Becta rubs salt in Microsoft’s wounds

Education technology agency Becta has dealt a hammer blow to Microsoft after advising schools and colleges not to upgrade their existing systems to Vista or Office 2007.

Becta delivered the damning verdict in a major report on Microsoft Vista and Office, released at this year’s British Education Training Technology (BETT) show. The agency recommended that schools and colleges read its findings before considering any large-scale investments.

In short, Becta said schools should only consider Vista where new institution-wide ICT provision is being planned. Even then, it recommended that no deployment should take place until schools are sure they have mechanisms in place to deal with potential interoperability and digital divide issues.

Crucially, it did not recommend upgrading existing systems to Vista, and counselled that mixed Windows-based operating environments should be avoided.

Rubbing salt in the wound, Becta added that pupils, teachers and parents should be made aware of free-to-use alternatives.

The report comes a year after Becta’s interim report on Vista, which concluded that the software’s new features do not add sufficient value to justify early adoption in the sector.

Becta said it has had to defer its final report on Microsoft’s Academic Licensing Programmes because its content relates to a recent complaint it made to the Office of Fair Trading for alleged anti-competitive practices by the vendor (CRN, 29 October).

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