[Gllug] The total cost of ownership to Ealing Council

[Caroline Ford]

2009/9/6 Nix <nix at esperi.org.uk>:
> On 1 Sep 2009, tethys at gmail.com stated:
>> I'm not talking about rules and regulations, I'm talking about
>> technical solutions. The last time I had to manage a Windows estate of
>> any non-trivial size, I had USB mass storage disabled on them all as
>> one of the first things I did. Anything else is bordering on
>> professional negligence IMHO.
>
> The problem is that while this is technically a really good idea, USB mass
> storage devices being DMA-capable, USB sticks are the floppies of our age:
> ban them and you'd better damn well have something to replace them with or
> your ban will be universally reviled and got around in every way possible.

One workplace decided not to run anti-virus software which was really
clever. Obviously gawd knows where those sticks have been. The other
workplace with the non-outsourced IT support has encrypted usb sticks.
Alas they don't work on linux.

USB sticks are how people do work. Banning them shows a lack of
understanding of this.

I'm not sure how to respond to this thread as I don't think some of
you know how offices work. The costs of moving to linux are
considerably more than the costs of conflickr. You'd have to train the
entire workforce as they come pre-trained in windows. You'd have to
rewrite all your documents that require features of MS Office.

It is very easy to forget how IT illiterate normal people are. Work
got rid of real faxes and replaced them with this e-fax thing. Not
only was it implemented in a broken way but the users couldn't work it
either to see that it was broken.

Caroline
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