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Maine To Skip Vista, Go Directly To Windows 7
Preedit writes "The State of Maine is the latest organization to skip Windows Vista, which has been a near-disaster for Microsoft. An internal state document (dated September 15) uncovered by Infoweek reveals that Maine will not be upgrading its more than 11,000 personal computing devices from XP to Vista — ever. Instead, it's going to wait until Windows 7 ships in 2010 and hope for the best. The news is in line with a survey that shows only 4% of businesses in the UK have upgraded to Vista, the story notes. So much for that $300 million Seinfeld campaign." A commenter on the article makes the point that Maine's signing an enterprise software license with Microsoft means that Redmond doesn't really lose out on this deal; it simply allows the state to upgrade its equipment and software on its own time.
Maine has been pretty interesting in the tech field lately. Recently we told RIAA to go pound sand in their ass. Now the State is making a choice to make the best choices (as they see) concerning their upgrade cycle.
This won't actually harm Microsoft in any way but it will save Maine some money in that they won't need to work on re-training people for Vista while they wait for the upgrade to Windows 7.
As the State is currently using Windows XP (and some old Win2k servers still) they should be able to continue some level of support for the remainder of this period assuming that there aren't any major delays with Windows 7. It will be interesting to see what happens.
As a side note, I just was up and across the mountain tops in the Height of the Land checking out the foliage. Once the Sun came out it was pretty vibrant. We cheated and cut across through Byron to Weld and then took 142 back down into Phillips getting out of the tourist areas. It was a nice trip, if you're in Maine and want to see the foliage than today might have been your best shot for this area.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
In the coming flood of OS conversion, shove as much Linux or BSD down their throat as you can. This is an opening that the Open Source community cannot afford to miss.
'nuff said
Wait- Microsoft can't get people to install their flagship product, even though they've already paid for it, and the commenter's point is that this isn't bad for Microsoft?
Hilarious.
"Be light, stinging, insolent and melancholy"
Wow another shitty flamebait story about Vista.
When will slashdot editors start skipping them?
I do think its great that states are turning down the pointless upgrade and saving some money, but they make it sound like there was no other choice. Seriously is Windows really the only OS out there? If Windows is posing such a problem that you cant even upgrade it cause its so bad why not upgrade AWAY from Windows... I just dont get it.
... and that point is when Microsoft has successfully convinced hardware makers to not create Windows XP device drivers for their new hardware. This is already starting to happen. Soon, you may not have a Windows XP option of any kind when buying new hardware.
I work for an organization which decided several years ago not to upgrade its windows 2000 PCs
to XP. because the win 2000 worked and the IT staff new it well and the upgrade was expensive, show we thought we would just wait a bit for longhorn.
Now in 2008 we are still with win 2000 on many thousnds of PCs and are basiclly forced to "upgrade" to Vista.
Vista is a crummy system, but you never know what comes next?
not that its going to happen in my workplace, but I am all for moving to Linux desktop for at least most workers.
Me.
Microsoft has truly lost its tracks during last 5 years.
Most of their new operating systems have been home-customer-directed teletubby-like interfaces for home-users.
Yet, 90% of Microsoft customers are corporate. Corporate customers don't care about aero or some fancy gui transparency.
Corporate customers want OS that looks and performs like windows 2000, is as secure as XP and doesn't cause excess load on their IT departments.
Vista and Office 2007 both failed miserabely with these requirements.
Office 2007 is being adopted since openoffice isn't ready just yet, but vista can be skipped since XP is good enough for 90% purposes.
Next 5 years, we'll see microsoft plummetting and losing its track even more, while linux and apple keeps gaining it's lost market share.
Once they realize they've truly lost it and try to regain monopoly, they come up with some system which is advanced enough to fulfill needs of customers for next 5 years.
Sadly, vista nor windows 7 will be that system and we corporate windows sysadmins are screw'd.
F* you microsoft for destroying my liver, since alcohol seems to be the only proper way to deal with your shit on daily basis.
There are no atheists when recovering from tape backup.
^^ did I miss a meeting or something?
We went from NT to XP, skipping 2000, and we're gonna go from XP to 7, skipping Vista.
Servers have also done the same jump, from NT to 2003 and from 2003 to Win 7 Server edition.
We do make money out of it, though, unlike Maine.
Is Maine known particulary for it's foliage? It seems a rather odd thing to comment on. (By foliage you mean the leaves on the trees turning autumnal?)
Little do they know that Windows 7 will be based on Windows Vista, in contradiction to all the nice ("completely new codebase") promises made...
I suffer from attention surplus disorder.
Why believe that Windows 7 will be better? Wasn't that the promise of Vista?
MS has not delivered its promised features so many times that it makes no sense to believe that Windows 7 will be any different.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
Hell yeah. People come from across the globe to see it. Giant buses go through, people drive, people fly in and rent. Maine has potatoes, trees, lobster, fish, and tourists. Most of our income (it would appear) is from tourism and the foliage season is one of the better ones as they come in, rent a hotel, drive around without consuming many of the natural resources, and then leave having deposited their dollars to visit what would have been there anyhow.
http://mainefoliage.com/ (I think but you can search for "Maine Foliage" if you want.)
The area I was in today is "peak" though it isn't as good as it should have been in my opinion. My wife, from California, hasn't seen it before and it was a bit dreary for my taste. We head to places (for the most part) that aren't laden with tourists though the route we were on today (for a portion of it) is quite famous for the foliage.
I'll be grabbing some pics off the camera later. If you're actually *really* interested then spam_here *at* whathostingshould *dot* be and I'll send you the link to see them. I'll most likely be tossing them up at http://maine.kgiii.info/ but that's likely to be a while before I get to that latter stage as I have a busy night tonight while I handle the help desk as Tom is sick.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
I understand users wanting the newest and greatest, I am like that a lot. I own a Mac Pro which is totally overboard for what I do, but I do it because I can. Home users will always want the newest stuff.
However, when you are talking about a large organization. Upgrading has to be for a reason. Hardware becomes faster, that's a good reason to upgrade. Application x gives new features that our users actually need, then its a good reason to upgrade.
But seriously, what does Vista provide that XP doesn't ? I can't think of a single thing that would justify the cost of upgrading all their hardware to upgrade to a newer OS that doesn't provide anything more for them. I think they made the right call.
I think Microsoft needs to wake up and realize that companies will upgrade when there is a reason to upgrade. Just releasing a new version isn't enough, it needs some major benefit.
Side note: It is starting to seem like Windows 7 is just going to be Vista "rebranded".
until (succeed) try { again(); }
I can completely understand their decision. After using Vista for one year, I'm now seriously thinking of getting a Mac for xMas.
The UI is the only good part of Vista but once the novelty wears off one starts to notice all the annoying issues, such as:
- Shutdown, boot, login cycle takes forever (5 minutes)
- Slow to go into sleep
- Explorer and Desktop sometimes freeze for a while
- Dhcp network config occasionally fails, need restart afterwards
- Baseline memory consumption: 1 GB RAM (!)
- Terrible support for bluetooth headsets
Considering it took several years to develop Vista, I wonder what the heck they have been doing all this time...
Wouldn't it be more cost effective for the State of Maine, and similar organizations to put half of the money that they put into Microsoft into building, by way of contractors, a shared, possibly open, solution on a less expensive platform over which they may have more control? This seems especially likely as I doubt that these organizations are actively competing against each other, at least not in a way where sharing an IT solution to be of negative impact to them.
"Thanks for all the money you paid to us. We've used it to buy off ISO among other things" -Microsoft
Sounds like we have our next candidate for the Mojave Experiment!
This is why I think single source is bad for business, and why *nix is a good option for worker drone machines that do not require specific applications. It is not like support persons cannot learn basic *nix, and users cannot learn OO.org instead of MS Office. I know there are some MS Exchange issues, but those are going away. What does the average lose when they move to *nix? The ability to change a background on the desktop with one click? The ability to download and play games? Sure flash may not work perfectly, but that is not a long term detterent.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
Maine not upgrading to Vista. Well, there goes 5 licenses down the drain. Call me when California or New York make this decision. Going back to sleep...
jsut athnoer menagiensls ltitle psrhae for you to dcoede. Why do we wtsae our tmie dnoig tihs?
I work for a Very Large Telecom. Nobody is running Vista. It would be too expensive in hardware, training and support. We can do our jobs just fine with XP on cheaper hardware.
Like most, we are 100% Microsoft on the desktop and there are no alternative we can switch to quickly. Exchange and AD are too entrenched. I have a feeling CTO's at some companies see this risk and are evaluating "other options." The problem is the propriety enterprise packages are tried and true on Windows, and it's too expensive to replace all that infrastructure.
Microsoft might force consumers to buy Vista, but I doubt it'll happen for large companies. It would make a lot of people very angry and force large companies to pressure the Enterprise software vendors to write Mac or Linux clients.
It wouldn't surprise me to see Microsoft force their hand, but it could be their undoing if they did.
Yeah because those security updates really made it so viruses were impossible to write for XP it was still receiving active support.
In Maine the cycle has been a lot like you describe.
94 386/486 mix with 3.1 and 95 in the middle (this was an odd one)
-- Same era -- DEC stuff still and our start of a love affair with Cisco as I recall
98 (year) to 98 (and then to 98se.)
2002 Win2k and XP
-- Same era -- Cisco prices for support kicked our ass
-- Same era -- Wyse and Citrix moved *back* in
2006 XP/Server 2k3
-- Same era -- Juniper shows up with a beautiful price (I think we run Juniper gear almost entirely in some areas now)
Here's where Microsoft screwed up... XP/2k3 is Good Enough® and for us that is a Good Thing©.
If we can still support XP we're fine until 2012 for the most part. Windows XP lasted too long. This isn't costing Microsoft any money, we're paying the same regardless. Licenses, support, and even custom hot patches are covered. We can upgrade when we want.
Our history says, 2010 and we're some staunch bastards here. We'll change when we're good and effin' ready, ayuh! We're too broke to actually afford new hardware. In the middle of these 4 year periods we've ALWAYS upgraded hardware for some departments. So, in 2008, we upgraded some. DOJ and DOC got some new hardware but it runs XP. DHHS (used to be DHS) also gets some very couple of years as they're a forward facing department.
It is my opinion that we're doing fine and that we made the right choice for this. I do believe that FOSS has a place (which is to answer the people saying that this is time to look at Vista) but that's more expensive in the short term for us. Right now we aren't able to afford a damned thing. We are one broke-ass state and the taxation is already a bit too high for some people.
There are old people in this state who are actually going to FREEZE to death this year. It will likely be under a handful of people. But we don't have the money, we aren't going to raise taxes if we can help it because that probably won't help a whole lot unless we tax the rich and we don't have a lot of those, so we can't afford a lot. The lack of income from the depreciated tourism industry is going to hurt us this winter. Oddly our gasoline is just $3.35/gallon at my local store but has still been to high to allow people to chance to come here and spend their hard earned money on our tourism and there aren't many other things left in Maine that people pay for other than lobster.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
Somehow, I am not very sure MS will keep the deadline.
OTOH, they have announced they are slimming it down to a bare minimum and pushing their downloadable stuff instead.
It's fun to watch how buzzword-compliant they are. "Multi-touch" and "Cloud" are terms they constantly associate with their future product line. It's textbook vaporware tactics at work.
http://www.dieblinkenlights.com
Now that MS is stalled Apple could probably pick up substantial numbers of enterprise customers if they put out a mid sized desktop spedced similar to a mini but upgradable and with heavier duty components and priced aggressively for big orders. They also ought to buy parallels outright and bundle it with 10.6, a BSD based stable desktop that will run commercial apps like Photoshop and XP at near native speeds to run MS office and IE should it be needed, what's not to like?
my state of new hampshire does its fair share of the "autumnal display" as well. however, we think of maine mostly for its beautiful rocky shoreline (and lobsters!)...
as i'm north of the Notches (closer to Canada actually) our foliage has gone past. Matter of fact, at this moment there is 2ft of snow not more than 40 miles from my house on the Rockpile.
the significance of a signature is insignificant
Do they get to collect $200?
main() { skip_vista(); } skip_vista() { windows7() }
I think there should be a movement to switch all government computers to Linux. It's about time the government stopped sponsoring corporations such as Microsoft when there is a free and better solution to the problem.
There's little value added for businesses. Certainly not enough to justify the expense of the time, hardware, and such to deploy Vista. By the time 7 rolls around the change will be a little easier to sell.
Ah it is beautiful there. I was out through Grafton Notch recently, headed into the "Rock" area and down through Conway, across towards the Castle in the Clouds, and back through Rt. 2 out of Vermont. Is the road up Mt. Washington closed yet? Given that the wind was upwards of 30 MPH gusts here in the Heights I'd have to guess that if they aren't closed with snow that they soon will be. If not then *maybe* next weekend I'll head over and grab some fireworks and make a trip up to see how it looks.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
Window Vista is such a huge disaster for Microsoft, considering that since it's release, it has consistently sold more than Windows XP in the same timeframe since it's release (ie. amount of sales after 1 year of being on the market for both XP and Vista, after 2 years, etc etc). Truly a horrible mistake one would never want to repeat. Oh wait, nevermind.
better hurry! according to the site:
http://www.mountwashingtonautoroad.com/Page-213.html
you have 9 days to do it....
October 6 - 13 8:00 AM-4:30 PM
October 14 - Closing 8:00 AM-4:00 PM
and if you went to Vermont via Rt 2, you went right by my apartment. I live at the southern junction of Rt's 2 & 3 in Lancaster NH (across the Connecticut River at Lunenburg/Guildhall VT [Rt2])...
the significance of a signature is insignificant
Sweet! I do like the autumn season, with all the colour. Only I have to enjoy it on a much smaller scale, here in Scotland. Here are some pictures I could find http://www.rampantscotland.com/flowers/autumn_a.htm
Why the heck does anyone think that 7 will actually be okay to use. This scares me. If I were forced to but my future into words, I would say I will stay in XP until... well... I dunno when... But I assume that 7 will be just as broken if not more so than Vista. At my work, all admins are still on XP and most lab workers are too. They is just a few students that come in with laptops that are barely capable of running XP let alone Vista but actually were sold with Vista. I wasted 30 minutes on one to install a printer driver. This was just opening a browser, downloading and unpacking a driver and then setting it up. Every step was painfully slow. Vista is a horrible OS. 7 will be compatible with all Windows up to and including Vista. How could it not be worse?
People are not going to be installing Windows 7 either. XP is getting all the same backdoors and the usual upgrade sabotage, so it too will be dumped. Is there anyone in the world still happy with the M$ PC Experience?
M$ has pissed away $60 billion dollars in the last few years. If that's a "near disaster" the real thing is going to be them going bankrupt as a result.
Political torture and murder is not funny http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=581079&cid=23757591
This just further proves that XP is still a completely viable OS. The biggest threat to Windows dominance is Vista too, imho. They tried to shove the OS down the throats of the consumer. Both choked. the only people I ever see endorsing Vista are hardcore fans or gurus. Everyone else I speak too says its still buggy, still overuses resources, and still--frankly, and from every face to face source I have met and discussed--blows. It'll go the way of ME: not with a bang, not with a whisper, but with a curious expression on people's faces when you mention it followed by the question "Vista? What's that?" Whether or not its replaced by a Windows OS is entirely up to them.
2GB of RAM is less than 40.00 in 2 unit quantities.
Let me get this straight...
1) Maine doesn't like Vista.
2) Maine can't know much about Windows 7 because it doesn't exist yet.
3) ?????
4) Maine decides it will switch to Windows 7.
5) Profit! (for Microsoft)
So, step 3 may entail:
a) Someone getting a bribe.
b) Someone realizing how happy Microsoft products have made them in the past, and assuming the Vista problems must have been a one-time fluke.
c) Someone thinking that "operating system" means "Windows".
A commenter on the article makes the point that Maine's signing an enterprise software license with Microsoft means that Redmond doesn't really lose out on this deal; it simply allows the state to upgrade its equipment and software on its own time.
And Maine is the story here?
How about the tying under license terms, service conditions, and through undocumented APIs and document formats that this implies? Would Maine have an enterprise license for Vista, an operating system they will never install, if there was not tying abuse going on?
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
With over 30 years of computer experience, I hardly consider switching from Microsoft XP to either Vista or Windows 7 as an `upgrade'. It's more like a sidegrade, if not a downgrade, considering the problems with Micro$oft in general, and Vista in particular. I wonder what makes anyone thing Windows 7 will be much better than just getting a real OS?
I have several computers around here, one running Vista (for what I call `backward compatability'). I know one thing for sure, I'm offended by Microsoft's poor design, particularly it's historical and neverending vunerability to viruses, spyware, and other security problems.
Why do we have to put up with nag screens telling us it's time to pay [yet more money] for yet another subscription to anti-virus & anti-spyware software which, had the Microsoft operating system been properly designed in the first place, would be as unneeded as it is in Linux, Solaris, all the BSD varients, etc., ad naseum.
Considering the poor security track record of Micro$oft, it's high cost, especially in regards to the site license required by Micro$oft for each of thousands of installations, wouldn't it be wiser to switch to a real operating system, with a proven track record in security, which isn't anywhere near as vulnerable to viruses and spyware as M$ is, is free and requires NO site licensing whatsoever, and has not one, but several complete office suites readily available, most of which are free, and with add-ons like VMware which can run Micro$oft programs (although I can't understand why anyone would insist on doing so!).
Instead of waiting for Windoze 7, training their people to use it, getting stuck with the high cost of having to upgrade hardware (usually required in M$ `upgrades') AND also having to pay for thousands of site licenses too, the state of Maine should just obtain only ONE distribution copy of Linux, make copies as needed, start retraining their people to use it, and start installing it. In the process they'll save millions of dollars over the next five years and increase security. And just ONE Linux distro can serve as either a desktop replacing XP/Vista/etc., or as a server replacing NT/2000!
Waiting for Windoze 7 and spending millions on site licenses, retraining, mandatory anti-virus & spyware software, firewalls, a pricey office suite and other software, AND hardware upgrades - not so smart after all.
Upgrading to a real OS, improving security, improving overall capabilities, maintaining cross-platform portability, retaining current hardware (no need to upgrade it), AND saving the taxpayers millions in the process - priceless!
So Maine have already paid for a it but won't actually be installing (hence no support calls etc.)? Elsewhere, the vast majority of new PCs are sold with it "installed" (even if an XP image is then slapped on either by the vendor or the organisation that bought it).
That's a "disaster" that many businesses would be happy with.
is the fact that it ships with IE7 and not IE6.
Vista took too long to develop, but during that period too many software vendors wrote bad web interface code for business applications that would only work with IE6 and not IE7, Firefox, Oprah or any other browser. Let us face it, IE6 has known compatibility problems. This problem is compounded by the fact that Microsoft chose not to support IE7 on Windows 2000. Therefore, it did not make sense to repair this bad code if it meant that older machines would immediately become obsolete unless with XP or Vista was installed, especially as XP was made available as an alternative to Vista Business Edition allowing the burying of heads in sand.
If the bad code was rewritten to support any suitable browser, then most business would try and use a different operating system other than windows. That is probably why Microsoft have released their mistake and backtracked allowing business to continue to use XP. But this solution has a double edged sword that they need to be wary of; when Windows 7 arrives, will be be even less compatible with business software than Vista? With the way the economic downturn is going, by the problem software developers waiting and not planning to resolve the problems presented by Vista, how will these businesses survive much beyond 2010? and what impact will that have on Microsoft as a result?
As for home use, I have been using Vista for 12 months. Don't find many problems, but then I'm using the 32 bit edition and don't need to using web browser based business applications.
With regard to complaints about minimum specification, Vista 32 is ironically holding back the specification of home PCs due to its inability to address more than 4GB of RAM. It sounds like everybody will have to adopt a 64 bit Windows pretty soon.
Hi, I'm just another closet nerd but on Slashdot I live in the state mentioned in the article so that makes me the expert! I'll post 50% of all comments on this article, because it's about me! Aren't I so cool, I look so authoritative this way. Woo hoo! All your Maine technology discussion are belong to me!
Considering it took several years to develop Vista, I wonder what the heck they have been doing all this time...
It's pretty easy to work out what they've been doing - the only remaining question is, "Have they been using hand lotion, butter, or Vaseline?"
my state of new hampshire does its fair share of the "autumnal display" as well...... as i'm north of the Notches (closer to Canada actually)
So do people still gather at the general store to use the internet?
Keep it please.
Seriously, I was just in my favorite state of NH just on Friday on business. Only got as far as the Lakes region, but the colors were looking good there. Still one of the greatest places on this earth.
== First cross river, then insult alligator.
It's business too. I just started working for a startup company and guess what, all the machines are XP Pro, even though they have Vista license keys on the bottom of them.
If my memory serves, since Windows 95, Microsoft has had a tendency to release new major versions of Windows somewhat later than originally scheduled. The delay was the most pronounced with the late release of Windows Vista, even with major features dropped to speed up release. Does the state of Maine have an alternative plan in the event that Windows 7 is delayed long enough that their 11,000 machines begin to break with no replacement capable of running the "obsolete" Windows XP (due to lack of XP drivers for new hardware) available? Perhaps instead of planning a move to Windows 7, which may not be released for some time, the state of Maine should at least investigate other possibilities, such as adopting F/OSS software or Apple machines.
McCain/Palin '08. Now THAT's hope and change!
Of course customers and shareholders might disagree, but MS has been blowing them off for ages.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
why would Microsoft put another desktop OS out there and totally mess up the migration off of XP and on top of that, give them another black eye like Windows ME. Granted, ME was a subset market since Win98 held it's own and Windows 2000 carried the main business user sector so the WinME flop was a consumer issue at best.
From what I see, Windows 7 is going to be the rent-a-Windows kit more to the likes of gOS where it's tied to online services or rental apps. You know, Ozzy's plan now that Gates is out of the way.
But I did get a laugh when it was said that Maine will "hope for the best" with regards to what comes out of Microsoft next. I do think they'll be unpleasantly surprised at what Windows 7 is and probably give GNU/Linux a good look-see as that time approaches. Just my guess. ;-)
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
Near Disaster? Really? In spite of popular perception, Vista has made millions for Microsoft.
Windows 7 is still going to be based off of the Vista kernel. It's still going to be a standard desktop OS.
Everyone I work with uses it. Oh wait I forgot - I work at Microsoft.
But I did get a laugh when it was said that Maine will "hope for the best" with regards to what comes out of Microsoft next. I do think they'll be unpleasantly surprised at what Windows 7 is and probably give GNU/Linux a good look-see as that time approaches.
jesus fuck, another one of the morons around here who thinks that people are really going to take a dive into another os if the next version of windows isn't what they think it should be. it would take longer for the migration than it would be to wait out yet another version of windows. why do you think they're skipping vista in the first place?
oh, that's right, the moron o.p. also has a linus sig. just goes to show how deluding fanboism is. raving fanbois aren't allowed to make these kinds of decisions because they can't step outside of themselves and see the big picture. open source may be the catch phrase to success around slashdot and in some server rooms but it's treated coolly, at best, everywhere else.
if anything the linux community would do well to distance themselves from the endless rants of fanbois and get some real businessmen in place who can lead it in a meaningful direction instead of continuing to rip off yet another os. it was sad when unix got ripped off and they acted like they had done something revolutionary but now that they're stealing their style from apple it's really laughable.
> "The State of Maine is the latest organization to skip Windows
> Vista, which has been a near-disaster for Microsoft.
While I agree that Microsoft Windows Vista Ultimate/whatever is a hideous iteration of MS Windows, I can't agree that it has been all that disastrous for Microsoft.
Each copy costs _considerably_ more than MS Windows XP Pro, and almost all retailed versions of MS windows today are OEM installed copies of MS Windows Vista Ultimate/whatever.
Microsoft is still making a fortune from MS Windows Vista.
My own personal view is that MS Windows Vista is an unfinished POS and I certainly won't be using it. But it *is* a financial winner for MS.
Matter of fact, at this moment there is 2ft of snow not more than 40 miles from my house on the Rockpile.
Hah. I'm still getting mid-80's
I built it by installing XP on an IDE hard drive, using a PCI controller.
I then lifted the controller and drive from that original machine, and placed it in a series of other machines (vastly different makes and models)... at each step successfully booting, and getting the image to "learn" each additional chipset.
This image works in just about any Dell these days, including a surprising number of laptops...
State government is a *prime* candidate for thin client computing. They need to spend some time in Largo, FL so they can see this kind of technology in action. Desktop computing is a waste of money in any environment, but in a taxpayer-funded environment it's just obscene. It wasn't all that long ago that most states had a mainframe or two running the state government, and there were just terminals all over the state. Support was easy and the technology was reliable. Most of those terminals never had a single site visit from the time they were first deployed until the time they were replaced with the first PC in a long line of treadmill upgrades.
State governments need to return to those days, and the technology is available, and it works. *That* would be a true benefit to taxpayers.
Tired of FB/Google censorship? Visit UNCENSORED!
This story strikes me as a bit strange. Maine announces they won't be migrating to Vista, supposedly because it's bad. So far, so good. But then they announce that they _will_ be migrating to Windows 7, which isn't out yet. So there is the possibility that Windows 7 will be even worse (for whatever value matters to Maine) than Vista, but they will migrate to it anyway?
I think what they should have done is compare existing software. If they gain by migrating now, they migrate now, to whatever provides the best result. If they don't gain by migrating now, they don't migrate. Maybe they will migrate to Windows 7 once it's out, but that's a consideration to make once it's actually out.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
I think the real problem areas are businesses that went from NT to 2000 (its a big improvement) and are still running it. They wanted to skip XP but now they're left with an 2000, which is starting to show its age or Vista, which isn't an option for many businesses for various reasons. Vista sucks and upgrading to XP, an OS nearing the end of its lifetime too, doesn't make a huge amount of sense either.
Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.
Colby College area?
More like Bowdoin country.
Actually, wasn't it the USM School of Law students dope-slapping the RIAA with better research, better logic, and pure unabashed righteousness?
Or something like that...
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
Get yourself out of the trap! Try Ubuntu desktops and your choice of server systems. Save money in you budget. Quit watching tv commercials and use your brain.
MS is going for the government bailout. Geez you guys are paying 6 million or so for wooden arrows, I think MS can come up with a good excuse to have the government bail out Vista.
I guess everyone who bought into Software Assurance is pretty pissed off right now...
Twinstiq, game news
Is Maine known particulary for it's foliage? It seems a rather odd thing to comment on. (By foliage you mean the leaves on the trees turning autumnal?)
"Can't this wait till after my scooter club's fall foliage trip to Maine?"
-Scrubs
I don't believe Vista is bad enough to be completely skipped.
Windows Vista will last for 3 years or more after it's release before being replaced by Windows 7, so you would be waiting at least that long, if not more. I bet that by the time Windows 7 releases, the state of WinXP support will be the same as the state of Win2000 support now, and considering that it will take time to deploy Windows 7, that is bad. XP lasted for 5 years after it's release before being replaced by Vista, yet some people skipped it.
having the same base kernel does not mean it will be the same distribution. What you said is like saying the because Ubuntu and the Android are based off the 2.6 kernel, they are the same.
Microsoft can base Windows 7 on the Vista kernel yet still make the OS a service oriented distribution. Think of it like Vista Home vs Vista Ultimate vs Vista MediaCenter. They are all based on the same kernel but different distributions( packaging ).
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
talk about a lunatic, I only said that they would likely look at GNU/Linux and nothing more. I do understand migrations cost but so does having your business based on an unsupported OS. It is not like the state of Maine can hire anyone to patch Windows XP outside of Microsoft and you know they won't. They want everyone on Vista.
And hey, there's the Mac too and there is ofcourse that high performance Windows Vista. It'll probably be with SP3 by then so who knows, it might only take 2 CPUs and 2GB of memory to run acceptably.
another freak AC can bite me.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
I can't be the only one thinking that Ubuntu is a better, FREE, available NOW technology that would do everything they want. I really can't understand how government offices haven't completely fallen in step with Open Office..... Whatever it is they don't like about it they could just code themselves, and for MUCH cheaper than 11,000 windows licenses....
Please, stop throwing tax payer money away on outdated, obsolete, proprietary virus infested crap, and switch to a real OS.
k thnx.
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
From what's been released, it really looks like Windows is going to be less bloated with the requirement to download extra apps (free, as they're already allowing people to download the apps that will replace the built-in versions). It'll obviously have a tie-in with Live services, but again, those are still free. They may go for renting with apps such as MS Office (which they've already publicly said), but I highly doubt they'll do so with Windows 7. The first beta is supposed to be released in a couple months so we'll know for sure, but from everything I've heard, the OS will *not* be software as a service.
[quote]...So do people still gather at the general store to use the internet?...[/quote]
when i came to Lancaster in 1999, there was 33k dial-up! In 2002, I opened a computer repair shop downtown and we were the first in town to have 1/368 ADSL.!! Today I enjoy 15/1 cable, and rumour is FiOS is headed here soon (5yrs?)! and yes, people still use CB radio's here, we just got cell-phones last year....in Franconia (down the road a ways) people ACTUALLY DO congregate to the General Store for Internet!
the significance of a signature is insignificant
Windows Vista, which has been a near-disaster for Microsoft.
Yes, if you consider selling 180 million copies a disaster.
Yeah, so much for "that" campaign. Not only did we not get it here in the UK, even if it was run we have no idea who "Seinfeld" is.
bullshit. we all know what you meant. even if they did five a look at linux and nothing more, so fucking what? it would be pointless. whatever fucktard. you make me laugh. another imbecile lost in linux land while the world moves on.
and you know damn well it doesn't take 2 cpus and 2 gigs of memory to run vista. all the bullshit that came out about vista in the early days was either fud or has been resolved. we both know that's true. i know a bunch of people who run vista on fairly conservative machines with no problems. and we both know there is bloat in linux land too. you guys who live there have your heads too far up your ass to see it.
Well said. There are some awful, awful web apps out there.
I work in government and (incredibly) all our web apps run on IE7 and most run on Firefox.
We have 'security suites' that don't work with XP SP 3, let alone Vista. So we run XP SP 2.
What keeps us on Windows generally is MS Office. Also more security nonsense that is required, but doesn't have an easy analog for Linux.
so you think what you see in the beta is what they must and will ship? That is just too funny and very naive.
Seeing what Microsoft does is like looking for rain on a dark night. You see it only if you look slightly to the side of what you would think is something that'll expose it to you. For rain, it is a bright light. For Microsoft, it's blogs, press releases, public statements and other things.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
Also from Maine here.
I'm certainly glad they skipped Vista but not because I don't think Vista works I just feel little confused why they have already decided to commit to a OS hat isn't here yet. To elaborate, this whole buy a new much more powerful computer to play is getting a little obscene, lets hope that's not the plan for 2012. Further more why bet the farm on a company that has such a poor track record with launching a new OS. I say create the budget and keep bidding open so more ideas get submitted. 2012 LoL, we could be banging sticks together again the way things are going by then anyways. So if I was in charge I would, Visit some of our astute college campuses to offer this contract to students to virtualize in a attempt to not only get a smooth transition for state employees but to not just save money but expand the program to include this process each year as a class. I have a hard time imagining that some kind of blended upgrade wouldn't suit us better. Some levels would get new computers and keep XP, some servers would become Linux based, and yes we could still get us some Windows7 if we absolutely could prove it would be the best platform. I don't care how many Windows supporters are out there but lets be real here, Linux by 2012 at this rate seems to be the logical business desktop platform option seeing it works pretty well already. I use work and play with Windows, Linux and Apple platforms and laugh every time I hear things like this because all I can see in my head is some guy saying "Well my cousin does computers lets have him do this, no need to consult someone that we gotta pay a lot of money too." Yup as if we have loads of money to waste on something that already works anyhow. (Hardware does need replacing OS's don't...)
I have been working for the State as a contractor for 2 years now. It would be a disaster if they went to Vista. They use so many old applications that still use and require legacy NT systems. So for them to upgrade would be more than just training users. They need to upgrade in many areas throughout all agencies to even be on par to use Vista. The state only upgraded to XP recently and that was due to Microsoft deciding to stop supporting Win2000. Otherwise they probably would have stayed with Win2000. The state is also still trying to upgrade those legacy systems, the funding just is not there. They have taken on the attitude of if isn't broken don't fix it. Just because a user has an old machine does not mean we should replace the PC. When it comes down to it we are using tax payer's money and we need to be selective on what we purchase. The state is basically on a 3-4 cycle, but a budget crisis does not help. The State recently consolidated all the IT departments from all the agencies to be working under one umbrella. Doing this alone requires training IT staff to understand the need for each agency and how they function.
Great! I'll see you later tonight.
LOL :-)
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
Please make sure any games you develop on Vista work just as well under XP, because I'm not buying it if it doesn't. I'm not upgrading to an operating system that has no significant benefits, a lot of negatives and enables a continuing monopoly. At this point I'm much more likely to try to get some weird game running under Linux than XP. There's no way in heck I'm installing Vista, even as a dual-boot, but I'd be very happy to give some new flavor of the week of Linux a try.
They ARE out to get you simply because They are in it for themselves and they don't care about you.