Russian Ministry of Health to Replace Microsoft and Oracle Products with Linux and PostgreSQL

Quoting:..but given Russian determination and "sheer bloody mindedness"..

Russia has not initiated any of these sanctions - they are just not backing down/bending over to (unjustified?) Western war mongering. Good for them for considering dropping US-based proprietary software. This is just what Linux needs.

I want to stress something here. LXer is non-political, hence to say anybody is "war mongering" is, I believe, totally out of place in any LXer discussion. That's pure politics and I want no part of it nor do the LXer site rules allow it as a discussion point.

Historically, Russia has a reputation of being incredibly stubbornly resistant to external actions it views as oppression and that's the only and completed point I wished to make in my initial post. In this case, it is taking action to move to Linux for the reasons that the article indicates very clearly. Nothing more on that aspect needs to be stated least of all anything to do with any sanctions or otherwise.

AS far as I am concerned, given our rules of discussion, I see the major question for Linux devotees as being along the lines of "Can Russia do this transfer effectively, given prior dependence on Microsoft ?" To me, that one question alone raises immense problems that have been faced at various locations in the EU and it has so many aspects that several threads could be filled before all the problems are sufficiently covered.

Post script.......But, if you ask me if would I like to see Russia move to Linux ? The answer is instant: "Absolutely !!" What a marvellous shot in the arm for what I believe is the world's best OS.

Quoting:Historically, Russia has a reputation of being incredibly stubbornly resistant to external actions it views as oppression

This is but one point of view. Here is another: "Historically" it's the West that is the aggressor around the world.

@linuxscreenshot: may I remind you of what I like to call the Great Twelve Year Plan? Hungary 1956? Prague 1968? Afghanistan 1980? Russia has indeed a reputation to oppress externals by action. I know LXer is not a political forum, but my father has fled russian oppression (he's Hungarian), and it looks like to you folks, history is nothing more than what was on the TV news the night before.

It's always the same old story:

"They" oppress.

"We" liberate.

You generally have to really, really, really know the history, before you can start to figure whether one side or the other might be "in the right".

☮

And I personally believe any of these "aggressors and oppressors" should be left strictly outside these debates. It allows too many old "feuds" to surface and surely we have enough in this world without re-igniting any more ? We are all "friends of Linux" which crosses all boundaries and leaves those political concepts behind. Why not leave it at that and concentrate on what Linux can do for Russia......if it gets there ?

Quoting:and it looks like to you folks, history is nothing more than what was on the TV news the night before.

Exactly, watch the talking heads with a grain of salt as each network is biased and has an agenda. Always look for the opposing perspective before picking sides, if you must. If you're going to watch CNN, then also watch RT.

Russia seems to be learning from their past and is now simply minding their own business, trying to get back on their feet. Obama/West's sanctions against Russia will mostly hurt the West. Russia is shrugging them off and making new deals and business partners around the world.

Maybe Obama will finally be remembered for something positive - pushing Russia to adopt open source/Linux.

If we can't discuss politics in LXer forums, which is easily understood, LXer should not publish articles having political aspects at its roots, even if it concerns Linux. The article mentions political sanctions as Russian motivations, it's hence so tainted, yet it passed the reviewer board.

Nmset, this has been an item of contention for many years.

The articles are important regardless of their political foundations, the idea is to keep the discussion as civil as possible.

Quoting:I want to stress something here. LXer is non-political, hence to say anybody is "war mongering" is, I believe, totally out of place in any LXer discussion. That's pure politics and I want no part of it nor do the LXer site rules allow it as a discussion point.

Could not agree more..Linux and FOSS by their nature have had and will continue to have an affect on things of a political nature, but the discussion of anything that has nothing to do with "Linux" itself has no place here. Yes, there have been and will continue to be articles posted on our newswire that have something to do with politics, but not our proponent of or against particular organizations etc..

At least that is my job to enforce and goal to achieve.

Scott

Linux and FOSS are about making computing and as a consequence the world a better place. If we can focus our conversations on that we are doing the right thing.

Again, I have to refer to this story's summary, which is highly political, covering sanctions. This is inviting political debate. It is a fine line..

No further comments.

Now that the political shouting and screaming has gone off into the sunset (and thankyou Scott), I've got a question to ask that intrigues me. Does Russia have any sort of "Linux OS" of its own that it could pick up and develop further ?

I have seen a number of articles that indicate some Russian schools have "played with using Linux", but I never saw much more on those schools. If there are some Russian readers of LXer perhaps they'd like to indicate what the general state of play of Linux deployment is in Russia.....or anyone else for that matter, if you have the data. My concern is that if Russia is starting from scratch, then they've got a large task in front of them. It's not impossible, but it's going to be hard.

At least Munich had some sort of German Linux to start with and you hear all sorts of things about "versions of Linux specific to a given country" in various articles......And then there is "Red Flag Linux" in China......about which I have heard little for a long time......But does Russia have a Linux variety ? That at least should give them a toehold on the matter.

> Does Russia have any sort of "Linux OS" of its own that it could pick up and develop further ?

I believe Alt Linux was originally aimed at the Russian market: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ALT_Linux

Isn't Zorin based in Russia?

Zorin = Ireland

Russian based distros: AgiliaLinux, ALT Linux, Calculate Linux, Point Linux, ROSA, Runtu

Ah ha! Thanks! I've clearly been conflating Zorin and Rosa, somehow...

The assumption I'm making is that the distros listed by linuxscreenshot are all written so that the desktop is in Cyrillic ? Which of those do you think stands out above the rest ?

Have a look at Runtu.

Many thanks "linuxscreenshot"......very interesting.....and I got an English translation. So Runtu has both Xfce and Gnome Window Managers and is based on Ubuntu. I'm not surprised at that last aspect, but it's nice to see Xfce given a chance to stand tall.

So.......The Russians do have something to start with. I wonder what will happen, but IF they take up Linux, (and it's a big, big IF), it has the power to do enormous good. I also think that IF this decision to go ahead is taken, then the Russians will do everything to MAKE it work......I said at the beginning, "watch this space with extreme interest".......I haven't changed my mind.