"Newsfactor.com reports that next June the French parliament will be switching from Microsoft to open source products such as Linux for desktops and servers and OpenOffice for day-to-day documents. They see it as a cost-cutting measure." The French have not settled on a Linux distribution yet. The article quotes an analyst voicing a note of caution: "'The evidence on the cost savings attributable to a switch to Linux has been mixed,' according to Chris Swenson, director of software industry analysis at research group NPD. 'There has been some evidence that companies have to spend a good deal on training and support after you deploy...'" Article: NewsFactor Network Source: Slashdot.org
They're certainly smart to calculate the cost of training as that would add a chunk to the transition.
The initial difficulty of a windows->Linux transistion will get the frogs jumping to new heights with all that rage and anger that will result :stars: :doh: :jump: Good on em though! The last large scale software upgrade in this country went belly up and is costing a bloody bom!
No one knows why it cost £2500 each to upgrade each one of those computers in Bristol(?) council. I'd say it was incompetence, and any deal from Microsoft would have looked better on paper.
Yup. Linux can be a solid alternative to Windows, BUT you need to have the technical aspects of it covered or it will bomb. If you don't know what you're doing the transition will be messy and possibly less secure if not setup correctly. Never underestimate the power of the ignorant IT staff in large numbers.
Yes, that is absolutely true: bad IT staff can make any situation a bad situation. Then again, that goes for incompetency in any professional field. Regardless, there are huge and long-term benefits of going with Linux besides pure cash savings. Let me provide a real-world example from my own experience. When I worked with a certain organization, we'll call them Group A, the entire back-end was all Linux (and some Solaris), with many Linux workstations as well. The network was rock-solid, and the servers performed impeccably well. The administrative overhead was low enough that the proportionately small IT population could afford to spend a good percentage of their time playing UT without pissing anybody off. When you needed something from the network, it was always an asset and never a burden. Now contrast that with company I work for now, we'll call them Group B -- let's just say it's a network security-related IT company that sells several prevalent filtering devices (some of you might have these in your schools or places of work). Group B's backend is pure Windows, and let me tell you, it shows. The servers together have an average of 95% uptime, which is abysmal even to already pitifully low Microsoft standards. We have problems with anything and everything which runs Windows including domain services, DNS, mail, web services, our CRM system, even silly things like print spooling. The IT staff are constantly running around like madmen. Now, consider the fact that when those services are not functioning as expected, the whole company loses critical time and efficiency, and tries the patience of our customers simultaneously. The long term losses are substantial, as is the impact on morale. The saddest thing about this is that Group A had a much smaller IT budget and staff than Group B, and they even had to manage more resources and responsibility. Which group was more successful? Why? There will be short term costs in migrating a substantial amount of systems from Windows to Linux, especially if you have to re-hire certain staffing. But the long-term benefits far, far outweigh the burden of the initial effort.
