On 08/06/2011 06:25 AM, planas wrote:
On Fri, 2011-08-05 at 20:53 +0000, toki wrote:On 08/05/2011 05:57 PM, upscope wrote:our government is looking for big budget cuts. One would be replace all the MS stuff with open source software.If the united states government, or the government of the united kingdom ruled today that effective 1 January 2012, only FLOSS may be used by the government, and closed source, proprietary software was banned, the budget savings would, at the earliest, be visible in 2016, and probably not until 2020, or even 2025. This is simply due to the unbreakable contracts various software vendors have with those governments. Contracts that requires the vendors to be paid, regardless of whether or not the product meets the contract specifications, assuming it is delivered in the first place. Long term, FLOSS saves money. Short term, it doesn't save money, and can be described as costing money. jonathon -- If Bing copied Google, there wouldn't be anything new worth requesting. If Bing did not copy Google, there wouldn't be anything relevant worth requesting. DaveJakeman 20110207 Groklaw.Actually changing to another application/OS, etc will require a learning curve at the beginning. The advantage that FOSS has is the primary cost to using is the learning curve in most cases. I think often the actual costs of switching forget if I switched from LO to KOffice I have a learning curve, I do not know KOffice so I need to learn its quirks to become proficient. If a purchase is involved it just adds to the cost.
Both the above responses are, of course, correct in pointing out that switching to open software would entail costs. But nobody has suggested junking all the Windows seats in the US Government and switching to FOSS. It would be rational to install FOSS in newly established offices instead of Windows, and let the phenomenon expand naturally, while getting MS on its toes, with a visible competitor. In any case, making the White House a subsidiary of Microsoft doesn't seem to do any good at all.
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