From: hardheart@gmail.com
Date: Sat 22 Oct 2005 - 01:43:19 EEST
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Open-source software gaining in Europe
http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/index.cfm/go/news.view/News/5195
Friday, 21 October 2005
Open-source software is gaining ground in Europe and the developing
world, with users attracted by lower costs and accessibility, according
to a recent study and industry observers.
A study of 12 European countries conducted by the University of
Maastricht in the Netherlands found that nearly 49 percent of local
government authorities are using Floss (free/libre/open source software)
and those doing so would like to increase its use. The phone and
web-based survey, conducted from late 2004 into early this year, netted
955 respondents in Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, France,
Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain, Sweden and the UK.
About 70 percent of Floss users wanted to increase its use, said Rishab
Aiyer Ghosh, program leader for the study of free and open-source
software at the Merit (Maastricht Economic Research Institute on
Innovation and Technology). Ghosh gave a presentation on the study at the
O'Reilly Open Source Convention in Amsterdam Tuesday.
But the survey also found that some 29 percent of respondents who said
they did not use Floaa did in fact use open-source software such as the
GNU/Linux operating system, MySQL database or Apache web server.
It also found that the average number of computers serviced by an IT
administrator was 66, 13 more than administrators who were not using
open-source software, Ghosh said. The statistic implies that fewer
administrators are needed for open-source software, he added.
Those surveyed feared that adopting open-source software would increase
training costs or reduce support options. In addition, they didn't want
to be the first to adopt something new, Ghosh said. The fears show how
vendor lock-in works, he added.
"It's easy to stick with Microsoft even if you know it's a stupid thing
to do because you can't be blamed for it, whereas if you migrate to
something new and everyone else isn't doing that and something goes
wrong, it's your fault," Ghosh said.
On the business and regulation side, some policy-making agencies within
the European Union are funding open-source related activities, said Paul
Everitt, founder and project leader of the Zope Europe Association, a
support group for developers and users of the Zope open-source
application server.
People who got sick of working at larger organisations are also starting
small businesses and contributing to the open-source community, he said.
"These are the free marketeers who are doing interesting things in
Europe," said Everitt, who gave a presentation on Wednesday at the
open-source conference.
In the developing world, more money is becoming available through the UN
and private groups that are funding technology purchases, said Danese
Cooper, senior director, open-source strategist at Intel's channel
software operation. There's demand for wireless, inexpensive computers
that fit in small family budgets, said Cooper, who conducted a session on
Wednesday at the open-source conference.
Open-source software is gaining because its development can also help
build local economies, Cooper said. Developers can get grant money and
localise the software since it's often difficult to get in their own
native language. "How sad it is that they can't get the big companies to
deal with them," she said.
Brazil has a strong, self-deterministic open-source software industry
working in Brazilian Portuguese.
One problem area is the way improvements to code are shared. Several
countries are involved in coding but a lot of it is not making it back to
the community, Cooper said. China is participating in open source, but
many internal projects are "viciously" proprietary, she said.
"They are trying to run the 80s and 90s again in a different way,"
Cooper said. "They want a Chinese Bill Gates."
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