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itnews@itweb.co.za | sales@itweb.co.za | Wed, 3 Dec 2008 |
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Home Open Source
Home Open Source
Unisa embraces Microsoft
- Read in this story
- Why Microsoft?
- Interoperability concerns
At a time when many public organisations are migrating to open source solutions – the University of SA (Unisa) has chosen to embrace Microsoft.
From 2009, registered students at Unisa will be required to sign up for a Microsoft-provided e-mail service.
The free e-mail system – myLife – will be the only system Unisa will use to communicate with its students. This marks a move away from the university's Sakai community source platform – myUnisa – which the university runs on a Linux platform.
In a welcome e-mail sent out to students, Unisa states: “We'd like to make it easier for you to communicate with us, so from 2009 Unisa will be offering all registered students a unique e-mail address. We will create your myLife e-mail account for you, which you MUST activate when you rejoin myUnisa. From this point onwards, Unisa will disregard all other e-mail addresses it has for you on record... If you decide, therefore, not to activate this e-mail account, you will not receive e-mails from Unisa.”
Jason Ming Sun, acting manager for portal and academic solutions, says Microsoft offered the university the solution it needed.
“We needed a sustainable and manageable service. It was important to ensure mailboxes were large enough and managed to ensure important communications always reach students.”
Ming Sun notes that Google was approached, but – though willing to accommodate the university's 200 000-plus students, it was not able to guarantee administrative and management reporting features – which he says are essential to see how well the system was being used.
In the end, Microsoft was chosen because it won on cost. “Some services ran into tens of millions [of rands] and this may have reflected in a cost to the student. Microsoft was able to provide the solution free of charge and that was core for students,” Ming Sun explains.
In its statement to students, Unisa notes: “In phase two, we plan to include other Microsoft Live services, such as social networking facilities, online file storage, and Office Live workspace.”
Ming Sun states students will not be required to use these services, but Unisa would look at capitalising on these available solutions as a means of marketing the university. “Our only intention,” he says, “is to bring about an e-mail service.”
A concern for the future is that students might be required to submit assignments prepared from Microsoft portal pages or through Microsoft applications – a claim Ming Sun dismisses. He also notes that the system is not restrictive as it is IMAP- and POP-enabled and students can, therefore, use Thunderbird to access it, as it is not restricted to Outlook.
Ming Sun notes: “The e-mail service is giving them a place to receive e-mail. Students must remember they can always set up and redirect any e-mail destined for myLife to their personal e-mail, such as hotmail.”
* Is Unisa doing the right thing going with Microsoft? Give us your opinion via our feedback facility.
POST YOUR COMMENT
Comments (26)
Antares
said:
Rather spend the money they were willing to pay for the services to pay staff to support these systems
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Management is willing to pay themselves millions, while staff are over worked and underpaid. Workers can not even qualify for a year end bonus, even if you work your ass off. But for management, bonus of a million is not uncommon. Their excuse? They don`t have a system to measure performance. But for management there apparently is such a system. It seems the longer they postpone bonuses for workers, the longer management can share in bonus money. And it will be nice if one can have a monthly salary of about R200,000 - then I can easily pay for my kids` education without having to worry where the money would come from. But on the other hand, this is Africa, who cares - millions for the king while the rest are starving. Long live the king!!!!! |
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Antares
said:
Do your homework...
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I don`t have microsoft on my desktop or laptop as I don`t need it - there are thousands of games for Ms, but I am not a gamer. I also do not appreriate the millions of viruses for Ms, which has no effect on open source. As to outdated open source, we stay abreast of the latest - do yourself a favour and download the latest at ftp://ftp.is.co.za (if you have the bandwith) or buy the CD`s or DVD`s from a company who already downloaded it. The cost is minimal. We use Fedora(bleeding edge Redhat) for desktops and laptops and Redhat for our servers. |
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Antares
said:
Unisa made right desision ???
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Unisa has made the worst decision ever in going for MS. The cost of IT labour when you utilise Linux is minimal as the systems are stable and only go down should the hardware or ups fail. It does not even require a reboot when additional programs are installed - the only reason to reboot is when installing a new kernel which almost never happens. Uptime of a few years on Linux machines is not uncommon. As for the database side, a good stable sql server comes part of the package, as well as openoffice, which is compatible with msoffice. I can not see why a company has to pay zillions for inferior software when Linux can provide stable systems. The desktop market for especially kids who love their games, is another story. Not many games for Linux as opposed to Windows with zillions of games and viruses. Your mouse has moved - please restart your computer to make the changes take effect. Sounds more or less familiar? In Linux we don`t "restart", our systems stay up. |
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Cooper
said:
What the Purpose of a University?
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Well support is always the greatest concern in organizations, but rather then always going the easy option, they can be innovative, they are a UNIVERSITY and find solutions. Are they intending to be users of these email services, I thought Universities are the one organizations apart from government to try and lead people to be innovative, independent and creators. How can they do that if they are just users? Rather spend the money they were willing to pay for the services to pay staff to support these systems, even if it might be a little more expensive. What is the core purpose for this University to be in existence???? |
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Shirley
said:
Microsoft Office System solution from nSynergy
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Very Great! nSynergy SharePoint Document management and collaboration software architectures allow organisations to centralise and better manage all electronic information with its seamless integration of Microsoft SharePoint into the Microsoft Office suite of products in intranet, extranet and internet. The ability to simply create and deploy extranets and portal sites allows these firms to build stronger relationships with clients and increase the productivity. There is more information at nsynergy.com or mail to info@nsynergy.com. |
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Bamboe
said:
Open Source vs MS - Unisa has made the right decision
| I love open source software and I am a huge fan of Linux based technologies, but the fact is that support, platform maturity and cost of IT labour in this sector remains expensive. Microsoft are clearly starting to come to the party. Unisa has made a good decision as they require escalations for problems, control of their environment and to have access to reasonable cost of labour to support their platform. | |
Dev
said:
Go ahead
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Go ahead, talk. You need to separate poor implementation from poor technology. Linux and other open source technologies have been widely implemented by a lot of companies. So go ahead, what about ENATAS? |
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Dev
said:
We need to be long sighted
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Unisa is an institute of learning, not just a business. They will be driving the way people think and do things in the future. microsoft does not have the best track record when it comes to power abuse and you think they care about SA beyond milking us for money? We need to start building our skills now so we don`t have this problem in the future and Unisa should be at the forefront, not going with a proprietary vendor were the future looks like they will be locked in. |
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Goldfish
said:
Couple of good points, but.......
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`In the world of software, the strength of channel partners are probably one of the top 3 key success factors for any company doing that kind of work.` - good point `general businesses making real sustainable money from open source solutions in south Africa is critically weak. ` - my experience tells me otherwise. Open source is maturing on the very issue you mentioned up front. Add to that the very real value of development, entrepreneurship, education and very real opportunity open source code brings to empowering people and you have something this country really needs. In the Open Source VOIP market alone the open guys are making very real headway. As an example - the largest call centres in the Southern hemisphere run on open source Asterisk platforms. What is needed however is an independent quality assurance body that protects the end user and keeps us guys on our toes. Yep we have a David and Goliath mentality..... and probably a bit of a chip on our shoulders..... but if I remember the story correctly...... Goliath hit the deck :). |
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James
said:
This will make things worse for students
| This is not an optional value-added offer to students - students are being FORCED to sign up if they wish to receive e-mail from the university. I think Unisa sees it as a way of avoiding bounced e-mails and complaints by students that e-mails have not been received. Forcing students to use an in-house e-mail system means Unisa can always claim that an e-mail has been delivered, and then simply ignore the problem of whether the e-mail was successfully forwarded to a student`s real e-mail address or not. An additional problem is that Unisa is in effect setting itself up as an ISP for 200 000 students. The Unisa staff e-mail system (also Microsoft) is often down. I shudder to think what will happen when thousands of students around the world find they can`t access their e-mail and start contacting the already over-stretched IT support department. | |
profdoris
said:
Control your platform
| I think that Unisa has made a good choice as it at the end of the day gives them a lower cost of ownership as well as more visable control over the platform. | |
Dev
said:
Sad day for SA eduacation
| As a user of open source software and a Unisa student I find this trend worrying. Unisa should be embracing open source software yet now they are being drawn into microsofts free offer which, I think, will later be a problem. If Unisa continue down this path I will not be studying with them for much longer. | |
Dev
said:
TCO no facts
| The only facts they have are whitepapers by people closely associated with microsoft. | |
History Guy
said:
Common Sense facts
|
In the world of software, the strength of channel partners are probably one of the top 3 key success factors for any company doing that kind of work. The channel for deployment, support, maintenance, design, skills, and in generall businessed making real sustainable money from open source solutions in south Africa is critically weak. That`s a fact. Why should Unisa or any other business bet on that weakness? Microsoft rules that game and has been for years. Arguably, it is Bill Gates kickstarted the commercial software economy in the first instance. Personally, I am so glad that Open Source is keeping Microsoft on its toes to do what`s right - this move is an example of that. I have no love for Titans and support the Underdog. But Open Source talk these days like in this thred is making me rethink who the underdog really is. |
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profdoris
said:
the chip
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Hi Folks, from reading this form / comments I only see one thing... There is a serious lack of business knowledge with our audience and a lot of chips on their shoulders. Come on guys this is not just going to make life easier for the students but also provide them with more options and flexibility in their study’s. |
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So sad
said:
It starts here...
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In marketing terms, this act of generosity by Microsoft is known as a loss leader. Give ’e;m something for free, and reel ’e;m in when they’re hooked. Unisa can’t cope with sending emails to 200,000 students, so it now hosts the service to send AND receive them. Explain why we will still have the option to forward the emails to other email systems when you can’t currently send email to those same systems. What’s next Unisa? Restricting assignments to only the latest version of Office? |
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jaco
said:
MS still dominant - so good 1 Unisa
| If MS did this free of charge, den it was a wise business decision, and I have seen the email client, looks pretty much outlook, and many businesses run Outlook, I think dis will make student life easier | |
Disappointed
said:
Shame Unisa
| All academic instutions accross thw wolrd are going open source in order to encourage enterpreneurship,collaboration and new technologies. Unisa has just taken its students to the stone ages and failed them dismally. | |
nuts
said:
Do your homework...
|
Do your homework before you comment. You can submit assignments in other formats like pdf as well. In fact, to be sure your assignment prints correctly when submitted, it is preferred. I have had problems with emails from UNISA not reaching me and I am glad that something has been done to improve the quality of communication. I just hope the open source software that we are required to use for our studies improve. Some of it is so outdated, it is frustrating to use. |
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Redshoes
said:
Nonsense
| This is nonsense. What is going to happen is that when UNISA starts looking at other features, they will locked into using Microsoft. That is what proprietary software is all about. Students are already forced to hand in their assignments in.doc version which is shocking to say the least. | |
Integrated
said:
Evermore Integrated Office is worth looking at.
| Why don`t you look at Evermore Integrated Office sofware. www.evermoresw.com. Using Evermore, you can save documents in all MS formats. Totally interoperable with MS. | |
Paul_ZA
said:
Deal with it
| Fact is the TCO of choosing MS will ALWAYS be less than an open source solution and that`s what`s attractive to both private and public sector alike. | |
Charles Oertel
said:
Microsoft`s solutions are like politicians promises
|
You have no guarantee that the new system will be any better at delivering your emails - but you can be sure there will be other problems. At some point in the future, Microsoft will offer a wonderful feature that Unisa will `must have`. But it will only work if students use MS Office or some other proprietary extension. Each step will seen innocuous and harmless, until you find that it is just too far to walk back into the light |
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