I belive that if a small business solution were to be made from Red Hat, it would have to
be easy to switch from a server edition to a desktop edition. It would have to have all
Open Office apps including all fonts and picture options (Things like word art and pic
art). The desktop would also need to be very very close to windows. All options would have
to be in the same position. All menus organised the same way. An idea might also be to
have a school edition. I know I have had a couple schools run on Linux destros and I had
to point them to Ed instead of Fedora because Edubuntu is made for schools. These are just
my opinions and I have worked more with schools than small business as far as getting
people to use Linux.
[Matt]^_^
----------------------------------------
Date: Wed, 25 Jun 2008 20:58:27 -0400
From: karlie_robinson(a)webpath.net
To: fedora-marketing-list(a)redhat.com
Subject: Re: Small Businesses WILL need a Red Hat Linux suited for them!!!
Sankarshan (সঙ্কর্ষণ) wrote:
> To begin addressing this space, it would require a jot-down of what
> tasks the Small Businesses expect to achieve using this OS, what
> services they currently consume and desire replaced by a FOSS stack
> and what applications are available that can meet their needs.
Exactly.
When dealing with small businesses, sometimes the direct approach isn't
always the most effective.
Small business owners have a lot going on and taking time for a new
anything is a big deal. We, as business owners [1], have to be
convinced that the investment in time and/or money will be well worth
it. Because we don't buy into something simply because it might do
wonderful things.
I work with many small businesses through SCORE [2] - an organization in
the USA to counsel small business owners. From start-up to growing
pains and beyond. (Best of all, it's free advice.)
I've begun pitching Open Source applications as a triage process knowing
that for some businesses, the introduction will come in small steps and
not always with an operating system. [3]
What would it mean to your business if you went with OOo instead of a
commercial office suite? Is that money you don't have to borrow? Money
you could put to use elsewhere?
To other businesses FOSS means websites that are "close enough" that
they only need to hire a tech for the finishing touches. (Knitting
components together in an OSCommerce shopping cart or tweaking Joomla
extensions etc)
~Karlie
[1]
http://webpath.net/index.php?wiki=Staff
[2]
http://SCORE.org or my chapter,
http://scorerochester.org
[3] Example of how I plug FOSS in business -
http://www.craftster.org/forum/index.php?topic=253123.0
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