ubuntu-ngo team mailing list archive

[Fabian Rodriguez <magicfab@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Le 12-09-30 04:33 AM, Pierre van Male a écrit :
> Dear All,
>
> My name is Pierre. I am 38 yo and I have been working for the last 10
> years as an expatriate for humanitarian organizations in very
> different contexts (Palestine, Darfur, Chechnya, Sri-Lanka, Guinea,
> etc.). I am also a big fan of OSS and Ubuntu in particular. Therefore,
> to be stuck to MS Windows at work has always been a frustration form me.

Hi Pierre, welcome to the list. I joined when I went to Haiti to install
a small computer lab last year. I went back to Haiti this year for a
similar project, this time also showing Trisquel and Debian too, with
emphasis on educational software and desktop applications (such as
LibreOffice).

> [...] Still, the promotion of Ubuntu on the market is a big challenge
> because of the aggressive marketing driven by Microsoft and Apple. I
> wonder why then Canonical does not promote its distribution in a more
> proactive way among non-profit organizations and the developing countries?

Comparing Canonical to such companies with basically unlimited resources
is interesting, but quite a stretch. Canonical *is* a company with
financial objectives too, but the approach is a bit different here.

Ubuntu was given away for free to anyone asking for it on
shipit.ubuntu.com on physical CDs for a long time. Now it's available
via the Ubuntu Local teams (http://loco.ubuntu.com). Free (as in beer),
however, is not enough to compete. Other companies *pay* their way into
such markets, so Ubuntu, in a way, remains more expensive than for
example acceptiong paid training, products, certification, hardware and
resources from Microsoft. In my opinion it's not possible to go
face-to-face with the same tactics and absurd money spending Apple and
Microsoft practice in those markets, with a capitalistic approach. It's
even harder where corruption is possible.

>
> It is of course nice to see volunteer geeks spending times to support
> NGOs using OSS, but why does not Canonical put in place a structure
> that would provide to those initiatives its full back-up? If Ubuntu
> manage to be adopted by a few but famous NGOs, it would be such a good
> prove of concept for the commercial market! In counter part, those
> NGOs could then contribute to the promotion of OSS in the countries
> where they are deployed.

Deploying resources like Microsoft or Apple do in emerging economies
wouldn't be a very effective use of resources. Such companies have
essentially unlimited money, which is not the case here.

Ubuntu is already used by huge organizations! I believe this page was
created to gather NGO-specific case studies:
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/NGO/CaseStudy Also check here:
http://www.ubuntu.com/business/case-studies

This may also support your advocacy, depending on how involved with
gorvernement the organizations you work with are:
http://news.idg.no/cw/art.cfm?id=BA0C6095-091B-2DCE-1F08AAAACA5ED2CF

The backing in Ubuntu comes mostly from its governance model: its many
communities organized in LoCo Teams (including this one), which extend
into many countries (http://loco.ubuntu.com). My personal contribution
to bring Ubuntu and free open-source software to Haiti, for example,
included important efforts to kickstart/reinforce the corresponding
local communities if they didn't exist - sometimes even just putting in
touch local resources that didn't know about each other. In my example
this lead to https://wiki.ubuntu.com/HaitianTeam and
http://libreplanet.org/wiki/Group:LibrePlanet_Ayiti.

> NGOs working in the humanitarian sector at the field level have very
> similar structures and needs.
> [...]
> What could Ubuntu/OSS offer (lets dream a little bit):
[...]

Ubuntu already offers the pieces for that. I see fantastic opportunites
to organize such pieces and propose them to any interested parties.
Everything you describe is already there, or is getting easier/closer
with every release. Even full-disk encryption is now (with 12.10) part
of the graphical install. Compare that with what was needed when it was
introduced a few year ago: http://www.linux-mag.com/id/7568/1/

> [...] All this is not that simple to design and configure (especially
> the CMS), but it is technically feasible. We can create an image with
> the system ready for deployment. I imagine an Ubuntu system that could
> either be used as a local server in an office (running on a PC
> dedicated to that, while the other desktops in the same LAN would
> access it through a web interface) or be used as desktop/server on
> every PCs (the power of the today laptops and the flexibility of
> GNU/Linux allow that). In case of several Ubuntu systems running in
> the same LAN, one of them would automatically take over the server
> tasks and the other desktops would work as clients (to limit the
> bandwidth usage).
You could use LTSP and Zentyal for example, or so many / any other
packages in Ubuntu.. I doubt one image would accomodate all NPOs, I
think your own experience would be best to start from a vanilla Ubuntu
and build what you need from there. You can try whatever you want for
essentially $0, prototype, plan, investigate, test, deploy, maintain,
use, etc. for $0 and learn it, or pay someone else to do it/go faster.
The economic model here is to pay for knowledge and services, and
develop local resources as opposed to pay for products. Canonical won't
do it for you, at least not for free, so it's really that simple: either
you do it and learn it with the amazing resources out there or you pay
someone to do it for you/go faster.

> The issue of maintaining an Ubuntu installation without a direct
> access has been reported as a common issue.[...] I believe that any
> Ubuntu system should be designed to act as a soft source server over
> the LAN where it is located. It is not normal that in a same LAN with
> several Ubuntu PCs, each Ubuntu installations connect individually to
> the internet to be updated. They should first connect to each other to
> get the updated list of packages and the packages already downloaded.
Use the "apt-cacher-ng" package for that or just use LTSP if all
computer can boot from network and are in a similar environment
(computerlab/classroom for example). There are many ways to prepare in
advance when deploying Ubuntu in zero-connectivity environments, this
list is no doubt good to ask for such tips.

> “Tout un programme”, I know. It may be difficult to convince Mark
> Shuttleworth to invest in such a project..., but it does not cost a
> lot (only time) to design it. Let me know what you think about it and
> I will do my best to progress in that direction.

Ubuntu and free software are pretty much whatever you want to do of
them, at any scale (ask Google, for example), with or without Canonical.
Mark Shuttleworth has already invested and continues to do so. I can't
speak for Canonical, but his (and Canonical's) focus is probably not
NPOs, unless their are equal customers to other current opportunities.

By being on this list and sharing your experience and learning from
others' you are already on the right direction, however this is not a
typical provider-customer relationship.

By all means come back and share your findings/thoughts :)

Cheers,

Fabian Rodriguez
Montreal, QC - Canada
http://magicfab.ubuntu.com