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Governments & Open Source
sydney-computer-support writes "The Greens in New Zealand who advocate the use of OSS are upset about a Novell contract because it doesn't support open source. The article mentions the greens spokeperson saying
the contract "cleared the path for government agencies to adopt and expand their use of non-proprietary software" -- failing to note that Novell is a company offering proprietary versions of OSS."
Slashdot is just taunting with this headline. I mean, come on! "Open Souce"?
My humor is probably your flamebait
My workplace recently started moving some critical servers from Solaris to Red Hat. Of course this is a proprietary (and often reviled) Linux. But that's not important.
What's important are the number of people installing test boxes and "piddle" boxes running Linux to get more familiar with it. Some of these are Red Hat, but a couple folks are starting to look at the other non-commercial packages. I fully expect more to do this.
Once corporate folks have put their feet on the Linux platform and found it will both hold weight and perform fabulously, they can then move on to the freer options. I think almost all of it has to do with support and CYA.
Personally, my philosophy is "best tool for the job". If that's a commercial/proprietary Linux, so be it. If it's Sun, so be it. MS...same deal. This adoption of proprietary Linux is a first step towards a similar, more open philosophy, so it shouldn't be poo-poo'd.
Novell, in case the Greens didn't notice, has been releasing more and more of the Ximian and SuSE code under the GPL and making their distribution much easier to acquire gratis as well as libre. So what's their complaint? Reading TFA it's hard to tell.
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
The news post claims the greens are upset about this deal, then links to an article in which two different spokespeople from the green party praise the deal.
And what's with the jab at Novell for offering "proprietary versions of OSS". What does that even mean? Is Suse Linux somehow now less open because Novell owns it?
Am I missing something here?
How, "of course?"
I'm by no way a Red Hat fan, but every byte of software that Red Hat produces is under the GPL, and they not only tell you that in their LICENSES file but give precise instructions for how to remove the Red Hat trademark files from their distribution so that it can be redistributed.
If that's "proprietary" then we're well on our way to becoming what the anti-OSS crowd call us: religious fanatics, more interested in internal inquisitions for insufficient piety than in the real world.
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
The /. lead-in completely misrepresents the article in question. Had the submitter actually read TFA, he would know that the Greens are actually very excited about the deal. The quotes from Gren spokespersons cover a lot of the standard ground for OSS advocacy. However, the article in question was written for the National Business review, and is primarily a "debunking" of OSS, and of the Greens' enthusiasm for open solutions.
Sorry but you shouldn't believe everything you read.
The Red Hat Enterprise distribution includes some trademarks, logos and what not, but it is in no way proprietary. You can download all the source code directly from Red Hat's own ftp servers for free. And you can even create your own linux distribution based off the source, however, you must remove the trademark logos and what not before you distribute as you are not Red Hat.
If you don't believe then try checking out http://centos.org/
Or just peruse the Red Hat website and read their licensing agreements for their products.
It seems you've bought into FUD spread by both the anti-OSS crowd saying "...Red Hat is no different, its proprietary just like Windows..." and the Red Hat bashing linux elitists "...Red Hat is the next Microsoft, they took our linux and made it proprietary...". Its all BS.
burnin
If you are talking about an individual or corporation then your inclination would be ok.
Public systems paid for with public tax dollars do not in any way go by the same litmus tests. Why should I not be able to access a government website because I use Firefox.
No government documents should ever be in a proprietary format. Also, when it comes to tax dollars, it seems to me that "good enough" makes a tool the right tool for the job when the price is free (OpenOffice.org) versus Microsoft Office. Price MUST be a factor when determining the "right" tool. Also, if proprietary vendor products attempt to lock in an organization and lock out competing products from interoperating, that is unacceptable.
Right tool for the job? Ok, but let's talk about what DEFINES the right tool. It isn't purely function.
Word doc reader is only free to people that already have paid microsoft for their use of the windows platform. That's like saying that your car doors were free with your car - no, the doors came with the car, they were part of what you paid for.
When MS publishes a DOC reader for a free operating system, or releases a win32-compatible operating system for free (with a perpetual license) _then_ the Doc reader will be free.
PDF, on the other hand, can be viewed with free tools.