Dutch City Of Haarlem Takes Up OpenOffice.org 32
zerdood writes "An article in IDA states that Haarlem, the capitol of North Holland, has succeeded in converting 2000 desktops to use OpenOffice.org. They initiated the migration in response to the 500,000 Euro licensing fees paid every year to Microsoft for an upgrade from Office '97. Training people to use OpenOffice.org is projected to cost about one tenth of that. Jan van de Straat, director of R&D for the city, has also stated that they could move up to 20% of the city's desktops to Linux without any problems. Their servers already use Penguin Power."
w00t another for OSS (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:w00t another for OSS (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:w00t another for OSS (Score:1)
Re:w00t another for OSS (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:w00t another for OSS (Score:2)
Especially to republicans.
*ducks*
Seriously, if it's not a standard-with-distro copy of OpenOffice, then nothing seems to be associated properly, and it's a pain to figure out how to get things (associations) to work with the WindowManager-of-the-day and the mail client of choice.
Icons on the desktop are the least of our problems...
Re:w00t another for OSS (Score:4, Insightful)
They won't realize that what they are using isn't "Word" or "Excel" but a free open program that they could use at home. If they knew that, they would use it it at home and also tell their friends about this amazing new free software on the intarwebs that's just as good or even better than the expensive Microsoft version.
Tricking people has never helped spread word of mouth. Ever. At all.
If you had taken the time to actually address the problems people complained about with each person, they would have realized themselves that OO.o is, as I said above, just as good if not better than the Microsoft "standard," and once they realize that, they tell their friends and family.
Sorry for going off on a rant there, but that kind of stuff bugs the hell out of me.
Re:w00t another for OSS (Score:3, Insightful)
The users we're talking about don't know -- and more importantly -- don't care what they're running as long as they can get their work done.
Re:w00t another for OSS (Score:2)
But don't lie and say "This is MS Word" when it isn't.
And, don't assume the lusers are that stupid, some actually try to learn about their computers.. unfortunatly they go to Best Buy for advice.
Help your flock
Re:A little U2 for OpenOffice (Score:1)
I would have gone for the Haarlem Gløbtrotters reference, myself.
May I draw a striking parallel. (Score:2)
Standardisation of networks and huge expansion of market will lead to network commodotisation and things such as voice calls will loose significant revenue.
OS companies (Microsoft):
Home and office users with a standardised hardware and software requirements make generic PC and office suites a commodity.
Specialised software still has clout.
Dear Haarlem,
Haven't you heared that OSS virus software has a greater TOC than our l33t war3z? Save money now and buy our XP w4r3z, plus get a free c
Encouraging... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Encouraging... (Score:3, Interesting)
But rather than the shift to open source, this is more encouraging to me:
"With regards to open standards, Haarlem has decided that all new software purchases must use open standards, such as XML."
With a shift to open standards, what would Europe's governments do if Microsoft did indeed launch an IP battle against OSS products?
Re:Encouraging...Open Standards (Score:4, Insightful)
Their adoption gives everyone a chance to get the service level they require. Free software can be written in the knowledge that it will interact with commercial software. Commercial software can be written to give the slick finish and support that the corporate or nervous user craves.
If an organisation as large as the collective EU were to take the open standard/OSS route, all compainies like Microsoft could do was jump on the bandwagon to compete on a more equal playing field.
Re:Encouraging...Open Standards (Score:2, Insightful)
Indeed. And a very important point. The path to a good future for the Internet and computing as a whole is open standards. This is good for, but does not require, open source.
Open-source is a good and noble cause but nobody is going to win the war for open computing based on GNU/Zealotry alone. It plays an important role but even more important are standards that let all members work on equal footing.
For example, Safari is not purely open-source but it has fo
Migration Path (Score:4, Insightful)
Adopting a new product (OOo) as the new standard, training people to use it and then insisting it be used for new work is the way to go.
Since they already have licensed copies of Office97, there is no cost involved in keeping it alongside to run legacy apps and handle legacy documentation.
Sending documents for other people to view can always be done by creating PDFs of them. This is the main way we do it and find that most people can read them regardless of platform. I can even read them on my telephone
The next step on migration would be to divert some of the cash that would have been spent on the upgrade to porting the legacy apps to use OOo. Even if this took the whole upgrade budget, in the medium to long run they will still benefit greatly.
Where there are people who cannot cope with PDF, or a PDF isn't adequate (i.e. they need an active spreadsheet) then encourage people to get OOo. The price is right
In the case of suppliers, then you tell them they have to use it. I doubt there will be any contractual issues regarding this - I've yet to see a contract that said 'all invoice to be submitted in Word97' or somesuch:) If they want your money, this is a minimal cost (and ultimately a saving) for them.
For other people, there can be problems, but even then how different are they to upgrading to a new version of Office? I remember incompatabilities between versions and having to save documents as Word 2.0 format, etc. OOo does produce passably decent Office code that is probably no waorse than those cases.
OOo is freely distributable. CD-Rs are cheap. Burn a few copies to give to these people. If you have an organisation of a few thousand (as many govt organs will), then you will have a tech support department. Give a few of these valued people access to your tech support for OOo issues. It won't cost anything extra in most cases.
While I write software commercially for a living, I also find advantage in OpenSource. Companies like Microsoft have, either by design or accident, gained a strong monopoly and thus have a stranglehold over us. For a piece of software that has become a 'standard', its cost is just too high for most people to afford. How many pirate copies because of this? How many feel justified in doing so? How many would agree with them?
Whatever the 'rights' or 'wrongs' of the situation, no commercial product should be in such a monopoly position (unless its mine and I get all the dosh, of course
aa goes for oo (Score:2)
Open Office still has long way to go (Score:1)
The major challange remains interoperation with Word, and to a lesser degree, PowerPoint. Although internally this is survivable, when we have to share documents with customers (which is nearly every document in my case), OpenOffice is a major hassle.
Some of our customers are enthusased and willing to get with OO just to work with us, but the vast majority at this point still do not c
Re:Open Office still has long way to go (Score:3, Interesting)
I do contract work. So far, OO.o has opened every doc file I have come across, with one exception.
It was the technical programming (register) guide for the ATI Xilleon.
Over 1,000 pages, and formatted in tables. Then again, all tools in Redhat 9 refused to have anything sensible to do with the document.
But, so far, that has been the only problem case. And I have put a LOT of stuff into O
Re:Open Office still has long way to go (Score:1)
Most of the documents I've had difficulty with are lengthy (30-100 pages), and this is the bulk of my and my collegues working set. If OO can't handle big docs as well as short docs then thats not going to work.
The problem is not in the content. Every single word comes through (I haven't found a case where this wasn
Re:Open Office still has long way to go (Score:2)
There are very minor issues with tables that I know of but these are generally not show stoppers.
a) Please raise an issue and provide a sample document that will not convert. OOo is always interested in solving these problems.
b) Raise the prompt saving to word as a usability issue or find an issue that discussed it and vote for it.
We are working through all the issues but if nothing is reported then nothing will get f
If only conversion cost was zero (Score:2)
This isn't rocket science; Microsoft did the exact same thing to Lotus in order to crush the 1-2-3
Re:If only conversion cost was zero (Score:3, Interesting)
OO already duplicates MSO quite closely. I suspect that if they get any closer, they may face copyright problems.
Furthermore, OO's purpose is not to duplicate MSO misfeature for misfeature. Many OO users are first-time users of any office suite and they really don't need to be burdened with all the things MSO gets wrong. OO trie
At least re-invent a better wheel (Score:1)
However, as geg81 and others have pointed out, many OOo users are new users. They don't need the baggage of legacy software. Even if the users aren't so new, this is a chance to get things right, or at least better.
Re:If only conversion cost was zero (Score:2)
How do people manage to upgrade MS Office in your world? The last 3 upgrades all looked different, to the point of using different terms for the same concepts and different placement of menu items. Trust me, I have seen people flounder aplenty after an upgrade.
In the end, moving to OOo will happen exactly the same as upgrading to
OOo is not a Word clone (Score:2)
As you wish (Score:2)
So it is not a strategic direction of OOO to use the interface standards of the market, right? Please allow me to quote from "User Interface Design for Programmers [amazon.com]" (APress, 2001):
If they're still using Office '97... (Score:1)
If they had already been using Office XP or 2003 I would imagine there'd be some resistance from the users.
As good as OOo is, MS is still one or two steps ahead. (I use both, all the way back to the StarOffice 5.x days, and Microsoft Office is just more polished IMO all the way around...)
Every now and then I toy with rolling out OOo at the school where I work, but until I can install it via GPO and it is more "network/user" aware I'm going to wait. I
Whoohoo (Score:1)
Haarlem has almost 150000 inhabitants so they save 3 euro per tax payer. Not bad.