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South African Education Department Bans Free and Open Source Software
An anonymous reader writes "The South African Education Department has effectively banned the use of FOSS software in state-run schools by forcing all candidates writing the Computer Applications Technology examination to use Microsoft's Office 2010 or 2013 as the only supported options. In the same circular, the state has mandated that all schools use Delphi, instead of Java, as the programming language for the country's Information Technology practical paper. South Africa, notorious for its poor performance in Maths and Science and for having vastly over-crowded and underfunded schools, are now locked into costly Microsoft licensing because of this decision."
Well, I don't smell any hint of corruption here, no sirree!
</sarcasm>
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
How many people where bribed to make this deal?
"The South African Education Department has effectively banned the use of FOSS software in state-run schools by forcing all candidates writing the Computer Applications Technology examination to use Microsoft's Office 2010 or 2013 as the only supported options."
Fascinating, apparently MS-South Africa has sophisticated technology that seeks out and destroys all open source software simply because Microsoft Office is used for some tasks. This new learning is amazing! Tell me again how sheep-bladders can be used to prevent earthquakes!
AntiFA: An abbreviation for Anti First Amendment.
looks like they take protecting it seriously
Mark Shuttleworth, please speak up!
Side effect of the Gates foundation aid to Africa?
S. Africa is known for this sort of thing. They purchased a bunch of fighter jets that they could never afford to fly in exchange for a huge kick-back to the ANC.
Hopefully the kickback they got from Microsoft was worth it.
Sounds like they've entered the death-spiral, where the product of their education system is now making decisions on the future of the education system. Sad.
Apparently they missed the global ostracization which accompanied such mind mindbogglingly bad choices as apartheid.
This makes me sad
I came, I conquered, I coredumped
I hope someone sets up a protest on Avaaz.
http://www.avaaz.org/en/
I'm not afraid to admit I use a quite of commercial software and have been quite happy with many products out there. Yes even a few MS ones. But as a person with a functioning brain and an interest in productivity you can bet your ass every time I'm looking at an upgrade I take a moment to survey the options. Often over the course of a major version upgrade cycle I learn that a cheaper or if I'm lucky an OSS solution has become viable for my needs. Any time I see an organization act outside of that simple principle I can suspect only one of two things and neither are good. I usually hope it's just narrow minded ignorance, which with luck can sometimes be cured, but when you lock people into a paid-for only solution it usually ends up being bribery of some sort. Governments are in the end just made up of people, and like in the corporate world the decision makers are often the most selfcentered people in the land. Add to that despite using and recommending certain MS programs and services I have little doubt in my mind that MS is one of the most unethical technology companies in the world- it's how they got where they are.
If my $10 mil company can't afford Office 2013 and is switching to Libre, how the hell can an African school system afford it?
I think, it's an hoax. Isn't it?
Now the rest of the world uses open source, but SA insists on an antiquated idea called Microsoft.
Forced to use Delphi? Really?
Aren't there a couple FOSS compilers that support Delphi to a greater or less degree?
Mandating Delphi vs. Java means that students will be learning to program in Delphi, not Java. It has nothing to do with whether other software that *is* FOSS will be used. Sure, Delphi runs on Windows, but *amazingly*, so does a lot of other software, both FOSS and not FOSS. And since not everyone is programming, there certainly could be many other machines not running Delphi, or Windows for that matter, that all sorts of FOSSy goodness could run on.
Unless we're talking about Africa, where there are only 3 computers per 1000 people. :(
Unless they mean Delphi as in Aftermarket Auto Parts. If that's the case, I'm *outraged*. :)
Keep them dumb and dependent!
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
I'm sure the 5 people that do those courses will be able to "legally purchase" a copy of what they need somewhere.
The last thing this industry needs is yet another wave of bad Java programmers.
Students need to learn Office. A major majority of companies use Microsoft products. They need to know how to use them. It is that simple.
I know nothing of this Delphi doodad, however if you're not teaching Java you're not in the present reality. The country is already behind, this doesn't help any.
Laughter is the Spackle of the Soul.
maybe not for every situation, but it certainly applies here...
this is often a false distinction...true 'incompetence' without malice requires a staggering level of pure ignorance...
Why bother bringing this up?
b/c there is **NO DEFENSE** for what South Africa and M$ are doing here....it is PURE EVIL
I see these discussions on /. whenever a company or government does this horseshit and we all call it out as horseshit...
The idea that this decision was an "honest" mistake is surely *theoretically* possible...but to make an "honest" mistake at this level would require so much ignorance of how daily society works that the person probably wouldn't be able to support themselves...
Thank you Dave Raggett
Is not malice enough? And doesn't stupidity fail to explain it?
Forgetting someone's birthday: stupidly forgetting or maliciously hates them? Why attribute malice here?
Makeing a collossal cock up and screwing people over, and remember that there WILL be bribes offered, and why ascribe to stupidity when malice explains it so much better?
After all, youd have to explain
1) Why stupidity leads to this decision
2) Why someone didn't point out the stupidity
3) How did someone get high enough when they were this stupid
4) Why realising it's stupid isn't happening when we're pointing it out
Delphi is one version of it, a propriatory one owned by Oracle.
Just like FORTH is the language, Fig FORTH a version of it.
Or FORTRAN a language, but VAX FORTRAN a version.
BASIC and MS BASIC.
Delphi is the program, not the programming language. The programming language is Pascal.
The ANC which controls the government of South Africa is a member of the Socialist International.
Why are they in bed with Microsoft?
Just seems strange.
Rule of acquisition #98.
Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
so pretty much the only computer most people can afford there (rpi and other cheap arm devices) aren't allowed ?
If my $10 mil company can't afford Office 2013 and is switching to Libre, how the hell can an African school system afford it?
Office 365 plans and pricing for education [South Africa]
Plan A3
Students:
R 23,30 user/month
Faculty and staff:
R 42,00 user/month
1 South African Rand = 10 cents US.
Includes:
Hosted e-mail. 25 GB/user.
Web conferencing, supports HD video, etc.
3,000 SharePoint team sites.
Active directory integration
24/7 phone support
Anti-spam and anti-malware
Office Web Apps
MS Office "Pro" Suite for 5 PCs or Macs/user
Advanced e-mail, advanced voice mail.
May include "MS Office Anywhere" --- stream full Office apps to any PC.
So what are your monthly costs per user for an equivalent bundle of applications and services? How well does Libre Office integrate with third party applications and resources?
That's not very Ubuntu feelings, I can feel.
Who is using expensive up-to-date Microsoft products at home, and who is using the FOSS alternatives? OTOH perhaps the economic boundary is more between those who have computers at home and those who don't, in which case perhaps this is a good thing - prospective employees should be training on the current business-level software (not that school is supposed to be vocational training, but something is better than nothing).
...kicking and screaming.
Stick Men
MS Office 2003? Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if a few of them still run Office 97... if not worse.
*Scratches head*
Delphi is TurboPascal but then evaluated to... what exactly? Anyway, it's a programming language still used in some rapid development environments that are supporting legacy applications. It may not even be a bad language to learn the principles of programming in. The chances of finding a job with Delphi skills and making a good career as a programmer if that's the only language you can code in, are unfortunately rather limited. OP stating that he'd rather see Java isn't such a bad choice, both from a career and a learning perspective. How "open source" Java is, is debatable, but at least you have FOSS runtimes for it and it's OS agnostic, which you can't really say about Delphi.
In ethics there is a concept known as "conflict of interest". In almost every instance where someone trots out the line "Never ascribe to malice..." they are responding to a question about someone's potential conflict of interest.
Especially when those in position of trust and authority are involved in improper decisions, it is unethical to trot out the "Never ascribe to malice..." line. Their position of trust and authority obligates them, and their would-be defenders to being open to additional scrutiny as to potential conflicts of interest.
Seastead this.
Sounds like some one got a bag of money under the table from M$ xD
I used the free Office offering that comes with my free SkyDrive subscription. Surely a student / school can use this for basic Office stuff. Of course, if they want anything more advanced then they will have to pay.
"When Samsung packaged a solar-powered classroom for Africa’s remote communities, it shipped a GNU/Linux solution but M$ intervened"
"Working together with Reza Bardien, our Education Lead, we managed to turn this into an end to end Windows solution by the end of the week"
- quote -
Solar Powered Schools – Linux Win
In the week of 16 January, Samsung Africa launched its first Solar Powered Internet Schools. These 40 ft solar powered containers are designed for use in remote rural education communities with limited, or no access to electricity. This is a world first and shows great innovation from our partners.
However, this solution with little education relevance (all 20 student laptops as well as the teacher one) was a complete Linex solution at the time of launch. Working together with Reza Bardien, our Education Lead, we managed to turn this into an end to end Windows solution by the end of the week, including the PIL Learning Suite and the Windows-based NETOP Classroom Management solution.
By Friday morning, when Samsung demonstrated its solution to press and stakeholders, the solution was based on a Microsoft platform. This container (and the next 10 containers going into Africa and South Africa) will include devices running on a Microsoft platform only, so the students learning on these devices will be running and learning on Windows.
Some great cross group collaboration between the Windows BG, the Education Public Sector, NETOP and Jacques from OEM who assisted.
Thank you all!
- unquote -
DELPHI is D E A D and will concurently lock down any chance a child has of getting a decent job in the rest of the world.
I mean, if they're locking down to a Microsoft solution then why not lock into C#. It's THE STANDARD in web applications on a Microsoft platform.
They are using Delphi because Pascal's always been taught, and they don't want to have to teach the teachers a new language.
IT as a subject is not taught in all schools, maybe it's bigger now, but I had to travel to a different school twice a week to take it, and there were only 20 people in the class. Typically a maths or science teacher will take the class as an on-the-side sort of thing. There's a huge shortage of teachers here, unfortunately it's just not practical to change from Pascal.
As for office, everyone uses it, so it makes sense to teach it. Microsoft give very good student rates.
This really has nothing to do with being specifically anti-FOSS.
It's the way of higher management. If it succeeds- it happened due to my leadership. If it fails- it failed due to incompetent workers, incompetent committees, incompetent scapegoats, sub-optimal company structure, etc. Incompetence is easier to forgive than greed-driven risk-taking or things designed to fail after they have enriched you.
--Coder
I've presented IT classes for highschoolers a few years back, had contact with various policy makers and education experts in the field, actually authored material at a stage, and had up to recently been employed by a company in the education market in South Africa.
Let me state that kids taking IT related subjects because they think they will gain useful skills for later life, have bigger problems than having a certain software suite mandated. It's not so much the material presented (that could be improved too, no doubt) but a very limited way of thinking ("there is only one way to do this, no need to look at alternatives").
For kids wanting to study further after school, my personal recommendation would be to just do subjects needed to pass school and gain university entrance. Use free time to your advantage to do your own (worthwhile!) study/projects. Or at least start to become a more rounded individual (and I don't mean a high-calorie diet by that).
For kids thinking that a school qualification (alone) would be sufficient to gain gainful employment, I have bad news....
Hallo. I'll reply to you because you're far enough on the discussion.
"Never attribute to Malice ..." is a really great concept because it gets you out of a *lot* of nasty jams!
1. There *is* malice, but you find an awesome fix, then you avoid million-dollar malice-audits.
2. There really is *incompetence*, so you just fix that before *anyone else* "pretends" it's malice!
3. In the realm of social affairs with co-workers, a "mistake" is tons easier to fix than an accusation of "malice", which threatens a firing and then you for calling it out!
And more.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
While I understand hating java I don't understand using Delphi instead.
Sounds lime Appharteid.
When I studied Computer Science, we used Turbo Pascal - so if you think about the fact that all teachers are probably already on the Delphi track (not sure when it moved from Pascal to Delphi, but it's a natural progression) that makes sense. With regards to Office, as far as I'm aware, Microsoft put up money so that many of the previously disadvantaged schools could get computers - probably why they have Windows and Office on them. If I was Microsoft donating funds for PC's I'd probably make sure they cannot (read may not) be retooled to use my competitors products.
I don't buy the whole corruption story on this one, and while I'd probably go another route if I was to start from scratch (I switched from Delphi to C# a number of years back as a Senior developer - perhaps there are good reasons for Java, and I'd prefer my children to do either c# or Java (not sure about Visual Basic) over Delphi.
Let's not scream corruption whenever something apparently nonsensical is done, there CAN be other reasons too... at least consider the possibilities.
It may not be corruption, stupidity nor incompetence, but all of above
Never underestimate the destructive and creative power of stupidity