Sorry for forwarding some politics -- but those are some good news from Germany ! I am a subscriber to the weekly news and have only left the general overview and the article about linux in the appended message. - Horst
---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Fri, 30 Nov 2001 13:46:35 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: German Information Center <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: wk_11_30_01 The Week in Germany November 30, 2001 Editors: Valerie Belz and Margaret Dornfeld e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Our topics this week: UN-Led �Post-Taliban Process� Begins at Bonn Conference Bundestag Passes 2002 Budget Greens Back Military Participation at Party Congress German Armed Forces Deployed in Operation Enduring Freedom Flying Hospital Ready to Help The Press New Consumer Protection Laws Proposed Ecotourism Gets a Push from the Chancellor Germany Leads the Way with Linux Euro Countdown � With Four Weeks to Go, Consumers Seek Assurances of Security Germans Feel Closer Ties to U.S. in Wake of Terrorist Attacks Berlin�s Museum Island Jewel to Reopen Its Doors Digital Dexterity Restores Medieval Manuscripts W.G. Sebald to Be Honored with Bremen Literary Prize Harry Potter�s Silver Screen Sorcery Works in Germany, Too German Boy Band Grows Up ... clipped Germany Leads the Way with Linux Germany�s reputation as a high-tech hothouse has spread wildly in the past few years. According to a recent report in Die Woche, German companies are, appropriately, on the vanguard of adopting a progressive operating system known as Linux. Linux is a free, open source computer operating system originally created by Finnish programmer Linus Torvalds in cooperation with developers around the world. Torvalds built the operating system to take into account users' comments and suggestions for improvements. The system is heralded by a spectrum of users from computer freaks to blue-chip companies. Now even the German federal government is considering Linux for the nodal computers in its intranet and Internet. This would come as little surprise to most German companies. In recent years, they have posted the highest commercial use of Linux worldwide. Roughly 40% of all German companies now run on the open operating system and 55% of all German web servers run on Linux. Earlier this year, the venerated German investment banking house Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein became the first investment bank to adopt Linux for its risk management operations. All this has prompted the federal government to ask, If Linux is good enough for the economy, why not for politics? Nearly all parliamentary parties have come out in favor of open source code in the past few months. The ruling red-green coalition recently made a push for more widespread use of �standardized, secure and stable soft- and hardware,� which would also save taxpayers DM 125 million (US$ 62.5 million) in software licensing fees. This could happen as early as next year. In 2002, about 5,000 parliamentary members� computers are slated for updating. The change from the current system, Microsoft Windows, is �more a question of psychology than ability,� according to Tom Schwaller, an advocate of the open source operating system. The U.S. software giant is laboring to retain customer loyalty, holding workshops on its new Windows XP operating system for interested parliamentary members. However, influential politicians seem to be lining up in the Linux camp. The government�s Information Technology Office has been advocating the open system in a 60-page brochure for several months. Federal Minister of Economics and Technology Werner Mueller contends that the bottom line isn�t the system�s only appeal. Since September 11, information security has vaulted to the top of the government�s agenda. Mueller believes �open source code offers a fundamental security advantage.� The system�s transparency gives companies and governments alike a critical advantage in blocking corporate and international intelligence gathering efforts. ... clipped
