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The use of Free and Open Source Software offers a cost effective solution as regard the software part. Furthermore, the ability to customize a solution to the special needs of a country, and any school or university in the country is very important.
Free and Open source software (FOSS) has become mainstream and has been recognized in many cases as a valid alternative to corresponding closed source software. Its availability contributes to widen the choice of software and avoid vendor lock-in by fostering competition on the market.
As regard the use of computer technology into public administrations , there is a need to foster the interoperability of their diverse ICT systems by requiring the use of open standards and open file formats irrespective of their choice of software. They should also ensure that the encoding of data guarantees the permanence of electronic public records and is not tied to a particular software provider.
Best wishes, Jean-Claude
Jean-Claude, Hello, I would like to follow-up a little more on the connections between the needs that you identified and the use of FOSS. Different FOSS applications and their communities have different characteristics. What do you envision are some of the important characteristics of FOSS applications that will be used to meet the needs that you identified within the context of the project you have described, and what do you see as the role of UNESCO?
Thanks, Ken
Hi Ken, I agree that the needs identified in my previous post address different communities as it would also concern different units inside UNESCO.
As a first step we could envisage to undertake a separate detailed needs analysis for each one, i.e. for:
The detailed needs analysis would:
This is a huge work, however, UNESCO already initiated some activities related to the five items above:
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