the cool stuff being done with Zope and Plone before you assume that I have handed you such a loaded shotgun. SharePoint, InfoPath and all of the other new MS Office technologies are cool, but they are more along the lines of development tools than part of the MS Office suite. Either way, you can bet that the city of L.A. isn't using any of these tools, and the only way that they can afford them is to spend money that they currently are hoping to spend on police officers.

Re:And a fine tactic it is.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, the end of the story is a cowtow. That is what happened with Munich. It slashed its price by 30%, and still lost the contract. There are a lot of other cases where the same thing happened. MS has ordered its sales people in Europe to never lose a big sale, and lower prices however much is needed to win.

Re:And a fine tactic it is.

[jschoenberg]

Yeah, Zope is exactly what I'm talking about. It's good to see that business automation is a priority to OSS.

Actually, my most recent InfoPath form did not have any complex server requirement. I merely had the datasource connection for the InfoPath form be a Sharepoint list for retrieval, and a Sharepoint forms library for publishing. I sent the actual form file to my users, and when they clicked submit, bam, it showed up as an entry in the Sharepoint forms library.

But, very true, if you want to do really cool stuff, rather than just simple and quick stuff, you'd better get your manuals out or your checkbook out!

Re:And a fine tactic it is.

[Anonymous Coward]

I run OpenOffice.org on a livecd Knoppix remaster.
On one machine I have with a GB of ram, it would seem to run all day. Can't understand why everybody still sticks with hard drive installs. Can get in there and mess that up, but on a livecd, just start over. I'm just one of many, I'm sure, that are working on my own to create a useful (for me, anyway) knoppix remaster. Bound to be something in that, expecially for cities needing an inexpensive alternative to Windows XP.

Re:And a fine tactic it is.

[Jason Earl]

Thanks for the conversation. It allowed me to go back and take another look at SharePoint and take a closer look at InfoPath. I also appreciate the fact that you kept things civil. Clearly we both work with different toolkits, and I must admit that I gave you plenty of opportunity to "take things the wrong way."

I know that Microsoft has got some neat tools, but OpenOffice.org has the basic uses wrapped up pretty neatly and the licensing savings would buy the city of L.A. a lot of custom Zope programming :).

But TCO could still be high...

[wasted]

...due to costs associated with license administration and the risk of fines resulting from audits that find that the licenses were improperly administered. If it takes a bunch of man-hours to track the licenses and ensure compliance, the cost of those man-hours goes into the total cost of ownership. Those costs are avoided (usually) with free-as-in-beer software.

Or I could be wrong, and MS would grant a low-cost blanket license.

Re:But TCO could still be high...

[Anonymous Coward]

Doesn't matter... the administration will take credit for obtaining a massive concession from MS. It's not about saving money for them, it's about getting fame.

Re:But TCO could still be high...

[morcego]

That is what site licenses are for. Not to mention that Microsoft has some softwares to administer that. Which, of course, they charge for.

There are always more oportunities to keep people that are locked on a give archtecture giving you money.

Let's start spreading our own FUD

[britneys 9th husband]

What does a cop make, about 52k/year or so? We need to start fighting fire with fire. Here's the new FUD we can start spreading against Microsoft:

Through its licensing fee structure, Microsoft tried to take 100 police officers off the streets of Los Angeles.

Re:Let's start spreading our own FUD

[Anonymous Coward]

... that's for one year, if you estimate 5 years/ms upgrade you're looking at a stable increase of 20 cops.

Re:Let's start spreading our own FUD

[amliebsch]

Two FUDs don't make a truth.

Re:Let's start spreading our own FUD

[Anonymous Coward]

...And as a result African Americans in LA have never been safer.

Eh, sorry, I kid.

Re:Let's start spreading our own FUD

[Anonymous Coward]

Two FUDs don't make a truth.

FUD is more convincing than the truth. Why do you think so many PHBs swear by Microsoft?

Re:Let's start spreading our own FUD

[Anonymous Coward]

It is very CLEAR that the article poster doesn't agree with capitalism.

Re:Let's start spreading our own FUD

[SunPin]

Maybe not but people would more easily absorb "Microsoft licenses cost neighborhood police officers" and quickly extrapolate what proprietary software does to them and there children in real terms. People don't listen to technical arguments.

Re:Let's start spreading our own FUD

[Anonymous Coward]

What you just said is not FUD, it is a FACT and inline with FOSS mantra "No FUD, Just facts"

Re:Let's start spreading our own FUD

[Coneasfast]

Two FUDs don't make a truth.

no, but it makes you laugh.
it's suppose to be sarcastic.

Re:Let's start spreading our own FUD

[gagol]

That's what I want to ear... you people get on and move on. Get togheter for god sake...

Smaller communities would benefit most from OSS

[TykeClone]

I'm on the city council of a (very) small town, and because of that I'm on a mailing list for an Iowa municipal issues magaizine. This month they had an article in it about reducing Microsoft licensing costs - by using the state purchasing power. No mention of Open Office or any other competitors.

In Iowa, there are a few population centers, a few "larger towns", and many towns with low enough populations that they can run the entire municipal government with two or three employees. These are the kinds of places that don't have the built-in MS infrastructure and could migrate to OpenOffice fairly easily. Larger communities may have the infrastructure in place the makes it more difficult to migrate away from Microsoft.

Seeing headlines that LA is thinking about going open source is interesting, but there might be thousands of other communities in the country that could see a proportionally greater benefit from that software than LA would - but they'd never make the news.

Re:Smaller communities would benefit most from OSS

[westlake]

In Iowa, there are a few population centers, a few "larger towns", and many towns with low enough populations that they can run the entire municipal government with two or three employees. These are the kinds of places that don't have the built-in MS infrastructure and could migrate to OpenOffice fairly easily.

The small towns will stay with Microsoft.

They will see no reliable technical support, no significant training programs, no active, organized, open-source advocacy group within seventy-five miles.

Their full-time employees and senior volunteers will have been there since the dawn of time, with decades of experience in MSDOS and Windows. (Our village clerk retired after fifty-five years on the job.) The apps and customizations they need will be place, functioning pretty well, and, by general agreement, probably best left alone.

Re:Smaller communities would benefit most from OSS

[TykeClone]

I don't think that you'll see them dumping the windows OS, but I do think that OpenOffice would be a serious contender for the "standard" office suite in smaller communities. Communities like ours don't purchase multiple machines per year (we go multiple years per machine) and will typically just buy a system with the OEM Windows and Office installed. Ignoring office could be a good place to save money (at least during the year a new machine is purchased) that could just as well go to something else.

To be honest, we're not doing anything with OpenOffice (or anything else, really) at city hall - but we've not upgraded any of the city hardware since OpenOffice has been a viable alternative in the last couple of years.

Just like any other business, city government has inertia to software change caused by existing software - but I'm not sure that the office suite is as sticky in a small municipal situation as it would be in a corporate environment (where you do use Outlook with Exchange servers).

with 5.2 million..

[ThomasFlip]

you could hire people to make your own damn office sweet.

Re:with 5.2 million..

[Anonymous Coward]

what the hell is an office sweet? is that some kind of candy?

Re:with 5.2 million..

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a secretary.

Re:with 5.2 million..

[Anonymous Coward]

You are correct. Because they make a rustling noise when you unwrap them.

Re:with 5.2 million..

[Anonymous Coward]

Goddamn you're a fucking retard.

First off, you illiterate bastard, it's "suite", not "sweet".

Second, do you have any idea how much time and energy (and money) it takes to write a complete office suite? Obviously you don't, because 5.2 million is WAY TOO LOW.

Re:with 5.2 million..

[dustmite]

OK, 5.2 mil is definitely too low, that was rather naive, but the OP still has a point that you cannot deny: collectively, governments and corporations are paying so many tens of billions of $$ in Microsoft Office licensing fees that it would be possible, if only a fraction of those fees were diverted to a centralised managed fund instead, to develop an entirely new, better Office Suite in just a few years. The savings would be in the billions.

Re:with 5.2 million..

[Lehk228]

5.2 million is more than enough to develope an office suite for government use. it wouldn't have to be fancy or all that much more complex than a text editor with a few basic functions, using a simple xml scheme to store documents I bet one could be developed for 150K-200k (two programmers working full time for a year)

Re:with 5.2 million..

[mpe]

OK, 5.2 mil is definitely too low, that was rather naive, but the OP still has a point that you cannot deny: collectively, governments and corporations are paying so many tens of billions of $$ in Microsoft Office licensing fees that it would be possible, if only a fraction of those fees were diverted to a centralised managed fund instead, to develop an entirely new, better Office Suite in just a few years.

Actually most of the work would probably be along the lines of an administrative system to disable all the "features" which where not needed. Rather than adding much.

Re:You get what you pay for

[GNUALMAFUERTE]

I Shouldn't be replying to a troll, but here it goes anyway ...

Free Software is not about technical improvement. Free Software is about FREEDOM. We want to be able to use software without being held hostages by the "owner" of the software. If we can create a better alternative to propietary software in the way, then we will be happier, but if our software is worse than propietary alternatives, we will still use it, 'cause it's free.

ALMAFUERTE

disk space

[DrIdiot]

OpenOffice tends to be more hard disk friendly than MSOffice too. A 5 MB MSWord file is less than 1 MB when saved with OpenOffice. Think of all the money they could save on disk space as well!

Re:disk space

[Manchot]

This is because all OOo files are actually compressed ZIP files. Go ahead: try renaming an Ooo file to a .zip extension. You can unzip it, and even pull out the XML text of the file (a useful ability, might I add).

communism

[DrIdiot]

http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/01/14/162624 8&tid=109 Better watch out because L.A. is turning communist, according to Bill.

Re:communism

[voteforkerry78]

Communism works! isn't bill a right winger? (BTW, i changed my mind about kerry)

Re:communism

[Anonymous Coward]

If so, they'll justt send in the Governator after the local officials...

Pilot Program

[nurb432]

Lets hope this spreads among other states too.

We are tax payers, everyone write a NICE letter to their local representatives..

Forget the simple "replace Microsoft.. they suck" angle, this sort of move saves money..

Re:Pilot Program

[Anonymous Coward]

We are tax payers

I'm Al Capone, you insensitive clod!

Government that's working..

[tempest69]

Microsoft has been able to charge a huge amount based on a monopoly. Just the threat that they might need to fight a fair fight will make their price cave in.

I'm not sure that the city of LA really wants open office. Everybody's already trained and comfortable with MS office quirks. I'm betting that the cost of whining alone isnt worth the price break. But the threat is great, I bet that Redmond will cave.

M$ should peek and see if LA is really able to do this, letting them fall on their collective behind would be great marketing. But it would suck for the people of California.

> Storm

Re:Government that's working..

[Anonymous Coward]

Apparently you are not familiar with OpenOffice. The team have done a good job. It's more than 99.999% compatible (quirk for quirk) with Microsoft's word processor. I know at work they use Microsoft's stuff exclusively. Someone asked me how to do a particular function. I didn't know right off the top, but the day was at it's end anyway. I told them I would let them know the next day. I went home, looked up this obscure feature, including an example with a dozen other obscure features using OpenOffice. The next day I told them the example(keystroke for keystroke) how to do it. It worked *EXACTLY* the same on Microsofts stuff.

Re:Government that's working..

[HermanAB]

"Everybody's already trained and comfortable with MS office quirks." So what training do you need to use a word processor??? I know the world is full of stupid people, but damn...

Rekall Revealed

[reality-bytes]

I think you were meaning Rekall Revealed - the open-source (GPL) version of Rekall.

That's a great idea if......

[sammykrupa]

The people working with OpenOffice knew had to use it!

Cities

[cyberfunk2]

It really is nice to see gov. agencies considering solid open source software over costly, and sometimes dangerous stuff.

Wonder what the CIA/NSA uses?

Re:You get what you pay for

[EEBaum]

I gotta agree with you. This is why I eventually let my linux partition deteriorate and die. For a while it was fun, but I found myself falling behind on the maintenance. With all the other stuff I have going on, I simply don't have the time or effort to significantly investigate the workings of the OS, not to mention make it work like I want it to.

I've opted to have one less thing to talk about with great knowledge in computer circles, and I haven't really minded.

The problem, I think, is that open source software wants to have its cake and eat it too. It often goes for raw functionality without usability, with the mentality of "if I can figure it out, so can you!" This is fine, if you want "open-source-types" to use your software, but you really can't complain if Joe User doesn't want to do a significant amount of research before setting up a computer.

It's like modernist composers who write art music very inaccessible to the average listener... sure, it may be an absolutely magnificent piece of music, and I'm not saying you shouldn't write it, and I'm not saying whether it's better or worse than something more common-listener-friendly. However, if you complain that nobody wants to listen to it, you have only yourself to blame.

something for nothing

[hankaholic]

I'd like to see large organizations that realize a quantifiable savings due to the use of OSS contribute a small portion of the savings back to the projects that made it possible.

If using OOooo.oOo could save them 5.2 million, how about a one-time gift of 5% of the annual savings to the project leaders? Saving a net of $4.94 million would still be a huge boost to the budget, and I'm sure that OOooO could benefit quite a bit from a one-time $260k donation.

Re:something for nothing

[cyberfunk2]

I'd like to see the people in charge who save money by using open source get the bonus. Now thats a real incentive not to go w/ the status quo.

If it suddenly becomes finacially incentive for the politicians to consider OSS, you're gonna be damned sure they will.

Re:something for nothing

[Ogerman]

I'd like to see large organizations that realize a quantifiable savings due to the use of OSS contribute a small portion of the savings back to the projects that made it possible.

Lets take it a step further. Suppose that a company or gov't. could save $5.2m by using OO.org, but the result of missing features / lack of polish would cost too much in lost productivity. However, if they spend $4m to hire some programmers to improve OO.org to the point where it no longer sucks for their needs, they're still saving $1.2m. It may not be as large, but in the end, any significant and viable savings opportunity is worth pursuing.

Lets say they hire programmers at a respectable $75k/year. Figure another $25k/year for benefits, management costs, etc. $4m = 40 full-time programmers for one year. Can I get, by a show of hands, how many of you Open Source developers out there would accept a $75,000 w/ benefits contract to work full time for one year doing what you love with a team of like-minded co-workers?

And that's only one company / government. There are literally thousands of possible contracts like this worldwide.

Now, think further. Suppose that we make it easier on these prospective companies / governments by starting a company that contracts out this work and has a staff of 100+ OpenOffice programmers. This way, customers don't have to worry about the management / HR end of things. It would be a very simple company -- basically just a way keep the developers salaried and insured. A thin layer of abstraction if you will. No sales. No marketing. Just an employee owned-and-run "labor farm" if you will. It would market itself. "Thinking of switching to OO.org but it doesn't meet your needs? Let us fix it for you for half the cost of MSO licensing."

Lets be honest, folks.. OpenOffice is not the same quality of MSO yet. It is improving but it's definitely not there yet. And the project could be progressing a heck of a lot faster. Yes, the example I gave is idealistic. But it's the idea that counts -- the money is out there for the taking! People want an alternative. It is our fault if we do not provide it.

$200 dollars

[manuelpl]

Im not a Microsoft apologist , but the figures are wrong , at my district , right next door to LAUSD we pay $47 for Microsoft Office. This is FUD , there is no way they pay $200 , thats just wrong. Volume licensing is under $50.

Re:$200 dollars

[Stone316]

Thats what really bugs the hell out of me... If Office only cost 50 bucks i'd probably buy a copy for home use. But there's no way i'm going to pay a few hundred bucks so I can use it at home. I'll use my company laptop or open office.

AFAIK software for personal use is way to expensive.

Re:$200 dollars

[Mincemeat.net]

Okay then, let's see.... $47 X 26,000 machines = 1.22 million.

Nope, still doesn't change my thinking. While OOo isn't perfect, in the short term they're paying for installation, retraining and tech support. I think that in the long run LA would save money because they don't have to pay for upgrades to OOo, just for the installation and tech support.

While we're at it, let's take into consideration that if LA has Adobe Acrobat on any of those machines they won't have to worry about upgrading that one too. OOo has export to PDF. That'll shave a few more pennies.

Re:$200 dollars

[MikeB90]

But you have to take in account a) training of OpenOffice b) imperfect (pretty good, but imperfect) compatibility with MS office. c) porting of things like VBA scripts, etc that don't work with OO (or hss this changed recently0 So the gap is probably more like 500,000 instead of a million. Or less. Please try to think intelligently like a business must. Or else your comments are really not relevant, and do NOT HELP the cause of FOSS (dramatically the opposite in fact)

Ok

[iminplaya]

All you programmers out there had better make sure that all your comments in the source code are polically correct. No more talk about slaves and masters.

Re:Ok

[Anonymous Coward]

That's right, we gotta use "tops" and "bottoms" instead now.

Well

[simontek2]

I wonder if they will call me. I finally opened my shop. The Open Store www.theopenstore.net

More cops?

[jones77]

Is that wise?

Re:More cops?

[Anonymous Coward]

Is that wise?

I guess someone had to be dumb enough to say it. <sarcasm>I'm sure that it is the intent of the Los Angeles gov't to hire bad cops.</sarcasm>

Re:More cops?

[Anonymous Coward]

Damn, this many speaketh the truth. All I see is LAPD kills child, people protesting against LAPD, and to top it off Ex-LAPD Officer Found Guilty of Fondling Women.

Re:More cops?

[Quiet_Desperation]

The kid was out at 4am driving a stolen car, lead the police on a chase, and then rammed the stolen car repeatedly into the police car. Only then did the cops open fire. They didn't even know it was a kid at that moment, and the shooting was according to policy. the car was being used as a deadly weapon. Good riddance to the little brat, I say.

The activists are playing this up as they always do. The media appears to be trying to start a riot by painting a picture ow a sweet wittle baby who never did no wrong. Trust me on this. I live here. That brat was a little gang monster that the world is far better off without.

Today's lesson: if you steal a car, lead a police chase, and then start ramming one of the police cars with the stolen car, you can (and should) get shot.

Letting the people decide.

[Thats_Pipe]

Ok, cities around the country are considering Open Source. Are there going to be any sort of vote for whether a city wants to switch? Government is in place for the people and if their money is being thrown away on software that can easily be replaced then I would say most people would be in favor. If it did come down to a vote, I would expect the majority of people to go with the more cost effective solution.

They're not going to get what they want

[Anonymous Coward]

"It pretty much stands to reason that if support and the software are available for free, that are going to be some cost savings."

Sounds like a pipe dream. But do they honestly think this is the only way to beat an MS offer, to get everything for free? Or do they want support just to hold someone accountable for their mistakes?

They certainly don't consider the value they get from using OSS and the rights granted to them. They don't consider the value they get from using software that is more secure and open. Less downtime, easier to identify and fix problems, even more access and freedom to manipulate their own data through the use of such programs.

CIA/NSA

[Anonymous Coward]

Wonder what the CIA/NSA uses?

I'd tell you, but then I'd have to... Wait, it seems we have agents near your house. Stand by, they'll pop in for a visit to uhh show you.

Bad Move. OO not 100% compat.

[Anonymous Coward]

I seriously question their IT personnel for backing this decision.

I've been using OO for some time. I'm current with the 1.x branch, and have not tried the 2.x branch yet.

With that said, OO just does not render old Word documents very well. I still can't use OO reliably with older Word documents laying around in my "/home/docs" partition.

Unless they have someone dedicated to re-rendering most of their older Word docs to the native .sxw format, they're gonna have major headaches down the road.

1. Granted, it would only take a handful of dedicated personnel to re-render those docs and save them in native OO format. That shouldn't cost more than a million and a few months for that process.

2. However, you run into the problem of compatibility while exporting those OO files outside of LA offices.

Pioneers? yes. Prudent IT personnel? no.

Re:Bad Move. OO not 100% compat.

[trewornan]

1. freshmeat.net/projects/antiword/ 2. PDF

Re:Bad Move. OO not 100% compat.

[erroneus]

Hold on there.

For one, let's keep something in perspective. This is word processing -- it's not desktop publishing. If you are using MS Word for desktop publishing, then I'd have to say that you're probably not using your software tools appropriately.

When casting rendering compatability asside, the functions OO.o are perfectly adequate for I'd guess 99.9% of the users out there.

It is perfectly prudent to regocnize the cost/benefit ratio. When MS Office costs $200 and OO.o costs nothing while doing the same thing, I think it's time to factor in the costs of the headaches associated with migration. I don't think those costs are all that great and for most documents, OO.o does a great job...even the 1.1.x versions that I currently use.

I have deployed OO.o along with MSOffice on all of my desktops at the office and for now, I let my users decide which they use. Many of my users choose OO.o naturally for reasons of their own and at the moment, I have no probems with letting the people decide.

OO.o and GiMP and many others are great tools. Once you break the circles that MS products seem to take people into, the world works and looks a lot better.

So I challenge you -- make the effort to move away from vendor dependancy and see just how "painful" it really is -- I think you'll surprise yourself.

Re:Bad Move. OO not 100% compat.

[HermanAB]

Well gee, you said you are on the 1.x branch and you still think it wise to complain?

Free software not really free

[charles28c]

Let's be clear, free software is not really free. I worked for a company that jumped heavily into a linux-based product and we soon found bugs in all kinds of underlying linux infrastructure... Sure it's open source, but realistically no small company that is cutting cost to deploy open-source in the first place will have the resources to go in and hack code to fix bugs. We ended up spending a small fortune in consultant costs to hire outside programmers to fix small bugs thoughout several linux subsystems... and the kicker was we were theoretically expected to release those fixes back into the open-source community. Needless to say, our executives said "screw it, let everyone else figure it out for themselves". Yes, you can cut costs with open source, but god help you if you need to fix something because you won't have the expertise to do it anymore that you'd have the expertise to recompile MS Office. This isn't a rant against open source (I use several open source packages myself), but it isn't a panacea and you still need to allocate funds for things like developing your own bug fixes. Nothing is truly free.

Re:Free software not really free

[GIL_Dude]

You must be a liar because with so many eyes on it, OSS HAS NO BUGS. And we all believe that Firefox has been patched, right? Oh, you mean it is only patched in the "nightly" builds? Is that like Microsoft saying that they have a patch in beta? So it will take 6 months for the patches to actually download to Firefox users? Hmm. People bash MS for the same thing... Guess OSS is the same as proprietary.

Re:Free software not really free

[Diabolus777]

The point is that with the money you save on liscensing fees, you get funding for such things. If everybody would do it, there would be less bugs, less spending, more saving, better software. . . .

Initially it might cost a small fortune, but divide it up by all the potential companies that could help, it will be really small. Anyway, like someone said above, with tha amount of cash LA pays for office alone, they could built their own office suite. Open Office is better than to start up from scratch, so invest, it will indeniably pay off.

I never could understand Microsoft's strategy...

[the_skywise]

Short term, getting everybody roped into a subscription based model "locks" existing customers in.

But now it shows up in the budget as "annual recurring costs" and not a one-time fixed cost.

So this stuff comes up for dicussion every year during budget time. And... it looks pretty silly to be spending 5 million dollars on "clippy" a year when you can't afford enough police to protect the city.

So now they HAVE to lower the cost of the product *and* governments are now aware of OpenOffice (which is free). Whereas if they had just lowered costs to begin with and offered some things like "free" support to sweeten the pot, they could've kept stringing them along.

(And why is this article sectioned as "politics"?)

I hope the budget in decent support.

[stephenisu]

While I find this to be very exciting, I hope that they use SOME of the saved money to add to user support. They will need it for at least the first year or so until users/admins are familiar with the new systems.

Re:I hope the budget in decent support.

[GIL_Dude]

I'm sure they had a support contract with MS. So they should be able to use Star Office and pay support there. Or, go the whole hog with OpenOffice and find someone they can contract with for support. It would be interesting to have them do this so we could have a real world comparison of costs. The $47 or so Volume License fee for office plus whatever they pay for their support contract, vs. what they end up with with OpenOffice +the support contract.

Good and Bad idea...

[voteforkerry78]

Of course, open source is great, and it will save LA a jug or two of money. However, if the jugs of money will be donated to the LAPD, I'm pretty much against it. The racism and anti-black/latino actions of the LAPD in the past worry me. I would rather see the money go towards cleaning up LA's skies, because right now LA is one of the most polluted cities in the world.

Doesn't matter either way.

[khasim]

If it is a real attempt to migrate, wonderful.

If it is a blatant attempt to get Microsoft to lower their prices by threatening to move to a competitor, wonderful.

Either way, OO.org gets press coverage. That's better advertising than they could buy otherwise.

The more people hear about OO.org as an alternative to MSOffice, the better.

This is outrageous!

[callipygian-showsyst]

As someone who's earned a good living writing computer software and managing software projects over the past 25 years, I'm outraged about this move to "Free Software".

The Government wouldn't be able to get away with replacing other workers and contractors with unpaid volunteers--why should people who write software for a living be treated any differently?

What's especially troubling is that this move is motivated by some off-beat political agenda that makes it unpopular to support American industry like Microsoft and Oracle in exchange for using second-rate software developed by kids overseas.

I tried and rejected Open Office. It is an inferior product.

Re:This is outrageous!

[Anonymous Coward]

what the hell you talking about. The most mature software is written by seasoned and experienced developers. Not some kid overseas you moron. If you look at the kind of developers in mature/robust projects, they filled with experienced developers who make a living programming. If OSS scares you then, good. Things change. If you're not able to adapt, then find some other job.

Re:This is outrageous!

[Anonymous Coward]

I tried and rejected Microsoft Windows and Microsoft Office. It is a childish product, with colorful kid like interfaces and animated cartoon paperclips.

Give me a call when both you and these products grow up.

Re:This is outrageous!

[Anonymous Coward]

Um, this is an OSTG site, so this may be funny to us, but this guy was not trying to be and he is marked funny. Check out his other posts.

Re:This is outrageous!

[prettyshygrrl]

Im sorry you feel this way. Change is hard and can be scary. At some point in your life you will realize that supporting one of the most basic flaws in humanity is not the way to succeed. I hope one day you will see that there is more to life than insulting people and making them feel inferior becuase they do not make the same choices as you. Think about how you feel when people make inappropriate and rude comments about your choices in life. That is how other people feel when you treat them badly. Be well.

So when all software is free?

[b3rs3rk3r]

What do all us "nerds" do with our time??? I got bills to pay? Anyone else???

I really don't get the argument that software should be free? Nothing is for free...

Heck if anything thing things that are required for humans to exists: food, power, shelter, etc should be free, but software???

Priorities???????

Re:So when all software is free?

[Anonymous Coward]

Everything you do will be free. Welcome to the New Economy, where the government assigns you a job because they don't pay you for it. Instead, you will be given an equal stipend to support yourself. And then everyone will wear furry hats and the rich will drive BMWs in the snow.

Yes, welcome to Russi--... er.. I mean the Soviet Republic of the USA!

Re:So when all software is free?

[The Cisco Kid]

Anyone else that thinks the parent makes a good point should take a good read over the following writing - it will clear up a lot of misconceptions.

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html

It's a win-win for LA

[Mincemeat.net]

I seriously doubt that LA will save 5 million but it's really a win-win for LA when you get right down to it. If LA is serious about using OOo as a replacement for Office then yes, they'll save money in the long run after their employees get used to using the suite. After all, they're basically only paying for installation, training and tech support. Down the road, upgrades will be free, as in beer, and free, as in speech. But there are other issues that have already been mentioned, macros for instance, that can't be transferred to OOo. On top of that will be the relative lack of tech support, except for what the city might be able to conjure up by hiring someone or assigning someone the job of providing tech support to city employees. No matter how they go about it, they will get a product that works and while not perfect, is a good alternative to Office, and is definately worth the price.

If it's LA's intention to get MS marketing down there to city hall to lobby for their position, spread FUD, negotiate a lower price, etc. then LA still wins. LA won't be paying an outrageous sum of money for an office suite, and will only have to pay for the software, installation, retraining and tech support.

Even if LA switches to OOo, what will MS do? Sue the City of Los Angeles? I seriously doubt that, because it wouldn't be in their best interest to lose a government customer in the long run and risk losing new customers, nor would it do for something like that to hit the press and create more of a buzzword for open source software.

Either way, for Los Angeles, there will be a cost savings. It won't be what they initially projected, that's for sure. But now that our President's proposed budget expects to cut funding for police and other emergency services, local governments have to find ways of saving money and provide the same or better level of public service that the citizens expect, especially in metropolitan areas. If it starts with the software they use, fine with me. I wish my municipality had that kind of insight.

Re:It's a win-win for LA

[MsGeek]

I'm a Native Angeleno and I truly want to see this actually happen. I pay taxes here, and I don't want my tax dollars going to support Yet Another Microsoft Site License. Using proprietary software is throwing money down the drain that could be better used elsewhere.

However, I would much rather see the money saved get plowed back into education, not the LAPD.

I wonder if any of the LUGs out here are involved with the lobbying effort?

Or pay for mod's you need in an Open Source one.

[khasim]

You're right. But they don't have to pay to write one from scratch.

That's a lot of money to pay for developers to add in any features/functionality that you want but does not exist in OO.org.

Save $2 or $3 million this election cycle and save even more next cycle.

The best thing is, every year you can keep investing in development and still claim that you're saving $$millions$$ in license fees.

And if you hire local programmers, you're also "creating good jobs".

Re:You get what you pay for

[Anonymous Coward]

*yawn*

Police is bad!

[Anonymous Coward]

Now you see why Windows is a Good Thing (TM): it helps decreasing the number of cops.

Switch to open document formats, first.

[khasim]

#1. Mandate that all official documents be in an open format (.pdf for example).

#2. Mandate that all software used be able to save in that format, 100%, by default. (None of those bogus warnings from MSWord about saving in a different format and maybe losing your changes.)

#3. Let the various ISV's compete on price / functionality / service for your governmental contracts while you rake in the savings.

We don't really give a damn what you think

[Anonymous Coward]

Lookig at your web site it is extremely clear that you are a Windows developer so I would not expect you to "get it". So tell me why as a Open Source developer give a damn what you think? Well guess what I don't care if you get GPL'd off the face of the planet.

I get paid very well to implement, debug and maintain OSS software and yes at your expense. OSS just has the effect of moving control back to the user and programmer as it should be.

Re:We don't really give a damn what you think

[Anonymous Coward]

Lookig at your web site it is extremely clear that you are a Windows developer so I would not expect you to "get it".

This is such a typical mono-mentality statement, which proves what he is talking about. Once you code for Windows, you're unable "to get it". I think you're failing to realize that most of the Linux code was written by young people overseas (such as Linus Torvalds himself) and some of the brightest people in the world work at Microsoft. They aren't all just a bunch of witless zombies. These are top-in-their-field PhDs. OSS is inferior CLONEWARE. I installed RedHat the other day and was utterly shocked at what a cheap copy it was.

Re:We don't really give a damn what you think

[risacher]

Certainly it's unfair to say that just because someone develops software for Windows, they wouldn't "get it", in terms of the open-source movement. But let me split a hair for a moment... in English, describing someone as a "Windows developer" denotes that the person develops software for Windows, but it also connotes that the person does not develop for other platforms, and therefore probably lacks the broad perspective of wider experience.

From his web site, the orignial poster here does appear to be a "Windows developer" in both senses.

On your other points, certainly Microsoft has many talented people and have developed some great software over the years. But be careful where you start throwing epithets. "CLONEWARE?" IE is just a copy of Netscape, which is just a copy of Mosaic. Word is clearly an expensive copy of Word Perfect. Outlook is a souped up version of Eudora. The Windows GUI is a copy of the Mac GUI which is a copy of the Xerox ALTO.

Let's face it, we all stand on the shoulders of giants. In my opinion, most of the innovations that one might attribute to Microsoft are trivial improvements of a transformational concept that they stole or bought from someone else. That's not a criticism. Take any software suite and it's basically cloneware. Any new feature that one vendor (or community) adds raises the bar for the others, and we users just expect it to be there in all of them.

Microsoft plays the game better than anybody else, that's clear. But the rules are changing; I'll be curious to see if they play the new game better too.

Re:We don't really give a damn what you think

[callipygian-showsyst]

First of all, I don't develop exclusivly for Microsoft. I am a Mac developer (I'm a former Apple employee, in fact), a FreeBSD, and a PalmOS developer too! (Not to mention embedded microcontrollers like PIC, etc).

It's just that my personal experience shows that Microsoft's development tools and systems (C#, .NET) are at the present time, the best environments for developing desktop applications. For someone who builds custom vertical solutions, I chose Microsoft.

In the past, I've worked for companies that made high-end shrink-wrap software. The shrink-wrap market is suffering, and I'd hate to see it killed by "political" moves to "open source" cloneware that's unstable, hard to administer, and may cost more in the long run.

Companies like Apple and Sun spent a lot of money on direct and Viral marketing campaigns to make liking Microsoft politically incorrect. (Apple has shills that work message boards like /. making you all a bunch of dupes!). That's a very disturbing trend--worse in my opinion than any pricing strategy Microsoft has ever been criticized for.

OO is great but needs decent outlining

[Anonymous Coward]

*****
To any OO developers reading this, please add a way to writer to easily do decent outlining. It will make a big difference for us government types :)
*****

Re:OO is great but needs decent outlining

[trewornan]

Yeah . . . I've always liked "Outline" view in Word - it's not exactly indispensable though.

"Free" as in "libre", "speech", "freedom", etc.

[khasim]

I see you're trolling, but I'll answer this one anyway to keep down the other trolls.

What do all us "nerds" do with our time??? I got bills to pay? Anyone else???

Most of the programmers are not employed by ISV's to write shrinkwrapped software. They're paid by companies who sell non-software services to support and enhance their software systems.

So even if all software was free (as in beer), the impact on most programmers would be minimal (they suddenly get their tools for free).

But that isn't the point. This is about "Free" as in speech. That means that you're allowed to make changes to the software and re-distribute it (under the restrictions of the various licenses).

Re:"Free" as in "libre", "speech", "freedom", etc.

[b3rs3rk3r]

and??? Kinda hypocratic if you ask me... "I want my tools for free so I can build stuff I can charge for!"

Re:"Free" as in "libre", "speech", "freedom", etc.

[Anonymous Coward]

This sounds like "stealth" charging instead of up-front cost.

1) Write free software and get everyone hooked.
2) Crush the competition with the copy that is free.
3) Charg $$$ for support and service!!

This seems worse to me than paying up-front for Windows and enjoying free updates and support. In fact, that process seems really dishonest.

Re:"Free" as in "libre", "speech", "freedom", etc.

[Anonymous Coward]

You already have free speech. You just don't have the freedom to rip off companies that pay R&D dollars to build new stuff. And you shouldn't have that ability. It's anti-capitalist.

Re:"Free" as in "libre", "speech", "freedom", etc.

[mpe]

Most of the programmers are not employed by ISV's to write shrinkwrapped software.

Indeed the vast majority of software is not and could never be any kind of "off the shelf" product.

They're paid by companies who sell non-software services to support and enhance their software systems.

Where there is a business model involved here it is that of a tertiary industry.

So even if all software was free (as in beer), the impact on most programmers would be minimal (they suddenly get their tools for free).

Also free of having to consult with a lawyer if they want to use anyone else's software.

But that isn't the point. This is about "Free" as in speech. That means that you're allowed to make changes to the software and re-distribute it (under the restrictions of the various licenses).

In ways that proprietary software makes difficult or disallows. In the "proprietary world" in might actually be easier and cheaper to "reinvent the wheel". (Especially when lawyers are better paid than programmers.)

Not only macros

[sql_noob]

Just a warning. It's likely to be my problems but I would like to post here as a warning. I used to use Open Office but when I upgrade from 1.1.1 to 1.1.4, I found that some documents look a bit difference. The texttable functions could messed up the my preformatted numbers and credit cards numbers. I had to do some extra python programming in order to solve this problem. It made me really disappointed about open office's quality. I would like to use this opportunity to suggest LA to test the openoffice suite first and distribute only a tested, tweaked version. e.g. Add a print preview icon on the main tool bar, disable some try-to-be-smart autoformat/autocorrect

Re:Not only macros

[Anonymous Coward]

---- e.g. Add a print preview icon on the main tool bar,

This is already standard with Oo 2.0 which should be ready in a few months. The daily snapshots already work pretty well and it's not even in formal beta yet.

My experience: OO need less support.

[Futurepower(R)]

"maybe has a little less support"

When you have "26,000 desktops", commercial support is not a factor, because you have your own support staff. Also, my experience with Open Office is that the help messages are better and there are fewer serious quirks than Microsoft Word 2000. (I've never tried Office XP because I decided to get off the Microsoft time waste train.)

I'm guessing governments have not adopted Open Office sooner because most government officials did not have enough technical knowledge to feel confident in committing thousands of desktops to something that didn't come from Microsoft. It is "you can't get fired for choosing Microsoft, even if the software doesn't work well".

When someone chooses a software package, they are choosing business partners, because so much staff time is invested in becoming comfortable with software and in using it. Officials are beginning to think about this: Is is sensible to want to be the business partner of a company that has been so adversarial toward its customers, and which produces software of amazingly bad quality?

If you test Open Office, be sure you test the latest version, 1.1.4. Version 2.0 will be available in April or May of this year.

Generally, when you send documents outside your company or organization, it is better to send PDF files. That guards against accidental changes. To make PDF files in Open Office, just click the PDF icon in the toolbar. To do this in Microsoft Word, install additional software.

Re:My experience: OO need less support.

[jschoenberg]

It's humorous that you are comparing Open Office to MS Office 2000 (two versions old), yet you are making sure that people compare it with the absolute bleeding edge of OpenOffice (1.1.4).

I totally understand not comparing apples-to-apples, because the features are simply not there in the Openoffice product. It's a tough sell.

Re:My experience: OO need less support.

[Jason Earl]

No, comparing OpenOffice.org to past versions of MS Office is just good common sense. If Los Angeles were already on the newest version of MS Office then this wouldn't be an issue, as they would have already spent the $5.2 million. The fact of the matter is that not even half of Microsoft's Office customers are on the newest version.

Los Angeles basically has three choices. They can stick with what they currently are using, they can spend $5.2 million and upgrade to the newest MS Office, or they can migrate to OpenOffice.org and pay the one time migration costs. The fact that the politicos have already tied the upgrade "savings" to an increase in their police force means that they are serious about making the switch. There could be very large political ramifications for the politician that took $5.2 million earmarked for more policemen and spent it on software licenses. That's a very hot-button issue in L.A.

No one is going to argue that OpenOffice.org has as many features as the newest version of MS Office. The question is whether OpenOffice.org is better than the version of MS Office that you happen to be using right now. Throw in the fact that OpenOffice.org means that you no longer have to worry about licensing issues for new PCs and OO.o starts to look like a pretty good deal.

The truly scary part, at least for Microsoft, is that if Los Angeles switches to OO.o then lots of other businesses and communities that deal with Los Angeles (and there are piles of them) are also likely to experiment with OO.o. Everyone has to deal with the government.

Re:My experience: OO need less support.

[jschoenberg]

I definitely understand--and to a certain degree agree--with your argument. To paraphrase, if they have no expectation of using the features of Office 2003 (because they don't use them now, so it's not a critical need, right?) then any argument about mere features is moot. If their business workflow works fine and they don't need any improvement, then there should be no need for new features.

However, by moving to OSS office productivity applications (not Star Office), they are limiting themselves for the future. If they figure out that taxpayers money is being wasted in an inefficient process where the application of technology like Office 2003 would help. But that technology does not exist in the basic functionality of Openoffice, then they are stuck. In the end, they would have to pay for licenses from one of the office suites that offer those features (some of which, like Lotus Notes, would be a significant expenditure to migrate to).

Again, if they don't plan on changing the way they do business...if they expect to always create and share documents the way they do now, then sure, stick with Openoffice.

Re:My experience: OO need less support.

[Channing]

...you can't get fired for choosing Microsoft, even if the software doesn't work well.

Absolutely, its called An Acceptable Way Of Failing.

Re:My experience: OO need less support.

[Jason Earl]

For the most part office suites get used as glorified typewriters. One of the advantages of OO.org is that it has a truly opaque XML-based file format. Yes, I know that newer versions of MS Office support XML formats as well (in the even more expensive Enterprise Edition), but OpenOffice.org uses XML formats by default. This allows people to do things with normal OpenOffice.org files that you pay big money for in the MS Office world. You should take a look at the things that the Zope folks are doing with OO.org integration. Basically you get drag and drop content management of OO.org files with indexing, workflow management, and a whole pile of extra goodness, and that's just one example of what's available that happen to know of offhand. Most of the world simply puts their MS Office files on a normal fileshare (or emails them). OpenOffice.org is more than good enough to compete with those sorts of MS Office uses.

The primary technical reason that OO.org isn't well on its way to Total World Domination is that OO.org is not 100% compatible with MS Office. In cases where 100% compatibility isn't necessary then the choice is easy.

Re:My experience: OO need less support.

[Anonymous Coward]

But this views OpenOffice as a product which cannot be significantly influenced(as with MS Office or other shelf-sold software), when the opposite is true; the government can use the savings on licenses to hire development on the specific features it needs added.

For the record, I think this is one of the most astroturfed discussions /. has seen in the last few months.

Re:My experience: OO need less support.

[jschoenberg]

So, I'm curious about your experience. You say that "Most of the world simply puts their MS Office files on a normal fileshare.", but are you in a proper place to make that kind of claim? Personally, I am an IT consultant and 100% of my clients that have Office 2003 use Sharepoint to share files with others in their workgroup. Companies that think the computer is merely a word processor and a file cabinet are really missing the boat, and would likely be very happy with Openoffice.

Now, I'm certainly not prepared to apply my experience to "Most of the world", but I'm interested to know how you form that opinion, and whether you are qualified to say that....not that it's not true....just that I'm dubious that the person who knows what the rest of the world is doing with MS Office is responding to my little-old post on Slashdot!

Re:My experience: OO need less support.

[Jason Earl]

So, I'm curious about your experience. You say that "Most of the world simply puts their MS Office files on a normal fileshare.", but are you in a proper place to make that kind of claim?

Let me give you a little clue, my friend. Even Microsoft would admit to the fact that half of their MS Office customers are on MS Office 2000 or older.

Personally, I am an IT consultant and 100% of my clients that have Office 2003 use Sharepoint to share files with others in their workgroup.

At the place where I currently work we have a sharepoint portal as well. Interestingly enough, the wiki gets more actual use. People like how easy it is to edit and link documents.

Companies that think the computer is merely a word processor and a file cabinet are really missing the boat.

Precisely, they should be using OpenOffice.org with Zope and Plone :). It's free and it rocks.

Re:My experience: OO need less support.

[jschoenberg]

Did you mean to say Office XP or older? I believe that to be true (with most on XP and very few on 97), but that does not mean that most of the world simply saves office files on a file share. That's quite a stretch, which is why I asked about the breadth of your exeprience. Witnessing this behavior at a single company is probably not enough to claim that most companies do it that way (regardless if most companies don't have Office 2003).

Re:My experience: OO need less support.

[Jason Earl]

I understand why you would ask about the breadth of my experience, but you yourself are forgetting that Windows 2000, Netware, and even Windows NT still have large chunks of marketshare. Not to mention all of the network attached storage devices running Samba or Microsoft's cut down version of Windows Server (minus SharePoint).

Honestly, why in the world would you think that SharePoint has become the de-facto way to share files? What evidence do you have that this is the case? Seriously, do the math. Take into account all of Microsoft's many filesharing competitors, the old versions of their software, and the folks that have SharePoint Services but don't see the point in setting them up and you'll start to see what I am talking about.

Re:My experience: OO need less support.

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

by moving to OSS office productivity applications (not Star Office), they are limiting themselves for the future. If they figure out that taxpayers money is being wasted in an inefficient process where the application of technology like Office 2003 would help. But that technology does not exist in the basic functionality of Openoffice, then they are stuck.

OK, so you are saying going with an open source project limits you to the functionality of that project, where as going with a commercial, closed source project does not? You have made the logical fallacy of implicit statement, implying that any functionality that would be useful or beneficial is in either both projects or only the commercial one. If you go with open source you can hire someone to add any functionality you want. If you go with closed source, you can beg the vendor to implement it, but if they don't want to you are screwed. I think for just 1 million of that 5 million, you can hire some consultants to add whatever function it is that you feel is lacking, still save millions, and help out any other government agency that is also using the software. That is a win+win+win over closed source.

I'm posting this from Firefox on Ubuntu.

[khasim]

This is why I eventually let my linux partition deteriorate and die.

It's software. How does it "deteriorate and die"?

For a while it was fun, but I found myself falling behind on the maintenance. With all the other stuff I have going on, I simply don't have the time or effort to significantly investigate the workings of the OS, not to mention make it work like I want it to.

apt-get update
apt-get upgrade

Compare that to:
WindowsUpdate
Anti-virus update
SpyWare update
Defrag

The problem, I think, is that open source software wants to have its cake and eat it too. It often goes for raw functionality without usability, with the mentality of "if I can figure it out, so can you!" This is fine, if you want "open-source-types" to use your software, but you really can't complain if Joe User doesn't want to do a significant amount of research before setting up a computer.

Yet Firefox is gaining marketshare and google seems to be popular, also. Thunderbird is also doing okay.

It's like ... blah blah blah ... blame.

Again, usage of Open Source apps and Linux is increasing.

Increasing == more people using it.

More people using it == more popular.

If it doesn't work for you, that's fine. But the numbers show that it is working for an ever increasing number of other people.

Re:I'm posting this from Firefox on Ubuntu.

[EEBaum]

It deteriorates and dies quite easily. First a little thing goes wrong that I don't fix, then another. I botch a couple installations of things because I don't bother reading the immense tomes. Pretty soon I have trouble booting. All the while, I'm using it less often, because I already spend ENOUGH time coding things I consider productive. It dies when I need the disk space to install Knights of the Old Republic II.

Regarding updates, yes, Windows Update is irritating. I'm careful with my computer setup though. I use Opera, watch what I download, and haven't had a virus in years, despite not using antivirus software. AdAware comes up clean (aside from a couple registry keys) when I run it every few months. I'd never heard of the apt-get update command, but apparently I didn't dig deep enough into manpages to find it. My 2001 Mandrake (the "friendly" one?) install sure didn't have an obvious link to it, and if I'm going to read 200 pages to find such things I'll much sooner pick up some good fiction.

I have nothing against open source, per se, and am delighted to see programs like Firefox doing well. I attribute this largely to an increasing emphasis on user-friendliness, which is exactly what open source needs to succeed.

A few years ago, I was very big into the "Linux shall overthrow Microsoft" crowd (running Linux, Mozilla, and OpenOffice, very unstably), and would still quite like to see it happen, and I do indeed consider Bill Gates to be a turd sandwich. I just feel that a switch to Linux at the moment involves a lot of work and research on my part, time I'd rather spend elsewhere.

Granted, money talks, I'm a big hypocrite, and if I wasn't getting academic pricing on Office, I'd probably have ditched it years ago.

No, it's speed.

[khasim]

Couldn't you say the same thing about word processors in general? Nobody *needs* a word processor. People just need to learn how to write correctly and legibly.

Nope. It's speed. I can type far Far FAR FAR faster than I can write. I use a word processor and grammar checker because it makes my life easier. That's what computers are supposed to do.

That's one opinion. If by "easier" you mean "get the boring work done faster".

Personally, I hate the grammar checking functionality in MSOffice. It isn't setup to understand the technical papers I write. So, in most cases OpenOffice.org is a better tool for me.

Not to mention the idiotic idea of storing MSOffice files in binary format so that a few times a month I have to pull a copy off of the back up tape because something happened and no one can open it in MSOffice anymore. What was that about "makes my life easier"?

From a provider of free software?

[Stone316]

A quote one of your download pages:

""Simply the best freeware 3D anaglyph package" - James R. Turner, StereoViews newsletter"

I find it strange that someone is denouncing OSS when they themselves develope and distribute freeware...

You know, there are some people out there that have found a way to make money off of support software rather than making their customers pay through the nose for the sofware. If you ask me, thats pure capitalism.

Re:You get what you pay for

[Anonymous Coward]

Free Software is not about technical improvement. Free Software is about FREEDOM. We want to be able to use software without being held hostages by the "owner" of the software. If we can create a better alternative to propietary software in the way, then we will be happier, but if our software is worse than propietary alternatives, we will still use it, 'cause it's free

That's all great and wonderful, but what you describe, producing alternatives that use the processes developed by the original companies is ILLEGAL. They are known as patents, and they are the only to way to keep companies funding R&D.

What you describe above is a pipe dream. Once an cloneware OSS version of something appears, and if everyone switched to it, the market would stagnate. It's a dead end.

Re: sig

[Anonymous Coward]

Wouldn't that be "him not my grammar excellent"?

Try reading that again.

[khasim]

and??? Kinda hypocratic if you ask me... "I want my tools for free so I can build stuff I can charge for!"

Once again, the majority of coders do not work for ISV's so they are not building stuff they will be charging for.

Re:Try reading that again.

[b3rs3rk3r]

I understand that, but what about the once that do? Why don't you give me an example of things that are for free? It will be a VERY short list! There are allways hidden costs, advertising (gmail) etc. Whe was the last time you picked up tools for free when you needed some work done on your house? I'm just trying to understand what you mean by "free"...?

Re:Try reading that again.

[b3rs3rk3r]

lol u are cracking me up! U claim FREE and in the next sentence brag over how you make a living on charging for service and support??? Like I said nothing is for free. Sure for you being someone smart enought to mod and actually understand the software, OSS i great! Its almost like an ego trip for you I think. "Look ma I can get this for free and I know how to tweak it... why don't you install it so I can come over and charge you when you have no idea what happend and there's no 1800 number to call..." Hypocritical, YES! Comparing software to freedom of speach is like saying that paper and pencil should be free of charge! Freedom of speach is somethign we exercise right here rigth and now. But guess what: "IT IS NOT FOR FREE"

Re:Try reading that again.

[Anonymous Coward]

I just did a job the other day for a typical customer using typical proprietry accounting software.

The customer pays $5k a year for the right to "support" which involves paying around $200 per phone call.

We get hired at around $88 per hour to fix a simple active directory problem the software people can't or don't want to fix. The software people find out we were there and charge the customer anyway to "audit" our actions on their server (another $500).

So you see, in cases like this it really doesn't matter at all, not even a little bit, if the original base software system is completely free and open source (as in speech) or not - to the customer - except that they wouldn't be forced to pay "penalties" for using 3rd party support services when the preffered support channels are ineffective and lethargic.

This is news?

[bbc]

"The city of Los Angeles is considering using Open Source software". How is this news? I don't know how things are in the US, but in civilized countries, democratically elected governments do not just carry a pile of cash in a wheelbarrow to the first monopolist they can find, but rather consider all the alternatives.

Here's more: press release, Heise interview

[D4C5CE]

From an earlier submission when the story first broke:

On the heels of Austin, Munich, Vienna and entire countries e.g. in South America, LA City Councilmembers have unveiled plans for an extended transition to FOSS in their press release conspicuously labelled "FREE OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE MEANS MORE POLICE ON THE STREETS - COUNCIL BETS THAT OPEN SOURCE MOVEMENT CAN SAVE CITY MILLIONS".

Despite the telling omission of "AND" in its caption, the statement actually does look beyond the "...as in beer" part of the equation.

A spokesman also explained the project and its inspiration in greater detail to German heise online news.

For Ballmer and Gates, the good news is that they won't have to travel quite as far any more to try and win back their latest defectors.

The "bad" news (for them!) can be summed up as "Tux ante portas": their arch-enemy and worst nightmare already knocking (or should we say: pecking?) right at their porch now.

Feeding the Trolls..

[Anonymous Coward]

No. Just as MS Word was not illegal cloning of WordPerfect, OO.o is not illegal cloning of Office. It is perfectly legal to make software that has the same purpose as other software.

Re:Dear sack of cocks

[middlemen]

Awesome!!! U r damn right...

Open source this, open source that...

[danila]

All the posts here seem to ignore a very simple fact. Microsoft Office is a great product, clearly superior to open source alternatives.

I have OpenOffice and AbiWord installed on my machine and I tried other suites in the past (602, etc.) and Microsoft Office is still the best. It is faster, it has less bugs, it is more stable, it look better, it is more compatible, it has more powerful features (to say nothing about the powerful VBA support). I do admit that it has some badly designed dialogs and a number of annoying bugs, as well as being susceptible to gradual "file corruption" over long time. But overall it is a better product than anything else out there.

Of course, the OSS products are free and Free, that's a definite plus. And for a large organisation they may be good enough. But for a power-user nothing can replace Word on a Windows desktop (unless you need something like PageMaker or are willing to suffer using TeX). Similarly, Excel is THE spreadsheet and Powerpoint is THE presentation software.

And in my personal opinion, this will not change as long as open source developers would be content with cloning Microsoft products instead of trying something new and innovative. There can be no better Word than Word itself.

Re:Open source this, open source that...

[KrackHouse]

The really interesting thing here is that if this is a success, in five years or so everybody can just boot into Mandrake 15 or whatever and continue using the files on their memory stick. They won't be using Windows and they may not care.

The fact that this is cross platform software may be as important as the fact that it's free in the eyes of Microsoft. Apple really should spend some money getting better Mac OO.o support or they could become obsolete.

Re:Open source this, open source that...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, OpenOffice does copy M$ Word's design. Yes, it is essentially a clone. Does this mean that OpenOffice is rubbish? Of course not. There is an important difference between creating a decent design, and creating a design that's worth $100.

Re:Open source this, open source that...

[jamesbuko]

Microsoft Office is a great product, clearly superior to open source alternatives....
Where 90% of its features you dont use...

Re:Open source this, open source that...

[n0dalus]

...Microsoft Office is still the best. It is faster, it has less bugs, it is more stable, it look better, it is more compatible...

Let me guess; you even used MS Office for your spelling and grammar check in your post?

Re:Open source this, open source that...

[danila]

At least MS Office has grammar check, as opposed to OpenOffice.org, AbiWord and the rest of sorry open source office suites.

And your grammar in your post is not perfect either.

Re:Open source this, open source that...

[Anonymous Coward]

And your grammar, in your post, is not perfect either

Using MS word again? Also, OO.o does have spell check, it just isn't turned on by default. I like this in the respect that I get things done faster if I don't stop after each sentence to correct a mistake. Just keep typing, just keep typing...

Re:Open source this, open source that...

[Anonymous Coward]

And your grammar, in your post, is not perfect either

I was taking off the parent. And I know that OO.o has spell check, that's why I specifically mentioned grammar check. And you can easily turn it off in MS Word too, so it's not like OO.o has an advantage. :)

What would be news is....

[oliverthered]

if part of the saving went on funding OSS or programmers to help make the OSS more suitable to their needs.

Embrace and extend as the saying goes.

Re:What would be news is....

[jschoenberg]

So, what exactly does "funding OSS" mean?

Oxymoron - n : conjoining contradictory terms. Or a geek with acne and lesser intelligence spouting ideas that make no sense.

Re:What would be news is....

[oliverthered]

giving someone who has something to do with the development of OSS some money so that they can keep helping towards it's development.

Re:What would be news is....

[jschoenberg]

Sorry for my nasty post. It just seems strange that a person who feels that free software is better also feels that developers should be given money to create the software. It sounds like a complete contradiction in philosophy.

Developers should be paid for creating something they must only give away for free? (OSS prohibits charging money for the software itself)

Why would they not just be paid by people who use the software...which, of course, would therefore NOT be OSS. Like I said contradictory.

Re:What would be news is....

[Jason Earl]

Why would they not just be paid by people who use the software...which, of course, would therefore NOT be OSS. Like I said contradictory.

That's not quite how it works. This may come as a shock to you, but even Richard Stallman has made a living since starting the Free Software Foundation selling copies of Free Software. In fact, if you go to gnu.org you will be surprised to find that a deluxe GNU software distribution will set you back a cool $5000. Selling software isn't a contradiction at all. As another example Red Hat's entire Linux server product line is available in source form via anonymous FTP. The price that customers pay to Red Hat is a service and support fee and not a license fee.

Free Software developers aren't against making money, they are against software that doesn't come with source code. It's not about Free as in Free Beer, it's about Free as in Freedom to view and modify the source code.

Most Free Software hackers get paid to write Free Software, and some of them get paid very well.

Re:What would be news is....

[The Cisco Kid]

The "Free" in "Free software" has nothing to do with 'how much it costs' - it has to do with certain freedoms that users are allowed concerning the software.

You should *definitely* read

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html

Re:What would be news is....

[oliverthered]

Well, it doesn't have to be money, but under a capitalist system that's what seems to work the best.

I would have no objection to receiving any of the following.
A new PC.
or just some more HDD space or ram.
or a jar of coffee (decaff)
or my windows cleaned.
or free rent of a room in your house for a week.
or food
or some cash.
or absolutely nothing.

If you pick the last option I may not be able to continue my services for long because, although I am quite happy with absolutely nothing it doesn't get me very far in a capitalist world.

For the cost of absolutely nothing you can have, amongst other things directx 9 on wine, this version costs 100% less than the Transgaming version.

That's a good tagline for OSS

[MikeCapone]

"The savings would go to a special fund to hire more employees for the police department, a major focus for city officials right now, he added."

"Open Source: Keeping our streets safe!"

wrong section

[Anonymous Coward]

You put this in the "Politics" section, but it has nothing to do with the Evil Republicans That Are Going To Take Over The World And Kill Your Dog, which is what I thought the purpose of that section was.

One last time. It's "Free" as in speech.

[khasim]

I understand that, but what about the once that do?

What about them? They can license their products however they want to. No one is forcing them to use the GPL.

And if someone wants to release a similar app under the GPL, he is also Free to do so.

Why don't you give me an example of things that are for free? It will be a VERY short list!

Love, beauty, joy, Linux, Apache, Samba, php, summer days, etc.

I'm just trying to understand what you mean by "free"...?

No you're not, you're trolling.

I've already explained that "Free" is about freedom, not price. Since that doesn't fit your troll, you keep claiming that it is about price.

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=139239&cid=116 53532 As I said in my first post of this thread:

But that isn't the point. This is about "Free" as in speech. That means that you're allowed to make changes to the software and re-distribute it (under the restrictions of the various licenses).

*sigh* I remember the old trolls back in the day. These new trolls can't hold a candle to them. Have fun, little trollkin.

Will they dress the new cops in penguin suits?

[Stephen Samuel]

Just a silly thought.

apt-get install

[khasim]

It deteriorates and dies quite easily. First a little thing goes wrong that I don't fix, then another.

It's software. It doesn't decay. It doesn't wear out.

I botch a couple installations of things because I don't bother reading the immense tomes.

apt-get install foo

Where are the "immense tomes" you're refering to?

Pretty soon I have trouble booting. All the while, I'm using it less often, because I already spend ENOUGH time coding things I consider productive. It dies when I need the disk space to install Knights of the Old Republic II.

Okayyyyyyyy....... I can do a complete distribution upgrade and still not have troubles booting.

Did you ever think that the problem might be with you and not with Linux?

A few years ago, I was very big into the "Linux shall overthrow Microsoft" crowd (running Linux, Mozilla, and OpenOffice, very unstably), and would still quite like to see it happen, and I do indeed consider Bill Gates to be a turd sandwich. I just feel that a switch to Linux at the moment involves a lot of work and research on my part, time I'd rather spend elsewhere.

Yeah, whatever.

If Windows works so well for you and Linux sucks so badly, then WHY were you ever against Microsoft? Why don't you respect Bill's achievement instead of regarding him as "a turd sandwich"?

After all, you now have (so you claim) experience seeing how bad the alternatives are.

Granted, money talks, I'm a big hypocrite, and if I wasn't getting academic pricing on Office, I'd probably have ditched it years ago.

But OpenOffice.org is free (like beer). So it shouldn't be the price.

And if, as you claim, you were "running Linux, Mozilla, and OpenOffice, very unstably", then why do you talk about dumping MSOffice?

Is MSOffice also unstable for you?

If so, then why are you paying to run it when OpenOffice.org is free (as in beer)?

My 2001 Mandrake (the "friendly" one?) install sure didn't have an obvious link to it, and if I'm going to read 200 pages to find such things I'll much sooner pick up some good fiction.

Ah, the old "I used Linux x years ago and it sucked".

It's strange how you don't view finding AdAware, downloading it and running it to be too burdensome (no, it did NOT come with Windows), but Linux takes too much of your time.

And without running anti-virus software, how will you know if you don't have a virus?

Given how susceptible Windows is to viruses, isn't that a rather dumb thing to be doing? All it takes is one failure and you're infected.

Re:apt-get install

[naelurec]

I just wanted to tip my hat in your general direction. This reply is fantastic. I really hope to see a reply from the parent..

It amazes me as well that people will spend significant amount of time running adaware, spybot, virus scanners, windows update, defrag, norton internet security, a multitude of pop-up blockers, etc..etc..etc.. but will not spend time to gradually learn a new, better way of doing things.

I think people rationalize spending a little bit of time each week (ie a few hours) for an indefinite period of time is better than spending a larger amount of time learning a different system. The fact that perhaps the use of a non-MS operating system is not clearly evident in long-term time savings is perhaps holding most back from truly embracing an alternative system.

Re:apt-get install

[EEBaum]

I suppose I'm just lazy when it comes to Linux. However, of the listed utilities, I only run Windows Update, and perhaps the semiannual defrag and adaware, and my system runs perfectly.

Re:apt-get install

[EEBaum]

Complete honesty follows:

I run Windows for the following reasons:
I'm used to it. I know the interface, and I know where all the crap is and how to turn it off.
Games are written for it. Good games.
My programs (ProTools, SoundForge, Finale, others) that don't run on Linux run on it. I've paid lots of money for them, and alternatives of equal quality either do not exist or I haven't bothered trying to learn them.
I prefer to only have to maintain one operating system.
Consistency of user experience.
It feels fast.

It's software. It doesn't decay. It doesn't wear out.

Why aren't we all running the same software we did in 1993 then? Software is made up of many parts, all of which need to be upgraded at times. Sometimes these upgrades break things, which in turn need to be upgraded. Neglect one upgrade, it decays. The same is true of Windows (perhaps more so) if you don't maintain it.

Where are the "immense tomes" you're refering to?

Man pages, readme files, etc... they all add up. There's something to be said for one-click installation Wizards. No typing or anything!

If Windows works so well for you and Linux sucks so badly, then WHY were you ever against Microsoft?

For their monopolistic, anticompetitive behavior and overpriced software. I use it because, weighing the tradeoffs between quality, learning curve, maintenance, familiarity, and compatibility, it works for me at the present.

But OpenOffice.org is free (like beer). So it shouldn't be the price.

Free in money, yes. Free in time spent finding my way around and matching my documents to the MSOffice users with whom I associate? No. Free beer gets you drunk as effectively as non-free beer; not the case with office apps.

Is MSOffice also unstable for you?

For $15, I get complete compatibility with everyone I exchange documents with. I kick myself for supporting MS in this way, but them's the breaks. I haven't checked out OpenOffice in a few years, perhaps I'll give it another go in the summer when I have time for such luxuries.

Ah, the old "I used Linux x years ago and it sucked".

Indeed. It's probably time for me to try another install, but system-tinkering-and-experimentation ceased to be one of my hobbies a few years ago. When someone tells me honestly that it will be easier for me to learn, set up, and maintain a linux box than to keep doing what I'm doing, I'm game. In any case, I'm keeping my Windows box around for the reasons (at least the important ones) listed above... maintaing two Operating Systems for very little gain is not worth my time.

It's strange how you don't view finding AdAware, downloading it and running it to be too burdensome (no, it did NOT come with Windows), but Linux takes too much of your time.

Finding and downloading AdAware takes 3 minutes. I can grab lunch while it runs. Linux takes longer than 3 minutes to maintain.

And without running anti-virus software, how will you know if you don't have a virus?

I know people who excel at acquiring viruses. My system does not perform like theirs. When "stuff goes wrong," I've got one. I back up important documents and don't keep anything sensitive on my machine. Yes, I'm living dangerously.


I'm not disagreeing with you; I think it would be great, ideologically and practically, if most (perhaps all) software was open source. For my given situation, though, it's just too much trouble at the moment.

Re:apt-get install

[pclminion]

It's software. It doesn't decay. It doesn't wear out.

It gets outdated. Things are always improving, so data formats are always changing to accomodate the improvements. Software that used to work fine becomes useless. Arguing otherwise is just disingenuous.

apt-get install foo

This presumes that all potentially useful software is available as a package. Absolutely not the case.

Okayyyyyyyy....... I can do a complete distribution upgrade and still not have troubles booting. Did you ever think that the problem might be with you and not with Linux?

Ahh, the "I haven't seen it so it doesn't exist" fallacy.

A few days ago I had my first hard drive crash ever. EVER. In 15 years of using computers, I've never had a drive die on me before I threw it out. So would it have been reasonable for me to assume that hard drives never crash?

You're assuming that because you've never had problems with the particular software you use, that nobody must have problems. I'm a developer and a daily Linux user (I haven't touched a Windows box at home or at work in years) and even I have trouble making things work sometimes.

Did you ever think that the problem might be with you and not with Linux?

You won't get very far convincing somebody to use Linux by telling him he's too stupid to figure it out.

Perhaps your problem is that you've never used the system in a sufficiently demanding way to encounter the very real usability issues.

I could continue on, but I think I've said what I wanted to say... As a hardcore Linux user myself, even I think your attitude is caustic.

Re:apt-get install

[naelurec]

Thanks for the followup ..

So basically your like the majority of people out there..

#1 -- have software that only runs on Windows -- while you *might* be able to run it pretty well under some type of emulation, you basically forfit any type of support if it fails.

#2 -- trained on Windows, only know Windows, Windows = the computer, are completely oblivious to the benefits and merits of other operating systems. Even though you have tried other operating systems, you haven't really fully understood the other systems (ie everything you do in the other OS is relative to Windows -- your mind is still very much Windows-centric and as a result, your still bounded by the limitations and methodologies that Windows enforces).

It is a shame that #1 is still very true for most people. There is still a LOT of software that is simply only available for Windows and nothing too similar on other platforms (particularly music/notation software and games).

Keep on chippin' away I suppose. FOSS usage is on the rise, so perhaps the transition will be easier in a few years (would be great to have the music apps on Linux..)

Quothe Clippy...

[Sabathius]

It looks like you are trying to defect to the evil communist regime of open software!

Would you like to:

• Notify the authorities.
• Speak to a Microsoft representative, and repent.
• Kill yourself. you don't deserve to live.

sweet!!

[commodoresloat]

I live in LA. I'm so glad to hear this! Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go wait in a bread line.

Solution:

[Penguinoflight]

Hire someone else who is competent and doesn't need training for a simple computer program. (I'm available, but not in california)

Re:Solution:

[zapadoo]

Training is a big issue; but not the ONLY issue by far.

In a recent former life I built document and workflow management solutions - integrated with "office" applications, as well as with line of business applications (permits, licensing, parks n rec, planning, GIS, etc) - for large municipal governments.

Training was always the second largest cost impact after licensing itself.

Chances are LA uses some form of document mangagement solution (Hummingbird, Open Text, or others) and perhaps even more than one.

Strangely there are no "open source" DMS applications really ready to cut a large scale "desktop" (as opposed to "webtop") deployment, although it frankly would not be that difficult an endeavor to design and write one in this day and age. Quite a lot of the work was all the furtzing about with Microsoft as their products would tend to break integration ever so slightly with every new release.

There is more to it than just putting files under management; larger organizations also have records management rules which need to be followed, the DMS needs to manage these as well, and there are zero, as far as I am aware, open source records classification and retention application with document management capabilities suitable for a large deployment.

Again the metadata management is not terribly complex, but to date its been a rather arcane, boring, business and government-centric requirement that the open source community has not responded to.

I'd love to see an open source solution come out of such a big migration but there may be a chicken/egg scenario with the lack of a DMS / Records Management solution preventing them from moving.

Saving licensing costs on a DM/RM system could pay for an open source solution to be developed. Typical costs for a 1000 seat implementation (software only) tend to run around 200 - 500K depending on options.

And no, Microsoft does not have a Records Management solution and their DM piece is sorely lacking, so they don't have a compelling edge there themselves.

I'd be interested, and am even somewhat qualified, to work on such a project.

There's one Good Thing that can't be denied...

[Anonymous Coward]

The people running ads on /. always think this blather is a Good Thing. Every time revenues flounder does NealDownCowboy come up with a "Is Linux Ready for the Desktop" article?

"These are the jokes folks, these are the f'in jokes."

BS: They won't pay $200/desktop for Office.

[LazLong]

I've been involved with negotiations with M$ for a site with 16000 desktops. We didn't pay anywhere NEAR $200/desktop for Office, M$ desktop OS's, CAL's, and TSCAL's. If the article actually has based the savings on a figure of $200, they need to go back and do some fact checking. Else, it's more FUD and sensational journalism.

I don't want to sound like a M$ shill. However, if we fight them with the same BS FUD tactics we are no better than they.

Re:Dear sack of cocks

[naelurec]

What does this have to do with anything? This guy took a non-supported printer and is trying to reverse engineer it so it is fully supported under Linux.

Take any of the many PCL or PostScript printers out there and its plug and play .. As far as a "fucking waste of life" -- I don't see it like that .. I think its called "learning" and "contributing" or something.

Re:Negotiating Ploy? Yes it is!

[Oxide]

That's what competition brings you. Lower prices and better quality. The existence of a fuly capable alternate to microsoft products in the open source software gives Micorosoft and other software vendors competition and give us consumers lower prices and better quality.

Go for it!

[jschoenberg]

Every company that feels that office software is really just for creating documents should absolutely switch to Openoffice. That is a very sensible decision, given the features in Openoffice are really basic.

Any company that argues today's office PC is a glorified typewriter, and the features in Openoffice will satisfy their needs is a company destined to be unsuccessful.

Any government that abandons streamlining their processes and reducing manual labor where computers will work, is destined for revolution.

they'll come crawling back

[krunk4ever]

i know there may be many users against me on this, but i personally find that no other office suite product comes even close in comparing to ms office. i've used open office and star office for a short period of time and the interface was horrible and had many problems.

now give that to someone who's not as tech savvy and the TIME lost trying to figure out how open office works will already go over the amount you saved initially.

Re:Not Surprising

[Monf]

We have the best car chases, though....

$200 a license for 26000 licenses? right...

[Anonymous Coward]

Umm... Our school only has about 4000 cpu's running office/windows, and I KNOW we don't pay $200 for MSoffice licenses.... $200 is a street value, and probibly used by the reporter to give it a big # and a negative spin... I'd like to see the contract on that and know how much a licence of office REALLY is... Heck, we get OS & Office and it's affordable... Sure, we are a school, but I'm sure any LARGE account would get similar discounts. (Yes, assumed, and I know what that means...)

You can't imagine a Beowulf cluster though...

[sconeu]

Because in L.A., you can't refer to the nodes as "master" and "slave"!

Often a feature can be implemented another way.

[Futurepower(R)]

When there is a new feature in software, and an organization begins using it, the feature can become considered "necessary". However, often that same advantage can be had another way.

Open Office has features that Microsoft Office will never have, like complete customizability, because the source code is available.

In my experience of corporations and government, most uses of word processors are for letters like, Dear Ms. Jones, We have reviewed your application for a loan, and have found that you have not yet provided all the requested documents. Please check the list we sent you again. Regards, Mrs. Smith.

No one will ever open that file again, unless there is an unusual problem. No one but Ms. Jones and Mrs. Smith will ever read the letter. Open Office is a perfect environment for automating that kind of letter.

If an organization such as the one in the story that has 26,000 computers discovers that they have programmed some office automation that doesn't always work because of an incorrect assumption about Open Office, they can pay to have an existing feature fixed or a new feature added to OO.

On the other hand, the men who run Microsoft are billionaires, and act like it. Even someone with an important position in government is just a small insect to someone with a billionaire personality. Not only will they not consider adding a new feature to their product, they won't even allow you to communicate with them. Microsoft is run by arrogant people, and it shows in everything they do. For example, Microsoft seems to calculate very closely just how much aggravation they can give their customers and still keep them as customers. (53 serious vulnerabilities in Microsoft Internet Explorer in two years! If I ever tour Microsoft, I want to see their vulnerability programming department.)

Ask people what they want for their government. Do they want their government to be completely free of outside control? Then they want Open Office.

Or, do they want their government operations to be partly under the control of someone who is spending much of his time with his wife indulging in the rich person's hobby of doling out mere millions to unfortunate natives? That's one way to get appreciation: Buy it.

Re:Often a feature can be implemented another way.

[jschoenberg]

Do we want our government to be OO programmers? I don't think so.

Seriously, if it is important to stay away from billionaires, then why stop at software? Why should our government buy anything made by any company that is owned by someone rich? Are you saying that our government should not buy routers from Cisco's rich owners? Should they not buy computers from Dell's rich owners? Should they not get their toilet papaer from the rich guys tearing down the forests? Hardly seems like spite for rich people is a good reason to not by Microsoft products.

Can our governments ever be completely free from outside control? If so, then they will have to manufacture their own software, hardware, desk chairs, light bulbs...you name it, right?

Re:Often a feature can be implemented another way.

[Ogerman]

Do we want our government to be OO programmers? I don't think so.

Maybe.. if it saves taxpayer money in the long run. That's always the determining factor. It's not a matter of rich vs non-rich companies or whatever. The fact is, anyone can learn to program. Not everyone can manufacture routers, chairs, light bulbs, etc. If a government (or business) can hire some programmers and save money in the long run, they should go for it. Capitalism at work. Remember that software is most naturally a labor market.

Not Gonna Happen

[Anonymous Coward]

Open Office, as much as I like it, still is not as useful as Word and Excel. Just tryin graphing something in Office Calc with a couple hundred data points and you'll see what I mean.

Then why the fan-boy routine?

[khasim]

I run Windows for the following reasons:
I'm used to it. I know the interface, and I know where all the crap is and how to turn it off.
Games are written for it. Good games.
My programs (ProTools, SoundForge, Finale, others) that don't run on Linux run on it. I've paid lots of money for them, and alternatives of equal quality either do not exist or I haven't bothered trying to learn them.
I prefer to only have to maintain one operating system.
Consistency of user experience.
It feels fast.

Then why go on about how you think Bill Gates is a "turd sandwich"? Why didn't you like Microsoft?

For their monopolistic, anticompetitive behavior and overpriced software. I use it because, weighing the tradeoffs between quality, learning curve, maintenance, familiarity, and compatibility, it works for me at the present.

That makes no sense what-so-ever. Do you also complain that luxury cars cost more than other cars?

You seem to believe that Microsoft (run by Bill Gates) has produced a higher quality product and you complain because it costs more money. Do you think that those features you've quoted (quality, learning curve, maintenance and compatibility) just magically happen? They require thought, skill and testing.

You don't like the monopoly, but you think it produces the best software ... therefore, Bill Gates is a "turd sandwich". Again, that makes no sense.

For $15, I get complete compatibility with everyone I exchange documents with. I kick myself for supporting MS in this way, but them's the breaks. I haven't checked out OpenOffice in a few years, perhaps I'll give it another go in the summer when I have time for such luxuries.

MSOffice for $15 and Windows is usually wrapped up in the price of the PC.

Where is the "overpriced" software you were complaining about?

You hate Bill Gates because Microsoft ruthlessly crushes all competition so it can sell a high quality OS and office suite for pocket change.

Indeed. It's probably time for me to try another install, but system-tinkering-and-experimentation ceased to be one of my hobbies a few years ago.

Why would you want to?

Really. I'm not seeing your motivation for even bothering with Linux. You have high quality software that you're familiar with that costs you less than I spend on coffee in a week.

"You know, I really like my Lexus that I picked up for $100, but I might try one of those free cars they're giving away, even though I tried one several years ago and it sucked and broke down all the time."

That makes no sense.

When someone tells me honestly that it will be easier for me to learn, set up, and maintain a linux box than to keep doing what I'm doing, I'm game.

It will NEVER be easier to learn a new system than to stick with the system you already know. NEVER. Why do you think it would?

Finding and downloading AdAware takes 3 minutes. I can grab lunch while it runs. Linux takes longer than 3 minutes to maintain.

Did you just wake up one day and know that there was a product called AdAware and that you should install it?

Or did you hear about it while reading about Windows vulnerabilities?

But why would you read something like that when you're never affected by them?

I know people who excel at acquiring viruses. My system does not perform like theirs.

Yet another statement that makes no sense.

Of course your system "perform[s] like theirs". You both run Windows.

When "stuff goes wrong," I've got one. I back up important documents and don't keep anything sensitive on my machine. Yes, I'm living dangerously.

What is with all of these statements? They make no sense what-so-ever.

Do you

Los Angeles juror system already uses open source

[RKBA]

I was rather impressed when I did jury duty service in Los Angeles and noticed that in the main jurors waiting room there were several Micro-ATX sized computers with Internet access for rent by the hour. The computers were locked down so tight (the Mozilla web browser and a card game were the only apps installed) that I couldn't even tell what OS they were running until I did a POR reset so I could watch it reboot. They were running one of the major Linux distributions, but at the moment I can't recall which it was (Suse I think).

Cost of not upgrading: $0

[Anonymous Coward]

I still run Office 97 and it works just fine.

Accept Reality?!

[Anonymous Coward]

neeeeeeeeeeeevvvvvvvvvvvvvvvveeeeeeeeerrrrrrrr!!!

Unrecognised certificate authority

[kiore]

There's something bogus about that site, it's security certificate was issued by an unrecognised Certificate Authority (CA) ... at least that's what FireFox tells me.

The listed CA seems to be one of those bogus self cerifying "authorities"

I think I'll just pass on reading it until they can afford to pay for a certificate from a reputable CA.

OSS will lead to a police state.

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't believe me? Well, believe logic then.

OSS = more free money = used to hire more policemen = increased state sanctioned oppression.

Reject OSS. The less money spent on cops, the freer we are.

No, it works fine.

[khasim]

It gets outdated. Things are always improving, so data formats are always changing to accomodate the improvements. Software that used to work fine becomes useless. Arguing otherwise is just disingenuous.

You are completely wrong. I can write code on vi that has been around for years and years.

You only believe formats are changing because Microsoft changes the formats to drive sales of their latest office suite.

Ahh, the "I haven't seen it so it doesn't exist" fallacy.

No, that's the "provide substantiation for your claim" argument.

A few days ago I had my first hard drive crash ever. EVER. In 15 years of using computers, I've never had a drive die on me before I threw it out. So would it have been reasonable for me to assume that hard drives never crash?

Only if you were an idiot. Hard drives crash. They are mechanical devices and the bearings/motor/etc will, eventually, wear out. This is because of "friction".

You're assuming that because you've never had problems with the particular software you use, that nobody must have problems. I'm a developer and a daily Linux user (I haven't touched a Windows box at home or at work in years) and even I have trouble making things work sometimes.

No. I'm saying that he needs to substantiate his claims because they do not sound logical to me.

You won't get very far convincing somebody to use Linux by telling him he's too stupid to figure it out.

Why do you assume that one of my life goals is convincing him to use Linux?

He's posting and reading /. and there is a definate segment here that is pro-Linux.

I could continue on, but I think I've said what I wanted to say... As a hardcore Linux user myself, even I think your attitude is caustic.

Well it's a good thing that my life goals also don't include impressing you. I hope your goals don't include impressing me because you're off to a really bad start.

Re:No, it works fine.

[pclminion]

You are completely wrong. I can write code on vi that has been around for years and years.

I doubt you can code at all, or you'd understand the issues that all developers face with regards to longevity of data formats.

You only believe formats are changing because Microsoft changes the formats to drive sales of their latest office suite.

As I said, I haven't touched a Microsoft product in several years. I'm not basing this statement on MS's products.

Only if you were an idiot. Hard drives crash. They are mechanical devices and the bearings/motor/etc will, eventually, wear out. This is because of "friction".

Precisely my point. I'd have to be an idiot to believe that hard drives don't crash because I've never seen it -- and you'd have to be an idiot to believe that software is always perfectly usable because you've never seen an unusable piece of software.

Why do you assume that one of my life goals is convincing him to use Linux?

Because you're trying to convince him to use it? Apparently by calling him an idiot.

Well it's a good thing that my life goals also don't include impressing you. I hope your goals don't include impressing me because you're off to a really bad start.

As if I give a fuck. Now get back to work using the software I've written for you.

This is a fantastic idea

[adeydas]

This is a fantastic idea and many Indian offices has done it already saving millions of rupees in OS costs and other softwares. Kudos to FOSS.

Not all are arrogant. Don't avoid the real issues:

[Futurepower(R)]

A Slashdot comment is too short to be a full discussion of a complex issue. I don't think that being a billionaire necessarily makes someone arrogant. I've never thought Warren Buffett is arrogant, for example.

Here is some Microsoft history. Microsoft is much worse than anyone says, simply because recording all the abuses would take a lifetime of writing:

1994 October: IBM released OS/2 version 3.0, an operating system far superior to anything Microsoft had, or would have for years. IBM launched a major campaign to get software developed for it. Many major software houses signed up to port their applications, but nearly all had to drop OS/2 development when they read the NDA (Non-Disclosure Agreement) for the Windows 95 development kit. If you were developing anything for OS/2, you could not participate in the Windows 95 program. The NDA itself required total secrecy, so the reason everyone dropped OS/2 development was only rumored for years.

1995 August: Microsoft and Department of Justice finalize the antitrust Consent Decree. Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson is ordered to sign it, since Judge Stanley Sporkin refused, indicating it was too easy on Microsoft. Microsoft immediately starts publicly ridiculing the Department of Justice, changes the names of the practices forbidden by the Concent Decree, and continues business as usual.

1995 November: Intel released the Pentium Pro chip. Microsoft was livid because Pentium Pro was optimized for 32-bit code. Windows 95 runs like a dog on the Pentium Pro, exposing Microsoft's "32-bit" claims to be lies. OS/2 and Unix run just fine.

1998 June: Microsoft releases Windows 98. While it contained bug fixes for Windows 95 the real reason for its release was to bury Internet Explorer in Windows so the Justice Department couldn't make them take it out.

1998 October: Novell introduces NetWare 5.0. NetWare gets great reviews, and Microsoft feels the heat, especially from comparisons between NetWare 5.0 (shipping, works great) and Windows NT 5.0 (very, very late; very, very buggy, not shipping yet), so renames Windows NT 5.0 to Windows 2000 to stop the 5.0 vs 5.0 comparisons.

1998 November: AOL purchases Netscape for $4.2 billion. Netscape has been crushed by Microsoft's monopolist business proactices, but Microsoft spin doctors say it proves the vitality of the market.

1999 April: the Melissa virus is released, bringing down Windows-based networks worldwide.

1999 November: Guilty! Judge Jackson's Finding Of Fact in the Justice Department suit was released, declaring that Microsoft has a monopoly and has knowingly abused its monopoly position.

2000 February: Microsoft can't take the heat - buys off Caldera evil business practices lawsuit. Microsoft demands a gag order as always to keep the truth from getting out. Microsoft announces a charge of $150 million and implies that was the total price (so Caldera position must have been weak). Experts estimate the actual buy-out was between $350 million and $500 million based on $150 million added to pre-existing reserves.

2000 April: Guilty! Judge Jackson's Finding of Law is released immediately after DOJ / Microsoft settlement negotiations break down. Microsoft guilty on nearly all counts, "not proven" on a couple, and innocent on none.

2000 November: George W. Bush is elected president of the U.S. under suspicious circumstances. The business world presumes this means Microsoft will be let off on anti-trust charges.

2001 June: A pro-business, Libertarian leaning Court of Appeals unanimously upholds all 8 counts of Microsoft's conviction for abusing its monopoly. The court then set aside the penalty for retrial due to an "appearance" of bias on the part of judge Thomas Jackson.

2001 September

What about giving back to the GNU/Linux Community?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't see how this is good news, even if it IS Microsoft losing the money. $5.2 million that would be going into the technology sector now isn't. Why aren't they donating a fraction of this money to the people who wrote the software in the first place? Geez, they're trying to turn programmers into starving artists. How typical of politicians.

Dubya's DHS...

[quarkscat]

committed to a multi-billion dollar contract
with Microsoft for their OS and Apps needs,
in spite of warnings from IT security experts.
(Considering short-sheeting INS & BP from needed
funds, lame border & seaport security, etcetera,
doesn't this make Department of Homeland Security
an oxymoron?)

I believe that the CIA also uses MSFT products
extensively, but also uses Sun servers. The NSA
doesn't advertise just what they spend their
funds on, so just how deeply entrenched MSFT is
there is unknown, but they have made significant
contributions to GNU/Linux security.

It would be nice to believe that Los Angeles will
actually switch to F/OSS OpenOffice, but the
cynic within keeps saying "negotiating ploy".

s/bought/hired/

[vidnet]

I wonder how many FBI agents, CIA agents, NSA agents [...] could be bought!

Not too many, I hope... ;)

Keep your fantasies to yourself.

[khasim]

I doubt you can code at all, or you'd understand the issues that all developers face with regards to longevity of data formats.

Make all the claims you want. You haven't supported a single one. Meanwhile, I've provided support for everything I've said.

As I said, I haven't touched a Microsoft product in several years. I'm not basing this statement on MS's products.

Really? Then what are you basing it on?

Postscript? That's a fairly common dataformat used in non-Microsoft systems. No, it can't be Postscript because that still works, even when versions change. I have old Postscript files that still work 100% perfectly on the newest printers.

Precisely my point. I'd have to be an idiot to believe that hard drives don't crash because I've never seen it -- and you'd have to be an idiot to believe that software is always perfectly usable because you've never seen an unusable piece of software.

Let me get this straight ...

Because you have never seen X happen, but X is easily explained with a basic knowledge of physics...

That means that Y must happen because you have never seen Y happen just like you have never seen X happen.

Yeah. Whatever. I take it you failed basic logic, too.

Because you're trying to convince him to use it? Apparently by calling him an idiot.

No. I'm tearing apart his arguments like I'm tearing apart your's. I don't care about convincing him or you, but it's fun to show how illogical your arguments are.

As if I give a fuck. Now get back to work using the software I've written for you.

You've obviously failed basic logic and have no concept of what data formats are available so why would I ever want to use any crap that you fantasize about writing?

A good data format is future-proof. Learn that concept. Look at WordPerfect's implementation. Look at Postscript.

Or, you can continue to show your ignorance here.

won't happen

[Anonymous Coward]

The reason the City won't move to openoffice is that they do not have the budget to retrain their helpdesk, nor staff the help desk during the transition to support both productivity tools. EVEN if it meant huge savings to do so.

LA County is another example of where HUGE savings in the 10's of millions would be possible. However, they have the same situation where initial ramp up in training, support, and deployment would cost something up front. And it would take a year or two to realize the substantial benefits.

Another reason that it won't happen, reducing budget in one area of Govt. IT does not help other areas of IT. We would all like to think that cost efficiencies make a difference. But, to a departmental budget, or, on a project by project basis, money reduced for productivity tools or desktops would be reduced, period.

Contrary to logical thinking the savings would not be moved to another department, budget, or project. In spite of the benefits as a whole to the Govt. entity, there would be too many political practitioners doing all that they can to keep any of their budgets or monies for projects from being reduced or eliminated.