Slashdot Mirror
Details of Linux-in-Munich Deal Revealed
An anonymous reader writes "USA Today is running a piece about the lengths which Microsoft went to in order not to lose the government of Munich's account to a Linux-based proposal from SuSE. Interesting to see how these types of contracts are structured, and just what Microsoft is willing to give up to prevent losing to Linux."
goes to show how much they hate microsoft in germany
bite my glorious golden ass.
I'm surprised Gates didn't preside over a Bier-Hall Putsch to win the business!
weird so do I
It is really impressive to see that Munich went with Linux even though the price tag was higher than Microsoft's. The affordability of Linux is a definite plus, but too often Linux is played up in the media as being the "less expensive alternative to windows". I think that this downplays the other great advantages of Linux. Glad to see that Munich appreciates a great product when they see one.
lysergically yours
What length WILL M$ go to in order to preserve their market share?
Somebody should test this and put in the contract that Bill has to do dishes or clean toilets at the company for a month. Then we'll REALLY see to what lengths they'll go...
Bill Gates was seen curled up in the fetal position after learning the marketshare held by Microsoft would drop from 90% to 89%
"ooh...can't lose marketshare...can't lose marke-...gaahh!!"
I guess Ballmer's "Ich bin ein Bavarian Creme Pie" speech didn't go over so good with the Mayor. ;)
I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
isn't this article a complete ripoff of the first article on this posted to slashdot?
I think that in the long run, Linux will be cheaper than M$. This is for seveal reason which I won't go into as most of you are familiar with Linux. Even so, it is good to see/know that MS will bend when put in such a position. With all the Linux news I've seen/read over the past few days, I would be surprised to see MS push out some products sooner. It looks like MS is slowly loosing its grip on the market, but then again, its looked that way for a while. Only now are we seeing them fight fire with fire.
-Valiss
From the article: "...Mozilla, a Web browser that can perform basic workplace tasks"
How about: "Mozilla, a web browser with more features than Internet Explorer"
Well, they actually considered buying from Microsoft until Ballmer showed up doing the monkey dance.
I am all for linux, but now are we going to bash Microsoft for trying to do business. People this is business, its a cut-throat world not a woodstock concert.
Of course M$ will do everything in its power to bury linux, what's the news here ?
for the last time people, I am "frodo from middle eaRTH", not "middle eaST".
Microsoft must really be starting to sweat. Every country that switches over is another example of a Linux sucess story to other prospective nations.
I hope the decide to follow through and try to break free from the mold.
The real interesting thing that this article brough out was that the decision by wasen't made due to up-front costs: Microsoft brought their bid down to below IBM/SuSE's bid by several million dollars.
Probably, the government realised that the Microsoft solution had higher total 'costs' due to:
*vendor lock-in
*poor reliability
*poor scalability
*poor security
*poor standards compliance
amung other items.
Moneyed corporations, non-working 'poor' and criminal prisoners are turning productive citizens into tax-slaves.
...Microsoft last March dispatched CEO Steve Ballmer to the rescue....Documents obtained by USA TODAY show Microsoft subsequently lowered its pricing to $31.9 million and then to $23.7 million -- an overall 35% price cut. The discounts were for naught.
for the non believers: The CEO of MS himself went to a sales call and lost the sale, you better start beliving Linux is a threat to MS.
3 Cheers for all Linux, OSS, and Choice! Hip Hip Horay!
Linux is given away for free. So is it really unfair for Microsoft to give steep discounts in order to compete?
The only really unfair thing would be out-and-out bribery --- not that I'd be surprised to hear of bribery on the part of M$!
... was leaning toward a switch to Linux, the upstart computer operating system whose open-source code is continually improved by volunteer programmers worldwide.
How many big contracts have to be won by Linux companies before the papers realize that it's been around for a dozen years? Or that not everybody working on OSS is a volunteer?
Nice writeup (w/ movie) here.
Share and enjoy!
I want to drag this out as long as possible. Bring me my protractor.
Yeah, like we open sorcerers are conjuring up an attack against M$...hey USA Today, is it possible that maybe we don't consider M$ competition?
Though Microsoft underbid IBM and SuSE by $11.9 million in Munich, city officials were concerned about the unpredictable long-run cost of Microsoft upgrades
The city paid MUCH more money to IBM/SuSE because they didn't want to be locked into Microsoft's refusal to support/insistence on upgrading their software after X number of years. Linux let them upgrade when they wanted to, and not before. It was a long-term financial decision which, I'm certain, IBM and SuSE emphasized heavily in order to score a win.
Big, big news to other cities and corporations out there. A Microsoft contract is a dangerous thing when money is/will be tight. You can save a lot of money down the road if you make the switch today.
Quote of the year IMHO: "Microsoft's philosophy is to change our software every five years," Strobl (Munich council member Christine Strobl ) says. "With open-source, it is possible for us to make our own decision as to when to change our software."
Excuse me, my head hurts now.
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, it doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
Government uses tax payers' money to purchase the computer equipment.
The German legislation requires, that government has to make a public
call for offers, and then choose the cheapest offer. This was done
for buildings etc, and recently it occurred to the Germans that this
law also applies to computers and software. After all, it's quite a
huge investment. Unless Microsoft lowers the price, or Linux increases
the price, or Microsoft bends the numbers so that their offer appears
cheaper than Linux, government HAS TO choose Linux.
I think, the German government is not keen on using Linux over Windows,
and they will appreciate when someone comes along with a good-looking
statistics that allows them to go Windows without risk of being held
liable later.
The Microsoft numbers about total-cost-of-ownership obviously are still
not good enough, otherwise the case would be closed already since long
time.
Marc
It makes me feel good to know that finally someone other then a bunch of geeks is getting it.
Though Microsoft underbid IBM and SuSE by $11.9 million in Munich, city officials were concerned about the unpredictable long-run cost of Microsoft upgrades
Munich chose to spend a little more money now to save a LOT of money down the road. This was a big decision, and may have political ramifications in the short-term, but no doubt it was a wise one. Microsoft's strategy is to push an upgrade after X number of years by cancelling support for older products. With Linux, the city can upgrade what they need to, when they need to.
It looks like they did everything but hire David Hasselhoff to try and get the deal. I'm telling you... with the way Germany feels about David Hasselhoff, that would have sealed the deal.
Certainly every man at his best state is but vapor
It seems the good people of Munich have decided they no longer want Microsoft to be in control of how much money they must pay them and when.
Insted of letting Microsoft decide when they had to upgrade (and pay more and more), they went with a more solid option of linux. And for desktop no less!
This is truely a step in the right direction, one many [ not employed by Microsoft ] should be quite happy about.
Interesting to see how these types of contracts are structured, and just what Microsoft is willing to give up to prevent losing to Linux.
.. or give back ?
give up
Hey Steve, where's your Moses now??
Label me a troll or flame bate but Linux is not a garage OS anymore.
Linux is marketed by companies to make money.
Windows is marketed by Microsoft to make money.
Where is the news story here?
If there is profit to be gained no matter how small the margain is, companies are going to go after it. And in this case, if Microsoft can make a profit and under cut a competitor at the same time denying them profits, they are going to do it.
-- Knowing too much can get you killed, but knowing who knows too much can make you rich.
- The negociations where in step with what Microsoft is accostumed to doing with big accounts, regardless of who or what the competing "thing" happens to be. And it's no different from what other big software houses (Oracle in particular) do as a matter of fact when engaged in stuff like this. The idea that Microsoft was somehow "more desperate" because it was bidding against Linux is stupid.
- Yay free software. They ended up spending millions of dollars more over the Microsoft package. I'm sure training and attrition will offset whatever benefits they could have realized by avoiding the "forced upgrades", which SuSe will most certainly start doing eventually when they come to their senses, just like RH did. In any case, Microsoft was willing to defer the upgrade cycle for them. So it was more expensive and it will probably be about the same in the long run
- The vote was 50-30. Doesn't seem to me like an "overhelming" victory. Well, I guess it depends who you're rooting for.
Furthermore, I'd like to continue seeing articles about this topic here. I.e., how is the switch going, how much Munich ends up spending over the next 12 months, what their rate of attrition is, etc. All of previous articles smacked of "hahaa, we stick it to the man!!!1", which is nice but worthless unless all we're interested in is FUD and fluff.If anything, this will be watched by other cities and companies to see how well it works. I hope it does work, because Microsoft will be forced to change the way it does business. But it better damn work.
Ballmer cast open-source software as having 'no center of gravity'
What it means is "We don't know where to attack, because we can't buy them out"
------
"And may your days be long upon the earth."
It's nice (and fun too!) to pick on M$, but lets be honest here... Who in their right mind doesn't think that everybody involved with this knew exactly what the other was up to? What I found most disturbing about the whole thing was these numbers being tossed around (M$'s for instance) work out to over $2600 per system! For (in M$'s case, XP and Office) software only!!! And the winning bid works out to even more than that! I do understand tech support costs are included in that, but jeezus... Munich could have just gone out and bought 14,000 copies at the store, most likely getting a huge discount, and paid an third party company a lot less than that for tech support!
they are willing to give up the whole farm!!!
Letting the mayor not to lick Gates' boots?
Offering some Munich citizens the possibility not to send their first borns to Redmond?
Enough said...
Microsoft makes one last offer to fuck them in the ass.
Anyone tell me what's really written there?
-uso.
Dreams, dreams, don't doubt dreams, dreaming children's dreaming dreams. Sailor Moon SS
First Falcon-1 to orbit, then Falcon-9. Then I can die a happy man.
When recently asked about that e-mail[Under NO circumstances lose against Linux] and whether Microsoft was improperly undercutting competitors in Europe, Gates said, ''We will never have a price lower than Linux, in terms of just what you charge for the software,''
damn, so i wont get MS software for free anytime soon.
well, at least its good to see MS has to be acting fairly, since their software costs more, right?
...was leaning toward a switch to Linux, the upstart computer operating system...
What is this new software company...Linux???
eMelody Web Directory add your site today!
Though Microsoft underbid IBM and SuSE by $11.9 million in Munich, city officials were concerned about the unpredictable long-run cost of Microsoft upgrades, says Munich council member Christine Strobl, who championed the switch to Linux.
;^)
Game.
And the more Microsoft discounted, the more it underscored the notion that as a sole supplier, Microsoft could -- and has been -- naming its own price, she says.
Set.
''Microsoft's philosophy is to change our software every five years,'' Strobl says. ''With open-source, it is possible for us to make our own decision as to when to change our software.''
Match.
Munich must still prove that Linux is ready for prime time on the desktop. Research firm Gartner cautions it won't be until 2005 before it is known how well it works in Munich.
Now don't trip jumping over the net.
Soko
"Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm." - Anonymous
I'd like to ++ the moderator who marked you funny.
It is more an image one.
Munich is the center of germanys IT and probably one of the european IT centers with many big software companies located in its suburbs.
Second the deal for a strange reason got a huge press coverage, nobody knows why, the Frankfurt deal (which is equally important which Microsoft won) and severl other smaller but also big deals which IBM and others won with Linux did not really get the huge press attention.
Probably SuSE had a small advantage as well being a real german company the people to contact who are knowledable are just around the corner.
At the end due to the big press coverage and given Munics status the whole thing was more a marketing desaster than a financial one for Microsoft since Munich was the first big city which got huge press coverage which swichted to Linux. And if the switch succeeds (which probably it will) the threshold to jump onto Linux with IBM and or others probably will be lowered almost to nothing.
In the case of Munich, as the USA article points out, it's the fact that the city is replacing desktops.
To Microsoft, this is the Kiss of Death. They really only make a huge profit off of two items:
Desktop OS - the so called "Microsoft Tax" that is the reason why when I go to dell.com (well, not that I would, I'd go here instead for my Unix needs), I can't get a $100 price discount on a new computer by having it be "naked".
Microsoft Office
Other than these two, they don't make a lot of money on other stuff. Oh, some on server licenses, but a pittance compared to Desktop OS sales and Microsoft Office. The Xbox is losing money, I haven't heard anything profitable about their cable investments, and their games division (with the exception of the Xbox) is doing decently.
But the two things that keeps them with that $35 billion in cash is Desktop OS and Office. And Munich basically said "no" to both of them, so they would have the ability to upgrade when Munich wanted, not when Microsoft wanted.
And that's been Microsoft's winning business edge for years. We'll sell you Windows 98 - and in 3 years, you'll have to get Windows 2000 if you want to be able to do stuff with your vendors, your co-workers - you'll have to put it onto your machine at home if you plan on taking work home and doing stuff there.
Munich just got off the Wheel of Upgrades. Now you wonder how many employees will feel they have to upgrade their home computers? How many employees (espeically managers) will go to the IT department and say "Hey, I got a laptop - make it so I can do the same stuff I do here in the office on the road", and they walk out with a SUSE installed machine.
There's still some things they'll have to do on the Desktop end to make things as easy to use as the Windows world, and I trust that will be part of what Suse and IBM were just paid for.
But this is a major step for Linux in business, and Linux on the desktop. And what can Microsoft do about it, other than really compete for the first time on something other than forced installation upgrades?
For the record, I don't think Microsoft is "evil", but I do think they haven't had a real challenge in business because of their predatory business practices. I think it's great they're having a real competitor. Costs will go down, products on both sides will get better, and it someday I might be able to migrate back from OS X over to Linux - once it provides the same ease of use with Unix power I get from OS X.
And competition with Microsoft is just the thing it needs to get itself there. I'm patient - I'll say another 5 to 10 years before I have what I want.
But Munich is a good start.
Oh, and this is all just my opinion - I could be wrong.
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
Makes me feel nervous even reading a piece like this wondering if it's against my XP Eula or something...
"It's so convenient to have a system where everyone is a criminal" - A. Hitler
Are the numbers right? Even at the "new reduced price", that still winds up being $1692.86 per computer, and either $338.57/year or $282.14/year (5- and 6-year terms, respectivley) per computer.
Sounds a little (lot) expensive.
But hey, I guess that's why Bill & Steve get paid the big bucks...
More details to follow...
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
As many of you know, at the recent O'Reilly Open Source convention, Microsoft provided sack lunches to attendees for free. The Munich article reminds me of one guy's comment: "They should get used to us eating their lunch."
include $sig;
1;
This is a pretty big change for the government of Munich, and it has been very high profile. IBM had better be very careful that they don't go over budget or have problems with the installation (as _every_ project I have ever had to work with IBM on has done). Microsoft has a good PR machine as well, and it won't matter if it's IBM's fault or a problem with Linux - you can bet they'll spin it so that Linux takes the blame.
20,000 text editors
5,000 replacement shells
500 desktop environments
3,000 breakout clones
0 useful software
I copied this from some other kid, what are you gonna do about it? Cry for me? Go on, cry for me, crybaby.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
As much as I welcome that the city of Munich has decided to use Linux, I am really pissed that the ruling party in Munich, the SPD, is now running a poster campaign all over Munich with the slogan:
Mehr Linux, Mehr Freiheit, SPD
(More Linux, More Freedom, SPD)
Linux should not be misused by political parties to strengthen their chances for reelection.
Here's a screenshot of the poster.
...a well written, thoughtful investigative article. Without a single mention of NASCAR or your Traveller's forecast. Wow.
Toon toon! Black and white army!
so I don't hate Microsoft because they're greedy, manipulative and all-out evil? I hate them because I'm German? I'll be a sonovabitch.
I was turned on to Firebird yesterday in fact. It too me all of 10min to decide to make it my default browser. And I did the same thing at home lastnight as well. Down with IE, long live Mozilla [Firebird]!! Tabs...wonderful tabs...
oh it's pork. POOOORRRKKKK!!
Mode (3) smart-aleck mode. Press * to return to main menu.
As has been said before, the Linux deal is cheaper in the long run. Most of the 36million is probably going to go to training people to use Linux, as well as be a Linux sysadmin. In several years, when they want to upgrade again, the sysadmins go download the latest release of Linux, and install it all, for virtually no cost other than labor. With Linux, the cost is mostly labor, the "parts" other than hardware (which will be the same for Linux or Windows) don't cost very much.
With Microsoft, it's the other way around. With Windows Update etc, it doesn't take as skilled (read: as expensive) of an admin to run the boxes. However, while the labor may be cheaper, the "parts" (software licenses) are much more expensive.
developers, developers, developers, developers..... DOH!... we lost the contract with Munich...
....and Mozilla, a Web browser that can perform basic workplace tasks.RAR!!#)&
Technically correct, but sure is one hell of an understatement.
The unofficial
The decision was based on a study made by a consulting firm in which the upgrade solution to winxp was cheaper than a pure linux solution on the time base of 5 years ! In the longer run the study claims that linux is cheaper than m$. also a solution with vmware was compared which was the cheapest of all ! The study claimed that for the pure linux solution they would have to buy a lot of new peripherials (card readers, printer etc) which makes the linux solution more expensive. a big problem for the winxp solution was that they would have to buy a lot of new hardware (new processors, more ram) which they wouldnt have to using linux. a short version of the study is available online:2 7.06.03-0 03/e _kurz.p df
http://www.heise.de/newsticker/data/anw-
(sorry in german, use the fish)
the study is here:
http://www.muenchen.de/aktuell/clientstudi
They simply wanted to deal with a German company, not an American one.
But he also warns that Linux ''requires our concentrated focus and attention.''
So you have something with no center, that you have to focus all your attention on... like trying to catch flying dandelion seeds before they hit the ground. It doesn't matter how much you focus, later on you're going to be pulling more dandelions.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
nt
The article says:
"Munich, for instance, uses 175 Windows applications for such tasks as managing police records, issuing permits and collecting taxes."
Did Munich factor in the cost of replacing those 175 Windows applications with Linux-based ones? If many of those apps were custom made, there will likely be a significant (multi-million dollar) cost to rebuild those apps for Linux. If they were off-the-shelf apps, then there is a cost to locate, evaluate and test Linux-based replacements.
It sounds like Munich wanted to go with Linux just because an influential council member decided they didn't like Microsoft. Microsoft's offer was "technically superior and cheaper" and Microsoft said the Windows XP/Office XP deal would be supported for six years...until 2010. Don't you think Munich will want to upgrade their Linux installation in six years? Do you think that upgrade will be free?
Microsoft's offer (even at 31.9 million) sounded like the better deal and would not require recoding/replacing their custom apps.
In an opposing decision, microsoft won the contract to suppply server and client software to the department of homeland security here in the US.
- You don't know how to maintain a station wagon either!
Why is the price tag so high for Linux. It is FREE open-source software running on already existing hardware.
Isn't this just Upgrading the operating system? How can Linux cost more than Windows when the software is free??
For the first time in many years, Microsoft is cutting prices to bid for contracts and the one reason for this is Linux.
If all MS customers were stupid enough to fall for MS bribery and Linux was to go down Microsoft prices would rocket with avengance and there would be no option.
Thank god there are places like Munich that are clued up enough to see further than 6 months down the road.
Hmmmmmm..... Deep fried and look like Squirrel.
This story is really interesting for showing us what, as the blurb says, MS will give up to try to hold on to its contracts. Please permit me to juggle for a moment...
The fact that MS was willing to let Munich unbundle office is indicative that people dont want to pay for huge monster suites that they arent using most of. And in a govt organization this is even more true. Your average memo writing paper pusher doenst need to use excel.
MS, being the monster it is, is tripping over itself trying to dodge the bullets of its smaller, faster, and more flexible competitors. It's as if MS wants to jam the status quo down the throats of large organizations, hoping everyone will think "well everyone else uses MS is going to have to also to work with the rest of the to world." (not to mention I [and probably you] have heard variations on this theme before)
In today's climate of cost cutting and internet security disasters, the managers want to make sure people have the necessities to perform their job functions and not a bunch of extra crap to screw around with. A one size (license) fits all approach cannot meet that goal. The fact that the CEO has to show up implies 1 of 2 things. 1) The salesperson didnt have the authority to make such changes that the customer wanted. 2) Or if he did the initial beating over the head of the initial proposal spooked Munich so much they needed executive handholding.
Lint - Professional amateur analysis while you wait. Call for more details!
"First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win."
Guess we're at the "fight" part. Wake me up when it's over.
Thanks!
Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
"Unilog first recommended that the city select a $39.5 million Linux package from IBM-SuSE over a $36.6 million standard upgrade package from Microsoft" . What does IBM get out of this ? Thought linux was supposed to be free ? Why are these clowns even paying for it ,just download it and install on every computer.
I didn't see this mentioned in the article or in any other posting, but in addition to the long-term cost savings, Munich's $35.7 million goes to a German company, instead of an American one. I can't help but think that had something to do with with the decision.
// TODO: fix sig
Doesn't this set a very dangerous precedent for MS? I'm not sure how public news about individual contracts normally is, but won't every major organization now try to get a 50% discount by claiming they want to switch to Linux, whether they plan to or not?
...) came up for a new contract and threatened to use LINUX and make it very public, they could get an even bigger reduction in license fees (they might already, who knows?)
I imagine if a big corporate customer (say, Daimlery Chrysler, GE,
I always thought it very dangerous to give discounts in "special cases" as it pisses of all your other customers and essentially sets a precedent as to what the "real" price should be...
Ponxx
Billy G has compared Linux to OS/2 but a true comparison would be that to Airbus. What Airbus did to Boeing, Linux is doing it to M$: killing its monopoly ruthlessly. The German example goes to show it.
You say this EVERY day dont you? It would really be nice to go a day without having to hear this BS again.
Customers in Munich may be satsified with the support and usage of SUSE over a period of time.Investors all over the world would gain confidence by reviewing the Sucess history of SUSE services in Munich.. Thus this may really help all flavors of linux competing and MS will have to think other ways
Customers in Munich are not satisfied with support and usage of SUSE.This would strengthen the popularity of MS and may hit linux market.. I believe this major investment may serve as a model to confidently invest in Linux..
Hello , this is my way.
Which way is yours ?
btw there is no right way
I think they are also afraid of espionage (carnivore, whatever) and the like. be it corporate or military or political. They probably have good reasons for this. I'm not saying that all of the decision makers think this way but I'm pretty sure quite a few do.
Did you know that after 9/11 Lufthansa tore out their Boeing 7X7 passenger planes' computer systems and replaced them with their own to make sure any remote control capability (designed in the 70s to be able to direct hijacked planes) got taken out? Google if you don't believe me.
Those Germans are not stupid. It's also interesting that Munich is in the most Christian and conservative part of Germany.
If you have to compete on price... you've already lost.
(As Microsoft drops it's bid by several million).
Sure, the concept is a little different when it comes to open source software - and as with the city of Munich, price wasn't the main reason they made the decision.
(If time == money, I sure as hell didn't choose to learn OS software because it would be quick to pick up the technicalities. I would have saved myself a lot of time by upgrading to XP. I chose to move to FreeBSD because the open source experience is overall a more enjoyable, less big-brother-ish experience.)
If I had a nickel for every time a news-droid called Linux an "upstart" OS, I'd be up to my neck in Jeffersons!
Crikey! 32 bit OS to 32 bit OS age comparisons:
Linux: Released to the wild in 1991.
Windows NT: 1993.
Who's the upstart?
--
BMO
So Munich pays a German sw company more for software support instead of paying an American company less. Sounds like nationalism had some role in this. Certainly the US govt. support of MS has something to do with them being a US company.
Vote for Pedro
Since when did tech reporters start writing like sports writers? Yay! Our team wins.
Clearly, free market is at work here. Apparently the DoJ case was BS, since MS has real competiton.
Vote for Pedro
Given that so many West European governments are elected by some variety of proportional representation that forces them into the strictures of coalition building and all that that entails, a margin of 60% to 40% is a huge margin of victory for the passage of any bill in any West European legislature (except the British House of Commons, among others).
Still hoping for Gentle Treatment...
Umm they are probably paying for the cost of support and rolling over all their machines (14,000 I think).
Major IT purchasers like to have someone they can rely on for support so they pay for it. The other cost would be the storage and distribution costs allowed under the GPL.
Costs estimates failed to take into consideration the costs in lost productivity due to having solitaire installed on every desktop! Yep, my corporate installed Windows XP box has the productivity enhancing suite of FreeCell, Hearts, Solitaire, Pinball, Internet Backgammon, etc. What that hell were they thinking when they decided to give games to every employee?
"Freedom means freedom for everybody" -- Dick Cheney
After all that is the way MS, works you get assurance the the stuff you buy will work, then if the device sucks you have no one to blame but the manufacturer. If the North American retail and business market is to be addressed then the sale of Linux ware and tech help in retail need to be a focus for Oss people.
Don't give me any of that Bill Gates crap about everything being free and you cannot make money, there is no reason why software companies cannot use and improve Linux ware it is just that only the ones that offer effective customer support will thrive. In business that is the way it should be, not the current system "you have to use this software product because our hardware only runs this way!"
OH THE SHAME I fell off the wagon and use sigs again!
I feel so sorry for microsoft, they have always been on the screwing end of anti-competive practices.
I have nothing whatsoever to back this up, but I wonder if things had been different had it been Red Hat vs. MS and not Suse? I know parent was trolling, but it does bring up something of a point.
-Looking for a job as a materials chemist or multivariat
I didn't see this mentioned in the article or in the comments here, but I'd bet one of Munich's "strategic" considerations was the overhead in managing license compliance. Particularly with MS's concession to unbundle MS Word for some machines. Watch those savings go down the tubes when the MS lawyers come by and say, "So, can you prove you have installed only MS Word on X thousand machines?"
Assuring license compliance on desktops is a frickin' nightmare, and the lack of that overhead is a major advantage of open source software.
(And that's not even considering the ridiculousness of the Microsoft position that basically says, "We want your business so much we're going to let you NOT buy some of our software that you don't need! Yes, normally, we make everyone buy this whether they need it or not, but because we pride ourselves on being customer-driven, we will actually break our own rules and not sell you something you don't want!") Sheez. GMAB. (Give Me A Break)
I've not seen public disclosure of this (yet), but I have it on good authority that Ford is about to cut all of it's servers over to SuSE Linux, beginning Real Soon Now (on a 3-5 year plan). While that's beeing done, the engineering workstations.
We're talking a Fortune 5 corporation here. Thousands of servers, and hundreds of thousands of desktops once all is said and done. Though, I think they'll let the execs, secretaries and marketting folks keel their windows and Macs, respectively.
I'm posting AC because, well, it's not been announced yet as far as I can tell.
i'm sure they will do that too.
with an existing linux infrastructure, when they need a couple more servers...just slap it on there.
no worries.
just keep track of which servers are officially not on the contract support and which ones are.
That is named the MonkeyBoy Dance. Please remember this for future funny posts.
Reference 1, the original file was named dancemonkeyboy.mpg
Kindness is the language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see. - Mark Twain
I thought that happened in Italy. The group that hit him is known as the Italian Piemen, and are known for pieing celebrities in the face.
People will ALWAYS find the need to upgrade sooner or later. How many people do you know that still run Linux 1.2.13 (I loved that ver. number)?
Face it, over time libraries change and things are no longer developed for the older libraries (the recent up-level from GCC2 to GCC3 is one example).
But, yes, you're right to point that they choose their timeframe.
I bet M$ will make it's software open source when the open source competition finds a profitable business model and takes away enough business. Then it will do what M$ does best: Copy and market it.
... but Linux certainly does has a center of "lift"... it's openness.
(The center of gravity / center of lift terms come from aviation, if you didn't figure that out)
This appears to be a political decision. Let's face it, there's strong anti-American sentiment in Europe, and Microsoft is seen there as a rook in the game of chess that they play with the states. This especially is true since the new U.S. government dropped antitrust penalties.
There are people who see Microsoft as being imperialist. They are a hegemony at home, and now they're going after world hegemony.
If you're a German city councillor what are you going to do - spend money that will go into foreign, "imperialist" pockets? Or spend money that will (at least partly for SuSE) stay in the country?
+ any other political factors that may be going on with world politics.
simon
home page
While I make a living from M$ software I'm always looking at the Linux alternative, I've just begun installing and maintaining both Linux and Windows servers for a hosting company. The OSes are split about 50/50 all on Intel hardware.
High profile decisions attracting media attention like this could cause a snowball that crushes all over M$ at a speed never before seen in the business world. I'll even sum the reasons up for you:
1. Microsoft has just pissed of all of it's largest customers who will want to know why they don't get breaks like this.
2. The public will begin to see that hundreds of M$ programmers can't possibly compete with thousands of OS developers.
3. Every company that reads about deals like this will also be expecting huge discounts from M$.
4. Forcing companies to upgrade every 5 years means that each company must also evaluate their IT needs, this continually forces a company to reevaluate their IT infrastructure which means a regular comparison against OS products.
5. What sort of a company allows details like this to leak? Now all of their customers are going to expect huge price breaks.
6. OS might be more expensive to support now but as soon as the huge shortage of OS network engineers is resolved support costs will come down - forget the desktop argument, Linux isn't getting very far now because there's so few people that can install it for small to mid sized businesses for less than $100 an hour.
7. Did I mention how every company is going to start threatening to go OS to get increased benefits and discounts?
8. Even though there is a shortage of qualified OS network engineers the ones that there are know their beans, they know their hardware and software a whole lot better than an equilavent M$ engineer.
9. M$ has a terrible market name and security history. The whole of the IT industry has monumentally changed over the past 7 or 8 years. Windows 98 and Windows NT were never made with the internet in mind, every "update" and "add on" to Windows is another patch to make Windows do something it was never designed to do. It's little wonder there's been so many bugs introduced over the years.
10. My God! M$ customers are being given the green light to hold out and bargain hard because M$ will cave in the end.
There's a few other reasons that this could happen too. M$ OSes have gotten more mature and gotten exponentially better with every revision (discount Windows ME).
The basic trade off between OSes for companies to consider now is this:
With Linux you are locked in with your support company (small businesses especially) and there are far fewer qualified people to work on your network
M$ offers standardized systems and a tried and true support methodology. Real world performance with the history to prove it.
I consider M$ products to be the superior when competing with other OSes. Windows 2000 always installs on standard hardware and I know that if M$ says a product will do something then I know it will do it (maybe not well or as well but that's moot).
Anyway that's my take on this, I hope everyone has bookmarked this story and emailed it to their managers.
John the Kiwi
If you're thinking of buying a Microsoft product, then ask them: "Surely I shouldn't get a worse deal than what you were willing to offer Munich?" It's just a question of how much better they can make that deal, for it to start to look competitive.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
You don't know MS to well do you.
MS needed to make Linux didn't get a big deal and some legitimacy. They could have lost money on the deal and wouldn't have cared.
If someone small comes and says we want discounts and am pretty sure MS would say "No"
And then the small company would evaluate the cost of switching(linux or some thing else) to keeping current software to upgrading.
If enough small company switch then maybe MS will change but until then... don't hold your breath.
Munich ... uses 175 Windows applications for such tasks as managing police records, issuing permits and collecting taxes. ... Linux ... does not work well with Windows programs. Another layer of connection software is required, adding complexity. Unilog judged Microsoft's proposal -- to swap out all existing versions of Microsoft Windows and Office for the newest versions -- as cheaper and technically superior.
It seems that the only advantage Microsoft really had was that it worked, sometimes, with it's own software. Training was offered by both teams, implying no difference. Once those 175 applications are ported out of Windoze, what will Microsoft have to offer? Painful file formats? A single screen GUI, inferior networking, poor security, inferior stability and data loss are all hallmarks of Microsoft software. In six years, what's Microsoft going to do to try to win back the business?
Microsoft screwed their only advantages. They had a tremendous advantage in user familiarity and widespread use. The advantages this offered was supposed to be ease of information transfer and hardware compatibility. Instead of using that, they got greedy and broke interoperability to force upgrades. They also abused their deathgip on hardware manufacturers the same way to foce purchases of new equipment. With advantages like those, who needs flaws? Microsoft squandered money on anti-competitve behavior when it should have been fixing it's own software.
Free software has stuck itself right into these shorcomings. You can exchange data bewteen free programs though accepted standards. Why you can't get a hardware driver for the new Windoze, you can be sure the old one still works with free software. Free software is doing what Microsoft prommised to do but did not. That's not surprising because free software is made by people who have a job to do and they don't have an incentive to break things.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
"Then one little city rebelled and MS instantly rewrote the licensing deal. How many other MS customers who swallowed the original deal will now feel extremely pissed off? Pissed off enough to demand the same kind of cuts when their contract is up for renewal? "
Obligatory StarWars (tm) quote: "The more you tighten your grasp, the more starsystems slip through your fingers".
No I am going to hunt you down and pound the holy fuck out of you. You can run but you can't hide you little dipshit. Mongo is comming to get you. Then you will want people crying for you punk little ass.
Microsoft wasn't cheaper in the long run. According to the article, Microsoft was cheaper up front but failed to meet "strategic" goals. Microsoft dumps the current system to force another round of upgrades in 2009, an upgrade that wouldn't be required by contract, but they would be at Microsofts mercy in 2010 for another upgrade perpetuating the cycle! It might be 2016 by the time they could revisit this issue. The city could be stuck with an open ended liability in Microsoft. Microsoft was found to be the riskier option based on a cost performance basis. With Linux, they could plan that upgrade cycle to fit their budget and technical requirements. Imagine actually being able to buy or modify functionality you need, when you need it; and test a system and make sure it works before you install it on a massive scale.
Microsoft: Here, have a 10% discount
Customer: Not good enough.
Microsoft: OK, how about 20%
Customer: Nah.
Microsoft: 40%, that's our final offer.
Customer: No.
Microsoft: Okay, you win, 70% off, but that cuts our profit margin pretty slim.
Customers in unison: When did you start screwing us?
I assume that while the price tag of the IBM-SuSE deal was much higher than the Microsoft one (One is forced to wonder if Microsoft would be so kind to other, smaller customers) the real and largest savings were probably being seen in hardware in choosing Linux.
I further assume that the IBM-SuSE deal was broken up into various segments such as installation, testing, training, support and migration or at least aid in migrating the applications that currently run under WinNT. The migration would probably be based on using WINE initially and giving coding aid and support in porting the 100+ Munich applications over time.
But what probably clicnhed it was the fact that Linux would run on current hardware. Given that Munich was running WinNT, I assume that the majority of their PC's were in the 400MHz to 900MHz range i.e. a couple of years old. Anyone who has used WinXP on a 400MHz or even 600MHz machine knows that while it works, it's not something that is pleasant. I assume that installing WinXP would have meant aquiring a whole load of new hardware and with assumedly even only around 50% of those 14000 PC's in that range, it would have meant quite a bit of money since it would have meant going through a brand name company such as Siemens whose PC's (including support contracts) are not cheap.
Too late, Bill! WINE is already here!
Man, this is old. This is older than the litre of hot sauce in my fridge.
Details of Araya's (now off the job) insistence that they cannot "lose" to Linux was published soon after the events in question, back when this was news...
This whole article is just a friggin' synopsis of long passed events.
It's not news - it's friggin' history.
If SUSE dont make serious upgrades in functionality over the years, the deal will disappear. Since Linux bases any and all desktop decisions on chasing Microsoft, this will more likely than not be Linux's loss of virginity. Now they need really serious thinkers who have constant feedback on what is going on at the ground level with users, and no one is going to survey/chase customers/take user complaints/and any other behaviour associated with adults paying mortgages, for free, if someone is making billions at the high end of the deal.
It doesn't give people the feeling of intellectual superiority, you only feel used. I dont trust free electricians or plumbers, why should I trust free database maintainers running tax records. Its too "sixties", and something is out of place.
That's it, only IBM can afford to keep the thing going at a level of service business demand. Aging teenagers will soon realise how poor they are compared to what they could of been, and will stop providing free chat forum support. Which will not matter since India will provide support at rates cheaper than paying Mom and Dad to live in their garage.
Community run things are nice ideas, but the nice guys are always useless. They have no intentions, therefore nothing eventuates.
I think their "last minute" offer shows that Microsoft still thinks that everyone else either stands in awe or cowers in fear when in Microsoft's presence. I think that the deal-makers at Microsoft were thinking, "They'll be stunned to receive a deal from someone the likes of Microsoft!" only to be completely chagrined when Munich was not impressed. Microsoft isn't used to having to bargain. They're used to having their way.
I don't make the rules. I just make fun of them.
"Microsoft's biggest enemy is themselves," says Gartner's Silver. "They do things that make people very upset and engenders a lot of resentment."
:-)
That about sums it up for me. What upset me the most was the inability to master their products. I've worked with small businesses for over 7 years installing and supporting LANs. I began my career as a CNE with Novell NetWare, transitioned to Windows (which was the worst 4 years of my life), and now work exclusively with Linux. From my experience, It's impossible to avoid huge time-sucking disasters because of Microsoft's constant upgrade and patch cycles. Their End User License Agreements (EULA's) absolve themselves of all wrongdoing, and leave techs like myself holding the bag. After years of blowing out the operating system and reinstalling, hoping that a shotgun approach of service packs and hot fixes would make the problems go away, and reading everything under the sun only to find documentation fraught with errors, I gave up. Which is why two years ago I adopted the mantra "I don't do Windows" and set my mind on Linux. My current job is with a company moving their 2 servers & 22 workstations off Windows NT/98/XP, and onto Debian GNU/Linux.
And I'm happy now
There's no such thing as a Windows expert. There's only "I can flail around in the dark better than you can".
Ruby on Rails Screencast
Software upgrades used to be driven by customer demand for additional features. Somewhere along the line, companies realized that if they bumped a version number up to the next integer value, that many customers would automatically buy the newer version, believing that it would include a whole bunch of new features. Microsoft took this to a whole new level when they realized that by bumping a version number, explicitely dropping all support for previous versions, making data from newer version incompatible with older versions, and even penalizing those who try to skip an upgrade, loyal customers would be forced to buy the newer version. Microsoft changed the definition of "upgrade". It's not quite like using cattle prods to force a sale, but it's not too far off.
Good to see Microsoft starting to get what it deserves. Eat it, Microsoft. Suck your karma down. Don't gag, because you have a lot more coming to you.
Let's see - $35 million (give or take - ALL bids were in that range) and 14,000 desktops. Doesn't that work out to $2,500 or so a piece?
Hopefully this is for AT LEAST 5 years of support. God, even those inept crooks at Dell only get a $100 or so a year for support. And that for hardware AND software.
Lessee, if I go down to ChumpUSA and pay street for XP, say 2 bills, get ripped off for another 5 or 6 hundred for office, and when a PC breaks or is mucked up JUST BUY A NEW ONE, it'd STILL cost me less than any of the bidders.
Looks like they're (Munich) is getting boned by everybody.
I'm surprised the USA Today writer didn't point that out, but he was probably in a hurry to get to his second job down at the fillin' station.
Anyway, what's the rush - NT isn't EXPIRING. It won't stop working when Mickey$oft says they're going to stop supporting it. If you've got 14,000 users and your IT guys STILL have to call Mikiozoft for help, you're in more trouble than you can even know. Just keep using what you've got till it won't run important new applications. The APPS drive the OS choice, not the other way around.
Well what is new. :)
The anti-American, Bush hating, protectionist, loony left commies and old Europeans in Munich strike again!
This was nothing more than the usual nastiness from Germans, and a pathetic attempt to shore up a floundering German software company, Suse Linux, at a steep expense to the Munich tax payers.
This is especially funny when you look at the massive deficit that Munch is running right now.
Their hatred of America and Bush is leading them to shoot themselves in the foot and spend extra money they don't even have!
Hardly surprising the German economy is in such terrible shape, with German unemployment at a whopping 11%(nearly twice that in America), and GDP growth that was actually negative in the last quarter!
All that expensive, overpriced productivity sucking linux they are using is screwing the German economy but good!
Lets add in the fact that Germany's population has been going down for over 10 years, and you begin to see how fast Germany is sinking.
A shrinking economy and a shrinking population, mixed with overpriced linux, with up to twice the total cost of ownership over 5 years! What a nice recipe for disaster!
Meanwhile, we are stepping up our boycott of French and German products. These German creeps are enjoying a trade surplus with America of over $40 billion. Lets see how those American hating commies in Munich like it when we stop buying their overpriced products and put their workers out of business.
The great news?
Microsoft won a MASSIVE contract from the US Department of Defencve for to the tune of close to $500 million, right sfter the Munich beer putsch clowns had made their futile gesture!
And just today, Microsoft won amother MASSIVE contract from the Department of Homeland security for another $120 million!
Makes Munich's contract look like a joke doesn't it?
And its highlt significant that these contract came not long after the nasty Germans had cheated again!
Don Rumsefeld is sending a message to the nasty Germans : You want a fight? YOU GOT IT!
We are already stepping up our boucott of all German products. Expect Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilley and other patriotic Americans to ratchet up the anti-German evangelism over the coming months, over this daylight robbery of an American firm.
We are gonna make the dopy Germans pay!
Lets see how the city of Munich like it when their exports to America start falling and their taxpayers are put out of business.
I have taken note that BMW comes from Bavaria, and Munich is the capital of Bavaria.
Its not going to be hard to hit these guys where it hurts: In their pockets.
Have a buddy who does 150+ (ab)users. Corporate stuck him with 5 years of IBM support. Same day that's really like same week support, techs who come out alone first day on the job, the usual nightmares. Turns out the 5 year cost is equal to the cost of a new machine. Asked him if I could bid on the renewal.
You moron, who do you think is paying MS for those government contracts. Me! (A wild guess is that your paycheck from 7-11 can barely pay the rent your parents charge you to live in their basement, never mind any taxes.) The DOD couldn't find Osama if he was in their pants and Tom Rindge's department couldn't defend us from a mosquito. Yup, THEY know good software when they see it. I can imagine when they're corellating data - "Er, Mr. President, we'll have that terrorist location as soon as we reboot off this BSOD." These two MS "wins" took talent, sure, you betcha.
Amidst all the self-congratulation, few people seem to be noticing that, at the end of the day, it was German local government purchasing a product (SuSE Linux) from a German company.
I am sure that German hospitals prefer Siemens over GE MRI scanners, that more German fleet cars are BMW than Honda, and the German military prefer HK firearms over Colt. That government spending fosters local industry is often an important factor(*) in deciding where the money goes.
(*) except in countries like Australia, where stupidity and nepotism rule supreme.
"Ayala declares, Under NO circumstances lose against Linux.'' He authorizes $118 million in consulting service discounts"
Microsoft offers discounts in consulting services? Oh good. That means we can pay less to have Microsoft recommend its own products! I'm just thrilled!
The race isn't always to the swift... but that's the way to bet!
Its a matter of opinion and personal choice albeit, but I'd dissagree. Command-line is not a step backward. GUIs just can't do the same degree of robust detail within computing. *nix and like systems are old and have been around for decades, true. Ever wonder why? Its useful, relevant, and powerful. GUI's are the present/future, especially of computing "appliances" and similarly tasked computing systems. Just because a platform has a command-line at the base of it all doesn't make it outdated or backward. If anything it makes it flexible. Provided, if you want an appliance from your computer, which is a perfectly valid desire, GUIs are a must unless you for some reason already know command-line. Learning a few commands to use on a command-line can make that UI more useful, to have a 'back door' to the computer behind the toaster, uh, umm, word processor/web browser/email station.
There are some cases where one still needs to use command-line to change the system on many flavors of Linux, though SuSE I've experienced has made the most extensive changes in this area, to the point that I don't think command-line knowledge is ever needed, not even a text file editor, to update a computer's settings, add hardware, etc.
Having an array of choices of GUI desktops to choose from, with the list always growing and changing, that - to me - seems to fuel innovation, more than simply relocating "My Computer" and "My Documents" to the start menu and calling it innovation. MS changed more than that as a whole I know, but the UI itself? No big changes since 1994 for the most part. With window managers on *nix (GNU's not ....), this case Linux, but also with the BSDs, etc, we've actually seen something different, at least from the Windows model anyway (older users may see 'Motif' everywhere they look, though I won't argue since the Motif-ish UI is really one of the desirable alternatives to me anyway :). Some of the greener window managers are really interesting diversions from the norm. And I've never seen a Windows user actually use a desktop like a *nix/X user. The MS enviornment just doesn't seem to lend itself to mutlitasking in quite the same way. I'm probably wrong about that but its been my impression.
As for the development of Linux, I'm sure there's better qualified readers to answer how advanced or not it is compared to Windows or any other system on the low-end levels, but when I unarchive/compile/install two applications, run GUI network monitoring software, and play a openGL video game all at the same time without hardly missing a beat, that tells me something was done right (running on a p4 with 512MB DDR RAM, 64MB agp video).
PS: WinFS (database-driven filesystem)? You mean like JFS, XFS, etc (Journaled File Systems)? Well its about time MS saw the light... :)
but 600 pounds? Sheesh, that's just being mean.
"God, root, what is difference?" - Pitr, userfriendly
Maybe, but it's a different ballgame with people who have fiduciary responsibility. If a public company agreed to buy an IBM/Linux solution 50% above the cost of the M$ solution, they would probably be cast out at the next shareholder meeting, and may be subject to various conflict of interest investigations as well.
I am stunned that Munich paid 50% more for a Linux solution, and I doubt the TCO argument works given the huge up-front hit. This had to be a political decision more than anything else.
A few more of these and M$ will be able to go the WTO, which will really turn into a fascinating IP/trade/technology dispute. It's also conceivable that Red Hat and M$ could be allied in such a case, as it appears Red Hat wasn't considered, probably for domestic (German) political reasons. Imagine a ruling in which tariffs are applied to SuSE and Mandrake (foreign distro) but not Red Hat. One can imagine any number of countries deciding to encourage the creation of "national distros" in a thinly disguised protectionist move, while including the good stuff from other countries for free. Sure could turn into a big mess.
Imagine how much harder physics would be if electrons had feelings! -Feynman, maybe
Let's hope that Linux doesn't have the same problem of vertical stabilizers falling off in-flight after only 12 years of use...
...but are you Australian?
IBM has eng/mfg sites in many countries. Its stock ownership is so dilute (because of its age since IPO) that it may not even be majority US-owned.
C'mon, Microsoft hardly killed innovation. Both Linux stuff and MS stuff are very innovative, just in different arenas. Linux innovative, IMHO, is largely spent in catch-up for mainstream apps, while MS is trying to dominate think-ahead markets like all internet commercial activity (DRM, P3P, proprietary streaming formats) and home interconnectivity. The problem with MS innovation is that it generally doesn't appear to be ever in the consumers' interest except very short term 'gosh, new feature!'.
No, IANAMSE (I am not a Microsoft employee)!
Reading between the lines, it seems to me that there is a thinly veiled accusation that open source is a threat to free-market capitalism. Of course, free-market means competition, which forces improvement, but the writer (mostly likely paraphrasing some Microsoft exec's statement) is likening the loss of Microsoft dominance to a decline in the quality and diversity of Microsoft products.
Somewhere, somehow, the Linux community is at fault. Those of us in the know need to do a better job of making the distinction between "free" as in "free use", and free as in "no cost", and demonstrate that Linux as an OS, and other OSS products (regardless of price) actually opens the door for a more expanded market for computer programmers.
I doubt the publicity would have been as big; and also I doubt the rhetoric would have been as severe.
I have nothing to back up my opinion either. But you made a good point.
To the trolls out there, here's where I stand: I think MS did a good job at providing "computing for the masses" (whatever that really is) for a long time; but it's time for them to step down. The future will, if not controlled by corporations and corporate-bought politicians, belong to open source software, written by volunteers. Face it. The critical mass has been reached, and there really is no stopping it short of Big Brother style legislation.
Just like IBM in the 80s, the big corporate model eventually becomes obsolete, and if they can't change, they will lose in the long run. IBM got smart. I hope more companies do.
What worries me is the damage done to the users and purchasers during those times....sigh....
SB
It's old. The more humans I meet, the more I like my cats. At least they are honest.
Software giant Microsoft has picked up a five-year, $US90 million ($183.6 million) contract to supply desktop and server software to the United States' recently-formed department of homeland security. The deal makes Microsoft the chief software supplier for the department and covers products for around 140,000 desktop computers. The agreement will standardise software across the department, which was drawn together from parts of 22 different US government agencies.
HURAAAYYYYYY!!
virus after virus
buffer overflows bonanza, a dozen just this year, that allow anyone to take control of the pc
"add ons" to let you function - tcp printing for win 98, etc.
got to pay if you want to
run dns
run smtp
run pop
run a web server
run an ftp server
run an ntp server
run a news server
run a streaming video server
run an ldap directory
run gimp
run pagemil
run a firewall
run nat
route
run a cache server
run office products (word/excell/etc.)
compile anything vs. gnu c, fortran, etc.
worms
virus
(ed note: you already mentioned viruses)
yeah, but there are over 30000 nasties out there that could steal your tax returns and ruin your business and more are coming)
So why allow taxpayers to be bamboozeled by a sweating dancing monkey, when you can get solid code for the money.
Microsoft has won three contracts in cities in Germany and Finland - where the open-source force is strong - and in Latvia.
Microsoft said of the wins: 'Microsoft is always willing to discuss with government or organizations how we can help bring higher-value, stable, easy to use Microsoft solutions to the benefit of government agencies, consumers and businesses alike. Microsoft government customers across Europe... are realizing the advantages of integrated, value-based Microsoft solutions that deliver lower TCO and higher benefit.'
The company's winning bid for a desktop contract in the city of Turku, Finland, was up against a rival combination of SuSE on IBM.
Following pilot schemes, those examining the bids recommended upgrading to XP, as all workers could continue their daily business without further retraining. While 16 per cent of pilot users estimated turning to Linux would save money, 32 per cent thought the increased costs of retraining would reverse that. Some testers found they needed help every day.
The win will come as a blow to SuSE, which has only recently launched a desktop version of its operating system.
Frankfurt has also signed up with Microsoft to standardise local municipalities around Windows products on the basis that doing so would reduce the administration spend.
In Riga, Latvia, the Mayor rejected open-source bids, concluding that a general lack of knowledge on how to operate open-source software and a lack of trained tech staff would again mean hefty retraining costs.
There were also concerns expressed about a narrow range of applications available, 'no versioning' or sense of a finished product.
The fact that Microsoft products are subject to far greater numbers of security threats was also found to be in its favour, as it was seen to be more robust and extensively tested.
But perhaps most telling is the pride with which Microsoft is announcing these victories - it really does take the open-source threat seriously.
Microsoft Corp. has won a six-year contract worth more than $470 million to provide software to the U.S. Army, the biggest order ever for the company's programs.
The deal covers 494,000 desktop computers, Microsoft spokesman Keith Hodson said. The Army will buy the software from a Microsoft reseller, Softmart, based in Downingtown, Pa. Hodson declined to say how the companies will divide the revenue.
The contract demonstrates that the Army has decided that Microsoft's security is sufficient, said Rob Enderle, an analyst at Forrester Research Inc.
"It looks like whatever that problem was, it wasn't great enough to stop the sale, or it was fixed," Enderle said. "The Army wouldn't buy this stuff if it still had exposures they couldn't mitigate."
In fact, Army leaders "stated openly that they put a lot of faith in the security of our platform," Hodson said, citing Microsoft's overall security model, its Trustworthy Computing initiative, and the enhanced security features in its Windows operating systems.
The deal includes a wide range of software for new and existing computers within the Army, Hodson said. The applications to be used by the Army include desktop programs such as Windows and Microsoft Office applications, in addition to server software such as SQL Server and Microsoft Exchange Server.
Microsoft, the world's biggest software maker, is trying to boost sales to federal, state and local governments, which are spending to combat terrorism and improve security.
Chairman Bill Gates is scheduled to speak in Washington, D.C., today at a conference on the role of information technology in homeland security.
The Army also will buy licenses for 10,000 copies of Windows for servers that run computer networks, and software for 5,000 Microsoft Exchange e-mail servers, Hodson said.
Why does the press refer to the fight as "Microsoft vs. Linux" and not "Windows vs. Linux"?
Sure. I write code professionally, and a good part of my tools are command-line. It's nice for me, a programmer, to have. It's really, really horrible for the non-programmers out there. I believe that we should be making computers that cater to the people, rather than the other way around. {Linux, BSD, Amiga, whatever} elitists disagree.
There are some cases where one still needs to use command-line to change the system on many flavors of Linux, though SuSE I've experienced has made the most extensive changes in this area, to the point that I don't think command-line knowledge is ever needed, not even a text file editor, to update a computer's settings, add hardware, etc.
The Linux world is still quite addicted to the command line. As you mention, SuSE is just now getting to the point where a user doesn't absolutely need to use a shell. Now that's progress! Windows has been there for 8 years or more, the Mac for nearly twenty.
I didn't say that the Windows world was great, in terms of new innovations. I said that it was marginally better then *nix. Linux was never intended as a new, original operating system--it is a free implementation of an operating system that's been around for 30 years.
Apple, honestly, really embraced the notion that computers should be accessible. Not that most of the features in Macs or MacOS were original innovations thought up by Apple employees: they merely adopted user-friendliness as their dogma.
BTW: WinFS is not a journaled file system. Files are actually laid out as a database, with different rows and columns for each file that are searchable. The OS (and apps, if they implement it as such) will be able to assign new fields at will to the files--now you can add whatever metadata you want to files. The files might be mapped as c:\somewhere\whatever, but that won't have any bearing on the actual location of the files on the disk. As far as I know, WinFS is truly unique. The first good use for it I can think of is a google-type tool for searching your local files. Imagine finding exactly what you're looking for in the first few hits in a search, without having to drill into the right directory first.
A journaled file system just keeps journals of metadata and operations so that data can be reconstructed in realtime if something horrible happens (unexpected shutdown, power outage). [WinFS will have similar functionality] Searching for files on a journaled file system is still done the old fashioned way.
" Interesting to see how these types of contracts are structured, and just what Microsoft is willing to give up to prevent losing to Linux."
I hope Microsoft will give up their entire business in order to not lose to Linux.
From the article:
With battle lines drawn, Microsoft turned to a freshly hired recruit, Jurgen Gallman, steeped in Linux. Until last November, Gallman had been IBM's top Linux executive in Germany.
Nobody else (at +5) has commented on it, but this guy must sure feel like a tool...
--
$tar -xvf
However, I hope that Linux is indeed up to the task in Munich. If not, this publicity coup could boomerang, and the headlines could read "Paid $11M more for Linux and it still couldn't do the job..."
Here's hoping for competent admins, open-minded end-users, and a rational roll-out plan. if they pull this off it could be the shot heard round the world.
pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.
Incorrect. There was no competition on that point.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
Sorry, couldn't resist the three wasn'ts in one sentence
"Linux is cheaper if your time is worthless"
Windows is only $100 if your time is worthless. (Otherwise it's much, much, much more.)
microsoftword.mp3 - it doesn't care that they're not words...
Blowjobs.
To quote a coworker at a previous job (who just happened to be on parole after a manslaughter conviction), "A man's mouth and a woman's mouth feel the same to me."
--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
It's an interesting point, and I see it as a big advantage that Linux has over Microsoft - companies and governments can support both the system as a whole (OSS) and their local representatives, e.g. Connectiva, SuSE, Red Flag and so on. Even if it's judged that a Windows option would be cheaper, sometimes it makes sense to keep the money in your own country and your own economy.
"If he thinks he can hide and run from the United States and our allies, he's sorely mistaken." Bush on bin Laden
Get off the anti-microsoft band wagon. Their products aren't any worse than anything else out there. Security depends on the admins, you get locked into any software you buy, 5 to 10 years later your hardware is going to fail and your going to have to replace it anyway, XP is no more bloated than anything else (I don't mean just a kernel). I can go on and on. And to all those who complain about MS being a cut-throat company, welcome to reality, that's how companies operate. They would all trade places with MS if they could, that includes RedHat, Apple, IBM, etc. I love it when a programmer says that software should be free, well, do you like your paycheck? Anyway, MS actually isn't that expensive compared to most other commercial software products. It always comes down to question that is what you are buying worth the money for you. Is this going to give the productivity boost you need to surpass your competition. If anything this deal makes linux look bad because look at Germany's economy, you think Germans make any good business decisions? I think not. I mean really, paying more for a linux environment than for the equivlant Microsoft solution? The only reason I like linux is because it's killing the commercial Un*x's. Once they're dead, linux will soon follow. Goodbye Solaris, goodbye Irix, goodbye AIX, goodbye OSX, and the rest of you, good riddance!!!
What will MS do when everyone starts mentioning "that deal you gave Munich" at contract negotiation time? Truly, MS should have just let this fish go and refused to lower the bar, thus maintaining the Emporer's Clothes for a while longer. Now, they'll have every two-bit contract negotiator waving the "Munich Bid" in their faces, and people under the old usurious contracts crying for a do-over. Sincerely, this is a watershed, but not from a Linux/MS software supremecy standpoint. The largest way this changes things is it shows that MS is just a software company, and without it's momopolistic edge, it can be knuckled around just like many smaller companies. Linux didn't win, per se, but MS definitely lost. I suppose that with many more such "failed" negotiations as this, we'll start seeing unthinkable things such as porting to Linux much sooner than we would have predicted just prior to these events. This should be interesting.
Windows XP SP2 told me to install third-party software that prevents viruses and protects stability... I chose Ubuntu
I'd love to see the details of how much of the final pricetags of each company broke down into software versus training and support. Something tells me that the ratio of software licenses to training/support for each side would skew in two very different directions between MS and the Linux solution.
If I were making the decision, I'd pay close attention to that ratio (and I'm assuming Munich did). Software licenses are fairly transitory - they expire, the software needs upgrading, etc. whereas training and support seem more solid investments in the workforce and infrastructure.
- Jack
"Microsoft came too late...Psychologically it was not good"
:)
Maybe that would be news for (some) nerds
http://pcblues.com - Digits and Wood
I find this really ironic when remembering all of Microsoft's FUD about TCO. Paper after paper proving that TCO for Windows based systems being lower than Linux-based. The people of Munich are NOT stupid! They did NOT pay more for Linux because it was going to cost them more in the long term!
One quote in the article sums it up best: "Microsoft's biggest enemy is themselves" says Gartner's Silver.
That also means it is easy to fix, providing they actually open their eyes and see things as they are. If Microsoft's response is the same as it always has been (these are our enemies and we must crush them) and not as it must be (a few simple changes to the basic philosophy of Microsoft such as treating customers as a valued resource and actually offering more value for an upgrade to convince people to buy it rather than schemes to force an upgrade down people's throats) then they simply will not survive.
Another interesting quote: Munich "reinforces for us that we operate in a very competitive marketplace," says Maggie Wilderotter, Microsoft senior vice president of business strategy. Holy shit! Did we really hear that from a Microsoft vice president? I have the feeling this time Microsoft really means it, as opposed to press just for the benefit of the DoJ.
And one more interesting quote (I promise, last one): Should its desktop software sales stagnate or, worse, decline, Microsoft's profit could plummet, and it could find itself with a diminished ability to bankroll promising, but costly, new ventures, such as tablet PCs, smart phones and online video games.
Oh, bullshit! This has been standard partyline from every monopoly since Standard Oil; the world will be a poorer place if Microsoft doesn't make all that money! Truth is, if those "promising, but costly, new ventures" are valid, they will be funded and produced. If they re invalid, not even all of Microsoft billions wil be able to make them profitable. And I find it real hard to believe that a company with cash reserves larger than most countries' GNPs cannot bankroll just about anything they want, even if all revenue stopped tomorrow.
$35 Mil. for 14,000 desktops comes to $2,500 per desktop. If it is only for software upgrades, even if you include training costs, it seems pretty high. Unless they are rewriting all of the Win32 apps to work on Linux, in which case it might not be enough (175 apps to port).
Munich ''reinforces for us that we operate in a very competitive marketplace,'' says Maggie Wilderotter, Microsoft senior vice president of business strategy.
Linux was started from a foundation in a *nix tradition three decades long, granted. How it grows and adapts is one of the interesting things about it. Whether the tradition overtakes the creation, or the creation can evolve, will also be interesting to see. We'll all be using/interfacing with who-knows-what 20 years from now at any rate.
Thank you for the information on the differences between WinFS and JFS. WinFS does really sound like a good system. Very enlightening. Finding files and searching metadata would be well improved in such a system. I had read about how JFS helps in data recovery, but hadn't considered the implications for a database-oriented filesystem. I see the concept would have innovative uses for netowrk filesystems, and would work well with active directory.
Did you read the article. It was a big point. they wanted to upgrade on their own schedule and not microsoft's.
War is necrophilia.
I think Germany can take credit for being the first country to understand the true implications of SCO vs IBM and properly shut them up. Throwin pie isn't as classy as getting an injunction to stop the FUD.
-
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
$36.6 million, 14000 desktops. That's $2614.29 a piece. WTF? I don't care if MS was going to do the install themselves, it's still not worth $2614.29 a pop (unless there's on hell of a service contract, which I doubt). That's monopolistic pricing if I ever saw it. And this is when Microsoft's in a position where they've been force to bargin. I don't even what to think about what they'd be doing to Munich right now if there was no alternatives, and I guess neither does Munich.
You can't do things like this to your customers and expect them to ever trust you again. They'll jump ship the first chance they get.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Guess this guy doesnt get out much ....
Most people (Judge Jackson included) get emotional and condemn Microsoft summarily, without giving them credit where due. Here's a little guide, how to treat MS fairly:
.Net, and tell us why your losy mktg team removed the .Net brand from seeral products."
1. When throwing an egg, ensure it's a golden egg.
2. Don't say Windoze sucks. Be specific. Say "Windows 95 is fast, but doesn't have USB. Win98 sucks bad, no security. WinNT4 is actually good - no wonder you withdrew support. Win2K supports USB, but breaks a lot of code. Win2K also gives us useless DRM. WinXP Home sucks, and doen't include networking. WinXP PRo sucks bigtime - lots of Spyware, builtin lousy fiewall, builtin DRM enabled CD writing s/w etc..........."
3. Don't say ".Net is complex" Say instead " Please explain
and so on... Be fair to them - they spend $5bn every year for R&D, generate lots of Linux jobs,make more people hate the US by their attitude and behavior, etc. Praise them for all this.
Peace.
-
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
I'm sure a regional government is under more scrutiny than a publicly owned company. Also, if shareholders cast out the Exec. every time a company took an MS offer over a rival one that is 50% cheaper (eg Linux) no CEO would be in his job for very long...
I also very much doubt MS will go to the WTO, seeing they would lose any number of bids if they somehow forced everyone to go for the lowest price. There are many factors affecting what IT solution you choose for your organization, and price is just one of them.
Also, what makes you think Redhat was "not considered"? Surely it is up to them to respond to the public tender. Besides, I'm not sure Redhat Germany has the resources to provide support and services for a project this big. For Linux in Germany IBM + SuSE is probably hard to beat. Besides, IBM is not a german company last time i checked...
You know that Microsoft Germanys is placed in or at least very near to Munich?
IAAL
That's a good point. What I am wondering and is not in the article is how satisfied the Munich' users were with the MS NT systems they used for a long time. This must have played a role in the decision-making.
-- Cheers!
Country?! This isn't the federal government, it's the city administration of Munich, as you might have gathered from the article the federal government is in the process of reaching a sweatheart deal with Microfoft.
Anyway, Munich isn't really in Germany proper anyway, it's in Bavaria :p
Better to be despised for too anxious apprehensions, than ruined by too confident a security. --Edmund Burke
The city paid MUCH more money to IBM/SuSE because they didn't want to be locked into Microsoft's refusal to support/insistence on upgrading their software after X number of years. Linux let them upgrade when they wanted to, and not before. It was a long-term financial decision which, I'm certain, IBM and SuSE emphasized heavily in order to score a win.
I think plain cold reality also played a part.. Think about the two options
a) Pay 25 Millions to Microsoft, most of the money goes to the US, and ends up in shareholders pockets or as stockoptions for employees over there.
b) Pay 36 millions to SuSE, all of the money stayes in Germany and ends up as salary of lots of people. And when you calculate the multiplier factor of this money for the economy, it becomes an even bigger +
Now, let's say you're a German politician, what would you do ? (Apart from canceling your summer holiday in Italy :-)
echo '[q]sa[ln0=aln80~Psnlbx]16isb572CCB9AE9DB03273snlbxq' |dc
it happened in belgium. just before or after bill g. went to see the flemish minister. :P (and it could in fact be an italian, that i'm not sure of)
the guy who did it has nothing against bill g., he does it to every famous person he can get his pie on
On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
So if it solves your problem, use it. If it doesn't, don't use it.
The problem is, that the existing environment is end of life, dead, zilch, nix, nada! by 2004. Actually it's worse with our "trustworthy computer" friends from Redmond, who actually decline to deliver a service pack for a security vulnerability on a supported platform.
Even though if an old, unsupported platform does the job, Munich (or any business or community of a certain size for that matter) is not in a position to use it: period.
Just imagine how the press is shredding you into bits, if you just lost the entire tax records of your citizens. It's completely irrelevant if the reason is NT or not, the fact that the platform was unsupported is enough to get a lot of people tarred, featherd and flogged out of town.
Sheesh, some people here really seem to believe that a mission critical environment can be supported with a copy of Win 95, a welding iron and a MCSE. Either that or you are just a troll who should go away.
There is no need to thank me.
ich bin der musikant
mit taschenrechner in der hand
kraftwerk
At least there's one government with a vision for the future!!! As a non-German with German parents, I am EXTREMELY proud to have German heritage because of such actions taken by the German government (albeit Munich). I admire any government that is willing to stand up to such pressures to adopt a better long term solution. I wish I could have this much pride for my own government (who said Weapons of Mass Deception??)
There was a flawed logic that I didn't see mentioned elsewhere...
Even if the licenses for products were extended for 6 years for Germany, it wouldn't mean much. In two years everyone else would have moved on and Germany would be stuck with an outdated, crusty and most importantly ---INCOMPATIBLE--- Office Suite. They could not exchange documents with anyone because as we all know, Microsoft accidentally forget to implement backward compatibility.
I agree with most people that I would not want to be locked into a proprietary product that only continues to cause me grief.
I personally have had a strong hate relationship with Microsoft Office since Office 97 came out (ie. all version since Office 95). Maybe it's something in my blood (other than my overwhelming sense of pain in the butt stubbornness).
Now whose the next government to stand up to the school bully???
AC
Offering the same price to everyone, but suddenly giving a huge discount if someone is considering or has been buying from a competitor reeks of the Standard Oil days when they would go around and find everyone who got supplies from independent oil companies, then offer those people a ridiculously low rate until the small company had gone out of business, instantly eliminating the discounts of course.
I'm afraid you didn't quite understand one of the nice advantages of open source software. if you want support you can buy it from anyone, not only from one company.
You could even hire someone to support OSS for 10 years or your own IT department could learn the necessary skills and you're completely free to do whatever you like.
Some people just love being free and are willing to shell out some bucks for it
is that they will be using OpenOffice instead of MS Office on 14k PC's. That should really worry Microsoft as a lot of users will be getting used to documents not ending in .doc
The battle will be won the day MS will be forced to add OpenOffice filters to MS Office due to customer demand.
Linux, linux, linux... really?
Follow the money. This is about one company beating another in an important deal. The winner here is IBM, who have promised Munich a better deal than Microsoft was able to deliver.
Linux is IBM's (not so) secret weapon, the product they can push as a Windows killer.
Don't forget that for many large institutions and their IT departments, Microsoft is somewhat of an annoying upstart that caused havoc by giving tools like Excel and Access to people who then broke the back of centralized IT. IBM represents the comforting security of Big Iron, and with Linux, Big Iron that is Definitely Hip.
This is a victory for Linux, but before we all do a dance of joy for freedom and the GPL, remember that this is about money and power and IBM, the company that taught Microsoft everything they needed about monopolies, customer extortion, and unfair competition.
There is no reason to believe that this is not also the future of an IBM that once again gains a dominant position in corporate IT.
If there is one crucial device that will keep Linux alive it is the GPL, which is a beautifully designed poison pill against corporate takeovers of free software. Richard Stallman, thanks again!
Ceci n'est pas une signature
There has been some heavy duty German investment in municipalising Unix (there are companies that are dedicated to selling into local government). There are parts of Linux that are visibly German (i.e., local projects) and the system is *seen* to be largely European with a reasonable bit of German. Actually, it really is international, but it can be said to be more European/German than MS Windows/Office.
Regrettably, Frankfurt, although broke, will be staying with Windows for the time being.
See my journal, I write things there
His name is Noël Godin and he is Belgian := UTF -8&q=No%C3%ABl+godin
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe
Hi DU,
..., it is an non-diagnosable disease, you know many of US have it.
You are closer to correct, I think. Thank you for the spelling lesson. I checked, though I could not locate either "slutie" or "slutty". I believe, that the double-T is perhaps correct and any "Y/why" could cause an expectation of an "i.e. (Id est [that is])" mistake. Then again maybe [ie=y**3] in some instances, and being dyslectic at time I feel totally confused in a text editor with no spell-check or dictionary handy.
Now in Marry Old England (Middle English = slutte [not my ie]), but I am a US Citizen, it is today, and I suspect that I really should have used a "Y", sort of like in the adverb sluttishly. Also, nither the noun sluttishness nor the adjective sluttish uses "ie", but all three require the double-T. Today, I used the very prudish "Microsoft Word" application, would you believe that all "Slut" type words are identified as spelling errors.
Anyway, I am sure, we both know more about words (maybe grammar too) intent, and concepts than the "Microsoft Word" applications. I mean Microsoft is just a business institution without a brain and incapable of thought, feelings, and ethics.
Well, I could continue to torture you for correcting my spelling, but too much enjoyment is an evil thing. SO SPOKE THE MORAL MAJORITY, right after Religious Fat Cats Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell praised and supported the terrorist attack on the NYC World Trade Center, by saying (http://lundissimo.info/wtc/falwell.html) Jerry said, "God continues to lift the curtain and allow the enemies of America to give us probably what we deserve." Pat Robertson replied, "Jerry, that's my feeling." Sort of looks like the real evil false profits [AKA: Moral Majority] have always been in the USA and are very happy to receive donations for their political/global agenda and see American Citizens die by the thousands (maybe millions). Sheep that call themselves Christians will follow those sheepherders straight to hell.
See, I even have fun changing topics
OldHawk777
Reality is a self-induced hallucination.
Unaccountable leaders are masters, and unrepresented people are slaves. How do US and EU fare?
> David Burger says ...
<homer>Hum... Burger... Aaaaaaaaaarrrggllllllll...</homer>
Hi, When I was in Munich last weekend, I came out of an underground garage in Schwabing (party central :) to find a politcal clapboard bearing the slogan "Mehr Linux, Mehr Freiheit" Which literally translated means, "More Linux, More Freedom." I wondered for a split second what "Linux" meant in German, before realising it must actually mean Linux, because Linux is, well, Linux... :)
I think it was for Christinne Stobl, name rings a bell.
If you're inclined to view it, walk to the bottom of the street near the bottom of LeopoldStrasse, (the one with "Mama's kebap haus" Mc D's, "Schwabinger 7" and the internet cafe. Turn left at the 'net cafe and walk to the car park (100 meteres of so) you'll see it there, (if they haven't removed it already) not sure when the elections are, and Bavarians are a very "tidy" bunch :)
later
jb
Did you read what I wrote? There was no competition for Linux on the issue of freedom. Get it?
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
Windows stood up better, company claims
By INQUIRER staff: Wednesday 04 June 2003, 11:47
A UK BASED security firm claimed today that digital attacks on Web sites using the Linux operating system have reached an all-time high over the last three months.
British firm mi2g claimed that Windows based servers were more resilient from March to May for corporate and government systems.
It issued figures saying that the reason for the vulnerabilities was down to improperly configured systems, lack of a "trustworthy" computing initiative, and corporations choosing Linux because of its cost but not costing in technical support overheads.
?In May this year, 19,208 successful breaches were recorded against Linux based systems, compared to 3,801 against MS Windows based systems, it claimed. Both the USA and the UK were most attacked during the three months which included the Iraq war.
SIX times as many security breaches on Linux as on Windows! And this despite the fact that there are far more Windows installations than linux installations worldwide!
WOW!
Where are the linux clowns who claim that linux is secure again?
And what are they smoking?
Wasn't it in a German magazine that Microsoft ran those ads a couple years ago that had the penguins morphed with other animal parts to illustrate just how evil Linux is?
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
SANTIAGO -(Dow Jones)- A consortium including Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) has won the right to build and operate the Chilean state purchasing Internet portal, Chilecompras.cl, the finance ministry said over the weekend.
The consortium also includes Spanish utility Union Fenosa SA's (E.FEN) Soluziona unit and local software companies Sonda and Iconstruye.
"The decision will be made official in the coming days in a written notification to the company," the ministry added.
The consortium beat bids by telecommunications company Empresa Nacional de Telecomunicaciones SA (E.ENT) and electronic commerce company Artikos, a Banco de Chile SA (BCH) unit.
It will provide software, hardware, telecommunications and other equipment necessary to set up and operate the system, the ministry said.
Public bidding is compulsory for state purchases above some $43,000. Annually, Chilean state purchasing runs at around $7 billion, according to information on Chilecompras' web site.
Microsoft wanted $36,600,000 for the city to keep using Microsoft products - after microsoft pulled the support rug out from under them - except that they have to upgrade their OS to the newest offering, as Microsoft has decided they will no longer support the OS they originally sold them. Seems to me that, if Microsoft can decide to EOL a platform and stop supporting it before the official EOL date (as they did when they refused to create/release a security patch for NT), then any large user would be foolish to purchase their product without contracts in place limiting Microsofts' options - does anyone really think Microsoft will agree to that?
So Microsoft sold Munich a software bundle based on NT for some $$$. I am assuming it was millions of dollars, probably tens of millions. Now Microsoft won't i.e., choses not to support that platform - and it is propriatary software, so no one else can either and wants $36,600,000 more. Except there is now a competitor, so they reduce their profit (from 80%) and eventually get to $23,700,000. (1. Competition is GOOD for the consumer - 35% off in this case, 2. Propriatary software is BAD for the consumer - in this case it is the reason Munich has to spend $20-$30 million after ALREADY BUYING A SOFTWARE SOLUTION FROM MICROSOFT.)
I don't think Microsoft should have to support a platform forever - or even any longer than their contracts require or they are legally obligated. But the consumer should be allowed to chose between options - including support - which they can not do when they choose Microsoft OS.
I am running Redhat Linux, distribution 8.0, but have compiled the kernel - the source code is included in the basic install - with only the options I need. I have updated the kernel several times, and have updated binaries and compiled apps from source code. My computer is running the latest stable kernel version, and if a new version is released tomorrow, I can be running the newer version within hours. I don't have to wait for a large company with many other things - including making a profit occupying its' attention.
I can choose to upgrade to a later Redhat distribution. I can, if I choose to, stay with the current distribution, but update the kernel. I can, if I want, get support from Redhat or, again if I so choose get support from another vendor. These are not, with the exception of the first option, choices available if I am using Microsoft Windows.
Have mod points so posting anon!
By Paul Hales: Wednesday 16 July 2003, 16:54
n do ws_server_2003_approaching_100000_active_sites_800 0_sites_switch_from_linux.html
FIGURES FROM NETCRAFT show that Microsoft's Windows Server 2003 is replacing Linux on many servers, making gains that will please Microsofties engaged in a war on the Open Source operating system.
A number of sites were seen to be switching to Server 2003 before its official launch but, in the three months since the launch the number of active sites has increased by over 300 per cent, Netcraft reckons, and now stands at 88,400. And around 8,000 of these have sitched from Linux, as Netcraft shows here.
http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2003/07/15/wi
Redmond strikes back!
Actually "microsoft hating" is more accurate than your unsubtle suggestion that it's some kind of xenophobic "buy German" campaign.
... not much. These kinds of deals are all about support.
IBM actually has a huge presence in Germany -- in Stuttgart where I lived they were one of the biggest employers. I'm sure IBM had a big part to play in the deal.
And nationality aside, What is Red Hat's presence in Germany compared to SuSe's
Judging from the press coverage in Munich, to the degree that non-business considerations came into play at all, open-source advocacy actually had a much bigger role than nationality.
First of all, nearly every single one of these CAN be run FOR FREE on Windows! I have run many of them myself.
Second, what about the hidden cost of Linux? Many people are switching to Linux and are reporting even MORE problems as they don't put the proper extra effort into securing their systems because they thought that Linux was secure by default like "everyone" says it is?
Linux attacks are up 6 FOLD in recent months because of the added Linux user bases. Where is the security? Well it's not in Linux that's for sure...
Many of these people that do these switches have simply no idea what they are getting into. Many have switched back. But that is never reported in Slashdot...
From today's Microsoft eranings statement: "Server Platforms had strong revenue growth of 17% compared to the fourth quarter of last year, fueled by 24% growth in Windows Server(TM) revenue and 34% growth in Microsoft® SQL Server(TM) revenue. In addition, the company reported increasing demand for enterprise editions of its core server products, as customers continue to turn to Microsoft for their mission critical workloads"
linux threat? What linux threat?
So much for all the swagger and hysterical boasts from the linux fanatics about eating Microsoft's lunch. LOL!
Sorry fellas, but Microsoft continues to simply kick butt BIG TIME!
This is the same ridiculous thinking (That's the proven way, let's keep it that way) that's preventing us from going to Mars. Imagine if NASA's contractors to spend money on developing fusion-powered launchers instead of the inefficient but tried and true chemical rockets, we'd have a Mars colony by now.
We need Microsoft's creativity, its willingness to gamble on new technologies, to move our manned space program faster.
If Elon Musk (of Paypal fame) can start his own satellite launching business, imagine what Gates and Ballmer with their billions do for a new space race.
...I would have bought a mac. I wanted powerful, so I bought a windows pc, then started in on linux.
Now, I realize, that I need a mac either way.