they will save 188,000 € on Microsoft license fees per year
It would be nice to see the European governments start a genuine effort on funding open source development, and start laying the foundation for a migration to their own Linux distro. Microsoft isn’t trustworthy. Hell, most American big tech is untrustworthy. Moving your government offices to an in house developed OS is going to be paramount for their security in the future.
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I hate it so much that Whatsapp made itself a social media
I admire the plan, but I doubt the public sector is going to completely acclimate to Linux. The average age of an employee in the public sector is something like 40+.
You might get lucky and get them to use one new program like LibreOffice, but there’s no way you’re going to completely revamp every desktop PC to Linux. I work in this field, and while everyone has been nice and friendly, they (and the entire system around them) are also hugely resistant to digital change. If they ever make the move to a Linux Desktop environment, the IT support will go through hell.
There used to be skins for KDE that made it look and feel 1:1 like Windows XP, I don’t know if these things still exist. If yes, there you have it: Just make the system behave like Windows and they won’t notice a difference. They only have to use Office, Mail and print files anyways. Most other tools they use are browser-based and will feel the same way
The names have changed. I literally had that conversation with “an engineer” 20 years ago wherein he concluded “I don’t know, if I have to learn new names for most of the programs I use (Word, Photoshop, maybe two others) I don’t think I want to use that other OS.” I had to support his position, if you can’t retrain to click on “Libre Office Writer” instead of “Office Word”, then a move to Linux isn’t for you.
Except most people just click a link on their desktop that goes to a thing they have a completely different name for anyways. If you don’t tell them anything (or just say it’s a new version of Windows) they likely won’t notice the actual differences, just complain about missing a specific icon for something without being able to correctly name what it is
Icons look different, etc. People are ridiculously inflexible.
Yet they are fine with using Windows 11, which looks completely different to Windows 7 or XP. They complained in the beginning just as much but then they were fine with it. People get used to change, they just hate it in the beginning.
Holy fuck, that’s the clearest sign for war prepararion ive seen from Europe yet, they don’t want the US in their computers.
Don’t worry. They’ll get a big discount on licenses and swap right back again.
I dunno, free’s still a lot cheaper, once it’s setup, it’ll be so much more flexible, it’ll hardly be worth going back.
Ain’t no such thing as free.
Okay.
When it’s just you, on your own PC, and you don’t value your time, it’s free.
Just from the license fees here, we’re talking what, roughly 2000 employees?
At that scale, you’re going to be paying for support. Whether through a third party, or employing enough people to fix all the things that can go wrong. And not everyone in IT knows enough about Linux to fix broken boxes.
I once recommended Linux for our customer servers, to be installed hundreds of miles away. And what I found was that employees who knew Linux (and specifically how to fix it when it fucks up) were more expensive than the trained monkeys we sent out to fix things, who at least knew how to copy data off it and reinstall Windows/slap a new drive in it, and that issues were my fault for recommending it. It was also easier to talk customers through some settings in Windows if it falls off the network somehow, than it was to deal with getting them to type things into a command line.
And that’s before you even consider servers and where your stuff all goes. With MS it goes into “the cloud”, and you don’t need to worry too much about anything other than paying for it. With your own hardware, you very much need to worry because if you don’t, then one day it won’t be there any more.
LibreOffice is a great alternative for 99% of people, but there is that 1% of people who is gonna be disappointment. This is a great step though.
Same goes for any software.
I don’t understand why people act like Windows is the holy grail of computing.
It sucks, it barely works for 90% of users, and the rest will use anything else.
Just as Linux will work for 98% of people, and those last ones are due to handful of evil companies.
The problem is education. People know how to use Windows/Microsoft products, and are too lazy to learn anything else. Saying “that other thing sucks” is easier than admitting “Idk how to use that other thing, and I’m too lazy to learn”, especially in a corporate environment where you can’t climb ladders by acknowledging your own shortcomings.
Get LibreOffice/Nextcloud/etc into schools, and the problem will be solved in a single generation.
People ‘know’ how to use Microsoft products. I’m a data guy and might spend less than a day a week in word, PowerPoint, excel. Most of the time I spend in them is checking other people’s work. I’m still called on to help people with such tasks as switching from footnotes to endnotes, moving files in SharePoint, fixing formatting. My general knowledge of navigating the UI and googling fixes is better than what people ‘know’.
It’s gonna be a rough few months for the IT department
Actually being able to troubleshoot things yourself instead of waiting for a reply from Microsoft support is a godsend.
Assuming the IT staff isn’t comprised of a bunch of junior techs that only know the Microsoft suite and not the actual inner workings of how email and Linux works.
Conveniently, this could be a path to competence for those juniors in the long term.
“competency” in IT is more about your skills with the tools your company is using. My current company only has one super minor server running Linux so even if someone so advanced with Linux they make Richard Stallman look like a M$ shill wouldnt be a competent engineer in my infrastructure.
I do get what you’re saying though and I wish more things would move to Linux in general. It’s much nicer to manage.
You a glass half full type person, huh? Honestly, I admire that attitude. I hope you can keep that.
you’re a “wish you all the best” type person huh? I hope you can keep that
