I’ll believe it when I see it (I expect Microsoft will fight this tooth and nail), but …
Source:
Question - Does that mean an open source office suite will become what’s taught/used at schools and colleges etc. ?
(think what that would mean)
I’ll believe it when I see it as well, it will only take a few ministerial pockets lined and this will all go away for now, but if nothing else it’s an indication that the sun is slowly setting on Microsoft
Graeme
Not only is this news more than welcome (if it really happens which is yet to be seen) IMO it should have been mandatory years ago, why the hell have taxpayers been saddled with swelling the coffers of an overpriced OS & Office suite? Schools should have been using this forever, governments should have maybe been a bit more ‘austere’ themselves in previous years and considered running open source operating systems, open formats should be the norm, not the exception. Surely students would learn more by being part of a community of problem solvers rather than just waiting for a paid MS tech’ to come into school … It makes me angry that we’ve had to pay for this for years in schools, but money talks . . . . . .
I have a nasty feeling this will turn out to be more about attempting to scare Microsoft into price concessions or under the table palm greasing.
Our government over the years have paid for white paper after white paper that have all suggested F/OSS as the way forward, and so far they’ve ignored them all.
So I have a sneaking suspicion it’s just “bargaining time” again, so they’re just strengthening their bargaining position :
[EDIT]
I hope I’m wrong, as it would be a nice “first” if saving the taxpayer trumped corrupt backhander government/corporate deals … but I won’t hold my breath.
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Mmm … the government would like to spend less on IT … but it will still spend a lot.
It just might be that vendors have finally (!) concluded that the government will still pay the majority of what they’re paying, so long as they can make a saving, all they have to do is charge in support fees rather than license fees … that way vendors get all the money, instead of giving most of it to M$.
I know some sales types can be a little on the slow side, but I’ve been totally dumbfounded over the years that nobody twigged.
Whereas M$ (allegedly) pay lots of money to lobbyists to make sure M$ software makes it’s way to all the right places, they appear to have alienated pretty much their entire distribution channel over the last 18 months, what with competing directly with hardware vendors and upping all their SW prices (and screwing with their licensing AND training schemes).
Once OO (or Libre) starts to roll out in .gov, some people will start to use Linux instead of Windows, because if they don’t need to use Windows for M$ Office, Linux becomes an option. Once a proportion of gov users are on Linux, the only way to sell them Office is to roll out a Linux version of Office or sell them the cloud version. Following the white rabbit, it sounds like M$ need a Linux version of Office if they want to stay in the game …
Actually, I reckon you were right second time - Office 365 or whatever they’ll call it, will become BIG business (thoery - if Google can make it work, so can M$)
Yeah, I know what you mean, Bing! is coming on leaps and bounds … and as for Surface, whoh!, Android look out !!!
I didn’t mean that it’ll rescue the company and be the saviour of Microsoft - I just meant that if I was put in charge of M$, it’d be the way that I’d go. Gotta try and move with the times, as much as possible.
Yes . . . . the rumour mill abounds lol . . . .
Won’t bother me either way, I like using Libre Office/ Open Office, they are so much nice to look at and use, to me, than the latest MS office, really - people that say Unity is ugly need to take a long hard look at office to see real ugly 