If a government organization would want to use a Linux, how hard would it actually be? Is it a viable alternative?
What is often forgotten about non-tech enterprise here on HN is that a typical public sector organisation has a ratio of 20-50 IT people (this is everyone, from the network and operations people to developers and project managers) per 10.000 employees in organisation where almost every employee uses some form of IT system to perform their duty.
Some users will not be capable of telling you if they are on an iOS or Android devices, and almost all of them know Microsoft Office and Outlook because that is what every place they have ever worked and will ever work uses. Or to frame it differently, the change management and retraining of 10000 employees is going to crush you, very, very quickly. On top of that your IT staff is certified and trained with Microsoft technologies, and most of them are likely happy about that to the point where they will leave your organisation if you push them toward Linux.
That is the employees. There is also the technology, and all the IT systems that only works on windows and have no competitors. This can be everything from your million dollar MRI machine to the dentist program (dentists are part of the public sector in Denmark). Cutting ties with Microsoft completely, would mean you’d need someone to develop alternatives to these things. (Yes, your million dollar MRI machine shouldn’t depend on windows XP, but it does).
So obviously it’s not impossible, nothing is, it’s just really, really, expensive. It’s so expensive that it will likely be it would be political suicide because the money you need to pay for the transition is going to come from firing nurses, school teachers, and other primary functions.
That being said, a lot of public sector organisations do take open source seriously. Especially here in Europe. But there isn’t a clean way to cut ties with Microsoft, and it’s actually become harder and harder. Because where is the Linux alternative to office365?
Disclaimer: I consider Microsoft to be the best external business partner that I’ve worked with while I was in the public sector.
It sounds like it's always gonna be a messy migration, but I wonder if you can somewhat simplify it by moving all users to web apps? Basically as an intermediate transition step to first decouple usage from the underlying OS.
It will not die because it a scary ball of buggy spaghetti, a security risk and an energy hog.
It will die because people use cloud software in their browsers. Thank you Google (That hurt)
Windows will continue, I fear, to power MRI machines, bank's server rooms, and (shudder) jet aeroplane cockpits and control software.
[0] https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/02/windows_for_w...
I know there are a few examples of it happening, but one of the reasons Microsoft is so successful is because they actually sell a really nice product with some really good support. This isn’t true for you or me as private customers, but when I was working in an average sized Danish City our IT department had a direct line to Seattle, and not only would they sometimes change Office365 or Azure in ways that we suggested, they would call you every hour with updates during major incidents. Part of what Microsoft sells to enterprise organisations is the ability for IT management to tell their organisation that Microsoft is giving them personal hourly updates while outlook is down.
As bad as bribes are, I don’t think they are going to move public opinion enough for politicians (or anyone else really) to push for alternatives. In fact, I doubt I’ll be reading about this outside of HN, as sad as that may be.
Having a Linux based business is hard, for a few reasons:
- Destkop Linux sucks
- You need experienced sysadmins. There is no Linux equivalent to AD / Azure AD in terms of simplicity, as far as I know. Also true for other stuff like app management.
- User resistance, as few people use Linux as their daily OSes
It has not sucked since about 1993
If you compare Linux 1993 to Mac SO 2022 it still stacks up, almost.
Comparing Linux 1993 to MS Dos of the time is unfair.
It took MS till about 2000 to be able to compete with Linux on quality
MS Windows was successful for other reasons than the operating system.
Security, configuration, usability, documentation, driver support... it's all terrible.
BSDs are generally a bit better as they will at least have some level of consistency and decent docs.
Unfortunately, that's the correct bar for things that need to "just work".
Sure, with enough experience, I'm sure I could buy hammer parts and build an awesome custom hammer.
If you gave me the box of parts and told me to quickly hang a picture, the head would probably fly off the hammer and kill someone.
(Desktop Linux user since kernel 0.9; it's by far the least bad option for me, but that doesn't matter in this context.)
Also certain Chinese agencies are most definitely using custom distros.
And the Microsoft came calling again - guess what they use now?
It is the example I used to tell clients about how if your organization is big enough, publicly visible enough and open to being in the news/or a case study) and has great lawyers, you can probably get Microsoft licensing for essentially "free".
And those "nearly free" licenses will increase over the next 2-5 years.
The cynic in me says that Germany did this to get better bargaining leverage with Microsoft...
(Apparently they are cycling around back again, over the last couple years trying to transition away from Microsoft for some states/groups/municipalities within Germany)
I think there is also Vicenza in Italy where the municipality is using Zorin Os. [1]
Well Gates made a "visit" in Münich to "convince" them that windows is better.
And yes it's a viable alternative and has been for decades.