News

  • Open-source consortium wins EC funding

    A European Commission-funded consortium has raised almost $4 million to fund a project testing the quality of open-source software.

    The consortium is made up of research organizations, consultants and those undertaking open-source projects. Known as the Software Quality Observatory for Open Source Software (SQO-OSS), it is half funded by its participants and half by the European Commission.

  • Red Hat signs up UK services partner

    Surrey-based open-source consultancy Sirius has formalised its partnership with Red Hat.

    Signing up for an advanced partner programme, Sirius says it wants to formalise its relationship with the Linux specialist following Red Hat's acquisition of middleware company JBoss.

  • Mass Move of Welsh Schools to Open Source E-Mail

    A progressive Welsh Council will use Open Source software to centralise the e-mail usage of its primary and secondary schools. Sirius Corporation, the UK's leading independent Open Source specialist, has been appointed to build a system with the potential to host a mailbox for every student and teacher in Carmarthenshire (some 40,000 users).

  • Open source gets training boost

    The European Computer Driving Licence, the most popular training course for basic IT literacy, which has for so long been a Microsoft stranglehold, is to offer a non-Microsoft course for the first time.

    The ECDL Foundation will now include a module on the use of Sun's Star Office Writer, Calc and Base applications for word processing, spreadsheets and database work.

    Although the Star Office course is intended for users running Windows XP, the company behind the new course, Ireland-based OpenApp, is preparing to expand into open source ECDL modules.

  • Computers in schools are 'environmental time-bomb'

    UK schools are producing 1 million tonnes of carbon dioxide and spending over £100 million every year on electricity a report published today claims.

    The study, by Open Source consultancy Sirius Corporation, adds that the Goverment's target of interactive whiteboard in every classroom and a computer for every pupil will increase school's power consumption ten fold within the next decade.