aprasadh writes "The government of Tamil Nadu, a state in southern India, has begun initiatives to convert all of their IT systems fully to OSS-based software. (The link is a copy of a news item that appeared recently in the Deccan Chronicle, an English-language daily.) The managing director of the IT procurement, consulting, and training agency for the Tamil Nadu government describes the reasons why he has chosen OSS, and also how he dealt with Microsoft executives." From the article: "Initially, 99 per cent of government systems have been running on Microsoft systems but then 2007 will be a watershed year for the state IT sector... We have already dispatched 6,500 Linux systems to village panchayats and another 6,100 Acer desktop systems with Suse Linux operating systems are on their way. We are procuring 20,000 desktop systems for schools, which will run only on Suse Linux... I require at least 500 trainers to train 30,000 state officials across Tamil Nadu in the next six months."
Contrary to popular belief, using Suse does not turn you into a vile subhuman ogre. Also, it didn't say what Suse they were migrating to, so if they're downloading free copies of OpenSuse, I really don't see why you'd even care. The various SUSE distros are wonderful operating systems, and they are (mostly) FOSS, so even if you don't agree with the Novell deal, I don't see why you feel the need to keep trolling about it.
You're absolutely right. Don't forget that over 40% of Linux code comes from company employed programmers. And it's still Open Source. Like for example RedHat. And Suse. So there shouldn't be any grievances about it - those companies push FOSS to market and give all FOSS community sense of direction.
And coming back to India - that's brilliant news. Think that India has over 1 billion people. All of them will be Linux users. And finally they will come as cheap labour (IT support) to UK/US to promote FOSS. And don't forget about opportunities of opening cheap Linux support call centres there.
And coming back to India - that's brilliant news. Think that India has over 1 billion people. All of them will be Linux users. And finally they will come as cheap labour (IT support) to UK/US to promote FOSS. And don't forget about opportunities of opening cheap Linux support call centres there.
By my calculation we're talking about 0.003% of those 1 billion people. And Indian call centres for linux will likely be pricier than their Windows counterparts (smaller pool, rising demand). Those call centres are already rising in cost anyway.
Not that it isn't a promising sign... but to suggest all of India will embrace linux seems unrealistic.
I've just installed 10.2. It's pretty, stable and works. ATi graphics are still a pain (have to follow a 14-step instruction list and compile yourself in a terminal, which is daunting) but it can be done. Zenworks is broken (or at least, mine is and tells me this everytime my computer boots) but I don't use Zenworks, so I don't care (I should uninstall it to get rid of the errors, but it's low on the priority list).
These things are a pain for a newbie (I'm not a complete newbie, but I've had to call in som
The real thing that annoys me about opensuse is that certain parts come deliberately crippled (like getting a xine engine that won't play mp3's) and no visible instructions on how to un-cripple.
Yeah - they don't provide certain packages, such as the MP3 stuff, to avoid potential legal problems. There is a simple way to fix it though - add a Packman [links2linux.org] repository to your list of sources in YaST, and update/install whatever you need. Here's one location:
but Microsoft will find it tough without a huge country like India buying their software packages
Yes, but for another reason. Ok, it might be tough for Microsoft losing a large customer base like India, but I think that the migration of a large number of Indian programmers to Linux poses a much larger thread to Microsoft.
One of the most often head FUD arguments against Linux is that there are not enough programs and this alone would be a reason why Linux isn't ready for the desktop. We all know the chicken/egg problem Linux had to deal with for a long time. With more and more countries considering Linux and a growing user/developer base this argument gets more and more ridiculous. And Indian isn't known for having the worst programmers.
Even worse for Microsoft: Linux still has a little (!) problem with hardware and drivers. There are still too many hardware producers, which do not provide drivers or even specifications of their products. The situation got much better in the last years, but if one is honest, one must admit, that going into a shop and buying an arbitrary piece of hardware can still be result in quite a disappointment for Linux users. Maybe the hardware producers can afford to ignore the Linux users in Europe and America (stupid and short sighted, if you ask me), but can the afford to lose a whole country like India? Yes, Tamil Nadu might not be the whole India, but if this switch works, and there is no technical reason that it doesn't, the rest of India might follow quickly. Over night the remaining hardware/driver problems might be gone. And with that another FUD 'argument'.
Losing India might be the worst that can happen to Microsoft. And not because of some unsold Office and Vista packages in India.
Plus, there's also big movement in Europe. And Europe is the part of the world that CAN pay. They are choosing to switch because of Microsoft's monopoly. They want free choice and INTEROPERABILITY. That will boost India's software companies and both will benefit. Especially that companies are changing their business models. Now, with FOSS quite widespread, they change from selling product to supporting them. Look at RedHat.
So India will soon have what Europe needs (cheap support, free software) and Europe has what India needs - cash, foreign currencies especially.
Plus, there's also big movement in Europe. And Europe is the part of the world that CAN pay. They are choosing to switch because of Microsoft's monopoly. They want free choice and INTEROPERABILITY.
True, but there's another issue that's quietly getting attention: Microsoft's potential control over government's computers.
There was a funny example of the problem in the recent discussion here of Vista's DRM. When people mentioned MS's ability to disable your software remotely, one reply was that they've had this ability since XT. Really! This is a huge sword hanging over anyone that needs reliability and control of their own computer systems and data.
This is a really good issue for OSS supporters, and it should be used as a "talking point" at any opportunity. Do you really want a giant American corporation with such power over your computer's software? Such questions can really get the attention of government administrators.
I really don't understand the argument that there isn't enough applications for Linux. As a Linux user, I find that there's plenty of applications for Linux. Sure there's a couple specialized applications that don't work, such as Photoshop, Autocad, and others, but for 99% of the people with computers on their work desk, Linux would do just fine. Most of the time, the open source alternative will suffice. Once most of the world is switched, the rest of the applications will follow.
Man... just the other day, I stuck a Ubuntu CD in my notebook, which I specifically selected for Linux-compatibility, and everything just worked! I have bluetooth, sound, accelerated graphics, everything! It even connected to a nearby unencrypted wireless network automatically.
I also installed Windows from scratch... what a pain, I had to go and download each driver, then restart the machine at least 5 times to get them all installed and up and running, and then I had to install my programs which all took restarts as well. Such a pain.
My point? Get the correct machine, and Linux IS easy, and works out of the box. Just like you can't run Windows on a PowerPC, and wouldn't even try, get crappy hardware like a cheap laptop with no Linux support, and it won't work.
Or this might be the worst thing that could happen to Tamil Nadu. And not because they are getting bad software, but because they need *500* linux trainers. If I needed 500 full-time Linux trainers, I seriously doubt I could get them at all, much less for a year.
This is Tamil Nadu in INDIA. The Tamil Tigers (LTTE) are a Terrorist Faction, which consists of a minority of Sri Lankans who speak tamil. Same Language, different people, Just like Americans and British, both speak english.
Tamils have suffered terribly in the years since independence, and organised killing, and rape by groups suspected to be associated or controlled by the Government of Sri Lanka is common.
Although I was born in Sri Lanka, I have lived in the UK since the age of three, having emigrated here since 1979. However, sometimes when I go to Sri Lanka, The fact my passport has my Place of Birth as "Jaffna" I am noticeably treated with suspicion by some people.
The LTTE are seen by many Tamils in Sri Lanka as the only hope for them. In many cases, the LTTE has provided a lot of change in Sri Lanka. However, their overall egalitarian view could cause more issues than solve at this stage. Also the use of killing to achieve the goals is another thing I am a bit objectionable about. This is why they are view by many as terrorists, even though their mandate, and their intentions are Freedom Fighters. Although most of what they do are for self defence, some actions do indeed go far beyond self defence. Certainly the LTTE are NOT on the same scale as Al-Queda, etc.
Yes you are totally correct about the Buddhist Clergy, and certain ultra nationalist factions. A lot of lies and propaganda exist there, were the general populace is hood winkled to believing that Tamils are the cause of every problem.
However, I have many Sinhalese Friends, who are frankly amazing, so maybe now is the time to capitalise on friendships, rather than war. I just feel there is too much bloodshed already, and people have to put behind old prejudices, and actually look forward. I know its not easy, I have been through the heartache of hopes being dashed. Therefore I criticize both the government and the LTTE for not really working hard to capitalising the short lived ceasefire, and showing true leadership rather than rhetoric.
The Problems in Sri Lanka are immense, and rather than tell you everything, I simply invite those who wish to know, to find information, readily available on the Internet from both sides.
One thing for sure, the war back home brings tears to my eyes. Sri Lanka was and in some ways still is a beautiful country, with some very smart educated and intellectual people. Had there not been a war, Sri Lanka would be on a par with Korea and other far east "tigers".
The LTTE are seen by many Tamils in Sri Lanka as the only hope for them. In many cases, the LTTE has provided a lot of change in Sri Lanka. However, their overall egalitarian view could cause more issues than solve at this stage. Also the use of killing to achieve the goals is another thing I am a bit objectionable about. This is why they are view by many as terrorists, even though their mandate, and their intentions are Freedom Fighters. Although most of what they do are for self defence, some actions do
I require at least 500 trainers to train 30,000 state officials across Tamil Nadu in the next six months.
If anyone is interested then please deposit a small sum of money $1,000 into my bank account to cover the cost of getting your visa and other associated paperwork. Because I am so desperate for trainers I will be paying $100,000 so it is really only a very small sum of money.
The numbers outlined looks good, but then they have always looked good. It really comes down to getting people who can actually make it happen. But if any one country has the IT manpower to make it happen, I'd say it was India... and cheaply too.
I hope there are many eyes on this move. They plan to move pretty quickly and so people will not become quite so bored as when other such projects are projected to take 5+ years and often peter out or are otherwise persuaded not to continue.
I also find it interesting that this particular Indian state seems somewhat uncorruptable. I'm not saying that anyone opting for proprietary software is corrupted, but I am saying that this guy's hard-line lacks any sort of compromise or wriggle room for Microsoft to persuade them against this. If Microsoft can't buy them, I have to wonder what these people are like.
And just to put it out there -- I could probably be bought by Microsoft if I were to find myself in a similar situation. So I have to admire this Indian state's dedication. But I'm guessing Microsoft has only begun their campaign of dirty tricks, leverage and persuation. Rather like one U.S. state's intention to move to OpenDocument, while Microsoft could make the IT guy budge on his plans, they simply when around him and bought his bosses.
But the bottom line is that if these guys are successful, a lot of people will be noticing.
Microsoft has it right that the future is software as a service... well, at least the service part anyway. The software part should not be proprietary.
I am cynical about this. Large scale migrations are usually not successful. And when they happen in govt. enterprises you have every reason to be cynical. Nearly eight years back, treasury department of MP (another Indian state) had adopted Linux in a big way. The project was more or less successful. The erstwhile Chief Minister had made his preference for Linux/OSS clear for the forthcoming govt. projects. But then his govt. got voted out in next elections, new CM took over the reins and announced her alle
Kerala was the first state to do this - slashdot story [slashdot.org] (and the oblig. dupe [slashdot.org]).
But those stories paint Kerala as some hippie commune full of comrades - I've been following the developments in Kerala [dotgnu.info]
for a while and in general all that makes sense.
Of course, most of these states are picking F/OSS for economic reasons - but not exactly about freedom and stuff. I've heard whispers from the gubment that it is the support contracts which are deal killers for F/OSS in general, but of late the government has started taking a socialist approach of doing it in-house rather than contracting it out to vendors (well, it doesn't sound socialist when a company does I.T, right).
I'm officially speaking out of my glorious backside on this, but I suppose language could be a key issue here. Tamil, famously, was the first Indian language with a full Linux UI. I have no idea (too lazy) to see if there's a Tamil version for Windows, but if there isn't, here's a very good reason. (And our Tamilian brethren, bless their hearts, are rather proud of their linguistic heritage, so there).
Considering that Kerala has achieved the highest literacy rate in India, and achieved life expectancy and health indexes [expert-eyes.org] to rival the first world when it'd been on a third world budget for decades, and is for that matter a leader in that country's impressive development in IT, I should think that its endorsement of Linux should have done folks here proud, whether or not Kerala's government has voted communists in and out and in again or not.
But, Tamilnad has smart people too, so this is good news, especially if you find all that business of helping the working poor help themselves a radioactive concept and are keen to keep your distance from it.;)
The official offered the XP operating system for about Rs.7000 while he quoted Rs.500. ...
ELCOT is not the loser when Microsoft did not accept our price of Rs.500; on the other hand, Microsoft loses out due to our big volumes involved," he said.
In other words, the guy wanted XP for 11 dollars [google.com], but Microsoft would only offer it for 158 dollars [google.com]. Nice.
Sounds pretty cheap for the US, at least for a smaller shop. Remember, XP and Vista can't be bought through volume licensing, only upgrades are available. You have to buy Windows pre-installed or retail, then buy Windows again though the volume programs. At our size (less than 200 desks), Windows XP Pro (the second purchase) without Software Assurance is $172. With SA for 2 years is $272, SA for 3 years is $313. This is on top of actually getting Windows pre-installed at an unknown price from major ven
From Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] the population is just over 60 million which gives it a population roughly equivalent to the UK so 30K civil servants isn't that outrageous - especially as they inherited their civil service from the UK. Furthermore
The sixth most populous state in the Indian Union, Tamil Nadu has the largest urban agglomeration nationwide. Increases in literacy have caused Tamil Nadu to report the second lowest decadal growth in population in India. Globalisation brought increased export opportunities, making Tamil Nadu the fifth largest economy among the states of India. The growing demands for skilled labour have caused the increased number of educational institutions in Tamil Nadu. It has the highest number of vocational training institutions in India. Chennai, which was known until 1996 as Madras, is the fourth largest city of India and the state capital. Chennai is the home of Marina Beach, one of longest beaches in the world. Madurai, Coimbatore, Tiruchirapalli, Salem, Thirunelveli and Tiruppur are other large cities (Corporations) of Tamil Nadu.
And this is what (imho) we westerners seem not to get: when (not if) the switch to OSS happens it won't be here in the west: China and India make up some (half?) of the world's population, and once they come on board... MS et.all are toast. And with them out, our IT staff becomes second-rate as they become irrelevant.
MS et.all are toast. And with them out, our IT staff becomes second-rate as they become irrelevant.
Your perspective has drifted and needs to be fixed. You seem to equate M$ with US and US technical excellence. Most people would throw away a meter like you, but a new faceplate and a few twists should have you back in operation.
Developers and IT staff at IBM, Red Hat, Novel, Ubuntoo, Mepis, Chrysler, Lowes, GE, and so on and so forth, would tell you that M$ and those who know only that are already second rate. They would not share you assessment of "our IT staff," nor do they fear foreign "competition". In their world, the more the merrier. American excellence does not have to be anti-social.
The Information and Technology Minister - Dayanidhi Maran belongs to the same political party as the one in Tamil Nadu and he is seen hobnobbing with Billy [hindu.com] on launching MS products in India
As Good as this news in, does the slashdot community have to constantly reminded not only of the benifits of open source but more annoyingly, of every single government and private organisation which switches from Microsoft to oss?
Slashdot gives you full control over the subjects you see on the homepage. If you have Linux selected, then yes, you'll repeatedly hear when Linux is deployed in favor of Windows. Since it seems you do include Linux on your Slashdot homepage, were you hoping to read about kernel scheduling latency, NUMA architecture, futexes, and devfs? I'm happy hearing about India choosing Linux.
Microsoft is in a "can't lose" situation with VISTA in the developed world - OEM systems will all be shipped with it no questions asked, and most businesses will drink the TCO cool-aid and go with what they think is safe. But the margins are much tighter in the developing world, making proprietary software unaffordable. Their choice is either piracy, (and MS is really putting the squeeze on that) or FOSS.
If FOSS can do the job at all they will use it, even if there are a few warts to deal with. The windows install base will start to erode not in America or Europe as expected, but in the emerging markets. MS themselves knew that when they came out with those international editions of XP at fire sale prices, but they were deliberately crippled in how many applications they could run.
I know a lot of us have experienced the despair of offshore IT "help desks" and many of those are in India. But they're just cowboys jumping on the outsourcing bandwaggon. Their days are numbered, for the most part.
This part of the business gives a false impression of what the state of IT expertise in India is *really* like. It's pretty darn good. There are plenty of highly competent IT people there and, yes they generally have a huge advantage in terms of cost-of-living vs. expected-income. However, despite the rhetoric about the Internet making geographical location irrelevant, I don't see it happening just yet. For most of my work I still have to fly to the client's site.
But, in their own back yard, Indian IT workers are in a position to do what the hell they like. They have the expertise, culture and work ethic to make it work and there is no way that anyone can force a second-choice solution on them. And if they see MS as second choice...
read the article replacing "tamil nadu" with south carolina. believe it or not, the IT economy of south carolina is probably at least as large as that of Tamil Nadu. If the government of South Carolina suddenly decided to use all OSS, would we see half of the globalization-implications-scope comments we see here? No. Rather, linux fans would highlight this as a significant but ultimately small victory for OSS and the rest of the world would just shrug. After all, slashdot duly posts some article every time some town or municipality's government switches fo linux, but some of us notice that even at the rate of one a month, it would take centuries for the world's governments, much less the world as a whole, to take up linux.
The proper solution for governments, indicidentally, is OPEN SOURCE SOTWARE, that is OPERATING SYSTEM NEUTRAL/AGNOSTIC. That is to say, it should run equally on Windows, Linux and Macintosh without too much problem. the operating system is not an interesting question (in fact, it can be OSS but microsoft only... i dont care) any more than the mouse is. the open-ness or closed-ness of the application software itself - that is, the bits of code that embody government policy about voting, welfare, whatever are the important bits to be OSS as long as we have reasonable trust that the underlying OS is fair (and, despite whatever hyperbole you might see here on slashdot, windows and osx are both certainly 'fair' in this respect - microsoft has not created any OS hooks that anybody knows or reasonably suspects to, say, detect voting software running on xp and change the results even though the software itself is correct).
Using FOSS involves no economic loss to the US whatsoever. Microsoft is not the US. Although Microsoft employees may earn less and their shareholders get less in dividends, and they may pay less tax, this is balanced by the increase in profitability of all the companies saving money by not using their products.
If you mean the loss of profits from foreign sales (i.e. the export market) this is a completely separate issue. The mere fact that other countries try to avoid buying MS products means that in the long or short term income from this source will dry up. From the point of view of the US, it is probably better that other countries continue to buy US products (Red Hat, Novell) than that they either do not develop an IT infrastructure at all, or develop entirely home grown solutions.
The history of every major industry is one of declining prices. This leads to economic expansion, not contraction, whether it is steel, cars, television. Software is not exempt from economic laws.
***At what point does our loathing of Microsoft and our support of OSS equate to a massive economic loss to our own nation?
At what point do American supporters of OSS achieve a shot to their own shared national foot?***
Is this not essentially the same argument we heard three decades ago when consumers on the coasts started buying smaller, cheaper, higher quality Japanese cars instead of the gas hungry, shoddily built, creations from Detroit that cornered like buckboards? It's not MY fault that Detroit didn't start delivering cars that (sort of) met my needs until the 1990s. The American Automobile industry wasn't killed by its consumers or competitors. It commited suicide.
It's likewise not MY fault that Microsoft is not delivering superior products with accessible source code at reasonable prices. If Microsoft's perception of its long term self interest is flawed (and I think it is) why blame the messengers?
Here's a country that's just learned to count, and it thinks it can go up against the most powerful country in the world, with a long history of mathematical excellence.
"Just learned to count"? I know the US educational system has a bad reputation, but isn't this a bit of an exaggeration?
Aside from your obvious racist attitude, the concept of zero and the rules governing it [wikipedia.org] for modern mathematics were first described in India [wikipedia.org]. Since this is the first axiom for natural numbers [wikipedia.org] it could be argued that the Indians were actually the first to be able to count as we understand it today.
More examples:
Indian Railways reservation system runs unix/vms and it's online sales are the highest ecommerce sales in the entire AsiaPac.
Jet Air runs it's in flight video on demand system on a customized linux which is good enough to eat. Over 200 terminals with touch screens, streaming over 100 video options from a single server (cluster). Always reboots during takeoff for some reason though. That's when you can see identical console messages flying by on every screen.
All High Courts (over 30 i think)
Suse? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Suse? (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re:Suse? (Score:5, Insightful)
And coming back to India - that's brilliant news. Think that India has over 1 billion people. All of them will be Linux users. And finally they will come as cheap labour (IT support) to UK/US to promote FOSS. And don't forget about opportunities of opening cheap Linux support call centres there.
We should be celebrating!
Parent
Jumping The Gun, Are We? (Score:4, Interesting)
By my calculation we're talking about 0.003% of those 1 billion people. And Indian call centres for linux will likely be pricier than their Windows counterparts (smaller pool, rising demand). Those call centres are already rising in cost anyway.
Not that it isn't a promising sign... but to suggest all of India will embrace linux seems unrealistic.
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These things are a pain for a newbie (I'm not a complete newbie, but I've had to call in som
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Yeah - they don't provide certain packages, such as the MP3 stuff, to avoid potential legal problems. There is a simple way to fix it though - add a Packman [links2linux.org] repository to your list of sources in YaST, and update/install whatever you need. Here's one location:
http://packman.iu-bremen.de/suse/10.2/ [iu-bremen.de]
After y
Re:Suse? (Score:5, Insightful)
One of the most often head FUD arguments against Linux is that there are not enough programs and this alone would be a reason why Linux isn't ready for the desktop. We all know the chicken/egg problem Linux had to deal with for a long time. With more and more countries considering Linux and a growing user/developer base this argument gets more and more ridiculous. And Indian isn't known for having the worst programmers.
Even worse for Microsoft: Linux still has a little (!) problem with hardware and drivers. There are still too many hardware producers, which do not provide drivers or even specifications of their products. The situation got much better in the last years, but if one is honest, one must admit, that going into a shop and buying an arbitrary piece of hardware can still be result in quite a disappointment for Linux users. Maybe the hardware producers can afford to ignore the Linux users in Europe and America (stupid and short sighted, if you ask me), but can the afford to lose a whole country like India? Yes, Tamil Nadu might not be the whole India, but if this switch works, and there is no technical reason that it doesn't, the rest of India might follow quickly. Over night the remaining hardware/driver problems might be gone. And with that another FUD 'argument'.
Losing India might be the worst that can happen to Microsoft. And not because of some unsold Office and Vista packages in India.
Parent
Re:Suse? (Score:5, Insightful)
That will boost India's software companies and both will benefit. Especially that companies are changing their business models. Now, with FOSS quite widespread, they change from selling product to supporting them. Look at RedHat.
So India will soon have what Europe needs (cheap support, free software) and Europe has what India needs - cash, foreign currencies especially.
Mutual benefit.
Parent
Re:Suse? (Score:5, Interesting)
True, but there's another issue that's quietly getting attention: Microsoft's potential control over government's computers.
There was a funny example of the problem in the recent discussion here of Vista's DRM. When people mentioned MS's ability to disable your software remotely, one reply was that they've had this ability since XT. Really! This is a huge sword hanging over anyone that needs reliability and control of their own computer systems and data.
This is a really good issue for OSS supporters, and it should be used as a "talking point" at any opportunity. Do you really want a giant American corporation with such power over your computer's software? Such questions can really get the attention of government administrators.
Parent
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Re:Suse? (Score:4, Insightful)
I also installed Windows from scratch... what a pain, I had to go and download each driver, then restart the machine at least 5 times to get them all installed and up and running, and then I had to install my programs which all took restarts as well. Such a pain.
My point? Get the correct machine, and Linux IS easy, and works out of the box. Just like you can't run Windows on a PowerPC, and wouldn't even try, get crappy hardware like a cheap laptop with no Linux support, and it won't work.
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Pity it's only Linux - what about the alternative? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Pity it's only Linux - what about the alternati (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Pity it's only Linux - what about the alternati (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Pity it's only Linux - what about the alternati (Score:5, Informative)
I am a Tamil, From Sri Lanka.. lets just say I know a bit more than the average person.
Tamils in Sri Lanka have been severely disenfranchised over the years by a few Nationalists.
I was going to write a bit about it, but read up on Black July.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_July [wikipedia.org] is a good starting point.
Tamils have suffered terribly in the years since independence, and organised killing, and rape by groups suspected to be associated or controlled by the Government of Sri Lanka is common.
Although I was born in Sri Lanka, I have lived in the UK since the age of three, having emigrated here since 1979. However, sometimes when I go to Sri Lanka, The fact my passport has my Place of Birth as "Jaffna" I am noticeably treated with suspicion by some people.
The LTTE are seen by many Tamils in Sri Lanka as the only hope for them. In many cases, the LTTE has provided a lot of change in Sri Lanka. However, their overall egalitarian view could cause more issues than solve at this stage. Also the use of killing to achieve the goals is another thing I am a bit objectionable about. This is why they are view by many as terrorists, even though their mandate, and their intentions are Freedom Fighters. Although most of what they do are for self defence, some actions do indeed go far beyond self defence. Certainly the LTTE are NOT on the same scale as Al-Queda, etc.
Yes you are totally correct about the Buddhist Clergy, and certain ultra nationalist factions. A lot of lies and propaganda exist there, were the general populace is hood winkled to believing that Tamils are the cause of every problem.
However, I have many Sinhalese Friends, who are frankly amazing, so maybe now is the time to capitalise on friendships, rather than war. I just feel there is too much bloodshed already, and people have to put behind old prejudices, and actually look forward. I know its not easy, I have been through the heartache of hopes being dashed. Therefore I criticize both the government and the LTTE for not really working hard to capitalising the short lived ceasefire, and showing true leadership rather than rhetoric.
The Problems in Sri Lanka are immense, and rather than tell you everything, I simply invite those who wish to know, to find information, readily available on the Internet from both sides.
One thing for sure, the war back home brings tears to my eyes. Sri Lanka was and in some ways still is a beautiful country, with some very smart educated and intellectual people. Had there not been a war, Sri Lanka would be on a par with Korea and other far east "tigers".
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It's a scam! (Score:5, Funny)
I wish them ALL success (Score:4, Insightful)
I hope there are many eyes on this move. They plan to move pretty quickly and so people will not become quite so bored as when other such projects are projected to take 5+ years and often peter out or are otherwise persuaded not to continue.
I also find it interesting that this particular Indian state seems somewhat uncorruptable. I'm not saying that anyone opting for proprietary software is corrupted, but I am saying that this guy's hard-line lacks any sort of compromise or wriggle room for Microsoft to persuade them against this. If Microsoft can't buy them, I have to wonder what these people are like.
And just to put it out there -- I could probably be bought by Microsoft if I were to find myself in a similar situation. So I have to admire this Indian state's dedication. But I'm guessing Microsoft has only begun their campaign of dirty tricks, leverage and persuation. Rather like one U.S. state's intention to move to OpenDocument, while Microsoft could make the IT guy budge on his plans, they simply when around him and bought his bosses.
But the bottom line is that if these guys are successful, a lot of people will be noticing.
Microsoft has it right that the future is software as a service... well, at least the service part anyway. The software part should not be proprietary.
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Not the first (and not the last, I hope) (Score:5, Interesting)
Kerala was the first state to do this - slashdot story [slashdot.org] (and the oblig. dupe [slashdot.org]).
But those stories paint Kerala as some hippie commune full of comrades - I've been following the developments in Kerala [dotgnu.info] for a while and in general all that makes sense.
Of course, most of these states are picking F/OSS for economic reasons - but not exactly about freedom and stuff. I've heard whispers from the gubment that it is the support contracts which are deal killers for F/OSS in general, but of late the government has started taking a socialist approach of doing it in-house rather than contracting it out to vendors (well, it doesn't sound socialist when a company does I.T, right).
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I'm officially speaking out of my glorious backside on this, but I suppose language could be a key issue here. Tamil, famously, was the first Indian language with a full Linux UI. I have no idea (too lazy) to see if there's a Tamil version for Windows, but if there isn't, here's a very good reason. (And our Tamilian brethren, bless their hearts, are rather proud of their linguistic heritage, so there).
Re:Not the first (and not the last, I hope) (Score:4, Informative)
But, Tamilnad has smart people too, so this is good news, especially if you find all that business of helping the working poor help themselves a radioactive concept and are keen to keep your distance from it.
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Microsoft's price (Score:3, Informative)
They're Safe (Score:4, Interesting)
MS overquote? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
30,000 government officials? (Score:3, Insightful)
Just how many people live in this state anyway?
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:30,000 government officials? (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:30,000 government officials? (Score:4, Interesting)
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Perspective Re-calibration. (Score:4, Interesting)
MS et.all are toast. And with them out, our IT staff becomes second-rate as they become irrelevant.
Your perspective has drifted and needs to be fixed. You seem to equate M$ with US and US technical excellence. Most people would throw away a meter like you, but a new faceplate and a few twists should have you back in operation.
Developers and IT staff at IBM, Red Hat, Novel, Ubuntoo, Mepis, Chrysler, Lowes, GE, and so on and so forth, would tell you that M$ and those who know only that are already second rate. They would not share you assessment of "our IT staff," nor do they fear foreign "competition". In their world, the more the merrier. American excellence does not have to be anti-social.
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Hmm .. (Score:3, Informative)
hey.. (Score:3, Funny)
Get your facts right. (Score:3, Funny)
Do we need to hear about this? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Do we need to hear about this? (Score:5, Insightful)
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This is where windows will crack (Score:4, Insightful)
If FOSS can do the job at all they will use it, even if there are a few warts to deal with. The windows install base will start to erode not in America or Europe as expected, but in the emerging markets. MS themselves knew that when they came out with those international editions of XP at fire sale prices, but they were deliberately crippled in how many applications they could run.
If it can happen anywhere... (Score:3, Informative)
I know a lot of us have experienced the despair of offshore IT "help desks" and many of those are in India. But they're just cowboys jumping on the outsourcing bandwaggon. Their days are numbered, for the most part.
This part of the business gives a false impression of what the state of IT expertise in India is *really* like. It's pretty darn good. There are plenty of highly competent IT people there and, yes they generally have a huge advantage in terms of cost-of-living vs. expected-income. However, despite the rhetoric about the Internet making geographical location irrelevant, I don't see it happening just yet. For most of my work I still have to fly to the client's site.
But, in their own back yard, Indian IT workers are in a position to do what the hell they like. They have the expertise, culture and work ethic to make it work and there is no way that anyone can force a second-choice solution on them. And if they see MS as second choice...
Replace "Tamil Nadu" with "South Carolina" (Score:5, Insightful)
The proper solution for governments, indicidentally, is OPEN SOURCE SOTWARE, that is OPERATING SYSTEM NEUTRAL/AGNOSTIC. That is to say, it should run equally on Windows, Linux and Macintosh without too much problem. the operating system is not an interesting question (in fact, it can be OSS but microsoft only... i dont care) any more than the mouse is. the open-ness or closed-ness of the application software itself - that is, the bits of code that embody government policy about voting, welfare, whatever are the important bits to be OSS as long as we have reasonable trust that the underlying OS is fair (and, despite whatever hyperbole you might see here on slashdot, windows and osx are both certainly 'fair' in this respect - microsoft has not created any OS hooks that anybody knows or reasonably suspects to, say, detect voting software running on xp and change the results even though the software itself is correct).
that' nice, because... (Score:4, Funny)
It doesn't (Score:5, Insightful)
If you mean the loss of profits from foreign sales (i.e. the export market) this is a completely separate issue. The mere fact that other countries try to avoid buying MS products means that in the long or short term income from this source will dry up. From the point of view of the US, it is probably better that other countries continue to buy US products (Red Hat, Novell) than that they either do not develop an IT infrastructure at all, or develop entirely home grown solutions.
The history of every major industry is one of declining prices. This leads to economic expansion, not contraction, whether it is steel, cars, television. Software is not exempt from economic laws.
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OK, here's an opinion (Score:5, Insightful)
Is this not essentially the same argument we heard three decades ago when consumers on the coasts started buying smaller, cheaper, higher quality Japanese cars instead of the gas hungry, shoddily built, creations from Detroit that cornered like buckboards? It's not MY fault that Detroit didn't start delivering cars that (sort of) met my needs until the 1990s. The American Automobile industry wasn't killed by its consumers or competitors. It commited suicide.
It's likewise not MY fault that Microsoft is not delivering superior products with accessible source code at reasonable prices. If Microsoft's perception of its long term self interest is flawed (and I think it is) why blame the messengers?
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
One thing that MS and most people like to forget is that trainers are necessary if you are deploying windows too.
tecnical training and support for windows are not free!!!!
Austin Powers (Score:3, Funny)
"I hate two things: bigotry, and the dutch."
And now I find them combined in one handy
Re:What a laugh! (Score:5, Funny)
"Just learned to count"? I know the US educational system has a bad reputation, but isn't this a bit of an exaggeration?
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Re:What a laugh! (Score:4, Insightful)
Bob
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Linux is still a tiny proportion of consumer desktops and isn't rising at a measureable rate.
Then again with that attitude it probably won't.
Jet airways runs inflight video on demand on Linux (Score:3, Informative)