[clug] Any Public Service organisations using Linix desktop and Open Office?

[Edward Lang]

Hi,

On Thu, Jul 3, 2008 at 7:38 PM, Kim Holburn <kim.holburn at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Software Firewall: Windows includes one.  It drops packets.  Define
>> "decent" in this context; desktops don't need fancy mangling rules.
>
> Would you trust your security to Microsoft?

The reason I don't currently want a UNIX variant as desktop
environment in the public service is that l don't want root access on
it. Well, I do -- root access is great, because it gives me the
ability to tinker and to install and to break and to start over again
-- but if I have that power to build worlds on my own computer, I'm
going to want to have that power on my corporate application's
development, acceptance testing, stress and volume testing and
production environments too, because then they would most closely
resemble the environment in which I wrote my application, or how I use
my application, etc.

As a UNIX systems administrator, giving users that taste for unlimited
power is my worst nightmare. I want nothing of it. I want them to be
under lock and key for their entire software development / delivery /
usage life cycle. I want the users to suffer and do things correctly,
properly. And, if they set up a system themselves with their own money
and time, and they have local root, and it breaks things, I don't want
to know about it, let alone support it.

I trust vendors more than I trust users! no matter how nice and
friendly the users may be ;-)

 - Edward.

-- 
Edward C. Lang

Photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/edlang/