Paris to examine Linux alternative to Microsoft

[Nomad559]

Linux alternative to Microsoft

-Snip-

The French government is planning to migrate a "significant number" of desktop computers to open source software, in order to evaluate the costs and interoperability of alternatives to Microsoft's Windows operating system.

Jacques Sauret, director of the French Agency for the Development of the Electronic Administration, said that between 5% and 15% of the 17,000 computers used by the administration in Paris were likely to move to the open source operating system Linux.

The trial is being run by systems integration consultancy Unilog. In 2003, a Unilog report spurred Munich City Council to vote to migrate 14,000 desktops from Microsoft to Linux, although that project recently encountered early "technical difficulties".

The French trial is part of a wider plan, called Project ADELE, to reorganise the Paris administration's IT budget and to update its IT systems over the next few years. In particular, the administration hopes to reduce spending on software licences in order to be able to spend more on development.
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A Microsoft certificate at eight

I want to build a computer that will respond to brain waves and dispense with the need to use hands,” says Mridul Seth, his fingers almost a whir as he punches the keys of a laptop.

Fresh from Bangalore where he successfully passed Microsoft’s online test on the software programmes devised by the firm, Mridul logs in to a site on Sikkim.

Within seconds, the screen changes to the site’s homepage, then to another on the hill state’s telecommunication.

“There is a lot more to do. Computers are like a gateway to a larger world for me,” says the shy eight-year-old designer of the two portals on the state that is also his home.

Later, as he prances about in the lawn with some other children without a trace of the earlier seriousness, it is difficult to believe he is the youngest Microsoft Certified Software Engineer, one of the most sought-after degrees for software professionals.

What makes Mridul’s story even more interesting is that until four years ago he did not even know how to speak.

[Book Lover]

1. Dispense with hands?

The little one has obviously not read "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy"

The machine was rather difficult to operate. For years radios had been operated by means of pressing buttons and turning dials; then as the technology became more sophisticated the controls were made touch-sensitive - you merely had to brush the panels with your fingers; now all you had to do was wave your hand in the general direction of the components and hope. It saved a lot of muscular expenditure, of course, but meant that you had to sit infuriatingly still if you wanted to keep listening to the same programme.

Good on yer for getting your MS certs, kiddo! Now to find a place that'll hire someone still too young to buy the beer....