Cons Slash 700 Environment Canada Positions

[Michael Hardner]

Here's a little exercise.

Read the article in the OP again ans ask yourself:

1. What functions are being eliminated or reduced ?

2. How is the change being managed ?

3. What are the one-time costs to make this change ?

4. How much will be saved ?

You, as a citizen, need to understand these things in order to make a decision on whether you support this decision or not. The article offers nothing but political spin - likely emailed in from the entities involved: the union and political parties.

There is nothing for us to discuss, because we have no information.

[Shwa]

The slashing is all across the federal Government.

slashes

You mean more of a light nicking, rather than a slashing. The article totals about 2% of the federal public service work force. Hardly newsworthy.

[PIK]

You don't need friends? I didn't think you had any to begin with.

Sorry, couldn't resist.

Thats allowed.

[Bonam]

I like your logic, if we stopped funding the military we'd save 220 billion over the next 10 year. Sounds like a good deal.

Just because some things can/should be cut doesn't mean everything can be.

Oh yeah, lets get the government using a totally insecure system.

Brilliant.

Wanna back that statement up? How insecure is gmail? How much more secure is outlook? In what ways are the security protocols different? What are the future prospects for security upgrades in each platform? What is the nature of email encryption and security? Do you know the answers to any of these questions?

Don't quit your day job

Wasn't planning on it, it's fun and it pays well.

Edited August 11, 2011 by Bonam

[Bonam]

It seems, by and large, that the federal government is a Microsoft shop so it must cost them a bundle. They could likely save 100's of millions by porting over to a custom Linux package, but I don't see that ever happening.

Switching over to Linux would involve years or decades of reduced productivity and billions in retraining costs. The overwhelming majority of people have no idea how to use Linux, even the builds that they try to make resemble windows in functionality as much as possible. The inherent differences make it essentially unusable for your typical non-computer-scientist. Additionally, a large proportion of software that one might want to use for various tasks at work is not available or does not work properly in Linux, unless one is very technically savvy and can use windows emulators and knows how to set that up properly. Furthermore, there would be almost insurmountable compatibility issues when interfacing with other organizations that all use windows.

This is not the case with gmail. In fact, I would guess that average people today are just as familiar with webmail services like gmail as they are with desktop email clients like outlook. The younger generation certainly is far more familiar with webmail. The retraining, productivity, and compatibility costs of switching over to gmail would be small. Anyone in the tech world knows that webmail systems will almost completely displace desktop email systems in the near future, they have a large and rapidly growing market share. There is no point to the government using technology that is nearing obsolescence, especially if they have to pay a premium to use it, instead of a better and free alternative.

Edited August 11, 2011 by Bonam

[dre]

Switching over to Linux would involve years or decades of reduced productivity and billions in retraining costs. The overwhelming majority of people have no idea how to use Linux, even the builds that they try to make resemble windows in functionality as much as possible. The inherent differences make it essentially unusable for your typical non-computer-scientist. Additionally, a large proportion of software that one might want to use for various tasks at work is not available or does not work properly in Linux, unless one is very technically savvy and can use windows emulators and knows how to set that up properly. Furthermore, there would be almost insurmountable compatibility issues when interfacing with other organizations that all use windows.

This is not the case with gmail. In fact, I would guess that average people today are just as familiar with webmail services like gmail as they are with desktop email clients like outlook. The younger generation certainly is far more familiar with webmail. The retraining, productivity, and compatibility costs of switching over to gmail would be small. Anyone in the tech world knows that webmail systems will almost completely displace desktop email systems in the near future, they have a large and rapidly growing market share. There is no point to the government using technology that is nearing obsolescence, especially if they have to pay a premium to use it, instead of a better and free alternative.

Youre not going to see medium to large sized organizations moving email into the cloud until the network is a lot faster. The biggest problem is that you are simply too far away from valuable data. The trend these days is towards comprehensive ECM systems that store mail in the same silo as the rest of your corporate data.

Anyone in the tech world knows that webmail systems will almost completely displace desktop email systems in the near future

This has nothing to do with web vs desktop. You can hook up to Exchange with a web interface as well. All it is, is a diferent email server. The real issue is whether bigger organizations are willing to have that much of their data out on the cloud, and the problem is its still too damn slow. Theres also other obstacles as well.

This is nowhere near as simple as youre making it out to be.

[Shwa]

Switching over to Linux would involve years or decades of reduced productivity and billions in retraining costs. The overwhelming majority of people have no idea how to use Linux, even the builds that they try to make resemble windows in functionality as much as possible. The inherent differences make it essentially unusable for your typical non-computer-scientist. Additionally, a large proportion of software that one might want to use for various tasks at work is not available or does not work properly in Linux, unless one is very technically savvy and can use windows emulators and knows how to set that up properly. Furthermore, there would be almost insurmountable compatibility issues when interfacing with other organizations that all use windows.

Just a few years ago I would have scoffed at you. Back in the day it was a much easier move from Banyan & SCO to Linux and it would have been more natural move leveraging the UNIX expertise already gained. At that time Windows was brutal compared to x-windows or even custom UI's and their NT platform was meh compared to even crappy Linux distros. However, with the maturity of SQL, .NET and some other webbing components, MS has caught up. The platform to run applications - especially legacy COBOL apps in a browser window - has gained them the stability for quite a few large federal enterprises. However, the constant requirement to patch Windows enterprise is still a BIG TCO cost along with the usual MS bloat.

This is not the case with gmail. In fact, I would guess that average people today are just as familiar with webmail services like gmail as they are with desktop email clients like outlook. The younger generation certainly is far more familiar with webmail. The retraining, productivity, and compatibility costs of switching over to gmail would be small. Anyone in the tech world knows that webmail systems will almost completely displace desktop email systems in the near future, they have a large and rapidly growing market share. There is no point to the government using technology that is nearing obsolescence, especially if they have to pay a premium to use it, instead of a better and free alternative.

Not only is the cloud slow, but it is also very vulnerable and the recent hacking scandals just go to show that anything exposed outside the firewall, even tight DMZ's, are still very vulnerable. However, Exchange does OWA and brings some of that internal security along, even when piped out to mobile or remote clients. gmail, as it is out in the present cloud is iffy. Do you think the average person would want their personal information from the government put to such risks? I don't.

[Oleg Bach]

You can dump them out of sheer spite. Works for me.

[Army Guy]

You mean more of a light nicking, rather than a slashing. The article totals about 2% of the federal public service work force. Hardly newsworthy.

I was pionting out that it was across the whole governmental spectrum, not just the eviromental portion,