![]() ![]() ![]() How will MAlt impact you and how to contribute? MAIL PILOT OFFICE 365 SOFTWAREMany other products and services are being worked on: evaluations of alternative solutions for various software packages used for IT core services, prototypes and pilots will emerge along the course of the next few years. In parallel, some Skype for Business clients and analogue phones will migrate to a softphone telephony pilot. The first major change coming is a pilot mail Service for the IT department and volunteers this summer, followed by the start of CERN-wide migration. Avoid vendor lock-in to decrease risk and dependency.Deliver the same service to every category of CERN personnel.The project’s principles of engagement are to: MAlt is a multi-year effort and it will now enter a new phase with the first migrations. By doing so, the laboratory is playing a pioneering role among public research institutions, most of whom have recently been faced with the same dilemma. The initial objective was to investigate the migration from commercial software products (Microsoft and others) to open-source solutions, so as to minimise CERN’s exposure to the risks of unsustainable commercial conditions. Although CERN has negotiated a ramp-up profile over ten years to give the necessary time to adapt, such costs are not sustainable.Īnticipating this situation, the IT department created the Microsoft Alternatives project, MAlt, a year ago. However, recently, the company has decided to revoke CERN’s academic status, a measure that took effect at the end of the previous contract in March 2019, replaced by a new contract based on user numbers, increasing the license costs by more than a factor of ten. Given the collaborative nature of CERN and its wide community, a high number of licenses are required to deliver services to everyone, and when traditional business models on a per-user basis are applied, the costs per product can be huge and become unaffordable in the long term.Ī prime example is that CERN has enjoyed special conditions for the use of Microsoft products for the last 20 years, by virtue of its status as an “academic institution”. Once installed, well-spread and heavily used, the leverage used to attract CERN service managers to the commercial solutions tends to disappear and be replaced by licensing schemes and business models tuned for the private sector. Over the years, CERN’s activities and services have increasingly relied on commercial software and solutions to deliver core functionalities, often leveraged by advantageous financial conditions based on the recognition of CERN’s status as an academic, non-profit or research institute. It is now time to present more widely this project and to explain how it will shape our computing environment. MAlt’s objective is to put us back in control using open software. MAIL PILOT OFFICE 365 SOFTWARE LICENSEThe Microsoft Alternatives project (MAlt) started a year ago to mitigate anticipated software license fee increases. Update: The name of the project was changed to Microservice Architecture on Libre Technology (MALT) to better reflect its scope. ![]()
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