Slashdot Mirror
Small-Town Open Source Adoption
An anonymous reader writes "ZDNet has a piece on the adoption of open source software by Steamboat Springs, CO. The small resort town has integrated OSS into all aspects of productivity and e-governance. Kent Morrison, the IS Manager for the town, discusses what made them switch and how it has gone." From the article: "What about Linux on the desktop--is this an option for your organization? Morrison: We've discussed it. With Linux's ability to emulate Windows improving every year, we see that as a possibility. We would build a Linux image for the majority of users, but for the 20 percent of users that run Windows-only applications we would keep them on the same platform. We would try to make a Linux desktop look like our Windows environment (the organization currently runs Windows 2000 but will start rolling out XP this year) as we don't want to retrain our users. We don't have a time frame for installing Linux yet, though."
You are several years behind Largo, give their IT dept a call.
Linux's ability to "emulate Windows" is already good enough for anything you want to throw at it. If you don't want to migrate, don't. But don't make up excuses.
Also, mixing Windows and Linux is more work than just choosing one or the other. And upgrading to XP is a dumb idea if you really have any intentions of moving to Linux soon.
"I assumed blithely that there were no elves out there in the darkness"
the organization currently runs Windows 2000 but will start rolling out XP this year
yeah, just in time for Vista.
On the flip side, these people look like a *really* budget-conscious bunch. The perfect target for a Linux move if they ever get around making it. I wish them good luck, grassroots migrations are a good thing.
I plan to become a consultant to help organizations make this transition. Hugo Chavez just mandated free software for their whole government. BTW, anyone seen this yet?
Dick and Harry's Awful Adventure
Featuring:
Aerosmith
Led Zeppelin
Pat Benatar
Bon Jovi
Johnny Cash
Frank Sinatra
The Fugees & DJ Hype
Steamboat Springs, CO may be having a great time moving to Linux, but it helps a lot that it's such a small community. The logistic problems are nowhere near the level they would be if a major metropolis tried to move all their systems to Linux. I think it's a great move, but there's a reason it's happening in a small town in Colorado rather than one of the cities with a high concentration of technology companies.
I've always pictured the color of OS zealotry as a sort of bright flamingo pinkish hue
They both can be made to perform the same operations, its a matter of cost vs time(currently it just isnt worth it- engineers balance "the right way" and "the cost effective way" every day), and that is dicated by politics. Until there is some serious political push behind linux, big bad redmond is gonna have all the market share to itself. Same goes for osx.
I can understand this sentiment for now, but I would like to see Linux surpass Windows. Maybe if that happens, we'll see Windows emulate Linux. It already emulates Mac OS9. And with Vista, it will emulate OSX. :-)
What?
Microsoft Fishing for dummies:
1) Install a few Linux file servers (without disturbing your Windows 2000 domain)
2) Talk to the press about plans of moving from Exchange to "open source" software. Mention possible plans of using Linux on desktops.
3) Let the Linux community talk about "another Munich"
4) Wait for the Microsoft call and cut a good deal for the already planned XP rollout
Being a textbook Red Hat customer could also come in handy, in case Microsoft does not bite.
lucm, indeed.
Sadly, there are too many homeless orphans and any Open Source method of adoption is welcome.
What? How does that work? The IS Manager for the town council, maybe.
Get your own free personal location tracker
We get trained not to build in platform dependencies; Java is pretty much sufficient for anything user-interface-ish or back-endish that we need to do. So what is Steamboat Springs doing, that needs Windows ? And can we help them achieve neutrality soon ?
A SourceForge repository for municipal applications would be great.
the organization currently runs Windows 2000 but will start rolling out XP this year
Hmmmm. We're about to start rolling out Windows XP? That means we need to start price negotiations with Microsoft. Hey! Lets call a reporter and tell them that we are THINKING about switching to Linux. That will undoubtedly get us a better price for our Windows licenses, since Microsoft would love to have the follow up story be "Steamboat Springs chooses Windows after all."
You are almost neglegent as the CIO of a prominent organization/government entity if you don't do the obligitory "I'm thinking of Linux" story before you negotiate for Windows licenses.
There may be 10,000 people living in the Steamboat Springs area (give or take a few thousand), but they certainly aren't all working for the local government! It is very clear that this OSS move is very small, very unimportant in this small mountain community. If my little sister can handle e17, I think professionals working for the government should be expected to, especially when it means a significantly lower cost to the public (not that any of the nature-lovers in Colorado care about fiscal responsibility)
"And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the World"
1 John 4:14
Although that makes sense, I doubt that a small town government has enough weight to really netociate much of anything. I'm sure MS wants as many users as possible, but under 500 desktops is probably not even a bump in the road to them. Any negociations would probably happen at standard volume licencing. Besides which, does anyone even "negotiate" windows licences on this scale? I don't think HP or Dell do, and usually you just get what comes with the machine. Office maybe, but not windows.
This doesn't look so good for Microsoft. If towns (or businesses) are still using Windows 2000, and only migrating to XP this year, how in the world are they going to find people who are going to adopt Vista? The world is still catching up to XP--we don't need yet another version of Windows to create even more distance between where Microsoft is and where many companies are.
Funtime Candy Wow! - my plan for eventually conquering Japan.
Although that makes sense, I doubt that a small town government has enough weight to really netociate [sic] much of anything.."
:)
Not unless you make enough waves in the press to get posted on slashdot.
This is the reason I said that you need to be from a "prominent organization." I too am impressed that Steamboat Springs managed to make enough waves to get noticed. It's the eyeballs on the press articles that give them leverage. Nevertheless, I agree that they are a bit too small to have much effect. Now, if you were a large government organization like a mid-sized east coast state.....
Yea, so, we've been running Linux servers for a little while. We have seven Linux servers now but, we still have six Windows servers. We're tossing around the idea of going to Linux on the desktop. That's after we upgrade to Windows XP later this year...
Seven servers makes the front page of Slashdot with a headline screaming about the town switching. Give me a break. You lot are pathetic. I could find more OS/2 servers still in use.
Dude jews really really love freedom of speech
evil is as evil does
People don't know the difference between a window manager, a browser, a desktop environment, etc. Honest, most don't. Now look at just normal acronyms and buzzwords. That's it, you are now officially way beyond the expertise of most computer users. They have a 256 mellowbit email drive client from delltel on a machine named the "computer explorer". And "the computer" is that big glowing thing they are staring at. That box off to the side is...something else, no one really knows, but it must be important....
It's a struggle for most computer users to use what they have, so once they learn to do a few things, that's it, that's as far as they will go willingly. Even people *paid* to "use the computer" have a hard time to do more than a few simple tasks. At best, they know just enough to screw up bad. At worst...
.
It's a real problem. Windows is the default everything on the desktop, again, a real problem (for some viewpoints), because to do ANYTHING a "non windows way" is to invite blank stares and nothing getting done. Right now it's obvious that it is already too complicated for most people, and that's with familiarity and in a lot of cases, years of use. Radical change invites both radical productivity gains and ALSO radical failure, it works both ways. It's not that it is that hard to learn NEW things, it's that it is SUPER hard to UNLEARN things.
Question: What does this have to do with Mozilla?
I'm going to be fairly annoyed if TFA turns out to be a lengthy discussion of how they installed Firefox.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
the organization currently runs Windows 2000 but will start rolling out XP this year) as we don't want to retrain our users
Uh-wha? Even with the classic skin, unless these workstations are completely managed with server policies, the users are going to have to be re-trained on how to do things that are different in XP than in 2000. Never mind where Vista and Office 12 will take them.
They're sure lucky that they started using computers with Windows 2000 because the migration from DOS to Win 3.1 to Win 95 to Win 2K would have been too much for their users - their minds would have exploded!
Or.... maybe their users really are smart and this is just a fallacious excuse.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
While that happens a lot, steamboat is very committed to lowering costs and improving services. Basically, they did municipal WIFI several years ago and all the locals were impressed. So impressed that Qwest and Comcast are fighting it and trying to get it banned not only in steamboat but thoughout the state.
"Great! So tell me about all the benefits of switching from Windows to Linux again?"
"............"
What a bunch of hypocrites. Microsoft is rotten through and through, UNTIL you start releasing your own operating system, and then Windows allofasudden becomes the shining perfect pinacle of excellence to be exactly cloned byte for byte. So, in effect, your ONLY real problem with Microsoft was simply that it wasn't YOUR COMPANY. Well, people who think that are just as damned as Bill Gates, with the extra measure of being even WORSE, since Bill never envied anybody else.
I've learned most of the slick little shortcuts to do things, and probably all of the well-known methods for accomplishing things.
On Linux, I still haven't figured out how to create a desktop shortcut icon.
I'm not stupid, before you go off on a rant here. I just don't have much luck in the couple of minutes I'm willing to spend searching for clues. I can find out how to do that in Windows in a couple minutes, so why not in Linux in the same time frame?
As long as Linux remains harder to use than Windows, the average user will tend to think it is not worth the effort.
And the Linux zealots who disdain average users and make pompous statements that they shouldn't be using computers if they can't figure out simple things like that? Well, you guys make it soooooooo much easier for Microsoft to retain its stranglehold on the consumers.
Way to go, guys. Bill Gates loves idiots like you.
Well consider the idea that MS selling one license is still more profitable than selling no licenses at full price. There's no reason for them not to negotiate on any order of a semi-decent size - any business that can sell a set of 25 characters separated into groups of five by hyphens at $150 a pop should be willing to sell those same sets at $50 each if the other option is selling none. The only reason they don't do it with single users is that it's actually not worth their time - that $50 actually would be better spent having the employee(s) involved doing something else. And they know that most end-users seriously considering switching to linux (or smart enough to say as much to get a discount) are the type that would run a pirated version anyways if they can't get one legally for cheap.
How are sites slashdotted when nobody reads TFAs?
The only problem i have with this article is the comment of "...With Linux's ability to emulate Windows improving every year..." Is this really where linux is going? a great generic emulater brand to Windows? Even if its not, is that the impression the decision makers are getting?
I'm not sure why everyone rejoices when some government organization goes OSS. The only reason they go OSS is because they don't have to pay a single dime for it. Ask them how much they are donating towards the project because it has helped them, and the answer will probarbly be $0. If you worked on an OSS project that helped your town/community, how much of a tax break do you think they are going to give you? My guess is 0. They'll probarbly have 200 different townhall meetings before they come to a conclusive decision on giving a tax break.
Don't be fooled to easily, the last thing they care about is the OSS movement, they just want something for free..
Yet another bit of Microsoft PR masquerading as OSS news...
"We would try to make a Linux desktop look like our Windows environment (the organization currently runs Windows 2000 but will start rolling out XP this year) as we don't want to retrain our users."
From Zonk naturally.
I've seen people who were entirely new to computers, several hundred by now, who were quickly able to do simple tasks in all the various flavors of Windows.
The significance of me knowing Windows was more in that I should be able to apply that knowledge to learning Linux. But the help files are less than helpful, the information online is disorganized by comparison, and installing new programs is a PITA of epic proportions.
Despite what the anonymous coward below said (Bill loves ya, babe), I am pretty good at learning new things, especially when they are similar to things I already know. Linux GUIs are similar to Windows (for obvious reasons), and I am expecting them to work in a similar fashion. Aside from handling accelerator keys differently and a few other annoyances, they mostly do.
Young farts like you (I can't believe you left edlin and Wordstar off that list, though "copy con>" would have been a bit much) have grown up using both. Slightly less young farts like myself have not. Though why age should even be a factor is beyond my comprehension, as there are plenty of people my age and older who have used *nix and Windows platforms equally.
I have mostly been isolated from that side of things until recently, and I am curious to see if Linux is worth switching to full time. The zealots who talk down to me, besides being social idiots, are also hurting the cause of Linux.
That big chunk of people you mentioned can't tell IE from OS, and not just because Microsoft wants it that way. Many people still think the monitor is their computer. From our perspective, they seem really dumb.
But they can learn to use Windows without anyone standing there helping them.
And most of them cannot do that with Linux. Linux is improving, but it's not there yet. I would like it to get there, but the alienating zealots not only interfere with that process, they also actively discourage people from wanting to look into it at all.
Sometimes I think Bill's crew makes those outrageous OSS==terrorism claims simply to rile up the zealots so they will fling poo and discredit Linux by association.