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Danish Ministry Replaces Windows and Microsoft Office with Linux and LibreOffice

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Re: Danish Ministry Replaces Windows and Microsoft Office with Linux and LibreOffice

#51

Post by skinkestek »

mrweasel wrote: post #39
skinkestek wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm currently working at a large public institution in Norway. Half the team runs Linux, and the only real constraint is using Edge for SSO. (Firefox works too - you just have to actually log in like it's 2008.) Honestly, everything else runs smoother than what my Windows-using teammates are dealing with.

> using Edge for SSO May I ask what that SSO solution is? Because it sounds like it might be a Microsoft product.

Honestly, I’m not entirely sure.

I’ve seen the name Forgerock pop up occasionally, but I don’t know if that’s just tied to the login component on the web pages. Also, they recommend Mac users stick with Safari, which is puzzling. I mean: if it was a Microsoft product, you’d think they’d lock it down to Edge on Mac too—so that makes me wonder.

Just my thoughts—could be totally off base.

Re: Danish Ministry Replaces Windows and Microsoft Office with Linux and LibreOffice

#52

Post by mrweasel »

skinkestek wrote: post #51
mrweasel wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> using Edge for SSO May I ask what that SSO solution is? Because it sounds like it might be a Microsoft product.

Honestly, I’m not entirely sure. I’ve seen the name Forgerock pop up occasionally, but I don’t know if that’s just tied to the login component on the web pages. Also, they recommend Mac users stick with Safari, which is puzzling. I mean: if it was a Microsoft product, you’d think they’d lock it down to Edge on Mac too—so that makes me wonder. Just my thoughts—could be totally off base.

Forgerock would make sense, though the Edge requirement is a little strange.

Re: Danish Ministry Replaces Windows and Microsoft Office with Linux and LibreOffice

#53

Post by ChocolateGod »

jve wrote: post #45
mrweasel wrote: post #24

As many IT people in Denmark is pointing out, it's not really about replacing Office and Windows, it's all the surrounding infrastructure that will be the main issue. Are these Linux machines going to authenticate against the Azure Active Directory, maybe just a local Active Directory, or are the IT department going to run a separate service in parallel? Are they moving away from Exchange Server... probably not, give…

> Are these Linux machines going to authenticate against the Azure Active Directory... Are they using Intune, if so what's the replacement strategy where? This comes up all the time when we talk about Linux in corporate deployment. As I have only experience in MS word regarding governance, let me ask this: - Is there really no tools for Linux world that allows managing loads of Linux machines in an easy manner as it…

> - Is there really no tools for Linux world that allows managing loads of Linux machines in an easy manner as it is in MS word (applying GPO policies)? A tool that can be easily set up and managed and doesn't have to always resort to scripting?

Nope, there's no unification in configuration formats (yml, ini etc), locations (/var, /etc, /usr, /opt/etc) or registries (dconf, gconf).

Yes, standards exist, but they are rarely followed to the letter.

Re: Danish Ministry Replaces Windows and Microsoft Office with Linux and LibreOffice

#54

Post by vaylian »

rcarmo wrote: post #42
thyristan wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is probably just a setting missing from your Firefox profile that allows your company Kerberos realm/domain. If your institution hasn't locked down your Firefox config, you can fix this yourself: https://docs.redhat.com/en/documentation/red_hat_enterprise_...

It’s really not. Edge bundles a number of authentication libraries with the Linux version that enable things like remote passkey support.

What is "remote passkey support"? I am familiar with passkeys (both resident and non-resident). But I haven't heard of remote passkeys yet.

Re: Danish Ministry Replaces Windows and Microsoft Office with Linux and LibreOffice

#55

Post by ChocolateGod »

powgpu wrote: post #48
jve wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Are these Linux machines going to authenticate against the Azure Active Directory... Are they using Intune, if so what's the replacement strategy where? This comes up all the time when we talk about Linux in corporate deployment. As I have only experience in MS word regarding governance, let me ask this: - Is there really no tools for Linux world that allows managing loads of Linux machines in an easy manner as it…

well for server is nix, but not sure about desktop.

I'd say using Nix is bordering on using scripting. Someone still has to write the method that extracts your Nix configuration into a file.

Re: Danish Ministry Replaces Windows and Microsoft Office with Linux and LibreOffice

#56

Post by skinkestek »

sneak wrote: post #14
exceptione wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

KDE + any rolling distro is miles ahead of Windows. So, as a user of both, I read your question with a smirk. If you would ask if LibreOffice is ready, I would say: yes and no. The UX of LO is worse than MS Office. LO is more feature rich in certain areas but it lacks the UX if you want to get a well-looking document with a minimum amount of work. Case in point: lack of acceptable Impress templates (they look from th…

…unless you work all day in Excel, which many do. There is no reasonable substitute or replacement for Excel. There should be, but there isn’t.

Probably true if you’re an advanced user using a machine with American language pack.

Personally, I stick with LibreOffice. The biggest win? It doesn’t aggressively mangle my data by assuming everything is a U.S. date that needs “fixing.”

And don’t get me started on how Excel insists that, just because my employer gave me a Norwegian-language Mac, every formula should now be written in some half-baked, poorly documented pseudo-Norwegian formula language.

The one tool I do miss? Outlook.

Re: Danish Ministry Replaces Windows and Microsoft Office with Linux and LibreOffice

#57

Post by IceDane »

mrweasel wrote: post #24

As many IT people in Denmark is pointing out, it's not really about replacing Office and Windows, it's all the surrounding infrastructure that will be the main issue. Are these Linux machines going to authenticate against the Azure Active Directory, maybe just a local Active Directory, or are the IT department going to run a separate service in parallel? Are they moving away from Exchange Server... probably not, give…

It's also just absurd in general since no one who has used LibreOffice can seriously think it is a viable replacement. It can do in a pinch but I imagine the file format incompatibility issues between ms and libre are going to cost more in lost productivity than your number above.

Re: Danish Ministry Replaces Windows and Microsoft Office with Linux and LibreOffice

#58

Post by weikju »

skinkestek wrote: post #51
mrweasel wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> using Edge for SSO May I ask what that SSO solution is? Because it sounds like it might be a Microsoft product.

Honestly, I’m not entirely sure. I’ve seen the name Forgerock pop up occasionally, but I don’t know if that’s just tied to the login component on the web pages. Also, they recommend Mac users stick with Safari, which is puzzling. I mean: if it was a Microsoft product, you’d think they’d lock it down to Edge on Mac too—so that makes me wonder. Just my thoughts—could be totally off base.

My guess -- they support Safari because of iOS. And so might as well just support it on Mac too because it's the default... Heck MS even made Teams more officially supported on Safari than Firefox!

Re: Danish Ministry Replaces Windows and Microsoft Office with Linux and LibreOffice

#59

Post by bigfatkitten »

jve wrote: post #45
mrweasel wrote: post #24

As many IT people in Denmark is pointing out, it's not really about replacing Office and Windows, it's all the surrounding infrastructure that will be the main issue. Are these Linux machines going to authenticate against the Azure Active Directory, maybe just a local Active Directory, or are the IT department going to run a separate service in parallel? Are they moving away from Exchange Server... probably not, give…

> Are these Linux machines going to authenticate against the Azure Active Directory... Are they using Intune, if so what's the replacement strategy where? This comes up all the time when we talk about Linux in corporate deployment. As I have only experience in MS word regarding governance, let me ask this: - Is there really no tools for Linux world that allows managing loads of Linux machines in an easy manner as it…

I’ve done it with Puppet, mostly dropping config files around the place.

Everything was more work than it would’ve been under Windows, from endpoint configuration enforcement through to things like authentication and PKI.

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