French Parliament Selects Open Source Desktops
Another win for Open Source and Free Software in France, this time in Parliament itself:
Starting in June 2007, PCs in French deputes’ offices will be equipped with a Linux operating system and open-source productivity software.
The project, backed by parliament members Richard Cazenave and Bernard Carayon of the Union for a Popular Movement party, will see 1,154 French parliamentary workstations running on Linux, with OpenOffice.org productivity software, the Firefox Web browser and an open-source e-mail client.
Interesting that the actual Linux distribution has yet to be chosen, and that the Government is endorsing the concept of an Open Desktop system in general. Already using Open Source Software on some of their servers, including Apache, Linux and Mambo, the Government expects to achieve significant cost savings in the long term using Open Source desktops as well:
“The study showed that open-source software will from now on offer functionality adapted to the needs of MPs (members of parliament) and will allow us to make substantial savings despite the associated migration and training costs,” the parliament said.
Add comment November 27th, 2006