Lambdacurry

Open source can make life cheaper and easier for the govt too...


This article is just sad.

However, the underlying reasoning is driven by pure fear. The New York city govt. had the choice to buy expensive Windows licenses + heavy duty computers + antivirus … vs cheap typewriters - it went with typewriters. It may be that typewriters ensure paper wastage, time-wastage (manual spellcheck) and is error-prone.

I would not be surprised if the Indian govt. made these kind of decisions - a third world country has to make its dollar go much further than the U.S.

However, there is a much better alternative.

A 240$ netbook (I’m sure much cheaper in bulk) + Linux based OS (Ubuntu Netbook Remix or the ultra fast Moblin / Clutter) with OpenOffice or AbiWord as word-processors. What you get is a very cheap and powerful word-processor which increases productivity, many-fold. And it is virus-free as well (so no extra hidden costs). Hook up a heavy duty network printer and you save enough paper (and correction whitener), not to mention time to make up for it.

It doesnt matter how hard you hit the keys of the netbook, because replacement keyboards cost 10$ at retail - I’m sure it would be much cheaper in bulk.

I believe that computers have gotten to the price-point where it would be senseless to give up this productivity  increase  and paper savings in exchange for negligible savings in upfront cost.


Lambdacurry

Open source can make life cheaper and easier for the govt too...

Published

July 15, 2009

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