Microsoft Scores Big: Three Year Contract with DoD

CommanderFrank

CommanderFrank

Cat Can't Scratch It
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Windows 8 operating system might not be as popular with the public as Windows 7 is just yet, but someone cares enough to place an order for 330K units: the Department of Defense. Microsoft has inked a 3 year licensing deal with the DoD to supply Windows 8, Office 2013 and Sharepoint 2013 to satisfy the needs of 450K employees..

This is the first time that three major DOD agencies—the Army, Air Force, and Defense Information Systems Agency— have entered into a single agreement with Microsoft, Redmond says
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Nothing new here.

Being in the AF and helping with the deployment of Win 7, this is nothing new.
 
Who did MS have to bribe to get that deal?

So the DoD computers will be as vulnerable as everyone else's.
 
Double post due to lack of Edit button. I'm in the Air Force as well. This is going to suck hard!
 
Free licenses and free support, nothing more than desperation and p.r. stunt
 
MajorDomo said:
Windows 8 operating system might not be as popular with the public as Windows 7 is just yet, but someone cares enough to place an order for 330K units: the Department of Defense. Microsoft has inked a 3 year licensing deal with the DoD to supply Windows 8, Office 2013 and Sharepoint 2013 to satisfy the needs of 450K employees..
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Having government use proprietary software is an assault on freedom. The people must be able to know the code that is running on the systems that they are paying for; anything less is an affront to transparency. One would think that the experience with the voting machines would have demonstrated the need for this.

The DoD, with its trillions of dollars, could, after all, afford to write its own operating system and office suite (or at least make a GNU/Linux distribution).
 
Goody. And we get to foot the bill not only for this but the re-training that will be required.

Oh, and the increase in Vision benefits because the contrast in Office 2013 is totally fucked up.
 
damicatz said:
Having government use proprietary software is an assault on freedom. The people must be able to know the code that is running on the systems that they are paying for; anything less is an affront to transparency. One would think that the experience with the voting machines would have demonstrated the need for this.

The DoD, with its trillions of dollars, could, after all, afford to write its own operating system and office suite (or at least make a GNU/Linux distribution).
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Seriously? An assault to freedom? An organization that is tasked with killing as efficiently and effectively as possible and buying Windows 8 licenses is an assault to freedom?
 
heatlesssun said:
Seriously? An assault to freedom? An organization that is tasked with killing as efficiently and effectively as possible and buying Windows 8 licenses is an assault to freedom?
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Ignoratio elenchi. The DoD's propensity for mass murder is not the topic of discussion here; their decision to purchase Microsoft software is.
 
damicatz said:
Ignoratio elenchi. The DoD's propensity for mass murder is not the topic of discussion here; their decision to purchase Microsoft software is.
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Their servers run RHEL I believe, so at least they have some dignity there to be fair.
 
damicatz said:
Ignoratio elenchi. The DoD's propensity for mass murder is not the topic of discussion here; their decision to purchase Microsoft software is.
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Theoretically the DoD is going to use these Microsoft products to kill more efficiently. To deprive some people not only of their freedom but their lives so that free people can remain free.
 
AWESOME!

At least the government knows an amazing operating when it sees one.

Linux is amazing if you set it up yourself for the utmost performance (ie compiling every little bit).

By the way, I own a RBMP and run OS X ML on it. I have an ESXI box running several distros of Linux for development. I run a Windows 8 gaming rig. Am I a Windows fanboy? No. I just love amazing software.
 
"We can't sell our POS to the consumer, lets sell it to the government."

Genius!
 
That license agreement doesn't seem large enough to me. Aren't there like eleventy bajillion people in the DoD? This is probably the first purchase.
 
take it from someone who is using xp and IE7 at my DoD job: I NEED THIS.
 
[RIP]Zeus;1039487321 said:
Nothing new here.

Being in the AF and helping with the deployment of Win 7, this is nothing new.
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SkribbelKat said:
That license agreement doesn't seem large enough to me. Aren't there like eleventy bajillion people in the DoD? This is probably the first purchase.
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From the link in the OP:

The DOD employs about 450,000 folks, it says. So more than 330,000 of them will soon be using Microsoft's newest operating system.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-windows-8-department-of-defense-2013-1#ixzz2HAE5yklp
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damicatz said:
The DoD, with its trillions of dollars, could, after all, afford to write its own operating system and office suite (or at least make a GNU/Linux distribution).
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The DoD does not operate in a bubble.

For instance, if they receive a CAD file from a contractor, this hypothetical OS of theirs would have to be able to read it perfectly.

There are literally hundreds of programs that they'd have to account for and support far better than even Linux can do with its decades of development and hundreds of developers.
 
ekuest said:
take it from someone who is using xp and IE7 at my DoD job: I NEED THIS.
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Really? I hope you get a newer OS soon. But if you're still on XP/IE7, you're probably using legacy applications that require it, huh?
 
SkribbelKat said:
That license agreement doesn't seem large enough to me. Aren't there like eleventy bajillion people in the DoD? This is probably the first purchase.
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It only seems like it. The DoD subcontracts like crazy so it seems like they have more people than they do.
 
Neurofreeze said:
It only seems like it. The DoD subcontracts like crazy so it seems like they have more people than they do.
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Do the contractors supply their own hardware or do they have the stuff supplied? I would think that would be contract-dependent, but the DoD's various agencies and departments would probably be less inclined to permit BYO computing by having corporate agencies supply computers and operating systems that might not conform to their security requirements, yet still process government owned data in support of whatever they're doing.
 
Neurofreeze said:
The DoD does not operate in a bubble.

For instance, if they receive a CAD file from a contractor, this hypothetical OS of theirs would have to be able to read it perfectly.

There are literally hundreds of programs that they'd have to account for and support far better than even Linux can do with its decades of development and hundreds of developers.
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I've worked for companies that do government work. You do what the government tells you to do, not the other way around. If they say that you will only use open CAD formats, then you will only use open CAD formats. The amount of business that the government gives out is far too great to risk loosing it all.

They did the same thing with IPv6. The DoD decreed that all software products they buy must support IPv6. The vendors all fell in line.
 
SkribbelKat said:
ekuest said:
take it from someone who is using xp and IE7 at my DoD job: I NEED THIS.
Click to expand...
Really? I hope you get a newer OS soon. But if you're still on XP/IE7, you're probably using legacy applications that require it, huh?
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I wish that was the reason I was still stuck on the old stuff as then there would actually be a half-way decent reason, but nothing I do requires these XP or IE7. My hardware isn't even the issue as I am running a last year model Dell with a core i5 and 3Gb of ram.
 
My guess is that MS told them in order to get the other licenses they HAD to get Win 8 to go with them to boost the Win8 numbers and get some PR out of it.
 
BoogerBomb said:
My guess is that MS told them in order to get the other licenses they HAD to get Win 8 to go with them to boost the Win8 numbers and get some PR out of it.
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Some truth to this. To get the discounted price (read the other articles about this if you don't understand this point) the DoD committed itself to use the latest and greatest Microsoft products.
 
heatlesssun said:
Some truth to this. To get the discounted price (read the other articles about this if you don't understand this point) the DoD committed itself to use the latest and greatest Microsoft products.
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I guess no know believes you when you say that you helped with deployment of win7 in the AF.

We had vista on these machines back in 07 then moved to win7 as quickly as we could.

Either way, this is nothing new for DoD.

As for the servers, I can not deny nor confirm we run Windows or Linux :D.
 
damicatz said:
Having government use proprietary software is an assault on freedom. The people must be able to know the code that is running on the systems that they are paying for; anything less is an affront to transparency. .
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That doesn't make any sense. Software and everything else is evaluated to functional requirements, not design implementation.
 
SkribbelKat said:
Really? I hope you get a newer OS soon. But if you're still on XP/IE7, you're probably using legacy applications that require it, huh?
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nope. a select few have win 7 and i assume newer IE. we just have cheap oversight and shitty tech guys i think. too much work to change all some thousand computers over to new software.

bbenz33 said:
I wish that was the reason I was still stuck on the old stuff as then there would actually be a half-way decent reason, but nothing I do requires these XP or IE7. My hardware isn't even the issue as I am running a last year model Dell with a core i5 and 3Gb of ram.
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hardware might be part of it for us. my computer has an E6550 (not sure but i wouldnt be surprised if 1GB ram), but it doesnt even feel that fast. i dont even want to know what hardware our VMs are running on cuz they are molasses.
 
There are still thousands of machines and entire operational networks that run windows xp, office 2003, sharepoint 2003 on brand new hardware. This is going to be a huge improvement.
 
[RIP]Zeus;1039488036 said:
I guess no know believes you when you say that you helped with deployment of win7 in the AF.
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Might want to reread this thread because I was never in the AF and have never claimed to be.
 
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