Partner network prize-winner shares crypto history

Last week the winner of Collabora Productivity’s LibreOffice Conference postcard contest was posted their prize. This week, winner Rhea Salome Sturm, Swiss native, received her 4kg Toblerone box.

Box of Toblerone being shipped

In Bern last month, we provided free stamps and postcards for LibreOffice Conference attendees to send to co-workers back at the office, entitled “Greetings from Bern!”. In the last six months Collabora Productivity’s network of international partners and resellers has grown to 18, representing business on six continents.

Tobelerone chocolate received by prize-winner
Rhea’s choclatey prize

Web company Founder Rhea has a penchant for cryptographic history, and took the opportunity to share some Swiss computing hardware (with the help of her Toblerone):

My chocolates climbed the German Enigma, and the Swiss NEMA cipher machines. Normally these machines are behind bullet-proof glass. For these pictures we were able to take them out (see photo) — Rhea Salome Sturm, Moka Web Solutions

These machines were used before and during World War II for secret government and military communications. Enigma machines played an important role in the development of modern computing.

Switzerland’s NEMA machine was the successor to an earlier model which had been compromised by German forces – “the Swiss K”. First used in 1945, NEMA was a new design by University of Bern professor of mathematics, Captain Arthur Alder, tasked with being harder to crack than its predecessor.

Rhea with a German Enigma Machine
Rhea with a German Enigma Machine
Swiss NEMA machine with Toblerone chocolate
Swiss NEMA machine avec Toblerone
Enigma machine with Toberone chocolate
Enigma Machine avec chocolate

Thanks to Rhea for sharing her pictures and history!

Mutual business crowdfunding for LibreOffice results in new features investment

A document being signed by hand

Last Friday Wilhelm Tux, a Swiss community group, reached their €8,000 (CHF 10.000) crowdfunding target for LibreOffice. The money will be used to add support for digital signatures in PDF documents in a secure and compliant way. From announcement to completion took four days.Once implemented, LibreOffice will be able to:

  • Create PDF documents with legally accepted digital signatures
  • Conform to PDF/A signature standards
  • Use Mozilla Firefox or Thunderbird to manage certificates using a simple interface

Demand

Wilhelm Tux has established a strong network of business users of Open Source over the last 12 years, including companies founded by members of the organisation themselves. Even taking this network into consideration however, the speed with which funds were raised is impressive for a local advocacy group with little media experience.

The success of their campaign shows that Swiss businesses want LibreOffice, want digital signing, and, given the opportunity, are happy to pay for it. It also demonstrates the freedom that the LibreOffice ecosystem provides to businesses. Independently of The Document Foundation who steward and steer LibreOffice development, and independently of the many businesses who have stakes in the future of the application, organisations of any size can organise the addition of new features. When their needs are shared, they need not even bear the exclusive burden of cost.

Wilheml Tux logo
Logo of Wilhelm Tux

Mutualisation

25 Businesses and 65 individuals contributed to the campaign. These 90 interested parties will have their wish fulfilled by April 2015, when the features are due to be delivered. More importantly however, the cost of implementing these new features was shared 90 times.

Uniting disparate groups with shared interests to invest in solutions for mutual benefit is sometimes referred to by crowdfunding marketers as “co-funding” or “mutualisation”. It has particular relevance to Open Source.

The role of Wilhelm Tux in this campaign was similar to that of an Internet dating agency. They identified people with similar needs, and introduced them to each other using a framework designed to keep the participants safe. Wilhelm Tux acted as treasurer, guaranteeing and safeguarding payments, and also as supervisor – undertaking to manage completion of development and assure quality.

By contrast, undertaking to contract Microsoft, Apple, or Google to make customisations, however minor, is well beyond reach of most trade associations and community groups. Users seeking improvements to Office 365, iWork, or Google Docs have few avenues to pursue.

Work on PDF digital signatures was partially completed in 2012, but then stagnated. Instead of pressuring volunteer developers to pick up the project, or The Document Foundation (who do not undertake LibreOffice development directly), Wilhelm Tux proactively sought out an independent company to complete the work.

Delivery

The LibreOffice community conference in Bern last September provided an opportunity for Wilhelm Tux to meet with Collabora Productivity GM Michael Meeks, and scope out the task in-person with Collabra developers. As they explain on their campaign page, Wilhelm Tux chose Collabora due to our enterprise experience, staff of core LibreOffice developers, and commitment to publishing all changes upstream to the Open Source edition of LibreOffice. As their website states:

“That all customer-specific modifications are merged back into the free development branch (“main tree”) of LibreOffice was, for us, the main reason why we chose Collabora as our partner for this project, as it means that we can ensure that PDF signatures will be freely available for all users world-wide” — Wilhelm Tux website

3x Win

This business model of Open Source development therefore provides a rare case of win-win-win. The 90 business and individuals who backed PDF digital signatures get the features that they need at a fraction of the total cost of their development, from a proven company with enterprise expertise. Collabora get a new contract for work that they can deliver efficiently, and which will improve the usefulness of their product to other customers. But in addition to the textbook two-way “win”, a third win is also achieved: a win for all people who may use LibreOffice, for now, and for the future.

As these features will also make their way back into Open Source LibreOffice and products based upon it, ultimately the widest possible audience will enjoy the benefit — without any detriment to the project’s 90 investors, or to the development team who will deliver it.

Although contracts such as this make up a small proportion of Collabora’s work on LibreOffice, being able to fulfil the productivity needs of the highly diverse range of people using LibreOffice adds strength and flexibility to our business and position in the Open Source ecosystem.

New LibreOffice infographic ready

Here’s something we’ve been working on this month: a brand new illustration of the growth of LibreOffice.

In the last week the graphic made it’s way to Brazil and Turkey, via Collabora Productivity partner EDX at LibreOffice Days (São Paulo), and Özgür Yazılım at ICT Summit Now (Istanbul). A banner version heralded LibreOffice’s merits to crowds in Quebec at S2LQ, presented by Collabora Productivity parent company CEO Philippe Kalaf.

Other network members are currently translating the image for local use – look out for new versions on Twitter over coming weeks.

LibreOffice infographic
LibreOffice infographic

LibreOffice-From-Collabora resellers benefit from localised promotional materials – contact us for details.