But who said it? According to Joinup, it was Christian Ude, the Mayor of Munich, whose local authority is a European leader in the deployment of open source by the public sector in general and local authorities in particular. It was said in a letter to Neelie Kroes, Vice-President of the EU Commission, a great […]
As the council in our home city moves away from its previous open source office suite (Star Office) to the dark side (aka Microsoft Office. Ed. ), news reaches the blogmeister’s inbox via the Free Software Foundation Europe reporting on the experience of Helsinki City Council. City officials in Helsinki, Finland, are overwhelmingly satisfied after […]
The H Online reports that developers at Leuven Catholic University in Belgium have released AccessODF, an open source extension for the LibreOffice and OpenOffice.org Writer word processing application. With the extension, Writer users can evaluate and repair accessibility issues in documents, including the open source OpenDocument (ODF) and proprietary DOC and Office Open XML (DOCX) […]
In the past we have been somewhat critical (with the aim of encouraging a bit more action, we hope. Ed.) of the UK government’s attitude to and adoption of open source (news passim). However, today we’d like to draw attention to (and applaud) some work done recently by the Cabinet Office. Tools to help the […]
Once again the UK’s public sector looks like being left behind as news arrives from OSOR that the administration of Miskolc, Hungary’s fourth largest city, is moving to Ubuntu to become less dependent on a single proprietary vendor and to reduce costs. Sixty per cent of the city’s staff already use the open source OpenOffice […]
Portugal’s Agency for Administrative Modernisation (AMA) is currently asking citizens to comment on several open standards, including document formats PDF, ODF, interoperability standards, plus standards for geographic information systems and electronic invoicing. Comments will be accepted until the end of October. The consultation is part of the country’s open standards law adopted in April. This […]
The Department of Defence has stepped up its push for open source software to reduce its A$100 million annual software licensing bill, IT News reports. Last week, it joined five other Australian government agencies in forming the Open Technology Foundation, which is aimed at facilitating collaboration and interoperable technology in the public sector. In January […]
According to Computerworld Denmark, hospitals in Denmark’s Copenhagen region are switching from Microsoft Office to the open source LibreOffice suite. The switch will involve some 25,000 desktops. Savings costs in the first year are estimated at DK 40 mn., equivalent to 5.3 mn. EUR or some £5 mn. In addition to the costs savings, the […]
OSOR reports that the Brazilian Government signed a letter of intent last month to work with both The Document Foundation and the Apache OpenOffice.org community to develop the office suites maintained by both communities. The letter states that the Open Document Format for Office Applications (ODF) standard is already a guarantee of interoperability within the […]
OSOR reports that the Hungarian government wants to use the Open Document Format, an open, non-proprietary format for electronic documents, as a default for its documents. Zsolt Nyitrai, Minister of State for ICT, told parliament earlier this month that legislation to use ODF by default is being prepared. The ODF plans were announced on 1st […]
The UK public sector has been characterised as an impregnable fortress as far as open source software is concerned. While public sector bodies in other countries are adopting open source (news passim), the British public sector is a virtual closed shop for advocates of openness (in terms of software). This dire situation has been further […]
Today is Document Freedom Day, an annual event that aims to educate the public about the importance of free document formats and open standards in general. Here in the Bristol Wireless lab, we’ve been telling visitors about why open standards and free document formats are important, such as avoiding the pitfalls of proprietary formats and […]
The Estonian Ministry of the Environment has saved millions of Euro over the past 10 years by using OpenOffice, the open source office suite, according to Meelis Merilo, the head of the Ministry’s IT department, in a news item posted on OSOR. Using the open source package has cost the Ministry no more than €64,000 […]
Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) is inviting individuals, community groups and institutions to celebrate Document Freedom Day (DFD) this coming 30th March. DFD is worldwide day of celebration of Open Standards, open document formats and their importance. Open Standards ensure the freedom to access your data and the freedom to build Free Software to write […]
Public administrations in Norway are increasingly turning to open source, says Martin Bekkelund, business developer at Friprog, the country’s open source competence centre. This year, all 19 county administrations are using some form of open source, compared to 76 per cent in 2005. Uses vary from server operating systems and content management systems to OpenOffice. […]
Not to be confused with tomorrow, April Fools’ Day, today, 31st March 2010 is Document Freedom Day – that time of year when those of us in the open source movement highlight the use of open standards for documents, that lifeblood of any organisation. One thought that strikes me when thinking about open formats is […]
Hot on the heels of the New Year comes encouraging news from Munich, where the city council is progressing with its LiMux free software project. Writing on his blog, deputy project leader Florian Schießl notes a number of major milestones. Firstly, the open source and ISO standard Open Document Format (ODF) is now the main […]
The New York Times reported yesterday that the Geneva-based International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) have rebuffed the efforts of Microsoft to have its Open Office XML (OOXML) document format accepted as an international standard. Of the 87 countries that participated in the vote, 26% opposed Microsoft’s bid. Under the […]