Sarawak State Governments Adopts StarOffice for Office Automation in Civil Service

More than 10,000 civil servants are migrating their OA productivity tool to StarOffice.

"The decision to adopt StarOffice as the OA desktop productivity tool has been researched to a considerable degree of detail by SAINS. It has been determined that StarOffice can be used to work well with existing OA applications. SAINS has prepared comprehensive training materials on all the application modules of StarOffice to facilitate the migration process from existing OA applications" said Datuk Amar Haji Abdul Aziz, State Secretary, Sarawak.

Organization

• State of Sarawak Civil Service,Malaysia

Industry

• Government

Configuration

• StarOffice 5.2 Productivity Suite
• PCs with Windows Operating Systems

Challenges

• Introduction of standard use of office automation across government departments and agencies in Sarawak
• Evaluation of office automation suite and ensure full file-format and cross platform compatibility.

Results

• StarOffice adopted as a new standard for office automation for Sarawak State Civil Services
• 10,000 State Civil Servants will eventually use StarOffice as the standard OA software.
• Huge cost savings for Government departments and agencies.

SARAWAK INFORMATION SYSTEMS SDN. BHD. (SAINS), a company of the Sarawak State Government, was commissioned by the State Information Technology and Resources Architecture Committee (ITRAC) to determine the issues and processes involved in the adoption of StarOffice as the preferred OA productivity tool. As a result, more than 10,000 Civil servants are currently at various stages of adopting StarOffice in their office environment.

StarOffice chosen after Careful Evaluation
SAINS, which started operations in 1992, is a leading systems integrator and solutions provider in Malaysia with services ranging from IT consultancy services, software development, networking, systems engineering, project management, IT Training, data conversion services, multimedia content development, facilities management and operations support. Today, the organization has grown to be one of the leading firms in the Information Technology field.

SAINS was tasked to evaluate a cost-effective standard office automation suite to be used throughout the Sarawak State Civil Service. In its evaluation of StarOffice, it found the office suite to be an efficient productive tool. Its free availability also meant that the software could be installed in the office or at home without any inhibition. "StarOffice full-featured suite of programs offer compatibility with various file formats and good cross-platform compatibility. The program is also quite similar to Microsoft Office and that was an advantage in our recommendation of office automation migration" said Mr. Teo Tien Hiong, General Manager of SAINS.

Emphasis on Training
To ensure the success and continued use of StarOffice throughout the government agencies and departments, SAINS embarked on a comprehensive training programme. It first trained its own internal staff and several key Government departments on the usage of StarOffice's suite of applications. SAINS then proceeded to offer training to general personnel and typical users ranging from office clerks to senior officers and directors as well as IT-oriented staff. Since then, Government departments and agencies have consistently been enrolling their staff with SAINS for training. SAINS has also extended its training programmes to its branches in major towns of Sarawak.

The adoption of StarOffice in the Sarawak Civil Service has seen a wide spectrum of applications, such as StarWriter, StarCalc and StarImpress, being used for word-processing, spreadsheet and presentation purposes.

"Our team of helpdesk/call centre personnel and computer trainers are constantly using the software to elevate its usage and discover its usefulness and features." Mr. Teo added.

Today, there are more than 10,000 StarOffice target users in the Sarawak State Civil Service. This does not include SAINS, its subsidiaries and the branches. The wide deployment of the free StarOffice suite means that most of the Government departments and agencies have saved substantially on buying office software.

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