[ Linux Today reader Fred
Mobach writes: ]
“At http://www.heise.de/newsticker/data/odi-15.03.00-001/
you can read an article in German of Heise news. It’s about Open
Source in the federal administration of Germany.
“A short summary :
The coordination and advisory board (KBSt)
[http://www.kbst.bund.de/]
of the Federal Government for information technology in the federal
administration has published a proposal [http://linux.kbst.bund.de/] to use
Open Source Software in the federal administration. The board sees
as possible fields of implementation of Free Software like the
operating systems Linux and FreeBSD servers and desktops. They’re
also pointing to the possible savings : not only less license fees
but also less hardware costs as older hardware can be used because
of the lesser need for resources.They have more argument for the use of Free Software. That
are the problems involved with the use of proprietary formats in
commercial applications. But also the higher security level which
can be reached with Open Software because of the possibility of
audits and corrections.From the past they know also of some “accidents” which have
questioned the trust in commercial hard- and software. Many
problems which prevented the use of Free Software in past have been
solved already : the installation of Free Software is nowadays as
simple as the commercial versions and education and support are
sufficiently available. Last but not least there is no dependency
on suppliers.
“Very good that after France also Germany as European countries
have seen the light at the end of the (encrypted ?) tunnel :-).