Switzerland is going open source, yet another reason to admire that country

Terminal Velocity

Terminal Velocity

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Damn, US and the rest of Europe need to raise the bar. Cyberattacks is becoming more and more of a threat, and using FOSS software is a great step to becoming more resilient against it. Germany also did a similar thing recently, if I remember correctly.
 
I think it's clear in the future companies or governments (in digital sphere) will compete against each other with privacy features and open source, all hints and trends seem to confirm this.
 
Vimmer said:
I still don't understand what that really means: so are the state computer systems going to be linux only? I didnt know countries themselves developed software.
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It applies to public sector which is not only the government but also any institution or business controlled or owned by the government such as banks, oil companies, hospitals etc.

Any software company or studio be it from public or private sector will have to release source code for software that it develops for public sector units, that is, public sector unit cannot buy and install closed sourced software by the law.
 
It's not going to happen. Germany has tried but then went back to what they were using before within a year. And switching from proprietary software to opensource software is not going to prevent cyber attacks or make them less of a problem.
 
Battledoge21 said:
Cyberattacks is becoming more and more of a threat, and using FOSS software is a great step to becoming more resilient against it.
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f33dm3bits said:
switching from proprietary software to opensource software is not going to prevent cyber attacks ore make them less of a problem.
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Agree, open source doesn't reduce cyberattacks, I think in regard to FOSS governments are more concerned with ruling out spyware and intelligence gathering because code can by reviewed.
 
When the Swiss set rules they know what they doing, they have the most stable constitution in Europe. They not gonna drop this
 
Terminal Velocity said:
When the Swiss set rules they know what they doing, they have the most stable constitution in Europe. They not gonna drop this
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how exactly can a constitution be stable? Do you mean the swiss more readily adhere to their constitution and are just more loyal to authority in general? I seem to remember somebody in the news saying something like that, that it's a country that tends to be more trusting of its leaders (not that it's good or bad, i live in the U.S. and it's generally a culture of pretending you are rebellious which imo isn't good)
 
Vimmer said:
how exactly can a constitution be stable? Do you mean the swiss more readily adhere to their constitution and are just more loyal to authority in general? I seem to remember somebody in the news saying something like that, that it's a country that tends to be more trusting of its leaders (not that it's good or bad, i live in the U.S. and it's generally a culture of pretending you are rebellious which imo isn't good)
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I don't know what's going on in the US but it is not a banana republic for sure. In most countries of the world (especially the developing countries) the law adapts to the interests of the people in power. Even in many European countries this is a fact. Switzerland is more mature in that regard. Politicians are in power to serve the people there, something not common in the world. They don't change course in every elections that's why smart people have their fortunes stored there
 
Vimmer said:
how exactly can a constitution be stable? Do you mean the swiss more readily adhere to their constitution and are just more loyal to authority in general? I seem to remember somebody in the news saying something like that, that it's a country that tends to be more trusting of its leaders (not that it's good or bad, i live in the U.S. and it's generally a culture of pretending you are rebellious which imo isn't good)
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Most famous countries where people have high trust in governments are nordic countries, not sure for Switzerland but it's likely not far.
This are all small and rich countries so their goals to pursuit for utopia is easier than in big countries which waste energy on foreign influence and military which smaller countries will never achieve due to them being too small for this.

I hope we're not going off topic or too political but I expect smaller countries will have less trouble adopting open source and online privacy, like @f33dm3bits said, Germany failed probably because it's big and their priorities probably can't support these ideas.
 
f33dm3bits said:
It's not going to happen. Germany has tried but then went back to what they were using before within a year. And switching from proprietary software to opensource software is not going to prevent cyber attacks or make them less of a problem.
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Mm-hm. And the simple reason was what it always boils down to; the country (I believe it was actually the City of Munich, IIRC) wanted to switch.....but the workforce that actually had to use it were highly resistant to learning a completely new way of doing things. Not only that, but a ton of "compatibility issues" arose, specifically with the office software municipal workers were then being forced to use...

And Microsoft went out of its way to entice the city back, with hugely-discounted licences, and funding a massive study into the whole saga (which, of course, was never made public.....being kept behind "closed doors").

They even went so far as to move their primary European office into the city of Munich...

itsfoss.com

Munich Is Ditching Linux For Purely Political Reasons

Brief: Once the flagbearer of open source adoption, the city of Munich is finally shutting the door on Linux in order to welcome Windows. German city Munich was among the first to opt for Linux as the main operating system and adopt open source office product. After more than a
itsfoss.com itsfoss.com

We humans get very rigidly "set in our ways". People learn to do things almost "by rote", and anything that threatens to upset our cozy routines is viewed with the deepest suspicion....

In this respect, unfortunately, nothing will EVER change.

Mike.
yawn-small.gif
 
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There are many people who believe anything and some believe this...

micro$oft is not about greed. It's about innovation and fairness
Bill gates.
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I believe this...

The day micro$oft makes a product that doesn't suck...

Is the day they make a vacuum cleaner.
1722322279377.gif
 
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I just did some research, and switzerland has to be one of the smallest countries in western europe. I think this does make their vision possible, but I'm still skeptical that every government bureaucracy and bank there will be able to pull it off.
 
Vimmer said:
I just did some research, and switzerland has to be one of the smallest countries in western europe. I think this does make their vision possible, but I'm still skeptical that every government bureaucracy and bank there will be able to pull it off.
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Switzerland is not a small country, let alone one of the smallest countries in Western Europe.

Where did you get this information ? You should check your resources.

List of European countries by area - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org
 
They're the 32nd country by size - out of 52 countries. They're 0.4 of the total area of Europe - according to the Wikipedia link. That is technically one of the smallest countries in Europe.
 
Linguistically and statistically I don't understand how being 32nd in a list of 52 is close to the bottom of that list. It would need to be 3rd or 5th lowest, or close, to comply with that.


But 32nd is not even close to that. It's even closer to the middle (26th) than to the last one (52nd). I would call that a far stretch, at best, but even that would be pushing it.


San Marino is one of the smallest countries of Europe, being 61 square kilometer. Switserland, with its 41291 square kilometer, is 677 times larger.
 
Diputs said:
Linguistically and statistically I don't understand how being 32nd in a list of 52 is close to the bottom of that list. It would need to be 3rd or 5th lowest, or close, to comply with that.
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As I recall, the statement was 'one of the smallest'. To be 'one of the smallest' you only need to be below the 26th largest (out of the 52 shown in your citation). That's just math (and English).

Then, there's the size... 0.4% of something is definitely 'one of the smallest'.
 
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