It is official that government agencies won’t be able to upgrade to Windows Vista unless they have written consent of the Texas legislature. While the bill has yet to be finalized, it’s looking like this is what’s going to happen. The Texas government has decided to go this route for several reasons.

While Windows 7 is right around the corner, they claim that this isn’t the reason that they are not upgrading. One of the senators proposed this line of action because of the widely known problems of Windows Vista. Windows XP seems to be working just fine for the state and they’re trying to avoid spending more money than they already have. It’s estimated that Texas has already spent in excess of 6 million dollars in upgrades to Vista.

The rider not only covers purchasing the operating system but new computers that have Vista already installed on it. The rider actually states Microsoft’s name in it. Microsoft commented that they were surprised that the rider singled them out. While this is true, Microsoft does own 99% of the government market for operating systems. In fact the state agencies only have 1,500 Macs.

Microsoft also controls 89% of the operating systems used on computers in the public school system. While schools are exempt from the rider it’s unlikely that they’ll upgrade before Windows 7 is released.

Texas has been plagued with bad contracts when it comes to technology. The first incident was when the stated suspended a deal because of data loss. The second was only a few months later in December.

Although the bill has been defeated before in Texas and many other states it’s likely to pass this time because of the financial situation that Texas is in. In reality it only makes sense for the government to hold off on upgrading until Windows 7 is released.

Source: Computer World

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