Ubuntu and open source help the City of Munich save millions • Hacker News Board

Re: Ubuntu and open source help the City of Munich save millions

#101

Post by virtue3 » Tue, Jul 08, 2014, 10:09 PM UTC

spodek wrote: post #63

alkonaut wrote: post #58

The costs seem to mention training and support, but not comparing productivity makes it useless. It's like arguing that you can use the Gimp rather than photoshop, which is only true until you try. The whole point of software is that it increases productivity (word processor rather than typewriter). While it may be the case that Linux and open source alternatives saves a bunch on licenses, I don't buy the argument th…

One might as well expect productivity to increase switching away from proprietary software. I would, at least. Taking your example of Gimp, I expect institutional adoption of free software would result in some people having it who didn't have Photoshop at all before. They can now become more productive and take less of other people's time.

I've used both photoshop and gimp a lot. If I had to use gimp for my day to day photo editing software I'd be _severely_ hampered in productivity.

Re: Ubuntu and open source help the City of Munich save millions

#102

Post by Zigurd » Wed, Jul 09, 2014, 1:35 AM UTC

alkonaut wrote: post #92

Zigurd wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Windows as a share of Web clients is down to 60%: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_operating_system... Nobody cites Windows or Office as an impediment to growth. It is very unlikely that the Windows Web client share decline has ever hit a "productivity" speed bump. Another way to look at it is that mobility turned out to be much more highly valued than Office or Windows compatibility.

That just says that web browsing is now a mobile activity. I think this project is about replacing desktop and laptop computers with linux. On desktop laptop windows is still dominating and losing mostly to MacOS

Office productivity is now a Web activity, in part because that's how modern tools can be used on otherwise locked-down desktops. Whether it's desktop Linux or people bringing their own iPads to workplaces with PCs running old versions of Windows, IE, and Office, nobody sees the supposed productivity of their desktop systems as a reason not to abandon them.

Re: Ubuntu and open source help the City of Munich save millions

#103

Post by pippy » Wed, Jul 09, 2014, 3:23 AM UTC

alkonaut wrote: post #58

The costs seem to mention training and support, but not comparing productivity makes it useless. It's like arguing that you can use the Gimp rather than photoshop, which is only true until you try. The whole point of software is that it increases productivity (word processor rather than typewriter). While it may be the case that Linux and open source alternatives saves a bunch on licenses, I don't buy the argument th…

One thing bureaucracies are susceptible to is vendors requiring mandatory software updates on custom software. This costs much more than most people think, and with the city of City of Munich would dwarf any productivity overhead.

Sure it's the case with Photoshop as it's an off the shelf piece product, but it won't be with CustomVendorDirectXAccounting v13.5. I doubt City of Munich has teams of people running photoshop, and any designers likely have suite of macs anyway.

I'd wager the cost savings of switching to OpenSource likely won't come from initial costs. It will come from forcing custom software vendors to distribute software that inherently requires less ongoing costs.

Re: Ubuntu and open source help the City of Munich save millions

#104

Post by slgeorge » Wed, Jul 09, 2014, 12:14 PM UTC

virtue3 wrote: post #101

spodek wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One might as well expect productivity to increase switching away from proprietary software. I would, at least. Taking your example of Gimp, I expect institutional adoption of free software would result in some people having it who didn't have Photoshop at all before. They can now become more productive and take less of other people's time.

I've used both photoshop and gimp a lot. If I had to use gimp for my day to day photo editing software I'd be _severely_ hampered in productivity.

How many local government workers do you think spend their day using Gimp or Photoshop?

E-mail, basic document forms and internal applications are the major use-cases for that type of scenario.

Re: Ubuntu and open source help the City of Munich save millions

#105

Post by slgeorge » Wed, Jul 09, 2014, 12:25 PM UTC

alkonaut wrote: post #58

The costs seem to mention training and support, but not comparing productivity makes it useless. It's like arguing that you can use the Gimp rather than photoshop, which is only true until you try. The whole point of software is that it increases productivity (word processor rather than typewriter). While it may be the case that Linux and open source alternatives saves a bunch on licenses, I don't buy the argument th…

Sorry, but it's not like arguing you can use "Gimp rather than Photoshop" at all.

You just identified a specialist application that's used in a specific use-case by a limited user-base who fully use the capabilities of the software. When a designer uses those tools their productivity is significantly increased or limited by the software. The focus of the role is using the computer as a tool, so if it performs poorly so do they.

Most 'general office' users, and certainly many administrators don't fully use the capabilities of the software they have because it's not the focus of their jobs. The software isn't the limiting factor in them doing the job. Take the example of someone working in job centre or similar, they'll likely use a Word processor for providing letters, e-mail for external/internal interaction and some custom internal applications (e.g. the jobs database). There are all well within the capabilities of Open Source software.

Framing it that way would certainly be an argument against replacing Photoshop for Gimp; but it doesn't tell you anything useful about replacing general Windows/MS Office with Linux and Open Source.

Re: Ubuntu and open source help the City of Munich save millions

#106

Post by anonbanker » Wed, Jul 09, 2014, 6:49 PM UTC

velodrome wrote: post #18

ams6110 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to mention the big kahunas, Exchange, Sharepoint, AD, SQL Server licenses.

Is there an opensource alternative for Sharepoint?

I've been implementing Alfresco[1] as a viable SharePoint replacement.

1. Http://alfresco.com

Re: Ubuntu and open source help the City of Munich save millions

#107

Post by alkonaut » Wed, Jul 09, 2014, 7:46 PM UTC

slgeorge wrote: post #105

alkonaut wrote: post #58

The costs seem to mention training and support, but not comparing productivity makes it useless. It's like arguing that you can use the Gimp rather than photoshop, which is only true until you try. The whole point of software is that it increases productivity (word processor rather than typewriter). While it may be the case that Linux and open source alternatives saves a bunch on licenses, I don't buy the argument th…

Sorry, but it's not like arguing you can use "Gimp rather than Photoshop" at all. You just identified a specialist application that's used in a specific use-case by a limited user-base who fully use the capabilities of the software. When a designer uses those tools their productivity is significantly increased or limited by the software. The focus of the role is using the computer as a tool, so if it performs poorly…

I think the same argument holds for OO vs MS Office as well. They are much closer than Gimp/PS obviously, but for power users they aren't even close to interchangeable.

A good middle ground would be migrating the 95 or 99% who are "casual" users to open source, but you'd then have a heterogeneous system, which isn't ideal. VM's could be used to have all-Linux desktops and still provide users of win-only software with what they need.

My point is: the big savings are in the 95% but the big cost is for migrating the last 5%.

Re: Ubuntu and open source help the City of Munich save millions

#108

Post by alkonaut » Wed, Jul 09, 2014, 7:52 PM UTC

slgeorge wrote: post #104

virtue3 wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've used both photoshop and gimp a lot. If I had to use gimp for my day to day photo editing software I'd be _severely_ hampered in productivity.

How many local government workers do you think spend their day using Gimp or Photoshop? E-mail, basic document forms and internal applications are the major use-cases for that type of scenario.

The cost of win (desktop) licenses is virtually zero, and office subscriptions are also dirt cheap. That's not where you save money. It's a few dollars per month. You can motivate that cost even for someone who uses office apps casually once a week.

Re: Ubuntu and open source help the City of Munich save millions

#109

Post by zanny » Thu, Jul 10, 2014, 1:25 PM UTC

jdong wrote: post #76

zanny wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because there are few opportunities to buy a notebook without giving Microsoft a lot of money.

Except you aren't giving Microsoft money while buying a Windows laptop. Nor can I see what you'd benefit from spending extra money to not give Microsoft money.

> Nor can I see what you'd benefit

Not giving Microsoft money means you are not funding the exact reason why Linux on the desktop is obscure in the first place.

If MS did not have such comprehensive control of the consumer computer space, they would not have pervasive "deals" with every vendor to lock them in to shipping Windows across the board. Because if you, as a hardware manufacturer, install Ubuntu and make sure all the drivers work, out of the box it is no more buggy than Windows is at this point - probably less, and much more usable than Windows 8 for the average joe.

But Microsoft has a firm grasp across the entire industry on all the vendors, and their ubiquity for 20 years has given them mindshare you cannot easily unravel. And giving them more money is not helping that.