On 07/12/10 11:50, gazz wrote: (snip) > I've been doing hands-on FOSS advocacy in the voluntary sector for the > best part of a decade and experience teaches me that it's a mistake to > gloss over the real issues in migrating from any Windows OS to any Linux > distro. What's important is to get across the concept of open standards > and to help the user understand that it isn't Linux' 'weirdness' causing > the issues but use of closed standards in proprietary software and to > explain that once they have made a successful migration to Ubuntu, they > will experience *fewer* issues with cross-compatibility in the future. > > For a proportion of Windows users, though, the barriers will honestly > still be too high for their resources - at least for the time being. > Especially users who rely on being able to open and edit proprietary > apps send by Windows users. Although times change and organisations who > once couldn't see their way to migrating are looking at it again in the > current climate. > > When I'm advocating Ubuntu with voluntary orgs, I don't really refer to > technical issues beyond giving them (what I consider to be) a sensible > overview of real and imaginary migration issues - I focus, instead, on > simplicity, resistance to slow-down and choking due to malware, > community ownership (which really appeals), keeping the economy local, > longevity of hardware, ease of installing peripherals, standardisation > of software used for photos, scanning etc etc, ease of maintaining a > properly-installed system for non-techies. And it's *pretty*! > > If you gloss over migration issues, you will forfeit trust when users do > experience problems. I prefer to support people migrating with their > eyes open and wait for the more nervous Windows users to go through the > emotional and practical issues involved for them and their organisation > in their own time. We'll be here when they're ready :) > > Paula
Neat. I do hope you are able to join the advertising team? -- alan cocks Ubuntu user -- ubuntu-uk@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-uk https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UKTeam/
