The Italian city of Udine has been using open source solutions wherever possible for years. The city's IT department can rely on many local IT service providers. It is also supported by the university, where this type of software development is actively used in teaching and research.
Open source software is everywhere in the offices of Udine's administration. The vast majority of servers in use at Udine, 96 per cent, use either the Red Hat or Debian Linux distribution. Postgresql is the default relational database management system. On the desktops, the city officials find OpenOffice alongside the ubiquitous proprietary office tools. "There are still some constraints that force us to use proprietary software here", says Antonio Scaramuzzi, head of the IT department. "But we're planning to migrate the desktops to an open source based virtualisation platform."
Important to the city's relying on open source is that it can draw on the support of many local ICT service firms. Scaramuzzi: "The government of Udine sees open source software as a way to improve the presence of software houses in the area." In 2008, ICT trade organisations, the university, its technology incubator park, Udine and other local public administrations set up the 'District of Digital Technology'. This Ditedi helps to develop the regional IT industry, and it is a way to organise ICT support for public administrations.
At Ditedi open source technology plays a major role. The organisation created a pool of companies with open source skills. The firms are "a catalyst for the diffusion of initiatives and technological advice."
Reducing costs
A second reason for switching to open source is that it allows the city to reduce the costs of software licences. Scaramuzzi cautions that savings realised by the reduction of licence costs can be partly offset if the IT staff needs to be trained how to maintain open source applications. "That is why, when we select open source software solutions, we check if the application comes with adequate documentation, preferably in Italian. We also find out what kind of technical support is available. For us, a forum on a website is of less use than a maintainer on some company's payroll."
Not surprisingly, here too the city looks for open source solutions with strong ties to ICT firms. "We use for example the Alfresco Document Management system. We don't use the Enterprise version but the Community Edition. However, if we need support, we can call on them. What makes us confident is that the firm has a well-defined roadmap."
More information:
District of Digital Technology
Open source at Ditedi
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