German state is tired of paying for Microsoft licenses, adopts Linux

The German state of Schleswig-Holstein has finished its review and is now taking concrete steps to migrate around 30,000 employees from Windows to Linux, Ars Technica reported. That means workers will use open-source software including LibreOffice, Nextcloud, Open X-Change, and Mozilla Thunderbird instead of Microsoft equivalents like Word and Exchange/Outlook.

Schleswig-Holstein will also develop an open-source alternative to Microsoft Active Directory, as well as its own telephone services, according to Ars Technica.

Justifications for the switch include older devices—a former minister told a German-language IT news portal in 2021 some of their computers couldn’t handle new Windows 11 hardware requirements—as well as cost, security, and freedom from international cloud services.

In an announcement in German, Schleswig-Holstein Digitalization Minister Dirk Schrödter touted investment in “real programming services from our domestic digital economy” rather than software licensing. He also wrote the move away from proprietary software would strengthen the state’s push for digital sovereignty and positions it to seek alternatives when building future administrative apps and services.

“This cannot be achieved with the current products of the standard IT workplace,” Schrödter added.

As Ars Technica noted, Schleswig-Holstein has rough precedent to follow: The municipal government of Vienna tried and failed to migrate to Debian distro Wienux by 2009. The Munich government introduced a Linux-based OS called LiMux, but never successfully managed to get off Windows entirely and ditched the project in 2017. (In 2020, Munich flip-flopped again, saying it would return to open source.)

However, the state isn’t alone in seeking an alternative to Microsoft. Other notable governments to use Linux include both South Korea and North Korea, as well as the municipal government of Barcelona. The government of China is not only ditching Microsoft products and working on its own Linux-based OSs to replace it but also pushing state-owned enterprises toward moving to domestic hardware.