Munich is ditching Linux in favor of Windows 10, at a cost of €49.3 million:
The Linux love affair of the German City of Munich, which decided to favor Linux in 2003, is finally over. The city has officially cleared the plan to bring back Windows 10 on about 29,000 PCs.
In 2003, when the city decided to switch to a Linux-based desktop called LiMux and other open source software, it showed that free software could be used on a large scale. However, things didn't turn out the way they were planned.
Coming back to the recent development, the politicians who supported the switch said that Windows 10 will make it easier to source compatible application and drivers, according to TechRepublic.
[...] Linux enthusiasts should also note that the city's IT Chief has previously said that any concrete technical reason doesn't back the move; it's all politics.
Also at Engadget.
Previously: No, Munich Isn't About To Ditch Free Software and Move Back to Windows
Munich Reveals Preliminary Costs for a 'Return' to Windows
Linux Champion Munich Takes Decisive Step Towards Returning to Windows
Related Stories
Recently, there has been a circle-jerk of clickbait, gleefully consumed and hyperlinked by the anti-FOSS crowd. The claim is that a certain (unspecified) number of city employees are whining that Linux isn't Windows and FOSS apps aren't good enough and that Munich city fathers have decided to go back to Windows. It's all wishful nonsense from Microsoft fans.
Nick Heath at TechRepublic spoke to city council spokesman Stefan Hauf.
He said the council's recently elected mayor Dieter Reiter has instead simply commissioned a report into the future IT system for the council.
"The new mayor has asked the administration to gather the facts so we can decide and make a proposal for the city council how to proceed in future," he said.
"Not only for LiMux but for all of IT. It's about the organisation, the costs, performance and the useability and satisfaction of the users." [...] "Nothing is decided because first we have to see the report and then we can decide," he said, adding the review has not been triggered by any dissatisfaction with LiMux but is rather part of a review of how to proceed now the LiMux migration project is complete.
In the Spring of 2013, Munich noted that over 94 percent of its computers were running Linux and that the city had already saved more than €10 million over what they would have paid for EULA-ware--even with the fire sale prices initially offered by Ballmer personally.
That anyone thinks the mayor would survive re-election after blowing tens of millions on MSFT licenses and tens of millions more for more-powerful hardware to run it defies all logic.
...and, as Nick notes there, it was never about money; the move to Linux was always about freedom.
Nick Heath reports
[Munich's city] council is intending to conduct a study to see which operating systems and software packages--both proprietary and open source--best fit its needs. The audit would also take into account the work already carried out to move the council to free software.
Now, in a response to Munich's Green Party (PDF), Mayor Dieter Reiter has revealed the cost of returning to Windows.
Reiter said that moving to Windows 7 would require the council to replace all the PCs for its 14,000-plus staff, a move he said would cost €3.15 million. That figure did not include software licensing and infrastructure costs, which Reiter said could not be calculated without further planning. He said a move to Windows 8 would be far more costly.
Reiter said going back to Microsoft would mean writing off about €14M of work it had carried out to shift to Limux, OpenOffice, and other free software. Work on project implementation, support, training, modifying systems, licensing of Limux-specific software, on setting up Limux and migrating from Microsoft Office would have to be shelved, he said.
He also revealed that the move to Limux had saved the council about €11M in licensing and hardware costs, as the Ubuntu-based Limux operating system was less demanding than if it had upgraded to a newer version of Windows.
Related: No, Munich Isn't About To Ditch Free Software and Move Back to Windows
The city will investigate how long it will take and how much it will cost to build a Windows 10 client ahead of a vote on whether to replace its Linux-based OS from 2021.
A decade ago, Munich was at the vanguard of a movement towards open-source software, switching thousands of staff to Linux from Windows at a time when a move on that scale was almost unheard of.
After spending nine years and millions of euros on the project, today the city's politicians agreed to begin preparing to return to Windows by 2021.
Under a proposal backed by the general council, the administration will investigate how long it will take and how much it will cost to build a Windows 10 client for use by the city's employees.
Once this work is complete, the council will vote again on whether to replace LiMux, a custom version of the Linux-based OS Ubuntu, across the authority from 2021.
Source: Linux champion Munich takes decisive step towards returning to Windows
Before the decision: Statement by The Document Foundation about the upcoming discussion
Linux's Munich crisis: Crunch vote locks city on course for Windows return
Previous: No, Munich Isn't About To Ditch Free Software and Move Back to Windows
Another German state plans switch back from Linux to Windows
The German state of Lower Saxony plans to follow Munich's example, and migrate a reported 13,000 users from Linux back to Windows.
Apparently undaunted by the cost of the Munich switch (which we reported in January could be as much as €100m), Lower Saxony is considering making the change in its tax office. The state seems to expect a much cheaper transition, with Heise (in German here) reporting the first-year budget is €5.9m, and another €7m further out.
The tax office argues its decision is driven by compatibility: field workers and teleworkers overwhelmingly use Windows, while the OpenSUSE variants are installed on its office workstations. The office workstations are also ageing and due for replacement, something that helped open the door for Windows.
Related: Linux Champion Munich Takes Decisive Step Towards Returning to Windows
Munich Switching From Linux to Windows 10
German Documentary on Relations Between Microsoft and Public Administration Now Available in English
The site It's FOSS is reporting that India's Defense Services are switching to GNU/Linux, ditching an insecure legacy operating system, with an August 15 deadline. Little is known about their home spun distro except that it seems to be based on Ubuntu.
What's Happening: According to a recent report, the Defence Ministry of India has decided to replace Windows with an in-house developed Linux distro called 'Maya' on all computers that are connected to the Internet.
Also reported at The Hindu, Defence Ministry to switch to locally built OS Maya amid threats, which explains that this move is a reaction to increasingly successful attacks against a certain, pervasive, desktop legacy operating system. x
Currently, Maya is being installed only in Defence Ministry systems and not on computers connected to the networks of the three Services. On this, the official said the three Services had also vetted it and would adopt it on service networks as well soon. The Navy had already cleared it and the Army and the Air Force were currently evaluating it, the official added.
Maya was developed by government development agencies within six months, the official said. Maya would prevent malware attacks and other cyberattacks which had seen a steep increase, the official noted.
However, the attacks in and of themselves are less of a problem than the fact that a large, and increasing, number of them are successful against that aging legacy desktop operating system.
For India to pull this off successfully, they must study how their opponent has maneuvered over the years against GNU/Linux deployments and in particular look at case studies like Kerala, Munich, Lower Saxony, Vaasa, and Turku. India's opponent in this move has had many programmes, years ago one was EDGI, and a long standing mandate that "under NO circumstances lose against Linux".
Previously:
(2018) German Documentary on Relations Between Microsoft and Public Administration Now Available in English
(2018) German State of Lower Saxony Plans to Switch From Linux to Windows
(2017) Munich Switching From Linux to Windows 10
(2017) Linux Champion Munich Takes Decisive Step Towards Returning to Windows
(2016) Draft Report Doesn't Say -Which- Software is Causing Problems in Munich
(2016) Munich: The High Cost of Having Committed to Closed-Source Software
(2014) Another German Town Says It Has Completed Its Switch To FOSS
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @06:25AM (17 children)
There was a recent thing where someone (a stenographer--obviously NOT a journalist) wrote down a bunch of crap that a political operative in Munich had told him and the stenographer got that published.
The lameoid writer never checked with another source, certainly not with a technologist who is employed by Munich.
One of the unverified things in his stupid article was a claim of an immense number of Windoze-only desktop apps that are still in use by Munich city employees.
The stories that I have been seeing, going back years, say that that is complete crap.
One of their major goals in switching to an all-FOSS ecosystem was to get control of the software being used, eliminate duplication, and standardize on Free Software where possible.
June 2012: 70 Percent Of Desktops Are All-FOSS; Desktops Requiring Windoze Are Down To 10 Percent [googleusercontent.com] (orig) [mrpogson.com]
May 2013: 94 Percent Of Munich's Desktops Are Running Linux [google.com]
...With Over €10 Million Saved So Far [googleusercontent.com] (orig) [h-online.com]
A previous report by Mayor Christian Ude [googleusercontent.com] (orig) [slashdot.org] had WAY underestimated savings.
January 2013: M$ and its "partner" HP try to bury their "report" on how FOSS is more expensive and is unsuitable [googleusercontent.com] (orig) [techrights.org]
.
The Story Of Munich's Migration From Vendor Lock-In To FOSS [googleusercontent.com] (orig) [europa.eu]
How Munich rejected Steve Ballmer and kicked Microsoft out of the city [googleusercontent.com] (orig) [techrepublic.com]
How Munich switched 15,000 PCs from Windows to Linux [linuxvoice.com]
.
This decision to waste a huge amount of money was definitely all politics--not based on an evaluation of the technology.[1]
Cats provide a good analogy: A male cat walking by a place will mark it as his territory by pissing on things.
{Image of Danny John-Jules and his spray bottle goes here}
Ever seen a a video of what happens when a new male lion defeats the old king of the pride?
Any still-nursing cubs (sired by the previous male) are killed. [google.com]
This brings the females back into estrus so that a new generation of cubs will carry the new guy's genes.
The same stuff goes for human politicians, apparently.
The big question that I have is, "Will the voters stand for tens of millions being squandered?"
...or will they vote out this bunch of spendthrifts?
[1] A recent report by Accenture--another M$ "partner", no less--said that FOSS wasn't the problem; where there are problems, that is bad management.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @06:39AM (14 children)
Anyway, it's easy to engage in political skulduggery when you get to play around with other people's money.
The solution is to get Government out of the business of allocating resources; a Government is just a bad business that won't go bankrupt, and will even be rewarded with more money when it fails—in a civilized society, there's no place for such a bizarre, illogical kind of organization.
(Score: 3, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @06:45AM (1 child)
"Let's put M$, Oracle, Facebook, Google, and Verizon in charge."
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @07:12PM
Agreed then at the Backdoor Club. The Gang: "You boys play OUR spyware game, or no funding, no free beerfest, no ..." Munich: "Jawohl!! We start tomorrow."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @06:53AM (6 children)
Yeah, I'm sure people prefer anarchy instead.
You actually realize how "free market economy" actually works? Government throws money out based on things people may want (like sewers, fire department or drinking water) and then everyone fights over the scraps while the government makes sure no one bullies another too much while taxing everyone a little until government gets all the paper back so they can throw out more. That is the entire economy right there, in one sentence. No government == no free market.
If you fuck around with that model, you fuck yourself rather quickly.... what do you want to cut? Sewers not needed? Or is it schools? Or healthcare? or Police and justice system? Or what?? The libtards (libertarian boneheads) need to realize that you can only tweak how government works, and slowly. Any sudden changes can cause the system to destabilize. Our entire civilization is based on this balance between altruism and authority.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @07:34AM (4 children)
Your reply is what is called a "straw man argument".
No one said everything should be thrown out in one rash coup; no one said anything about a jarring revolution.
However, in order to get evolution of the organization of society, there has to be some kind of selective pressure; that's why it's important to keep in mind some far flung ideal, such as a society that is organized without a government (that is, a society organized without "do-as-you're-told" coercion).
Sure, there will be authoritarian support structures along the way, but eventually those will be dismantled, carted off, and utterly forgotten, leaving behind a complex, robust, anti-fragile libertarian structure that neither requires men to be angels nor denies that each man is individually self-interested.
Evolution, not Revolution. Variation and Selection yield the Invisible Hand.
(Score: 2) by Nuke on Tuesday November 28 2017, @10:42AM (2 children)
If it is not organised by government it will be organised by local bullies and gang leaders. I know that you are likely to reply that government is the bully, but that would show that you do not really know what a bully is. As least the government is impersonal and not local.
If you want to see how anarchy works in practice, take a look at this [wikipedia.org] period of English history.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Tuesday November 28 2017, @12:18PM (1 child)
Soooo, which one of the Black Adders was this?
Just, you know, ....context...
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Tuesday November 28 2017, @01:44PM
Well given that the first series takes place at the end of the middle ages, I'd say it's a prequel of some sort.
(Score: 2) by boxfetish on Tuesday November 28 2017, @03:49PM
Right! Sort of like how the "authoritarian support structures along the way" in communist China and the former Soviet union were eventually dismantled, carted off, and utterly forgotten.
Oh, wait...
(Score: 2) by Bot on Tuesday November 28 2017, @09:44AM
The free market economy would be: most successful businesses, which by obvious mathematical properties are mafia owned outfits, grow bigger and bigger until they can afford to buy politicians' time, get favorable business with the government and get favorable laws passed. This ends the free market just like nepotism ends ideologically charged authoritarian governments. One generation.
A different story would be:
1. I am the government. Regardless my origin.
2. Things need to be done to make society flourish, who am I kidding, to prevent society to collapse over self interested sociopaths scheming.
2b. Money is a good incentive to make people do things.
3. People need a way to store surplus and exchange good.
3b. Money is a good way to do that.
4. Therefore I will control Money by making sure money is enough to exchange goods and not too much to be unable to store value. This is the utopia, but communist, fascist, free market, theocratic utopias are FAAAR worse than a math equation over how much money state really needs.
4b. I will pay state officers and buy things using money issued by ME.
4c. People will think my money is just paper, until I demand a growing percentage of taxes to be paid using that money, until I demand transactions with state to be done with that money.
4d. I might even not need taxes if I issue enough money for the bureaucratic machine to work and for people to do their transactions.
5 I wait for coups, massive sabotage at every level, and for the international community to bomb me with an excuse or another because I have just broken free of The True Current Government.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Arik on Tuesday November 28 2017, @07:39AM (3 children)
Also, as you appear to be attempting to false-flag post as a libertarian, that's a no. Government is what you said but it's still the most efficient known way to provision public goods. As libertarians we should certainly look to get the government out of anything that can be effectively done privately, but you're still left with a few genuine public goods and until they become obsolete there will be some sort of government, hopefully able to provide those. They're going to need computers.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @07:46AM (2 children)
I dispute the validity of the word "genuine" here. Furthermore, I'm skeptical of the notion of a "public good". So, your premise is not at all acceptable.
As for admonishing revolution, that's already been covered [soylentnews.org]. Nobody is arguing for that; it's a straw man.
By the way, why are your comments always formatted with the <tt> element???
(Score: 2) by Arik on Tuesday November 28 2017, @08:13AM
That's an interesting point to pick for dispute, as it was inserted specifically to concede ahead of time that not EVERYTHING that's claimed to be a public good necessarily is so, or must always be so.
I'm all for whittling the class away as quickly as possible - just not any faster. I guess in that last respect you could say I've become a *conservative* libertarian in my old age. ;)
But there are, at least for now, some genuine public goods. Is that what you're attempting to dispute?
Even the most austere minarchist admits a few exist, otherwise he would be an anarchist.
"As for admonishing revolution, that's already been covered [soylentnews.org]. Nobody is arguing for that; it's a straw man."
So you're not an anarchist? Or are you defying the historical categories?
To be clear, you're welcome to defy them so far as I'm concerned, it's just that you need to spell it out clearly rather than just waving your hands and saying something ambiguous.
"By the way, why are your comments always formatted with the <tt> element???"
Posting preference. Once you make an account you can save the setting.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @03:51PM
Down, Fido. Don't you have some shit to eat? Go on, go chase the cat, and see where she poops, so you can have some lunch, then take a nap.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @03:47PM
What a fuckwit. No, not him, YOU, AC. You're a complete fuckwit and a shitforbrains. Your GRANDPARENTS should have been culled from the herd. And, your great-grandparents should have been ground up for dog food. You are the one remaining class of people whom people are ENCOURAGED to be prejudiced against. Please - put your genitals into a wood shredder, and then jump in after them. (question - why are "genitals" always plural? How many does one person possess?)
(Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @07:36AM (1 child)
Anyway, it's easy to engage in political skulduggery when you get to play around with other people's money.
The solution is to get Government out of the business of allocating resources; a Government is just a bad business that won't go bankrupt, and will even be rewarded with more money when it fails—in a civilized society, there's no place for such a bizarre, illogical kind of organization.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @10:03PM
I'm guessing from the frequency of reposting this spammer is some troll using automated posting tools. What a loser.
(Score: 5, Touché) by Whoever on Tuesday November 28 2017, @07:25AM (17 children)
Linux crashes more than Windows? That has never been true. Windows certainly has improved in this regard and now rarely suffers from crashes, but even so, periodic reboots appear to be necessary under Windows to maintain performance.
The 2000's called and they want their [Mocrosoft-shill-promoted] trope back. Driver support under Linux is not an issue. I don't claim that every piece of hardware is supported, but if you have enough buying power and control of the hardware you are buying, driver support simply isn't an issue.
Exactly when is virtualization not an option? This is a set of government offices. They are not driving some weird hardware with a custom hardware interface that will not work when virtualized. Again, BS.
That's an awful lot of money. One might think that there is a payoff for someone.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @07:39AM
Please take a moment to form a complete response, rather than just responding to line items.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @08:00AM (2 children)
Please take a moment to form a complete response, rather than just responding to line items.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @08:36AM (1 child)
The identical comment a half hour later is NOT "Offtopic".
It's SPAM.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by shortscreen on Tuesday November 28 2017, @09:59AM
The first one was off-topic. The second one was both off-topic and redundant, though I'm not sure it qualifies as SPAM.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Tuesday November 28 2017, @08:22AM (5 children)
Indeed, my father had more driver issues under Windows than I had under Linux. Usually because the old hardware (e.g. printer) didn't have drivers for the new version of Windows. While under Linux, you can generally be sure that if hardware works now, it will also work after upgrading.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by isostatic on Tuesday November 28 2017, @09:55AM (4 children)
Haven't used windows since 2000. What's a driver?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @10:31AM
Apparently you also haven't used NVidia graphics cards either.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday November 28 2017, @03:56PM (2 children)
-1 silly
We use drivers in Linux Land. What OS are you using, which requires no drivers? Don't even go with Mac. Their drivers may well be hidden deep, but they've got them. Baaahhhhhh - they aren't even buried deep. If you want to run an HP printer with a Mac, you'll be visiting this page - https://support.apple.com/downloads [apple.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @10:30PM (1 child)
To be clear, what GP was alluding to is that hardware support is typically completly transparent for Linux users.
In 2017 (and for a lot of years now), WRT Linux and hardware, you mostly hear "it just works out of the box".
You may also hear "Linux loves old hardware", which is very different from the Windoze experience.
Use of the term "device driver" is mostly a carry-over from Windoze users.
In Linux, that is called a "module".
On the rare occasion where a Linux user has to hunt down a software adapto-kit for a piece of hardware, that will carry the extension .ko (kernel object).
Not all kernel modules are drivers, however.
Some are non-hardware-related processes.
For the curious, more details are available from these guys. [stackexchange.com]
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by isostatic on Wednesday November 29 2017, @09:14AM
Indeed, hardware "just works". I haven't had to compile a kernel or even run modprobe for over a decade. Software to use that hardware, yes you have to look in apt, but the days of device manager and yellow exclamation marks vanished around the same time as geocities.
I use Linux because my time isn't free. I have a work Mac, but someone else admins it, and to be fair I rarely find a problem other than the @ and " being the wrong way round.
(Score: 3, Informative) by LoRdTAW on Tuesday November 28 2017, @02:51PM (4 children)
Agreed. BSOD's and hard crashes are almost a thing of the past since at least Windows 7. Though it's still not perfect. We have to reboot a lot because the print spooler still shits the bed on Windows 7/10 and sometimes mapped drives from the file server won't mount or unmount at random and a reboot is the only fix. Flushing the windows state toilet is still necessary in 2017.
How fun is it opening device manager after a fresh Windows install to find a dozen yellow exclamation points indicating a lack of a drivers for the associated mystery device? Linux has been beating Windows at the hardware driver game for years so long as there is a driver (and if there isn't, it's the dumb manufactures fault). The kernel is great at figuring out what hardware is in the machine and what drivers/modules to load. I rarely encounter standard desktop or server hardware that Linux has trouble with. Windows sits there like a fucking idiot waiting for you to insert a disk in drive A.
Not so fast. Some ERP systems have crazy hardware for things like time clock devices, barcode readers, building access, alarm systems, paging, and so on. Some is via serial port and some have PCI devices. Sure, that could be virtualized but I've found that hammering the square software and hardware into the round VM is more trouble than it's worth. I did that with Windows based HMI for an industrial laser. Tried Linux+Wine, ran but the serial comms fail causing the HMI to crash forcing you to kill it. Tried ReactOS but it crashes. Tried Windows XP and 7 in a VM but the serial comms through a VM are sketchy and would frequently lose comms with the laser. Gave up and bought a PC with Windows 7 pro on it. VM's arent magic bullets.
For sure there is bribery involved. Governments love to tout the sunk cost fallacy. Reversing a project of such scale seems out of place for such an entity.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @03:29PM (1 child)
Three years ago, I attended a presentation from a senior Munich IT technician. The bulk of "unsolved" porting from older Win-installations were at that point mostly some archaic homebrew solutions in Access/Excel, made to manage things like parkings and inventories. Since it would be quite a task to port these, the older systems still worked, AND that parking revenue wasn't crucial for the city, it was sort of postphoned to "later".
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Tuesday November 28 2017, @04:12PM
There was a lot of that going on in the late 90's early 00's. A lot of VB applications using COM and MS access were common in business software. It is also very common in industrial automation and SCADA stuff. That is almost impossible to port after MS completely dropped VB support in favor of VB.net. I have a XP VM setup with Visual studio 6 to maintain a data logger system for our vacuum ovens which uses a COM library for a Dataq logger and I/O box plus an MS access database to store the report data. Thankfully I have the source as it was built in-house.
(Score: 1) by toddestan on Saturday December 02 2017, @05:57PM (1 child)
Actually, Windows driver support out of the box isn't bad. The problem with Windows is that many times, you're installing as 5+ year old OS on new hardware. A fresh install of Windows 7 on a new PC isn't going to recognize a lot of your hardware because it is 8 years old. Go install that on an older Core 2 or Pentium 4 and you'll find it'll likely recognize everything. With Linux, most of the time people are installing the latest and greatest, and even if they are not, it's pretty rare to install anything older than 2-3 years.
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Saturday December 02 2017, @09:14PM
USB serial port support was terrible. Not sure about 10 but even on 7 any USB serial device you plugged in needed a driver even if they all had the same FTDI chip. Linux didn't are if it was an arduino, USB serial or whatever, it saw an stty device and loaded a driver. Even OpenBSD fairs better.
Even video drivers were better as at least Linux would have something to fall back on where Windows for a long time would stick you with 640x480 @ 16 colors or maybe 800x600/1024x768 if you were lucky.
(Score: 1) by tftp on Tuesday November 28 2017, @09:58PM (1 child)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 29 2017, @02:23AM
they were terribly misformatted
You can get that while simply using a different release of M$Orifice than the creator of the document.
You can get that by using the SAME version of M$'s crap but having a different printer.
"M$ Word format" is NOT a standard by any stretch of the imagination.
Anyone who thinks it is is a fool.
If your correspondents insist on using MICROS~1's stupid buggy broken incompatible products, you should insist that they send you things in the most-usable form.
Word 95 format would be a not-too-awful choice.
OpenDocument Format is the smart way to save documents.
a poor gov worker when she has to process ms word documents
Easy solution: Don't accept that shit as input.
Alternate solution: Put a steep fee on accepting that shit.
That'll break 'em from sucking eggs real quick.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @08:04AM
Glad to hear corruption is live and well in Munich...
I bet Micro$oft has spent quite a lot of money in this operation as they must be well aware of both the network effect and the domino effect.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Orion Blastar on Tuesday November 28 2017, @08:17AM (10 children)
When Slashdot got bought out by Dice and other Scammers/Spammers, we moved to Kuro5hin and other sites like Metafilter, etc.
Heck when Infoworld Forums got destroyed because of astroturfing, they made that IWETHEY forum that still runs, but is boring and ban happy.
The DailyKOS to Reddit to Voat.co, gab.ai, vi.me, etc.
No matter where you go it is all about scamming and spamming and posting astroturf and banning anyone who disagrees with the mindset.
Youtube has done that, kicked out moderates and conservatives, but kept the pedophile porn producers that give them eyeballs that give them income. Pizzagate George Soros Liberal Progressive kiddie fiddlers just love it there.
http://blastar.in/k5/ [blastar.in]
Kuro5hin is gone! Soon this place will be.
I expect to be voted down by the troll and spammer and scammer accounts here for exposing their secrets. Either that or I get told my post is poorly formatted fool meme or something?
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @08:32AM
Can you be the slightest bit specific as to what it is that's bothering you which would cause you to use the term "Astroturfing"?
...or any of the other gibberish you wrote?
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Tuesday November 28 2017, @08:39AM (1 child)
Any evidence of this? I don't believe this, as it would not be something their customers (that is, the advertisers) would like.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 1) by Orion Blastar on Wednesday November 29 2017, @06:37AM
Sure the major news companies did not cover it. It is something called Elsagate:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsagate [wikipedia.org]
https://www.westernjournalism.com/crowder-says-youtube-silencing-conservative-views/ [westernjournalism.com]
It is really nothing new:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_by_Google [wikipedia.org]
They keep finding rings like this one:
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/42108748/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/t/massive-online-pedophile-ring-busted-cops/ [nbcnews.com]
You have to be living under a rock, or listening to fake news to not have heard about these things:
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/oct/26/hollywood-child-sex-abuse-in-focus/ [washingtontimes.com]
Youtube's customers and advertisers would not like sexual videos aimed towards children even if they are paid ads:
https://www.reddit.com/r/ElsaGate/ [reddit.com]
https://news.vice.com/story/youtube-kills-ads-on-50000-channels-as-advertisers-flee-over-disturbing-child-content [vice.com]
Youtube pulled ads but still keeps the videos up.
Those conservative channels where shut down, and not brought back up, but migrated to http://vid.me/ [vid.me] instead.
So why ban conservatives but keep pedophile videos up, only take away their advertising and not ban and censor them?
I've never seen links like this submitted here and if they were, most likely would be voted down.
Anyone who votes down this comment support the pedophiles' videos on Youtube.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @09:33AM
And how nice that is for you! Congrats!
It's possible. Could happen. What is a "fool meme"? What is a "something"? What is your opinion on Dark Matter and Manhattan gynecological services?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @10:24AM (2 children)
Heeeeeyy don't mod me dowwn u'll just prove I'm rightREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @11:05AM (1 child)
http://variety.com/2017/digital/news/youtube-ad-boycott-pedophile-sexual-children-videos-1202622790/ [variety.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @11:11AM
Innocent videos uploaded by kids themselves attract creepy comments and scare already fickle advertisers. And yet it is still FUCKING OFFTOPIC.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Gaaark on Tuesday November 28 2017, @12:35PM (1 child)
SOMEONE needs to get LAID!!!
Just sayin'!
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 1) by Orion Blastar on Wednesday November 29 2017, @06:23AM
I am asexual with no interest in sex.
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Tuesday November 28 2017, @01:26PM
You're being voted down because your post is from 2016, boring, and redundant.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Tuesday November 28 2017, @09:49AM
auf Wiedersehen.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by shortscreen on Tuesday November 28 2017, @10:06AM (3 children)
I'm assuming the 49 million is what MS will be handing over to the people of Munich in exchange for the opportunity to subject them to Win10 adware/spyware and for this PR success story.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @11:37AM (2 children)
Wouldn't surprise me if M$ is offering fire sale prices for their junk once again to try to get Munich.
(We'll just see what they have in mind for Windoze 11.)
I figure that a huge chunk of that 49M will be for new hardware.
As of 2013, Munich had 15,500 desktop boxes and they didn't have to buy any newer, more powerful boxes to run LiMux.
The summary gives the new number as 29,000 desktops.
At least 15,500 of those are old boxes, currently running LiMux quite happily, and will need to be replaced to get MICROS~1's bloatware going.
Pretty sure Windoze device drivers would be a problem as well.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 29 2017, @12:53AM (1 child)
Having actually managed and bought this sort of software before. Most of the cost is not the end user software. It is maintaining it. Getting a 'windows admin' is dead easy. In fact it is pretty cheap. Getting a linux admin who knows what they are doing? That takes care and work. Then on top of that they spun their own distro. Meaning even more work. They should have just used one of the standard distros.
I called it when they moved away that they would be back. Well here we are. I call it that they will also switch again in the future.
they didn't have to buy any newer, more powerful boxes
That means their computers are probably coming up on 7+ years old. I have HW that I have babied and take care of that is way older. But in an IT environ like that shit gets abused. Nothing shows 'we dont give a fuck about you' than on your first day of work getting a 7+ year old hand me down laptop.
My bet is their IT dept went on a huge binge of holier than thou and the users are done with that shit. It smells of a political play. One of which MS saw blood in the water and quickly took advantage of.
Pretty sure Windoze
What are you 13 and still living in 1998? Grow up. You can do better.
MS has lost the datacenter. Why? Cost. The desktop? Not even close.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 29 2017, @01:51AM
Getting a linux admin who knows what they are doing? That takes care and work.
...and once you've got a guy who has been doing things via scripts his whole career, he's WAY more productive than the "cheap" Windoze admins who need a GUI to do things (40 point&click operations; rinse and repeat for the next box).
"One Microsoft Way" is "penny wise and pound foolish".
MS has lost the datacenter
Yup.
Windoze
I enjoy noting how Redmond has not the slightest bit of creativity.
...in particular, in naming things.
Windows, Word, Office, Money, .NET -- WTF??
Big Pharma has been coming up with new and different names since the dawn of time:
Advil, Tylenol, Paxil, Zoloft, Motrin, ...
All uniquely Googleable.
MSFT simply lacks any imagination.
When you see me use the word "windows", it's unlikely to be capitalized and will be speaking of a rectangular thing that might appear on -my- screen.
That hasn't included anything M$-related in a LONG time.
[Has M$ lost] The desktop?
The public school system of Brazil: 500,000 seats; All Linux and all FOSS.
IBM, Inc.: 300,000 Linux seats
Panasonic, Inc.: 300,000 Linux seats
The gov't of Malaysia: All Linux and all FOSS.
Gov't-owned boxes in the autonomous region of Extremadura in Spain: All Linux and all FOSS.
Ernie Ball, Inc. since the BSA put them on TeeVee and called them thieves[1]: All Linux and all FOSS.
It's entirely do-able.
[1] Having a business that can be raided at any time for any reason by the Business Software Alliance (a M$ proxy) and have them assess huge fines for non-compliance with EULAs seems very stupid to me.
Needing a fulltime guy to monitor EULA compliance is equally stupid.
CEO Sterling Ball said the same thing back in 2000 and gave his IT guys till the end of the year to get that EULAware shit out the door.
[This stuff in Munich] smells of a political play
Very much so.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 28 2017, @12:36PM
I wonder if they'll get the China version with the spyware removed. Too bad you can't check the source LOL!