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German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

zdnet.com

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Re: German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

#31

Post by wolverine876 »

Can LibreOffice on Linux deliver management solutions?

Think of 1,000 workstations, a small to mid-sized network: you need software that automates installation, configuration, security, etc. It's not like at home: Even if everyone is in the same building, you can't manually install, configure, change configuration, upgrade, etc. 1,000 times (think about it; not only the time and quality issues, but you'd spend a total of days just walking around). With Microsoft Office, you click a box in Group Policy and the entire group, or whatever subset you desire, changes configuration. You can automate installs, patches, etc.

Re: German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

#33

Post by ozim »

lwde wrote: post #2

We'll have to see how long it takes, as it did with LiMux ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LiMux ) when Microsoft Germany headquarters magically moved to Munich and everything got back to running on Windows again.

My question is what the heck?

I read that same thing every 2-3 years “German state goes Linux/libre office”.

Then it turns out that it is not really true. Some parts yes then some other parts are already on it and some parts move back.

I do understand there might be different parts of rather big country doing different stuicf

Re: German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

#34

Post by karma_pharmer »

holografix wrote: post #21

Very hard for me to understand why, in a world of Google docs, anyone would want to deal with the bloated mess that is ms office. I was helping an elderly relative who works as a translator and hasn’t touched a modern version of word in about 5 years. They had a new computer and I got an ms office sub for them. The poor person re-did about 4 hours of their work 3x because they couldn’t find the file MS Word had guara…

> why, in a world of Google docs

The answer is in the first sentence of the article: data sovereignty.

Most governments don't want to store their data with a foreign corporation.

Re: German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

#35

Post by sega_sai »

I have been using Libreoffice/OpenOffice continuously pretty much for last 20 years (mostly Impress/presentation part for teaching/presentations). And the number of bugs, crashes, issues with video etc occasionally gets very annoying. I was hoping over the years things would improve, but I don't quite see that unfortunately. If I could get something to replace LibreOffice that is not online and works on Linux I would pay for it.

Re: German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

#37

Post by schmichael »

wolverine876 wrote: post #31

Can LibreOffice on Linux deliver management solutions? Think of 1,000 workstations, a small to mid-sized network: you need software that automates installation, configuration, security, etc. It's not like at home: Even if everyone is in the same building, you can't manually install, configure, change configuration, upgrade, etc. 1,000 times (think about it; not only the time and quality issues, but you'd spend a tota…

Linux has directories and config/package/fleet management as well. No one in the past 20 years should be walking to every desk in 1,000 desk building installing software.

Re: German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

#38

Post by FriedEggFred »

geraldwhen wrote: post #20
jll29 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The more people use free software, the more it will become cost effective to improve it using government funding. There can be enormous net savings (zero license fees), which is fantastic for the taxpayer.

Without an actual design vision, all open source software will flounder and never replace commercial counterparts.

Gimp, blender, firefox and obs are all very successful OSS alternatives that come to mind.

Re: German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

#39

Post by jolmg »

wolverine876 wrote: post #31

Can LibreOffice on Linux deliver management solutions? Think of 1,000 workstations, a small to mid-sized network: you need software that automates installation, configuration, security, etc. It's not like at home: Even if everyone is in the same building, you can't manually install, configure, change configuration, upgrade, etc. 1,000 times (think about it; not only the time and quality issues, but you'd spend a tota…

Linux has multiple options for configuration management: Puppet, Chef, Ansible, Salt, Nix, etc. You can even write a quick loop on the shell of your choice and orchestrate your machines that way if only want to rely on stock software...

Re: German state ditches Microsoft for Linux and LibreOffice

#40

Post by pmontra »

okasaki wrote: post #32
wolverine876 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Europe is poorer than ever Europe is richer than ever.

Wealth only matters in comparison to others, and Europe is poorer than ever compared to other regions.

In relative values it's worse than 100 years ago, better than 1000 years ago. Absolute values are also important. It's still much better than 100 years ago.

And then so many people migrate to Europe from the Americas, Africa and Asia. It shouldn't be so bad after all.

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