For small companies entering business, adopting open source software (OSS) is preferable to proprietary software, says Telkom`s senior specialist in technology strategy and architecture, Steve Jump.
"If you are a small business starting out and you don`t have an existing desktop environment then the costs of using open source are lower than proprietary software," he said yesterday at the Go Open Source channel partner programme workshop in Sandton.
Telkom and OSS
Jump told the audience that Telkom uses OSS in the information systems and network departments.
Apache Web servers, Q-Mail e-mail servers, My SQL databases and Clam anti-virus programmes are among the OSS applications used in Telkom.
He noted that for companies who have a working environment on proprietary platforms, migrating to OSS might be an unnecessary expense.
Workshop`s lofty ambitions
Go Open Source Project Manager, Tjipo Mothobi, says workshops in Johannesburg, Durban, East London and Cape Town will train 1 000 OSS support service specialists working for SMEs in the next 12 months.
Previously, she had said around 300 would be trained, but she told ITWeb yesterday that further sponsorship had been found by certain financial institutions, without revealing their names.
"We will upskill 1 000 engineers from SMEs in Linux Professional Institute certification and the International Computer Driving License," she promised.
The aim of this week`s two-day workshop, she added, is to sensitise people to the value of OSS by showing examples of its successful deployment in different South African industries.
"Organisations like Nandos, Telkom and Pick 'n Pay have already switched to OSS, and there is increasing interest from the public service," Mothobi noted.
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