Archive for the 'OpenOffice' Category
Monday, June 1st, 2009
ODF adoption continues – has it ‘crossed the chasm’?
There’s a certain point in any technology’s adoption that you step back and think to yourself “there’s no going back now”. It’s then that you realize the technology has “crossed the chasm” and whether some would wish it away or whether early adopters start testing a new “next generation” that technology will still be here to stay. I **think** ODF is there now. When you look at the government adoption levels it makes a very compelling case for “here to stay”. The fact is that as governments develop a standard, all government agencies, citizens who use the documents, and vendors who work with the government will all start to adopt the format.
I know within IBM we’re making the switch. Bob Sutor recently pointed that out. On Friday I also upgraded to the latest build of Symphony (as did every IBMer did per our automatic update tool). The switch still has miles to go, but much of the mythical “last mile cable” has been installed.
What prompted me to realize this just today? I receive the ODF Alliance Newsletter regularly in my inbox. Today, I noticed the following:
(note that while the URL is in Spanish, the translation can be seen here thanks to Google)
ECUADOR CHARTS PATH TO ODF ADOPTION
The latest government in South America to advance the use of ODF is Ecuador. Upon its approval by the Instituto Ecuatoriano de Normalización (INEN) as an Ecuadoran national standard, ODF was also adopted for sending and receiving documents by the national government’s Secretariat for Information Technology (Subsecretaría de Informática), whose mission is to improve the government’s management of IT projects and coordinate actions in this field in other public sector institutions in Ecuador . In South America, the governments of Brazil, Uruguay and Venezuela have already adopted ODF, as have several regional governments, including Parana (Brazil) and Misiones (Argentina).
Wednesday, April 22nd, 2009
Sun – Oracle Analysis
I just read Stephen O’Grady’s classic Q&A on Sun-Oracle. Another through analysis. There are certainly many angles to this one… and many questions that will play out over time.
http://redmonk.com/sogrady/2009/04/21/settingsun/
Monday, October 27th, 2008
Seen on campus: 2 Ubuntu Laptop Success Stories
I have two younger sisters who are currently in college – both at the same school. It’s a private college and has what I would consider your average IT setup for a campus.
Within the first two weeks, both had their laptops infected by viruses separately – different viruses, different times. One was running XP, the other Vista on you basic Dell laptops. Of course, who did they call? Answer: me.
Well, I took in both laptops and tried to fix them. I found that viruses today are far more advanced – one modified the MBR and the other completely wiped out the Dell recovery partition – savvy indeed. I did my best to try re-installing their respective Windows OSs, but I found that Microsoft’s licensing practices prevented me from succeeding. First, I only had Pro CDs of XP and Vista so the Home license keys on the underside of each laptop were of no use. I’d install the OS, then Microsoft Genuine Advantage would block me… thanks Microsoft.
So I had them try calling Dell – of course, no luck. They wouldn’t send a replacement media for Windows. If I had the time and energy, I’d file a lawsuit against them tomorrow.
So I turned to my laptop OS of choice: Ubuntu. No chance for a license key or media obtainment problem.
My sisters had both seen me using Ubuntu before so they had seen “what it looked like” but they never knew it wasn’t Windows. When I loaded it on their laptops, they actually didn’t know it wasn’t Windows. In fact, the first thing they both did was try downloading/installing iTunes from Apple.com. No luck – Apple, where’s an Ubuntu client?
So I set them up with all the software they needed for iPods. They actually installed their own printers without even calling me (HP printers – great compatibility). They use OpenOffice for their papers/spreadsheets/presentations, Firefox was not new to them, and Evolution is just as easy as Outlook.
They’re now both about to close out their first semester – both made it on Ubuntu alone. And the best news – not a single virus.
More amazingly, the overall number of “support requests” have gone down. Even when they had Windows there were other reasons for calls, but now… only an occassional “how do I?” type question here or there. It’s been great. They easily download from the digital cameras, they manage their music collections (no corrupted iTunes libraries), and they use all the latest social media networks. Now they would both prefer to get a Mac, but that’s the really interesting part – they have no need for Windows.
We’re making progress. Ubuntu is leading the way.
Wednesday, July 2nd, 2008
Bob Sutor goes 100% Linux on the desktop; Mac surges; where’s Windows?
Nice to see Bob Sutor has made the complete switch to Linux for laptop use at work. I remember the day I wiped out my Windows partition on my laptop – it was memorable. I then went an entire year booting Windows in VMWare only about 3-5 times.
It’s great to see the transition starting to happen everywhere. Even if some of the transitions are to Mac, it’s greater choice.
This is all going to be even easier as technologies like Firefox, OpenOffice/ODF and open standards start to permeate the set of options available to users.
Monday, April 21st, 2008
OOXML: A standard with no implementation
Even Microsoft cannot conform to its own OOXML standard…
Tuesday, April 8th, 2008
Swiss Education System to migrate 9,000 desktops from Windows to Linux
Great news for Linux as a desktop platform as the Swiss Education System signs up 9,000 desktops for the move.
http://www.linuxwins.com/9000-swiss-education-computers-drop-windows-for-linux/
From the Google translated page, it appears these desktop were in dual boot setups and are now going to be straight Ubuntu Linux.
What is the use? Candolle In college, it was anticipated the guidelines of DPI. Après des années de « dual boot , c’est-à-dire d’ordinateurs équipés d’un double système d’exploitation Windows/Linux, les machines tournent désormais exclusivement sous Ubuntu, une «distribution» de Linux. After years of “dual boot, ie computers equipped with a dual operating system Windows / Linux, the machines are now exclusively under Ubuntu, a” distribution “of Linux.
Thursday, April 3rd, 2008
Who really writes “Linux”? A special report from the Linux Foundation
Steven posted a good eWeek article summarizing the recent Linux Foundation report on who writes and contributes to the Linux kernel development. Too many have written blogs with titles like “who writes Linux” that I had to put “Linux” in quotes in my title. The reason is that this document/report is about the Linux kernel and there are many things that people commonly associate with “Linux” that are outside the kernel. Think of Gnome which is written by the Gnome community, KDE which is sponsored by Trolltech, package management tools from Red Hat, Debian or Novell (e.g. YaST, Apt Yum), a multitude of libraries, and even OpenOffice which is still controlled by Sun, but now with contributions from IBM.
So I would agree this report is fantastic – it provides a view into what’s going on beyond what we “think” happens. The Linux kernel community is a great success story in what Amanda calls “mass community collaboration” – even more ironic because there are many competitors, vendors, academics, hobbyists, customers and other random experts collaborating in one place.
Read the report (it’s “free as in beer”) and find out everything you wanted to know about Linux kernel development (including perhaps that IBM is the #3 contributor to the kernel). The story this report tells is a truly unique feature of the Linux community. You won’t see it anywhere in the communities or practices of other OSs, no matter how “open” they proclaim to have become.
The report is interesting in how it also debunks some myths that somehow get spread around. For instance, some have said “kernel development will slow down as the features catch up to UNIX/Windows”. Not true.
Some have said “Linux is just IBM” or “Linux is just Red Hat” trying to position Linux as dominated or caused by one entity that they’re not fond of. Again, not true (see the section of the report on Contributors).
Finally, take a look at how some end user companies are participating and reaping the benefits of a true collaborative development community. Did you know your next VW will be powered by Linux? Did you ever think the same features that make an auto’s systems “crash-proof” could also help on a server or mobile phone? The VW bullet is a pure example of innovation being applied to adjacent spaces – it would never happen in Windows, AIX or Solaris.
- Companies like Sony, Nokia, and Samsung ship Linux as a component of products like video cameras, television sets, and mobile telephones. Working with the development process helps these companies ensure that Linux will continue to be a solid base for their products in the future.
- Companies which are not in the information technology business can still find working with Linux beneficial. The 2.6.25 kernel will include an implementation of the PF_CAN network protocol which was contributed by Volkswagen. PF_CAN allows for reliable communications between components in an interference-prone environment – such as that found in an automobile. Linux gave Volkswagen a platform upon which it could build its networking code; the company then found it worthwhile to contribute the code back so that it could be maintained with the rest of the kernel. http://lwn.net/Articles/253425/ for more information on this work.
So with that I will end my praises and simply point you to the source over at the LF website here.
Wednesday, March 26th, 2008
Happy Document Freedom Day 2008
In case you haven’t yet heard, today is apparently Document Freedom Day ;-)
http://documentfreedom.org/News/20080326
Thursday, March 20th, 2008
OpenOffice 3.0 Preview
I can’t wait for this release. The Notes2 features are fantastic and probably the best feature will be native tables in Impress (FINALLY!). I wonder when these features will make it into Lotus Symphony… hopefully soon.
Check out the overview of new features here:
http://www.oooninja.com/2008/03/openofficeorg-30-new-features.html
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