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CERN Is Working To Move Further Away From Microsoft Due To License Costs Going Up By 10x

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CERN, The European Organization for Nuclear Research that is home to the Large Hadron Collider and a lot of other experiments, is experimenting with moving further away from Microsoft products. Due to Microsoft license fee increases affecting their work in the research laboratory and its budget, they established the Microsoft Alternatives "MAlt" project.

CERN had already long been involved with developing Scientific Linux (now shifting to CentOS) but they have still been reliant upon Microsoft products in other areas, on some Windows systems as well as using the likes of Skype for Business.

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Also today: Ubuntu preinstalled by Lenovo.

CERN Ditches Microsoft to ‘Take Back Control’ with Open Source

  • CERN Ditches Microsoft to ‘Take Back Control’ with Open Source Software

    The European Organisation for Nuclear Research, better known as CERN, and also known as home of the Large Hadron Collider, has announced plans to migrate away from Microsoft products and on to open-source solutions where possible.

    Why? Increases in Microsoft license fees.

    Microsoft recently revoked the organisations status as an academic institution, instead pricing access to its services on users. This bumps the cost of various software licenses 10x, which is just too much for CERN’s budget.

CERN is moving away from expensive Microsoft software

  • CERN is moving away from expensive Microsoft software and embracing open source

    CERN -- the European Organization for Nuclear Research best known for its particle smashing Large Hadron Collider -- has decided to eschew Microsoft in favor of open source software.

    For many years, CERN benefited from hefty discounts on Microsoft products, but this is coming to an end. Rather than paying hugely increased licensing fees, the organization is instead implementing its own Microsoft Alternatives project, known as MAlt. CERN says it is "taking back control using open software".

CERN plans to ditch Microsoft’s software after losing

  • CERN plans to ditch Microsoft’s software after losing its academic status

    CERN previously could use Microsoft’s software products such as Windows at a heavily discounted rate for decades thanks to its status as an academic institution. But the research organization said Microsoft’s decision to revoke that status has forced it to look elsewhere, as it reckons it simply cannot afford its standard license fees any more.

CERN ditches Windows and embraces open source to save cash

  • CERN ditches Windows and embraces open source to save cash

    Last year, the company launched the 'Microsoft Alternatives Project' to examine ways that the company could work smarter by switching to Linux-based operating systems. Its initial goal was to "investigate the migration from commercial software products (Microsoft and others) to open-source solutions, so as to minimise CERN's exposure to the risks of unsustainable commercial conditions."

    Also to 'seek out new life and new civilisations, to bol….

    Sorry, that's Star Trek. Moving on then.

    CERN appears to be one of the first major organisations switching to Linux as an alternative to switching to Windows 10 ahead of Windows 7 reaching end of life next January.

CERN leaves Microsoft programs behind for open-source software

  • CERN leaves Microsoft programs behind for open-source software

    We all use open-source software every day. What? You don't? Have you used Google, watched a Netflix show, or liked a buddy's Facebook post? Congrats, you're an open-source user.

    But, true, most of us don't use end-user open-source software every day. Even staffers at CERN, one of the world's great research institutions, don't -- and they run the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the world's largest particle accelerator, on it. But, on the desktop, they use Microsoft-based programs like many users around the globe. That's changing now.

    Beginning a year ago, CERN launched the Microsoft Alternatives project (MAlt). The name says it all.

    CERN wants to get away from Microsoft programs for a very prosaic reason: To save money.

CERN Is Looking At Microsoft Alternatives

  • CERN Is Looking At Microsoft Alternatives

    CERN is the home to the internet and also Higgs Boson, the ‘god’ particle. As we all know open source software is at the heart of all the scientific work that CERN does. It uses technologies like OpenStack and Kuberentes.

    However, when it comes to user-facing applications that are used by scientists, researchers, and employees – they run on Microsoft technologies such as Windows, Skype and so on.

    Microsoft offers a discount to academics and research organizations that brings the cost down as these organizations run hundreds, if not thousands of client machines. CERN has been using Microsoft technologies for over 20 years under a discount rate of being an academic institution”.

CERN Chooses Open Source And Ditches Microsoft Software

  • CERN Chooses Open Source And Ditches Microsoft Software

    Apart from the secure nature of the open source software, many organizations also make the switch to cut operating costs. Just last month, we reported that the Indian state of Kerala is saving about $430 million by using a Linux-based operating system in its schools.

    In a related development, The European Organisation for Nuclear Research (CERN) is all set to ditch Microsoft software and adopt the open source alternatives. This shift has been planned in the wake of the tenfold increase in Microsoft’s licensing costs. Earlier, CERN enjoyed discounted academic institution pricing, which expired in March.

    CERN has also published a blog post on its website that describes the organization’s plan to adopt open source software more widely and get things “back in control.” Notably, CERN has been working on a project called The Microsoft Alternatives project (MAlt) for over a year to look for the perfect alternatives.

    The post mentions that MAlt’s aim is to minimize CERN’s exposure to “risks of unsustainable commercial conditions” and help other public research institutions that also face a similar kind of situation.

Microsoft shrugs off...

"CERN reveals plan to shift from Microsoft"

  • Large Redmond Collider: CERN reveals plan to shift from Microsoft to open-source code after tenfold license fee hike

    Last year, anticipating an end to its discount, the lab, perhaps best known for the Large Hadron Collider, set in motion plans to shift toward open-source software to better control its computing costs.

    As such, CERN has been quietly working on a project called Microsoft Alternatives (MAlt) to develop migration paths away from the commercial software offered by Microsoft and like-minded vendors.

    In a memo issued Wednesday officially announcing the existence of MAlt, Emmanuel Ormancey, system architect at CERN, said Microsoft recently rescinded CERN's academic designation. Following the conclusion of its previous contract with the software giant in March 2019, CERN was presented with a new contract based on user numbers that increased its licensing costs more than tenfold.

    CERN said while it has negotiated a gradual fee increase over the next decade, the higher costs simply aren't sustainable.

" why it's ditching Microsoft and helping others do the same"

  • CERN, the famous scientific lab where the web was born, tells us why it's ditching Microsoft and helping others do the same

    For 20 years, Microsoft has been one of CERN's major IT suppliers, but earlier this week, CERN announced in a blog post that, thanks to a tenfold price hike by Microsoft, CERN was yanking out all of its Microsoft software, a project it calls the Microsoft Alternatives project (MAlt). CERN employs about 2,500 people and collaborates with more than 12,200, and Microsoft told CERN it must pay increased per-user software pricing why it's ditching Microsoft and helping others do the sam.

    [...]

    And he said CERN has every intention of showing other organizations how to replace Microsoft software with alternatives.

5 More articles

  • CERN want to see if it can operate with mostly open source software to “take back control”

    And a recent decision of the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) certainly seems to be lending its seal of approval to the conclusion that Linux has won this protracted David and Goliath software battle. Not only on technical merit – or because of ethics – but also on cost.

    What happened here is that the Switzerland-based CERN – who run such massive scientific projects as the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) – has been declared by Microsoft as “not an academic institution” – a decision designed to make CERN pay a full price for Microsoft products.

  • CERN turns to open source software as Microsoft increases its fees
  • CERN is looking to adopt open source software because Microsoft is too expensive [Ed: They mean proprietary software, not "commercial"]

    The research institute has therefore decided to explore ways of reducing or even eliminating its dependency on commercial [sic] software by employing open source alternatives.

  • CERN is going open source after Microsoft upped its licensing fees [Ed: This is how proprietary software works; it locks you in and then the cost skyrockets (when you're stuck).]

    Foreseeing this issue, the fancy folk at CERN started the Microsoft Alternative project (MAlt), last year, in an effort to figure out what alternative, open source software could be turned to their needs. More than likely, this also means moving to Linux systems, after almost 20 years of using Microsoft. It’s not a small thing, especially when particle physics is involved.

    Microsoft gets a lot of money from providing licenses for governmental and educational institutions, but if CERN can make the jump to open source, it might embolden others to do the same.

  • CERN to move away from Microsoft because license fees have skyrocketed

    Windows may still be the operating system on desktops and laptops, by choice or not, but Microsoft’s biggest profit comes from the wholesale licensing of the OS on enterprise, government, and educational computers. Those, however, are slowly losing ground especially with the latter two categories. That has mostly been because of the increasing costs of Windows licenses. That has caused not only governments but even CERN, the world’s largest particle physics laboratory, to move away from Windows and proprietary software at large.

Two more later articles

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