[extropy-chat] FWD (SK) Linux in City of Turku (+ Re: Maybe a little too much computing)

[Terry W. Colvin]

Paul W Harrison
interEnglish (Finland)
University of London External Programme


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Scott Peterson" <scottp4 at mindspring.com> [quoting article]
Sent: Wednesday, June 30, 2004 8:18 AM
> At Greenwich Country Day, a prestigious Connecticut private school,
> computers have all but replaced pencil and paper. Typing instruction
starts
> in second grade, and laptops are mandatory by seventh. Essays are typed,
> and often class notes are, too.
>
> "As an adult in today's work world, you don't write anything," said Carol
> Maoz, head of the upper school (grades 7-9), adding she couldn't think of
> an occasion students would write out a longhand essay. "You type
> everything. There really is no need for proper handwriting...."

Interesting. Though longhand certainly hasn't been phased out here in the
school system (and I would imagine this is a highly singular type of
situation in the United States), it is common for post-secondary students to
bring their laptops to lectures. Exams are still customarily written in
longhand. I imagine this is still the status quo in North America as well.

Evidently the much vaunted but for the most part unsuccessful 'paperless
office' idea has actually been recently realized in a City Council here in
the region (City of Kaarina), however, where Council meetings are undertaken
completely by laptop computer -- no papers, to my knowledge, are
distributed, with everyone hooked up to both the municipal organization's
Intranet and the Internet. Formerly, masses of documents, memos, resolutions
in printed format was the norm. Reductions in printing costs have reportedly
been considerable with the new electronic medium.

Several people have inquired about the results of the planned transition
from Microsoft systems to Linux on the part of the Turku (Finland's old
capital) city administration. Even though Turku estimated a few years back
that its Windows costs were set to rise by 1 million euros, or by 2 million
euros (figures which are roughly the same in US $) if hardware and training
costs are included, a final decision mostly against Linux* was arrived at
after Microsoft warned that "many local jobs would be on the line and lost"
by transferring all administrative office systems away from Windows. In the
previous and current election year here, any perception that local
politicians and city administrators could be jeopardizing workplaces has
been taken very seriously indeed. This was concurrent with fears that
professional user support for Linux would be strongly lacking.

A highly interesting 'Report on the suitability of the OpenOffice.org office
suite and the Linux operation system as the workstation standard of the City
of Turku' which details the practical problems (where they exist) of putting
an entire city administration on Linux is found in PDF format at:
< http://www.turku.fi/tieto/liite44.rtf >

In the concluding summary (unfortunately undated, but estimatedly completed
two years ago), the 20-member work group concluded:

'This report is based on a problem-oriented approach, using Microsoft Office
as the measuring stick. MS Office is a good product and full of useful
features, but for a municipality it is too expensive.

'The problems discussed in this report are marginal from the average user's
viewpoint, in other words, they occur rarely, if ever, in normal use.
Generally speaking, we can say that the reliability and performance of the
tested product [Linux Red Hat]are sufficient. It is worth noting, however,
that the product is continuously developing, and after a year or so, it will
be more usable....'

* The actual decision was actually a compromise, maintaining Windows as the
operating system at least for a few years. However, Linux at least scored a
coup in the City choosing Open Office, based on Linux. Also, a decision in
principle was reached that Turku will favor an open source code in its
program acquisitions in the future: i.e., Linux whenever technically and
economically practicable. Matti Mehtala, Microsoft Finland's CEO, fired off
a critique of the City's decision even though it was supportive of the MS
operating mode. "The real expenses of these competing systems have not been
compared by open competition for bids," he complained.

Although Turku "chickened out" by now using XP Professional at its actual
OS, those interested in the struggle between open and closed source systems
may find the success of Linux in Munich Germany in this respect more
heartening: see "Linux took on Microsoft and won big in Munich",
USAToday.com at

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2003-07-14-linux-tech_x.htm


-- 
"Only a zit on the wart on the heinie of progress." Copyright 1992, Frank Rice


Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1 at mindspring.com >
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