Munich to Go Ahead with Linux After All

Saeed al-Sahaf writes "According to Groklaw and the German publication Heise (it's in German, of course) Munich's mayor Christian Ude has held a press conference, in which he said that the bidding process for the switch from Windows to Linux will go forward as originally planned, despite patent issues. InfoWorld (in English), quotes Bernd Plank, a spokesman for Munich town hall, saying that he expected that the administration would take a maximum of 'two to three weeks' to decide whether the EU's Directive on software patents could affect the city's plan to switch to Linux, and that would be no 'dramatic setback.'" We reported this earlier as well, but now that it's making the rounds again in English, more of us can read it without resorting to Babelfish.

Comments

Discounts?

[HexDoll]

Did Microsoft not lower their prices enough at the mention of them going to Linux?

Re:Discounts?

[danidude]

Did Microsoft not lower their prices enough at the mention of them going to Linux?

Maybe there is more in it than just price, ya know...

Re:Discounts?

[thirteenVA]

Actually... they did. They lowered the price considerably on a couple of occasions. However Munich wound up approving the go ahead of a more expensive solution despite the Microsoft price cuts.

Here's the usa today article

Re:Discounts?

[Rude Turnip]

I think it's because Ballmer blurted out at the meeting, "of course you did, you invaded Poland!"

Re:Discounts?

[ackthpt]

Maybe there is more in it than just price, ya know...

IIRC, there was. The Munich government reps who were involved in the decision making were insensed that Microsoft didn't make their best offer when asked the first time, but in steps. I certainly know enough people who would have jumped at Microsoft's offer, but the germans were apparently insulted. There's also the likelihood that they were focused on Long Term TCO rather than short term, which was all Microsoft was really offering them. Look at what's going on with Microsoft since, all the patching (which in recent stories highlights the expense of testing, certifying and accepting patches and understanding their impact on software already in use.)

They're showing uncharacteristic good sense and courage in making such a decision... one would almost be convinced these weren't bureaucrats, but aliens who have taken the place of the bureaucrats.

Re:Discounts?

[Anonymous Coward]

Even though the Linux proposal is more expensive, a lot of that money stays in (i.e. helps) Germany's economy whereas with the Microsoft solution, essentially 100% leaves the country (i.e. enriches Microsoft). Perhaps that had something to do with the decision.

Re:Discounts?

[Izago909]

Maybe city officials realize something that a lot of businesses have yet to discover. Even if the initial investment and TCO of Linux and apps were higher than Windows, the fact that it's all built on open standards leaves the ability to make an easier switch in the future to new hardware and software platforms. Take VAX for example. It's a rock solid platform that can be trusted to run smoothly with little or no intervention. That's why many people still have them in operation today even though there are better applications that can be run on faster hardware. It's also going to be a big problem when the time comes for migration. Emulators for VAX have been mentioned on here before. With open standards, Linux won't have near the trouble when it comes time to migrate to new hardware architectures, different apps, or different operating systems. It's fairly easy to port apps between BSD, Linux, and other Unix variants. Future emulation probably won't be an issue once a total switch has been made. Basically, if it's a computer, Linux can be tailor made to run on it. Once the OS is ported, apps will follow. As for the apps themselves, instead of saving your documents as proprietary files, you have an open standard so you can easily move files between different applications without worring about compatability or licensing issues. To sum it up in one sentence: Linux offers a trustworthy migration path even with an unclear vision of what the future holds.

No fish?

[general_re]

...now that it's making the rounds again in English, more of us can read it without resorting to Babelfish.

What the hell fun is that?

--------------

City Munich continues Linux migration

Despite legal ambiguity and continuous fears of a patent war approximately around open SOURCE of Munich wants to start mayor Christian Ude the bidding procedure for the re-equipment of the Desktops in the city administration on free software. This announced the SPD politician on today's Wednesday on a press conference in the city hall. The Prozedere is brought to the active migration phase of the LiMux project after a "pause for thought by few days" in course, gave to Ude with well one week delay green light for the introduction . An appraisal and the participant competition should be final up to the autumn. If a conversion to Linux appears then harmless, can be begun immediately with the Bieterverfahren. In any case one however wants to remain the city with its confession to Linux: "it remains with the fact that the city Munich decided for open SOURCE."

Ude announced that the city will give a legal opinion for clarifying to the question in order, which effects the disputed European Union guideline to the patenting barness of "computer-implemented inventions" in its present version of the Council of Ministers have could. Of the Federal Government Ude information required, why she had votiert in Brussels at all for a change before good of the version of the directive which was called by the European parliament. If one wants to promote to Berlin of far open SOURCE projects, how from the Federal Department of Justice week passed stresses again , one must create right security for the public and private expenditures also. Furthermore Ude requested other cities, municipalities and authorities, which work on Linux migrations, to the shoulder conclusion with Munich -- the argumentation residents of Munich of the city head and the demands on the Federal Government submitted the city equivalent again in writing therefore .

With the temporary stop of the LiMux advertisement the residents of Munich city administration at the beginning of of August had fed the continuous debate over software patents and the lining up Brussels legislation on an expanded summer high floated -- in addition, doubts about the feasibility of the Linux re-equipment. Also the camp of the proponents of free software was in disagreement itself in the estimate of the concrete danger for the residents of Munich of migration plans. In a pointed reaction to the interruption of the project the Free warned software Foundation Europe ( FSFE ) and the LinuxTag e.V. Beginning of the week again together before the abuse of software patents "for psychological war guidance" in the economy.

"at present mechanisms from the cold war are adapted for the keeping by interests of enterprise", echauffierte themselves olive Zendel, chairman of the LinuxTags. The principle of the atomic deterrence is replaced by armament by Patentportfolios, while other companies nonaggression treaties would lock by a Kreuzlizenzierung of the own patents. Wrong-basic are thereby "programmers, small and medium-size enterprises and thus the economic situation Europe." Disturbingly to it above all, supplemented FSFE president is George Greve that do not even need to be prozessiert: "a confused rumor is completely sufficient, in order to bring a complex and complex project for days from the trace. It would be interesting to compute the economical damage."

The residents of Munich city administration does not see so far under any circumstances eliminated the fears of the open SOURCE scene despite the appeasement attempts from the Ministry of Justice. It has a number of open questions listed, approximately after long-term investment security for LiMux estimated approximately 30 million euro, after appearing a patent flood in the software range, itself the complaint waves and its consequences for the innovation strength of the economy,

Linux in munich

[bunburyist]

The more organizations deploy Linux, the lower the cost will become for further deployments. For example Munich will use VMWare while slowly porting their special Win-only software to Linux.
The next generation will do without VMWare and will lower the cost to migrate to Linux.
Oh, and I might add that 5 cities in Bavaria are also thinking in joining Munich directly.
Also, in 3-4 years, if any hardware company will want to sell hardware to Europe or Asia, it will have to provide Linux drivers which will be beneficial for ALL Linux users.

Re:Linux in munich

[4of12]

The more organizations deploy Linux, the lower the cost will become for further deployments.

Not only will a sizable deployment of Munich office workers using Linux reduce the transition costs of future organizations migrating to Linux (that is, applications evolve more into what people are used to from Windows), but it will also help drive further improvements in the quality of Linux applications and tools (we want this new feature added to this Linux application).

Munich could very easily be the first leak in what could turn into a torrential migration.

Every day that goes by, the costs of migration away from Windows go down and the benefits of migration to Linux go up.

Re:Linux in munich

[chris_mahan]

There is another factor.

The germans are generally considered to produce the finest things in the world on a technological standpoint. They also recognize the finest things, technologically. People all over the world (and there are) know this.

I contend that while Linux may cost more than windows in TCO, it is a better investment because it is a better, more reliable product.

Not to mention that a lot more money stays in the country when linux is used, and that always affect the elected ones.

Re:Why

[superpulpsicle]

Most countries around the world are not flooded with lawyers like it is here in the U.S. Depending on your perspective, there is a good and a bad. According to slashdot, mostly bad.

FAQ and popular errors

[Eloquence]

Before you bring up some of the standard arguments in defense of software patents, please read the FAQ. There is a lot more good analysis in that section. For an easier to understand example of how software patents affect real world applications - a big reason many small businesses oppose them - look at the webshop demo.

Die microsoft die

[marika]

It's german.

Don't pop the champagne quite yet...

[jimicus]

All they're doing is re-opening the bidding process. Not the actual migration.

From TFA:

Mayor Ude, who said he's been thinking it over for a few days, says there will be a legal study completed by Autumn concerning the migration, and if it looks safe, they will go forward and meanwhile the bidding begins.

With any luck, this will crystallise the issues surrounding software patents more clearly in Euro MPs minds and make them think about more than Microsoft et al's bottom line. Indeed, looks like Munich is really pushing that bit:

He also announced that the city is going to request a legal study on the question of what consequences the EU-directive on the patentability of "computer-implemented inventions" will have in the current version of the Council of Ministers's proposed law.

(All emphasis mine)

green party is for open source

[i_should_be_working]

i forgot where i read this, probably linux today or here at slashdot. but apparently the guy who stalled the linux implementation because of the patent problem is in the Green Party which is very much for open source and against software patents.
the article suggests that stopping the linux roll out and citing software patents as a roadblock was a way to wake up the government and public to get them to see why software patents is a bad idea

Re:green party is for open source

[Elektroschock]

Call it a auto-da-fe Public relations of the Limux project. They didn't expect the media reaction in Munich, so they cooled it down. They didn't want to spread FUD about the Limux oproject, they wanted to say that software patents are dangerous for them and cause costs. They wanted to urge the German Government to stop software patents.

Even FFII was surprised about Munich's initial press release, Hartmut Pilch wrote:

We were surprised by the announcement of Wilhelm Hoegner and the mayor. I learnt from both only through the media.
Yet I think their message is exactly to the point.

Municipalities must assess the risk caused by software patents. Some government authorities in Sweden and the UK have already seen themselves forced to litigate against frivolous software patent claims in order to retain their freedom to do basic day-to-day business. Interestingly, in these cases there was no Linux or free software involved. Yet, it can not be denied that solutions supplied by local SMEs on the basis of free software, as envisaged by Munich's IT strategy, involve greater patent risks than a contract with a single big supplier such as IBM or Microsoft. In any case it is the normal procedure to try to assess the risk and insure it, be it through the supplier or through a separate insurance. Recent estimates from the US suggest that such a patent insurance could cost more than 100,000 eur per year. The costs would be very similar in Europe, if the Council's political agreement, for which the German government and other national governments have been fighting, became law. If, on the other hand, the European Parliament's version of the directive was adopted, the risk would drop to zero.

It is a good exercise for municipal governments to estimate patent risks in terms of insurance costs, and it would be an even better exercise for national governments to start serious assessment of the effects of legislation. No such calculation has to date been made, in spite of regular calls from Brussels to do so -- not to speak of calls from FFII to calculate the macro-economic costs of the various legislative options. The message from the Munich's mayor is therefore timely and should be heeded by other municipalities and governments, regardless of whether they plan to deploy free operating systems or not.

Linux Community Support

[Bandit0013]

I hope for Linux's sake that the community gives Munich some special attention/aid if they decide to migrate and that whoever they have doing the migration knows what they're doing.

Imagine the field day Microsoft will have if the project goes over budget or outright fails!

I still say you have to throw the cost argument right out the window though. In the end, organizations will pay a premium for quality support/service and applications that play nice together easily. That is the biggest challenge Linux has to overcome before it can truly stand toe to toe with Microsoft.

Re:Linux Community Support

[Anonymous Coward]

The switch is mostly in the hands of SuSE/Novell and IBM. For them, this is a showcase project. If they can pull it off there, they can expect a lot of followup business.

I guess they'll do their best, whatever that is :)

This might be political?!?

[michaelzhao]

With the trouble the US has had with Europe, this very well might be political. Microsoft is a very big US company and switching from Microsoft to identityless software may improve the mood of some Europeans. This is not a unfounded belief. Korea-Japan-China initiative to develop an alternative OS was to depend less on the US software industry. The result was Red Flag Linux.

Re:Why

[Wolfbone]

"I'm not a fan of software patents, but if I did spend good money in getting one, it was made useless/unenforcable, and I didn't get a refund, I think I'd be rather pissed off about it."

Then you should have read Article 52 of the EPC which explicitly excludes software patentability. The companies that have been granted software patents by the EPO are mostly the same companies now lobbying for legislation to make valid their patents. They knew the score. They have gambled. They will lose. Tough.

there are no patent issues

[dekeji]

That's like the question "when did you stop beating your wife?", which simply plants the idea in everybody's head that the person questioned did, in fact, beat his wife.

The fact is that Linux does not have any more or less "patent issues" than any other OS: nobody who develops software and has good legal advice will try to do background searches on patents. Instead, the rational thing to do is to develop the software and then see who complains. As a result, just about every major piece of software infringes on lots of patents.

Given that Linux source code is out in the open, any patent holder who believes that their patent is being infringed can complain, and as soon as they do, the infringing code will be removed from Linux and life will go on.

Asia

[Anonymous Coward]

Everyone's focused on Europe and America. The battle of MSFT and SCOX and patent.

Not paying any attention to China and Korea. China has the man (and woman) power to develop and manufacture their own processors. And they're already switching over to Red Flag. At some point, companies on both sides will have to exchange documents in a format that is intra-compatible. More than likely, American companies will convert their documents to something the Chinese can use, negating MSFT Office's proprietary format. The only way MSFT could combat this, directly and in their current spirit, is by not allowing conversions from within Office or Windows.

I honestly believe China will bail us out of this whole mess. Just give them a bit more time; they're industrious people.

Obvious arm twisting.

[Anonymous Coward]

What a transparent attempt to get cheaper GPL licensing terms from Stallman and the FSF!

Germany probably demanded something extreme, like perpetual access to source code.

Re:Gun, foot, bang. Ouch!

[LibrePensador]

Insightful, my ass.

This was incredibly smart as they are now producing a legal report that the goverment will have to act upon, thus derailing the European directive to approve software patents as unanimity is likely to be needed on the Commission.

They have not admitted to the existence of any patents that affect Linux, but rather have stated that it is a troubling issue that needs to be examined.

This was very shrewed. They raised public awareness, will get the city's legal department to produce a patent-unfriendly report which will be elevated to the German national government, which will then adopt a no-patents European position at the Comission.

The trees not letting you see the forest?