Tue

Feb 27
2007

Allison Randal

Allison Randal

South African Government Favors Open Source

Last week the South African government announced an initiative to move all government departments over to open source software. In a statement from the Cabinet:

...all new software developed for or by the government will be based on open standards and government will itself migrate current software to FOSS. This strategy will, among other things, lower administration costs and enhance local IT skills.

The transition makes sense not only from a financial perspective, but also from a political and cultural one. South Africa boasts 11 official languages, and few have enough speakers to gain the attention of large software vendors. The readily available localized versions of popular open source desktop applications such as Firefox, Thunderbird, and OpenOffice.org are a significant step toward the Constitutional promise to "promote, and create conditions for, the development and use of" all official languages.

The announcement is a public recognition of a change process that's already started. The transition won't happen overnight, it may not even fully happen within the next decade, but the official seal of approval on open source software will help ease the many small changes along the way.


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