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France Challenges Microsoft in Software Re-Fit | |
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| Time: 11:42 EST/16:42 GMT | News Source: Washington Post | Posted By: Brian Kvalheim | ||
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France's cash-strapped government is giving alternative software firms the chance to win state business from Microsoft in a pioneering drive to challenge the U.S. software giant in the public sector. Civil service minister Renaud Dutreil told Reuters France wanted to use "open-source" software providers to resupply part of the almost one million state computers under a government cost-cutting drive designed to trim a bulging public deficit. | ||
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| #1 By 1643 (64.73.227.129) at 6/21/2004 8:02:02 PM |
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#1 Since when is Germany moving to OSS? A few cities does not mean the entire country.
Plus, how can you expect people to use applications that they are familiar with on Linux? Porting hundreds of apps to Linux isn't very ecconomical...but you just want OSS...you don't really care if it's the best choice now do you? And how the heck is $75 bucks for Windows (A well tested, supported, secure, and easy to use OS with thousands & thousands of applications) too much? You OPINION of it being crappy is just that (and an uninformed emotional one at that). The fact is, Windows is the easiest OS to deploy, maintain, and secure today (in an enterprise). If you don't know how to do it, don't assume it can't be done. humor |
| #2 By 1643 (64.73.227.129) at 6/21/2004 9:09:11 PM |
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I heard that too, but i haven't seen the build/deploy info for the project...so it's a bit speculative. I think the IT manager for Munich said some apps can't be ported, but the extent is not known. I'm sure they shouldn't need VMware for more than 50% (guess), but they should be able to use their existing client licenses (i.e. they don't need XP if 98 will do)
humor |
| #3 By 1643 (204.210.30.241) at 6/22/2004 12:07:39 AM |
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#14 BullS$%#! Training costs money, and I promise you it's more than a copy of office. Plus "integrates easily" doesn't mean completely, and with 0% formatting. Plus, OO doesn't integrate with well WebDav knowledge management sites, doesn't include refreshable web queries, has poor collaboration support...on and on I can go. Just because it's a good word processor doesn't mean it comes close to Office in terms of features, manageability, and integration into corporate information outside your desktop.
You just don't get it. |
| #4 By 1643 (204.210.30.241) at 6/22/2004 12:13:51 AM |
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#15 Your "beginning" is unfounded hype being brought to the masses by a sensationalist press. The entire asian contenent is not switching to linux as you would dream...that comment is a) speculitve b) not close to reality and c) moronic to say. If it's a majority, show me numbers.
Although I suspect many developing asian countries will utlize Linux where applicable just like here in the US. Raindrops don't always mean a thunderstorms. You need a little dose of reality kid. humor |
| #5 By 1643 (204.210.30.241) at 6/22/2004 2:39:54 AM |
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First article, a great article about how early stages of a PROPOSED development initiative. I particularly liked the part that said:
"But if [security] is the sole reason for putting the weight of the government and major corporations behind Linux, the developers may need to rethink their strategy, at least according to some analysts. A report by Forrester indicates Linux and Windows are equally secure -- so a move to Linux for purely security-related reasons might not be the soundest strategy. " and "Some observers think it would be better for Asian governments to focus on getting out of the way of companies, rather than trying to direct the marketplace from their bureaucratic offices. " But I didn't see the part that about: "The entire Asian continent is going OSS" as you put it. Hopeful, but very unlikely. Second article, I don't understand how a project less than a year old and not near completion = "The entire asian continent is going OSS". How about the companies that would like to use a more robust platform? I don't believe that it is a decree that forbids other platforms. And BTW...the 8.6 million dollars that japan will fund for this momentous research...will employ 86 or so engineers including management and expenses for a year. Your pinning your hopes on 86 guys + maybe 250 more (max) from the other two countries. These 300 developers, knights for the open source, fighting the evil microsoft empire's 30,000 developer, engineers, testers, security experts (albeit a recent addition, but customer driven)...etc. It's almost poetic...and I'd love to see the movie. As per usual, sensationalist press making huge news out of piddly and a manipulated reality. Third article, a rehash of the two above...but I love this quote: "Without the government mandate in place, Kingsoft’s WPS Office product has been adopted by only one-third of the Chinese government. But public schools in Shanghai have been told to use WPS Office, and now all government PCs will replace their existing Office systems with WPS Office no later than the next upgrade cycle." Well, I'm sure the government is great at deciding what software is best. </sarcasm> Fourth article, I'm so bored proving my point...that you have nothing but thin air and are easily lead by a biased/sensationalist media. Do actually read the article or the just the headlines. humor This post was edited by humor on Tuesday, June 22, 2004 at 03:33. |
| #6 By 1643 (204.210.30.241) at 6/22/2004 10:50:40 AM |
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"But if [security] is the sole reason for putting the weight of the government and major corporations behind Linux, the developers may need to rethink their strategy, at least according to some analysts. A report by Forrester indicates Linux and Windows are equally secure -- so a move to Linux for purely security-related reasons might not be the soundest strategy. "
"The research consultancy then created metrics to measure how well each operating system vendor responded with fixes to vulnerabilities. Forrester found Microsoft did the best job at patching vulnerabilities quickly, with RedHat, Debian and MandrakeSoft far behind." Read all about it!! http://www.linuxinsider.com/story/33285.html An the quality, UI, documentation, and integration of a majority of linux SW sucks. |
| #7 By 19992 (164.214.4.61) at 6/22/2004 12:43:10 PM |
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#21 100,000+ developers work on Linux? I've never heard a number that high... Are you sure that's accurate?
#22 I believe that this report was also measuring the time that it took a distro to get a patch ready. It glosses over the fact that patches would frequently be available (as in the public could download them) for days or weeks before a distro included them. "To get quantitative answers to these questions, Forrester used two metrics. The first is the number of days between when a problem is publicly disclosed and when the operating system vendor releases its fix. In Linux's case, a component maintainer—such as The Apache Software Foundation for the Apache Web server—can patch security holes, but then there may be a delay before the Linux distributor releases the component creator's patch. Forrester calls this period the "distribution days of risk."" Microsoft also had more critical vulns than any of the Linux distros "Microsoft came in with the lowest average "all days of risk" with an average of 25 days between disclosure and fix release. In addition, the company fixed all of its security holes. However, ICAT classified 67 percent of Microsoft's vulnerabilities as high-severity, placing Microsoft "dead last among the platform maintainers by this metric," the report noted." http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1557459,00.asp?kc=EWNKT0209KTX1K0100440 Of course the days at risk of 25 days sounds a little fishy to me. I seem to recall that Eeye maintained a website with a list of vulnerabilities (that they had not published) and were waiting for MS to patch before they published the vulnerability to the public. |
| #8 By 1643 (64.73.227.129) at 6/22/2004 12:52:55 PM |
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#23 I agree that all reports are subject to scrutiny of their methodology, but I have to stipulate that most enterprises that need to mange risk would NOT install a 0 day patch from a random OSS developer and would rely on the distro to verify and test the patch. Patches from MS probably are created in a day, it's the test matrixes that take time.
Really, if MS releases a patches in 3 days where 1/20 cause a regression...they would get slammed. It's a balancing act. humor |
| #9 By 19992 (164.214.4.61) at 6/22/2004 1:45:09 PM |
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#24 I won't argue against the need for regression testing of patches. But for the purposes of this report waiting for the code maintainers and then for the distro people to regression test the patch just seems like an arbitrary way of inflating the time to patch numbers for Linux systems.
"but I have to stipulate that most enterprises that need to mange risk would NOT install a 0 day patch from a random OSS developer" Agreed. Any enterprise that has an admin that installs a 0 day patch needs to find a new admin. "and would rely on the distro to verify and test the patch." Disagree, in the Linux world most of the admins I've ever worked with/for are perfectly comfortable downloading the source from the core development team and compiling and installing it themselves. This post was edited by happyguy on Tuesday, June 22, 2004 at 13:45. |
| #10 By 1643 (64.73.227.129) at 6/22/2004 2:45:37 PM |
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But how do you regression test it with the thousands of possible different HW/SW combinations in an large enterprise IT environment?
If you buy your SW from Red Hat for example, wouldn't want them code/compile/test the latest fixes for your destroy since not everyone is a developer? |
| #11 By 19992 (164.214.4.61) at 6/23/2004 9:22:59 AM |
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#26 I wouldn't know, my org has a strict baseline for all enterprise software. We settled on a HW vendor for our machines years ago. All servers fall into 1 of 5 categories and they are set to be configured a certain way (no exceptions). Desktops fall into two seperate categories and follow the same config rules as the servers.
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