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France to ditch Windows for Linux to reduce reliance on US tech

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Re: France to ditch Windows for Linux to reduce reliance on US tech

#531

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you need any user retraining? All distros are basically identical. The only real difference is whether you spell "package manager" as apt, yum, or dnf.

>All distros are basically identical. Have you ever used the Linux OS??

Yes, since it came on two 1.44MB floppies.

Re: France to ditch Windows for Linux to reduce reliance on US tech

#532
post #512

The age of the Linux desktop might actually finally be coming Personally I think we are at an interim period for a big player to emerge and take over this space. If enough governments in the EU start switching over to customized linux distros theres a big chance for someone like Nokia to come in and develop their own approved distro with proper MDM and GPO-like management functionality baked in . On top of that it co…

I've been using linux as a daily driver since the start of the year. There's still a long ways to go before things "just work". It's about equivalent to windows right now in terms of frustrations, it's just that frustrations are more along the lines of "this is a bit wonky" instead of "this is malicious / was their intended behavior". It's gotten a LOT better, don't get me wrong, but it's still far off from what a ty…

Yeah, for example a bunch of my system updates began showing scary error notes because somehow there is a header inconsistency between the amdgpu driver and the kernel.

I'm not regretting my choice, but it's also something where the average user can't just call Linux Support and get a "run X and it'll fix it" solution.

Re: France to ditch Windows for Linux to reduce reliance on US tech

#533
post #512

The age of the Linux desktop might actually finally be coming Personally I think we are at an interim period for a big player to emerge and take over this space. If enough governments in the EU start switching over to customized linux distros theres a big chance for someone like Nokia to come in and develop their own approved distro with proper MDM and GPO-like management functionality baked in . On top of that it co…

I've been using linux as a daily driver since the start of the year. There's still a long ways to go before things "just work". It's about equivalent to windows right now in terms of frustrations, it's just that frustrations are more along the lines of "this is a bit wonky" instead of "this is malicious / was their intended behavior". It's gotten a LOT better, don't get me wrong, but it's still far off from what a ty…

Do typical users care that much about a bit of jank, though? All the “typical users” I know are on spyware infested Windows laptops and just interpret the horrible shabbiness of the whole experience as being normal.

Re: France to ditch Windows for Linux to reduce reliance on US tech

#534
post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But what kind of projects are people using these different pieces of software for? Are people designing aircraft carriers in Fusion? Don't get me wrong, I understand that AutoCAD is extremely important for architecture and the death grip that AutoDesk has over that industry needs to be broken for the benefit of all of us, but from my understanding Dessault Systems makes software that is used for totally different pur…

>Are people designing aircraft carriers in Fusion? I don't know, but I have watched people designing high-speed trains in CATIA.

Big players use CATIA and Siemens NX almost exclusively. I don’t know many using Autocad, maybe architectural firms.

Re: France to ditch Windows for Linux to reduce reliance on US tech

#535
post #512

The age of the Linux desktop might actually finally be coming Personally I think we are at an interim period for a big player to emerge and take over this space. If enough governments in the EU start switching over to customized linux distros theres a big chance for someone like Nokia to come in and develop their own approved distro with proper MDM and GPO-like management functionality baked in . On top of that it co…

I've been using linux as a daily driver since the start of the year. There's still a long ways to go before things "just work". It's about equivalent to windows right now in terms of frustrations, it's just that frustrations are more along the lines of "this is a bit wonky" instead of "this is malicious / was their intended behavior". It's gotten a LOT better, don't get me wrong, but it's still far off from what a ty…

Thank you for saying something I've been saying for awhile: Linux definitely has jank, but I'm not convinced it's more janky than Windows.

I think people are so used to Windows' awfulness that they kind of forget about how much bullshit is associated with it. Linux has bullshit too, though it's getting better, but when people talk about Linux jank they're always smuggling in an implication of Windows having less jank, which I don't concede at all.

Re: France to ditch Windows for Linux to reduce reliance on US tech

#536

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine what can happen if the French and other governments would start pouring all the money into developing that further in the open, rather than just giving it all to Microsoft instead?

Most of the cost (to the government) for Windows is "support" (in a very general sense) and that cost isn't disappearing with Linux. Especially since it is easier to find badly underpaid (and not particularly competent) Windows sysadmins than it is to find badly underpaid Linux admins.

Are you implying that need for support would go away?

If anything the demand would be artificially high at the start of a mass migration, and then presumably level out to something similar to what we see today with Windows.

This is basically RHEL's entire business model.

Re: France to ditch Windows for Linux to reduce reliance on US tech

#537

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes I do mean that. Google is one of the only companies in the Linux space who takes security seriously.

And switching to Google achieves the aim of getting away from American tech giants?

I don't think it's a wise thing to do at this point in time. There is more risk by not depending on America.

Re: France to ditch Windows for Linux to reduce reliance on US tech

#538

I hope it succeeds and I hope they document the experience and invite interested parties to see how it was setup and how (well) it works in order to encourage as many governments and organisations as possible to do the same.

For sure, I would love for this approach to spill over to the US and cause them to sever any contracts they have with the EU member nations

Re: France to ditch Windows for Linux to reduce reliance on US tech

#539

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You mean switch Windows by Microsoft for ChromeOS by Google? Weird suggestion. As for "security" and "antimalware" solutions being ready, I don't think there is much difference between the OSs there. Windows is no candyland either. As always, they will need competent people in the right places to pull this through. Tech is just an enabler.

Yes I do mean that. Google is one of the only companies in the Linux space who takes security seriously.

There is no security when the US government can legally compel Google to do whatever they want. This is why foreign governments want to move away from big tech.

Turns out the imperial boomerang impacts many things, especially when previous orders are easily destroyed (because only one country was benefiting).

Re: France to ditch Windows for Linux to reduce reliance on US tech

#540

I applaud France for this decision. Windows is basically legal spyware and adware at this point

Like most Microsoft products, Windows is a tool that benefits mostly from aggressive early marketing and successfully convincing everyone that they need this product, and by the time everyone realizes how terrible the product is it's too late because everything already depends on it.

They have done this everywhere; Microsoft Office is everywhere and terrible. Sharepoint used to be everywhere and is terrible. I know they bought it, but LinkedIn is nearly required everywhere and terrible. Teams seems to be increasingly used everywhere and terrible. And of course Windows is everywhere and terrible.

As far as I can tell, there is not a single thing that Microsoft does not half-ass. They're not a software company, they're a marketing company that sells software.

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