[ubuntu-uk] local council

[alan c]

On 13/02/11 11:28, Sarah Chard wrote:
> O
> n Sat, 2011-02-12 at 19:46 +0000, alan c wrote:
>
>
>>  the IT department and found that Bracknell use an overwhelming amount
>>    of Suse Enterprise server, and are carefully aware of the non linux
>>  apps they still depend upon, and plan for a future with thin clients.
>>  I think they have been noted in the press as  doing well etc
>>  generally, but it does not hit local news, nor, apparently, the
>>  Councillors awareness.
>>
>>  Armed with my new knowledge I am recently in touch with my Councillor
>>  to help make them aware that there is no real reason why they need to
>>  stay with a paid-for OS on their corporate laptop. It may take a bit
>>  more time of course.
>
> Local and national govt are very slow to change - there is pressure
> building up but we need to keep pushing the case for linux&  open
> source. Our hlug Open Source day on March 26 is all about this and the
> need for govt to support Open Document Standards.
> We have sent invites out to all the Herefordshire councillors - the
> cabinet member for ICT says he will attend&  following pre -publicity
> about the day published in the local paper we were approached by the
> council ict dept and told that they were in the process of moving the
> council web platform over to 'mostly open source' and they too would
> like to send a rep and talk to us.
> The underlying structure may change to Open Source, the council may
> start using Linux Servers but the majority of their employees will
> probably still be using proprietary office software
> We want the council to consider putting Libre Office on their desktops
> as a starting point which is why we will be talking  about long term
> strategy to get out of lock-ins and issues around open formats.
> We also want to let more ordinary people know about and use open source
> and that's why we give away our custom open source disc - The Linux
> Emporium have just kindly agreed to sponsor 100 more discs for the day
> which is fantastic as we do everything with zero funds - we will replace
> open office with Libre Office on this version.
> Once people switch to using cross platform open source software and
> become familiar with it then moving over to a full Linux OS becomes far
> less intimidating.
> The more people out there who use linux and open source software the
> more pressure will be on govt local and national to use open formats we
> can all read. It will also become easier for councils&  national govt to
> change the OS used by their employees to Ubuntu or another flavour as
> they will have less resistance to deal with.
> It does take time but the boulder is moving - we just need to keep on
> pushing it.
>
> Sarah

Hi Sarah
Would you  find a FOSS leaflet  (double sided A4) based on the 
OpenDIsc useful?
If so can I email it to you?

-- 
alan cocks
Ubuntu user