Chinese Government to Use Only Local Software 534
owlmon writes "CNET Asia is reporting that China has outlawed foreign software in government applications. I expect that software buyers outside of the government will have to follow this lead. It's the same "network effect" that has powered Microsoft's growth for years. When the entire Chinese government is using WPS Office, anyone doing business with the government will feel mighty encouraged to follow suit. Otherwise, how will they exchange documents?"
Conversion Filter? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:I wonder: (Score:5, Informative)
"China is placing official support behind the Red Flag Linux operating system, which they trust because the open-source code allows officials to see that there are no data spyholes installed by foreign powers."
What matters is that who's selling it is based in China, and that any standards that come from outside China are open. Even if there are no Chinese contributers, as long as it's Chinese selling and supporting it, it's fine.
Why not open and unencumbered standards? (Score:5, Informative)
And AVS for audio/video is patent/royalty encumbered [china.org.cn].
How is it in the interests of the people in any nation, that daily government operations and communication be dependent upon a private corporation?
When will we see a government -- a people -- that will stand up to large corporate interests and fund the development and deployment of an open source office suite and groupware servers and clients, of similar or higher quality than existing proprietary solutions, so that the daily operation of our government will not be dependent upon the business strategies of private corporations.
based on the latest microsoft word debacle ... (Score:5, Informative)
From BBC News [bbc.co.uk] -- "Your Microsoft Word document can give readers more information about you than you might think. Even Alastair Campbell has fallen foul of the snippets of invisible data few of us realise our documents contain."
If you use Microsoft Word in a business environment -- or for anything where your information is valuable -- it is recommended that you look into what hidden files [wordsite.com] may be hiding in your Word documents.
It is becoming more clear that all of Windows and every Microsoft application is likely to be similar to Microsoft Word -- filled with hidden information and hidden functionality that has never been disclosed by Microsoft.
An aphorism of gambling says, "Only make a bet when you can afford to lose". In China's case, your entire nation's strength and health is at risk when they are using Microsoft software, so it simple to see that it is a bet that cannot be made.
Sun Tzu wrote "All war is deception." The big deception is Microsoft's "Source Code for Governments". What does that matter when you download binary "security" patches, "updates", "new drivers", "service packs", etc? What does that matter when you don't get to see the Microsoft Office source code? Microsoft's "Emperor's New Source Code" program is nothing but smoke and mirrors, deception at its finest. It looks like the Chinese have wised up to Microsoft's deception and given Microsoft the boot.
What will it take for the rest of the world to wake up and realize that the only software you can trust is open source?
More hackable? (Score:2, Informative)
Their official IT people won't even fix the thousands of hijacked proxies that are already compromised.
Info regarding WPS Office Suite (Score:5, Informative)
The WPS Office Suite is produced by "Golden Mountain Software Company" (it's a direct translation from the Chinese characters) and the web site is located at http://www.wps.com.cn/
According to press release at http://www.wps.com.cn/newsview.php?id=174 The WPS 2003 Office Suite will be on sale starting August 30th, the WPS Office Suite 2003.
The WPS Office Suite will carry the price of 1298 Chinese Yuan, (about USD 160).
All previous users of any softwares produced by WPS are eligible to upgrade to the latest WPS Office Suite 2003 for Ten Chinese Yuan (a little less than USD 2.00).
Yep, less than USD 2.00 for a complete upgrade.
Dunno if that includes the postage and handling or not, tho.
Re:GPL (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Double-edged sword (Score:5, Informative)
In my experience working in the semiconductor industry, I know China's economy in that sector is growing at a rapid rate. Many big name companies here, like HP, SUN, etc are all trying to get a piece of the pie. The only company to successfully grow their business in China is Intel. Everyone else aren't finding a good way to set foot in China. There are many business standards that China does not adopt from global businesses.
A main one is China does not recognize Intellectual Property. You bring your products to China, a local company to rip your design and sell it at a cheaper price. The goverment will not protect you against that. In fact, I might suspect they allow that kind of business conduct.
This is what I've learn about growing business in China for the semiconductor industry. I would imagine software industry is similar.
Re:Conversion Filter? (Score:1, Informative)
If it's "complex or critical", you shouldn't be using Word anyway. If it's plain text, use ASCII. If it's formatted, use PDF. By all means, use Word to compose your documents, but it's a terrible exchange or achival format.
Yeah, but what do you do when a client sends you a requirements document in Word with a dozen stupid macros. You don't want to tell them to send it again in ASCII, because they pay the bills. Instead, you just install Word, no matter how much it pisses you off.
I'd really like to live without Word and Excel, but price lists come in macro-riddled Excel format, and most documents come in Word format. Many companies even specify in their tender that you must use Office formats for documentation.
Office is a terrible piece of crap, but no matter how hard I've tried to avoid it, I always end up coming back to it in the end. It just takes one important document to fail to open properly in OpenOffice for you to realise you need Word. And if you send an OpenOffice-created document off to a client (who demands .doc files) and the layout is all over the place, then that doesn't reflect very well on your company.
I know we could try to "re-educate" clients to use .pdfs and ASCII text, but they'll just tell you to get lost and hire somebody who will do exactly what they want, and use the formats they specify.
Re:There are more chinese, just do the math. (Score:1, Informative)
China is not a country. Oh yeah, sure on a map its a nice red block. But in reality its about 28 subcountries, many of which have their own culture, language, and unique history. You can't just lump all of china into one, single minded monolith. Its more like a feudal domain, with an awful lot of agendas and ideas struggling for a voice, loosely tied together by a government.
If you want to look at numbers, look at the whole picture. There are 2.5 BILLION caucasion folk, with probably stronger ties than any chinese provinces have. Don't take my word for it, ask any chinese national. Do the math.
Re:Conversion Filter? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Double-edged sword (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Double-edged sword (Score:1, Informative)
China joined the WTO (Score:3, Informative)
This policy won't change how businesses or individuals in China have to operate, nor do we know if Hong Kong's government will have to change. China has entered the WTO, as of January 1st 2004 they are opening their market to free trade. A lot of the old intellectual property issues will be fixed over the next few years, mainland China is soon to become the biggest importer of British and American goods (by way of Hong Kong of course!)