U.S. DOT considers switch to Mac, Linux

MacNN ^ | 03/05/2007

[JohnSheppard]

The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) has banned Windows Vista, Office 2007, and Internet Explorer 2007 from its offices, and is considering switching its operations to Macs and PCs running Novell's SuSe Linux. The DOT enacted the ban in mid-January, according to one blogger, because certain applications essential to the agency's function can't run on Windows Vista. Microsoft has attracted intense criticism over its new operating system since it began shipping earlier this year, lacking proper driver software for a wide array of devices and utilizing a new user interface that closely resembles Apple's Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger system. Apple is also taking aim at the enterprise market with its upcoming Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard release, which incorporates numerous features that cater to large business needs.

[martin_fierro]

Techieness!

[Publius6961]

Ingrates!

How about if MS gives them the software for free? Then anyone having to deal with DOT will have to buy it, heh heh heh.

Only trouble is, they may not be able to play "protected content" and even software they have written themselves if VISTA doesn't like it.
Or break their computers if "unauthorized" hardware is used.

These government types are not the sharpest tools in the box, but they seem to know where this is going.

[Swordmaker]

DOT thinking MAC? PING?

I know, I know... but I couldn't resist...

If you want on or off the Mac Ping List, Freepmail me.

[TheStickman]

Would make sense to me if they went with Macs. They do work.

[Richard Kimball]

Pretty interesting. Sounds like someone in DOT seriously got a bee in their bonnet over Vista. MS may be getting ready to find out that Big Brother doesn't like people horning in on his territory. The Feds, aside from compliance with current hardware issues, probably don't like the idea of their own computers locking them out or refusing to play content. MS will very likely come out with a "Government" Verson of Vista, stripped of DRM and WGA. Alternately, MS may come up with a government code in the Windows serial number that will automatically prevent lockdown.

MS cannot continue to control 90% of the OS system forever, particularly as more and more interfaces become html based. They're cross-platform accessible, and this accessibility makes other operating systems a viable option.

It's not that MS won't be around or successful, but the total market dominance is going to go away. When that happens, MS could crumble. They are great at playing Monopoly, but many of their competitive successes have come from knee-capping the opposition through use of their dominance. I've been messing around with Google Applications, and there's a very good chance I won't buy Office again. I'm trying to go a month without using Office at home, and just seeing how effective the Google web apps are. I suspect that for a lot of people, they'll be everything they need.

[Vicki]

Finally, a government agency using good sense!

[coconutt2000]

Banning Vista three to five years before they even get around to installing it is a bit premature.

I'm a mac user, and an Apple Fan Boy - but somehow I think this story is premature and may not be the entire truth, the whole truth, or perhaps not even resemble the truth.

[George W. Bush]

Weren't there recent announcements from DoD and DoT that they forbade anyone to upgrade to Vista. One of them said something about it being an expensive and useless upgrade.

A lot of companies are feeling the same way. Instead of buying new machines with Vista, they're using their old copies of XP and installing Windows on new Macs.

[ShadowAce]

[rzeznikj at stout]

ib4ge...

[JRios1968]

For great glory

[rzeznikj at stout]

yes...

[Kevmo]

Macs are all right, as long as you don't want to some day manipulate the file on a pc, or try to back up the mac to a server. That's been my experience. We finally just put the Mac to bed and keep it around to make sure the source material was backed up when we might need it.

[antiRepublicrat]

Macs are all right, as long as you don't want to some day manipulate the file on a pc, or try to back up the mac to a server. That's been my experience. We finally just put the Mac to bed

Sounds like you were maybe using OS 9?

[antiRepublicrat]

Looks like the FAA is considering ditching Vista too, only to go to Linux. I think Microsoft made a strategic mistake with Vista. The real costs of switching from Windows to Mac or Linux has been migration, retraining, and with the Mac, new hardware. This let many TCO studies rightfully favor Windows.

But now the upgrade to Windows itself requires retraining and migration, so those advantages are lost against Mac and Linux. OS X will run on a lower-configured machine than full Vista, so the hardware advantage is out of the equation.

So now when people look to upgrade it's not so hard a decision to switch platforms at the same time.

[Doohickey]

I'm sure what you will not hear in this thread is that the DOT's CIO, Daniel Mintz, is the former director of government compliance programs at Sun Microsystems.

No hidden agenda here.

[antiRepublicrat]

No hidden agenda here.

The article didn't say DOT was considering a switch to Sun. A lot of agencies are cool to the idea of Vista, look at my previous post.

[Kevmo]

Yes, and the software did not port to OS10. Adobe Pagemaker. Upgrading from Pagemaker to Creative Suite is no picnic, so my company has reverted to using MSWord for technical datasheets moving forward. End of Apple era. Already things move along much smoother, though the quality of the documents isn't as crisp. The tradeoff is that now that all the technical community has access to them and they'll be in MSWord, the updates are much easier and they'll be much more accurate.