Deep Microsoft Penetration at Chalmers
Submitted by jonas on 4 June, 2010 - 05:22
I'm not one that would usually complain about Microsoft: I think they have as much right to compete on a free market as anyone else, and is obviously doing a good job at it (certain lock in effects should be taken into consideration though). Yet, it always strikes me as very odd indeed when an organisation or company willingly migrate from a platform over which they have complete control to a proprietary solution which they have no control over.
Little did I realise, until today, the full extent of this, and it's just around the corner from me.
Since almost a year now, staff and teachers at Chalmers has been using Microsoft Exchange to which Chalmers migrated from their own home-grown system (a system which I was particularly fond of, and which had many more features than Exchange, or at least such features which I found relevant). Towards the autumn 2010, Chalmers will take another step to use Microsoft Sharepoint for their web sites, and soon enough the entire Chalmers infrastructure will be Microsoft based, with Exchange for e-mail, Sharepoint for web, all this fondly packaged in the Microsoft name Live@edu.
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2 reponses to "Deep Microsoft Penetration at Chalmers"
1. proprietary
(Using a proprietary solution dose not necessarily mean using a solution which you have no control over.
&
Using a non proprietary solution dose not necessarily mean using a solution which you have full control over. )
All this boils down to one simple key ingredient, knowledge of the solution you are about to or have set in use.
As both a Employee of Chalmers, Gothenburg university you for one ought to understand.
That this is a huge contributing factor.
This may be why a lot of open source firms supply this in various forms in various ranges of price.
Where various text based information is totally free and up to direct support and courses in also various price classes depending on quality of service.
2. I disagree. Using a
I disagree. Using a proprietary solution does equal having no control. You will be at the mercy of another company, who can at any point in time choose to implement conflicting features, not provide support, withdraw the software from market, be sold to someone else, or any number of ways which will cause disruption, sometimes detrimental, to your own operations.