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Small-Town Open Source Adoption

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the growing-up-linux dept.

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."

3 of 134 comments (clear)

  1. Asking for trouble... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful
    if it hadn't been for a major power outage, it would have been running for three years without a reboot
    What is the deal with people and uptime. Reboot the damn machine every once and a while and let the kernel patches take effect. You're going to have a much greater down time if someone exploits your 3 year old kernel. There is nothing wrong with a short, planned downtime, especially if you have a redundant server to maintain basic functionality.
  2. Re:Not trying hard enough... by brunes69 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    That's easy to say when you are not responsible for the re-training for a 10,000 person workforce, many of whom know nothing about computers aside from their specific application they trained on when they were hired.

  3. Scam by lucm · · Score: 5, Insightful

    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.