[balug-talk] Good Letter in San Francisco Chronicle Today

[jim stockford]

what have been the experiences of other enterprises
that have switched to open source (e.g. munich,
florida, etc.)? Why did they change, what problems
did they encounter?
I suppose I could try to look it up myself, but I'm hoping
one of you knows.

On Oct 9, 2006, at 6:09 PM, Michael T. Halligan wrote:

> Ack. Pardon my many typos!
>
> Michael T. Halligan wrote:
>> Jeffrey Siegal wrote:
>>
>>> On Oct 9, 2006, at 10:18 , Michael T. Halligan wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>> I don't doubt that techies and reasonably intelligent individuals 
>>>> can
>>>> use Linux on the desktop. However, if you've ever managed to go 
>>>> through
>>>> the process of dealing with a towed car, or paying a parking ticket,
>>>> only to watch our fine local government lose the paperwork, 
>>>> mis-enter
>>>> payment information, an d then issue a warrant, you'd be rather
>>>> frightened that these savants might some day have to use anything 
>>>> more
>>>> complicated than Windows 95.
>>>>
>>> This is so nonsensical I have to wonder if you are actually some kind
>>> of Microsoft shill.
>>>
>>> First of all, there is nothing inherently "simple" or even easy to 
>>> use
>>> about Windows 95.  Its just old.    An old OS can often be MORE
>>> DIFFICULT to deal with, if that means you can't hook up a replacement
>>> printer or mouse or whatever, because the currently available devices
>>> do not have drivers for the old OS.  (Not to mention viruses, 
>>> crashes,
>>> filesystem corruption, etc. that are a really, really big problem for
>>> Windows 95, even when compared to new versions of Windows.)
>>>
>>> Second of all, when someone is processing a towed car or a parking
>>> ticket, they're interacting with the (user interface component of) 
>>> the
>>> operating system at all.  They're using some kind of custom
>>> application, generally a pretty thin layer on top of a database.  It
>>> makes no different in that case what operating system their data 
>>> entry
>>> station happens to be using.
>>>
>> So basically we're saying it would be a "good idea" to:
>>
>> - Replace a working, known system that their IT group understands 
>> with Linux
>> - Completely rewrite all of their existing applications to work with 
>> the
>> Linux environment
>> - Retrain all of their IT support people in an OS that is a 180degree
>> paradigm shift (Windows versus Linux)
>> - Retrain all of their Programmers to write in languages they're
>> unfamiliar with (because I doubt, VBscript is not
>> available in Linux)
>>
> ^^(because I doubt that VBscript is available in Linux)
>> - Give all of their IT support & Programmers huge raises to stay
>> competitive because the Linux skillset is a lot more valuable than
>> equivalent Linux skillsets
>>
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^windows skillsets
>
>
>
>> That doesn't sound very cheap to me.
>>
>> Just because it can be done, does not mean we should. Just because 
>> some
>> of us have socialistic tendencies does not mean that a socialist
>> operating system really would be good for the masses.
>>
>> Talk as much smack as you want to about Windows (And I'll agree with
>> 99.99999% about it), Microsoft delivers it's customers a crystal clear
>> path. Upgrade the software, we'll support you for N number of years. 
>> You
>> will be backwards compatible for N number of years.   Linux does not
>> give you this. There's really nothing clear about Linux with it's 200
>> different distribution, 2 different major desktop systems) and two
>> different office suites, neither of which are 100% compatible with 
>> what
>> 99% of the world uses for their documents, spreadsheets, and 
>> presentations.
>>
>>
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