China bans government purchases of Windows 8, surprising Microsoft
China is banning Windows 8 devices from at least some government IT purchases, in a mysterious move that took Microsoft off guard.
The ban came from China’s Central Government Procurement Center, which posted a brief notice last Friday on new requirements for government tenders. Among the demands is that Windows 8 be excluded from the bidding process on computer purchases.
This development comes amid the growing cyber security tiff between the US and Chinese governments. Some Americans will likely view this as hollow rhetoric on the part of China. I mean how can anybody get along with Microsoft? The superiority of US technology is absolute and permanent. Right? Think again. China has long term development projects to reduce its dependence on US technology and the exposure the intrusions by the NSA that comes with it. Here is what is likely to take the place of Windows 8 on Chinese computers.
China chooses Ubuntu as state-endorsed operating system
Canonical, the organization behind popular Linux distribution Ubuntu, is working alongside the Chinese government to deliver a state-endorsed operating system.
According to Canonical, it's working alongside the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology to bring a suitable Ubuntu version to China. The operating system, which will be known as Ubuntu Kylin, is expected to be released in April.
Ubuntu Kylin is part of a broader strategy on China's part to increase the adoption of open-source initiatives in the country, according to Canonical. China's ministry was deciding between several different Linux distributions before ultimately choosing Ubuntu.
"This collaboration will bring local investment and participation to ensure that the platform is relevant for the Chinese market, and close coordination with the global Ubuntu project ensures that it is familiar to software and hardware vendors, and useful for export products made by Chinese companies as well," Canonical CEO Jane Silber said yesterday in a statement.
That article is from last year and gives an overview of the long range planning. Here is a more recent update that a commercially operative has was shipped last month on schedule.
Ubuntu 14.04 will power “first commercially available Ubuntu tablets” "Trusty Tahr" also brings long term support to desktops and servers.
Canonical today is releasing Ubuntu 14.04, a Long Term Support (LTS) edition for desktops and servers and an update to the versions of Ubuntu for phones and tablets.
LTS editions are released once every two years and receive five years of support from Canonical and thus gain wider adoption in businesses than the less stable server and desktop editions that come out every six months.
Canonical eventually wants to create a single operating system that can be installed across desktops, phones, and tablets, with a different interface presented on each device. That convergence hasn't been completed yet, so with 14.04 (codenamed "Trusty Tahr") there will be separate downloads for the mobile editions. "Full convergence means that the same code for operating systems and applications will be running on all types of devices, from phones to tablets to desktops, and even both smaller and larger devices," Ubuntu Engineering VP Rick Spencer told Ars in an e-mail. "Convergence is still a work in progress, and we will continue to move the code to the desktop as it is ready in each release."
So the power of the US government that comes with the ability to restrict the export of US technology is losing some of its teeth. The ability of the NSA to have security back doors installed in it is disappearing and US tech companies are losing business.