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Vista Licensing Speeds Linux Move

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the here-comes-the-discount dept.

Stephen Samuel writes "Australia's NSW Office of State Revenue is speeding it's transition to a Linux desktop due in part to a lackluster interest in Microsoft's attempt to lock them into the Software Assurance Program, reports LinuxWorld. The agency's CIO and manager of client services both confirmed they would start scoping for a move to a Linux desktop within six months. Manager Pravash Babhoota seemed satisfied with a Linux move in their back office, citing Linux costs as being just over 1/6 the projected cost of a Windows upgrade, while processing doubled."

3 of 257 comments (clear)

  1. Mass. says the same thing about MS Office by P0ldy · · Score: 3, Informative
    TFA:
    the back-end switch to open source had cost 17 percent of what a proprietary upgrade had been costed at

    Similarly the Massachusetts Technology Leadership Council on the OpenDocument format mentioned the "cost of a Windows upgrade" if they wanted to upgrade to the next Office version instead of using something that supported an open format. They said that:

    If we were going to go through a migration, my understand of the new Office 12 is that it will not run on Windows 2000, therefore that migration will require a change in desktop operating system, as well as the office application suite itself. We don't know what the pricing of that might be. I've also been told, although I don't have direct experience, that the interface is changing significantly with Office 12. That will obviously create training needs for us within the state. If you compare the operating system upgrading cost--and of course we can only estimate it by prior experience, the upgrade cost for Microsoft Office--we can only estimate that by prior experience, the training intensity--we can only estimate that by prior experience, and probably some necessary hardware upgrades; we believe that an upgrade for us for, to go to that migration, if that were the choice, would be on the order of about 50 million dollars. And we estimate that the cost of going--if we were to go, for example, this is ONLY hypothetical--to OpenOffice, the cost with training and everything else would be on the order of about 5 million dollars. So, there's about a ten-times differential.

    Bold mine. I would like to point out for background info that they said they are running mostly Win2k and Office 2003, and that they wanted to state "vehemently" that they didn't want cost to be made into an issue.

  2. Microsoft committing corporate suicide by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    I, for one, welcome our new overlord Tux.

    Thank you Microsoft, as you push more and more customers away, hardware manufacturers will be providing more and more support for open-source driver development - unhindered by DRM, even! :)

    I used to be a Microsoft fanatic. Hell, I used to WORK for Microsoft! While I was no stranger to Linux (I ran it back when it was just a floppy-based installation and if you wanted X you had to FTP and compile it yourself) my job obviously required the use of Windows (Duh, working for Satan, you have to use his OS). When I moved on during the dot-com boom thinking that other tech companies' stock options would fare better (STUPID decision on my part. I worked for two dot-coms who tanked) I quit running Linux for a while. It wasn't until Microsoft began to outright attack their own customers (Suing college students for reselling unopened software after Microsoft refused to honor their unconditional 30-day money-back guarantee, suing customers who resell used but retired software license, and hell, even suing customers when they choose competitors' products) that I began to look seriously at Linux again, and when I began testing various distros last year I was shocked awed at how much and how quickly is matured. I use Linux 99.9% of the time now. I only use Windows to pull photos off of my cellphone, and to play an occasional game of Return to Castle Wolfenstein.

    I still consider Windows to be an excellent tool for most average users, but I have been moving more toward recommending Linux to non-gamers. OOo has matured, and while its file I/O still sucks, it is usable for 99% of users, and what's more, when they come home to {write term papers/draft business plans/write proposals/edit small flyers} Linux and OOo won't hinder them in the least, and most user-friendly commercial distros of Linux are under $100, and to get the equivalent amount and calibur of software for Windows would be anywhere from $20K on up.

    Microsoft you're shooting yourselves in the foot, and with every suit you file against a customer choosing a competitor's product, you're gaining bad press and driving thousands more away. With every bit you tighten the noose on your licensing scheme, you're driving more and more schools, municipalities, and large corporations away from your product line entirely, from desktops to workstations to servers.

    Keep it up, and you'll go the way of SCO in a few years.

  3. Re:I can see it now... by slashflood · · Score: 5, Informative
    Always the same post: The guy is called ClintJCL: one of his posts. You can find the same post in his blog, but he says, that he just copied it from /.. Some research at Google reveals a lot about this guy.