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DE: Open Source companies protest Parliament's Exchange pilot

DE: Open Source companies pro…

Published on: 26/04/2007 News Archived

A business association of German Open Source companies is protesting a pilot project in the German parliament using Microsoft's mail server Exchange.

The IT department is manipulating a parliamentarian commission on IT strategy, alledges Linux Verband, representing more than 80 companies delivering Open Source IT services, including SAP, Hewlett Packard and Oracle. "We know there is pilot project, but there has not been a public tender", Elmar Geese, chairman of the Open Source association said in a statement.

According to the German IT news service Heise, the pilot project is testing functionalities that can only be fully delivered by Microsoft's web browser Explorer. "This is interesting, since the German parliament so far recommends the Open Source Mozilla web browser, for security reasons", Heise quotes the Open Source businesses association.

A Parliament's spokesperson quoted Tuesday by Heise, denied that the parliament was moving away from its earlier Open Source strategy. He confirmed the limited pilot project will be using Microsoft Exchange, and said the proper procedures had been followed. The licence for the software was available because of an existing license deal with the American software company.

According to Heise, the Open Source businesses remain critical of the project. Geese told the news web site he can not understand why an important pilot does not follow an official tender process. "That kind of transparency is required especially in public projects. Also, normally it is solutions that are required, not specific software products."

Some of the member of the association are considering taking legal action, the Heise news site reports.

© European Communities 2007
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The views expressed are not an official position of the European Commission.

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