NHS urged to consider Microsoft alternatives following cyber attacks

Jon Hoeksma interviewed us about NHSbuntu for Digital Health. In the wake of Friday’s international cyber attacks, which caused widespread disruption across NHS organisations, a small team of developers is recommending the health service reduce its reliance on Microsoft. The NHS almost exclusively uses Microsoft operating systems, some of which – like Windows XP – are no longer officially supported. To demonstrate that there is a licence-free alternative, GP Marcus Baw and technologist Rob Dyke have adapted the open source Linux-based Ubuntu operating system specifically for the NHS....

May 17, 2017 · 1 min · Rob Dyke

JoinUp Open source observatory report on NHSbuntu

Gijs Hillenius wrote about NHSbuntu for the Open Source Observatory. A group of British IT health care specialists have tailored the Ubuntu Linux distribution for use by the UK’s national health service (NHS) on its workstations. The alpha version of NHSbuntu was unveiled at the South West CIO Forum on 27 April. The advantages of NHSbuntu over proprietary PC operating systems include security, speed, costs and freedom. Using NHSbuntu will also enable NHS organisations to run up-to-date versions of browsers, creating an environment in which innovation can flourish, the developers say....

May 10, 2017 · 1 min · Rob Dyke

SxSW CIO & CCIO Show and Tell

April 26, 2017 · 0 min · Rob Dyke

Why NHSbuntu?

Look. It’s time we talked about something. NHSland has a problem. A debt problem. A technical debt problem of immense proportions. We’re friends. We can talk about this. Openly. We want to help. Beveridge identified Five ‘Giant Evils’. We’ve also identified five giants. Five giant factors that compound the technical debt in NHSland: Security, Legacy, Speed, Cost, Freedom. Beveridge’s work was instrumental in establishing the NHS. And we love the NHS....

March 27, 2017 · 3 min · Rob Dyke