Ireland agency helps local governments beat 'open source' fears

Public administrations in Ireland are losing their fear of open source, trying it out in a test environment offered by the country's Local Government Management Agency (LGMA). In July, the agency publicly announced its so-called Sandbox, a standalone network infrastructure offering a safe, controlled environment. Already in place for a while now, the sandbox helped convince local administrations to implement customer relation management tool SugarCRM and content management system Drupal.

...The LGMA's test environment allow local administrations to quickly create virtual systems where they can install and experiment with open source and benefit from other authorities's use. "So far it has been used it to try out Alfresco, SugarCRM, Drupal and testing of the Linux Terminal Server Project for use in public libraries", says Willoughby. The major benefit is that public administrations do not have to build such a testing environment themselves, he says..

...The LGMA's Open Source Practice Centre is concentrating on helping public administrations use open source where it makes sense and where others have proven the maturity of the solution, Willoughby says. "IT companies no longer tell public administrations that open source is a risk." The government's austerity measures are also an important driver, he adds.