Munich considers returning to Windows due to problems with Linux

The city council of the German city of Munich is looking at whether it will let the thousands of Linux-running civil servant PCs run on Windows again. The many internal complaints about the open source operating system are said to be the main reason for Linux dropping.

Munich has migrated all PCs and laptops to LiMux over the past ten years; by December 2013, 15,000 systems had switched to the open source operating system. The project leader and the mayor discussed the successful completion of the migration. They also saw the project as ‘a consistent step towards greater openness and independence from individual software suppliers’.

Nevertheless, there appears to be a lot of dissatisfaction among the officials who have to work with the Linux systems, writes the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung on the basis of statements by Deputy Mayor Josef Schmidt. According to Schmidt, many officials would “suffer” by working with LiMux and an independent investigation should answer the question of whether the municipality should go back to Windows. Any advice in that direction is, according to the deputy mayor, ‘negotiable’.

According to Schmidt, there were problems with setting up a mail server that allowed officials to synchronize contacts, e-mails and appointments also on mobile devices. Also, a lot of manual programming would have to be done, so the extra costs for this would not outweigh the lack of license costs for Linux.

The deputy mayor states that Munich is one of the few municipalities that has completely switched to the open source operating system. Microsoft, for its part, has said that the company is open to any new contract negotiations with Munich’s city council.

A majority in the city council does not agree with the criticism of the deputy mayor, Heise reports. Several councilors support the LiMux project, although possible bottlenecks should be carefully examined.

Update 15:45: Response from city council has been added.