Reply to post: Re: The problem is not Linux itself...

Another German state plans switch back from Linux to Windows

Milton

Re: The problem is not Linux itself...

"The problem is not Linux itself ... it's the lack of applications on Linux, and the compatibility of existing ones with their Windows and Mac counterpart."

I'm a tad puzzled by that statement, and the rationale advanced by the Lower Saxony tax office quoted in the article—

"... decision is driven by compatibility: field workers and teleworkers overwhelmingly use Windows, while the OpenSUSE variants are installed on its office workstations"

If we are talking about specific business applications which exist only for Windows, what are they, and does this mean that the tax office has extant Windows servers running some back-office Win-only stuff? Presumably any such systems have long since been integrated with the users' workstations—so that could not be the rationale for such a statement.

Presumably also, "field workers and teleworkers" are absolutely not using unauthorised business-specific apps on their computers. So we are talking about standard office functionality, aren't we? The remote workers use email and office applications, such as Outlook, Word, Excel, maybe something for PDFs, and naturally enough tend to default to banging out *.docx, *.xlsx, *.pptx and/or perhaps their predecessor formats depending on versions installed.

Is it immensely expensive to train remote workers in the fiendishly complex and exhausting process of, say, selecting *.odt as their output format instead of *.docx? Or, better, is it beyond a German state government's resources and skills to tell remote workers to download, install and henceforth use LibreOffice on their Windows machines? I'd point out that it is technically trivial to identify incoming file extensions, filter these and send a polite rejection to the sender if the type is wrong. There'll be AV filtering and other security running already anyway.

Both office and remote staff will surely be using web-based diary, calendaring, meeting and workflow solutions, so that cannot be the problem either.

The direct, indirect and consequential security costs of adopting Windows are astronomical compared with the abundance of good (and usually more secure) FOSS stuff that performs the same functions.

The purported rationale for the migration makes no sense.

So ... what is going on?

. "Sorry, you've sent us an MS Excel (.xlsx) file: we don't use those. Please resave the file in the correct OpenDocument (.ods) format, or better still for future ease of use, import it into LibreSheet and use that application instead. For help on doing this, installation of Libre, and avoiding this problem in the future, see the Document Compatibility Help link <u>here</u>, and the Department Software Policy for Staff <u>here</u>. Danke schön!"

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