The city of Munich might drop Linux for Windows 10, could switch by 2020

2 min. read

Published on February 13, 2017

published on February 13, 2017

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The Munich City Authority Administrative and Personnel Committee is wanting to reorganize the city’s IT setup. This time, to reverse their former switch to Linux in favor of Windows 10 by the year 2020.

It’s been over ten years since Munich, the capital of Bavaria, switched to industry desktop distribution called LiMux. The migration had cost the city over $32 million dollars and included approximately 15,000 PCs in the conversion.

With Dieter Reiter of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) being elected mayor in 2014, the topic of switching back to Windows was almost immediate. This is the same Reiter that negotiated Microsoft’s office move into Munich and provided a study from Accenture supporting the availability of Windows 10 to government employees.

The debate is causing further of a rift between the Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) and the SPD. However, there might be a happy medium for the pair that includes both Linux and Windows 10 systems. As councilor Anne Hübner explained to ZDNet:

“Much of the server structure will remain as it is today. LibreOffice can also continue to be used, but we’ll allow our employees to use Microsoft products if they so wish” she said.

“I don’t think this whole LiMux-Microsoft thing should be debated on high ideologically driven emotions. In the future, whatever product fits our interests best, will be used. It will take some time to determine what’s best and what’s best may also change over time, as the digital industry and user requirements are changing fast.”

The availability of both applications and software independent of their operating systems is a complete option to explore for the committee. If they do vote for the redistribution of Windows 10 across the city’s IT, the choice could be quite costly. So far, the only estimate given was determined in 2014 for buying Windows 7 laptops. As ZDNet notes in their report, there is yet to be a complete Windows 10 migratory estimate.

The meeting to determine the next course of action, or lack thereof, is to be later this week.

Radu Tyrsina

Radu Tyrsina has been a Windows fan ever since he got his first PC, a Pentium III (a monster at that time). For most of the kids of his age, the Internet was an amazing way to play and communicate with others, but he was deeply impressed by the flow of information and how easily you can find anything on the web. Prior to founding Windows Report, this particular curiosity about digital content enabled him to grow a number of sites that helped hundreds of millions reach faster the answer they're looking for.