this post was submitted on 20 Nov 2024
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The petition is open to all EU resident. The goal is to replace all Windows in all public institution in Europe with a sovereign GNU/Linux.

If the petition is successful it would be a huge step forward for GNU/Linux adoption.

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[–] bustAsh@lemmy.world 37 points 2 days ago (10 children)

My main worry with Linux becoming more popular is that it will be attacked with more malware and viruses. I wouldn't mind though if Linux programmers could come up with better protection.

[–] PanArab@lemm.ee 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (2 children)

Linux-based OSes are less uniform than Windows. They could and probably will be targeted, but exploits won't spread because of how many verities they are and how different and incompatible they can be. Some, for example, don't even use the GNU utils and userland.

[–] pound_heap@lemm.ee 4 points 1 day ago

This petition is for developing something dubbed "EU-Linux", so if implemented as is will be pretty uniform

[–] gens@programming.dev 3 points 1 day ago

That is mostly false. Most of the code that faces the network is the same. As is most of the background running code. Linux is still more secure.

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[–] CameronDev@programming.dev 26 points 2 days ago (18 children)

Double edged sword. Forced adoption of a shitty distro, or a really locked down/limited system might not be a step forward at all.

From memory, Germany did this many years ago, and ended up rolling it back?

[–] Andromxda@lemmy.dbzer0.com 9 points 1 day ago (1 children)

From memory, Germany did this many years ago, and ended up rolling it back?

The city of Munich deployed their own custom Linux systems many years ago. But since it wasn't really maintained and updated, the user experience was pretty bad and the city's employees were unhappy. Then Micro$oft lobbyists also came in and made them switch - by threatening to move their German headquarters out of Munich, which would cost the city lots of tax revenue.

https://itsfoss.com/munich-linux-failure/

[–] Honytawk@lemmy.zip 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

You think that Microsoft lobbyist would have had any traction if the user experience was any decent?

Of course not. They wouldn't have had any reason to switch.

That is the biggest issue with Linux at the moment. It takes more maintenance than Windows. And there are a lot less people with the knowledge to setup and maintain those environments.

At the end of the day, the point of those environments is to allow the user to work in them. But if the user is unable to work properly because of the environment, then that environment must be changed. It is as simple as that.

[–] Andromxda@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 1 day ago

Of course not. They wouldn’t have had any reason to switch.

Of course they would? Millions of euros of tax revenue sounds like a pretty compelling reason to me. This is why Micro$oft's "lobby efforts" should be labeled as what they are: Nothing more and nothing less than corruption.

It takes more maintenance than Windows.

If you create your own distro, yes. But there are countless noob-friendly distros like Mint, Ubuntu and Fedora that they could use with practically 0 maintenance required. Also, compare the 2004 desktop Linux experience to now. Having used Gentoo Linux compiled from a stage 1 tarball back in 2002, I can tell you: the differences are tremendous. Many of the issues they had can be directly attributed to OpenOffice and it's bad compatibility with Microsoft Office file formats, which has long been replaced by LibreOffice. It still worked out pretty well for them, over a period of 13 years. And it saved the tax payer millions of euros of Microsoft's stupid licensing fee for their crappy proprietary garbage.

[–] fuzzy_feeling@programming.dev 35 points 2 days ago (5 children)

https://www.techspot.com/news/102518-windows-microsoft-office-replaced-linux-libreoffice-german-state.html

The 30,000 employees of Schleswig-Holstein's local government will be moving to Linux and LibreOffice as the state pushes for what it calls "digital sovereignty," a reference to non-EU companies not gathering troves of user data so European firms can compete with these foreign rivals.

Munich, the capital of German state Bavaria, switched from Windows to Linux-based LiMux in 2004, though it switched back in 2017 as part of an IT overhaul. Wanting Microsoft to move its headquarters to Munich likely played a part in returning to Windows, too.

[–] BCsven@lemmy.ca 3 points 2 days ago

Then they went back to Linux a few years pater

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[–] orcrist@lemm.ee 16 points 2 days ago (7 children)

No, it isn't a double edged sword. Even a mediocre distro would be better than Windows, any distro would be cheaper than Windows, and there's no reason to choose a bad distro anyway.

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[–] pearsaltchocolatebar@discuss.online 12 points 2 days ago (3 children)

Government systems should be locked down and limited.

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[–] Deckweiss@lemmy.world 17 points 2 days ago (1 children)

afaik Bayern rolled back to Windows after some Microsoft "lobbying"

[–] Successful_Try543@feddit.org 9 points 2 days ago

Precisely the city of Munich had its LiMux system.

[–] hellofriend@lemmy.world 10 points 2 days ago (4 children)

Solution: don't ship a shitty distro. This is the sort of issue that actual IT professionals need final say in. Not the MBAs. Not the politicals. The people who actually know what they're doing. Additionally, years ago Linux was in a much different place. It's really matured into something more suitable for both the average end user as well as professional adoption.

[–] Honytawk@lemmy.zip 2 points 1 day ago (2 children)

That argument would be fine, if only the Linux community could actually agree on what is a good distro.

[–] hellofriend@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Personally, I think it depends on the sitch. Something immutable would probably be the better go for people coming from Windows and would help with IT costs since all systems would be, at their base, the same. No one is going to accidentally install something that breaks their system. And the main drawback of immutability (less control over the system) wouldn't be a problem because people shouldn't be installing things on government systems that are outside the scope of their job.

EDIT: In a sentence: a good distro is one that's good for your organization.

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[–] Valmond@lemmy.world 8 points 2 days ago (2 children)

Maybe it's too early in the morning, anyone got a link, I couldn't find any?

[–] jagged_circle@feddit.nl 2 points 2 days ago

This is a link sharing platform. All posts are supposed to have a link to a news article. Its at the top.

[–] cro_magnon_gilf@sopuli.xyz 3 points 1 day ago

"I'd just like to interject for a moment..."

[–] fuzzy_feeling@programming.dev 10 points 2 days ago (1 children)

dunno how many online petitions actually worked, but "kay guys... now... linux!" ain't gonna work.

[–] erin@social.sidh.bzh 25 points 2 days ago (1 children)

That's a parliament petition. If it succeed it is forced by EU constitution to be turned into an EU law.

That tool is offered to EU representant to create a kind of referendum and accelerate the adoption of a law through direct democracy.

[–] MyParentsYeetMe@lemm.ee 21 points 2 days ago

I think you're a bit mistaken. Per https://www.edf-feph.org/enforcement-toolkit-european-parliament-peti-committee/

"The Petitions Committee does not have investigatory nor enforcement powers and it can only adopt non-binding recommendations. Nevertheless, it can be a good tool to draw political attention to specific matters."

At most, it makes the parliament have to look at the proposal and decide if its worth looking into or not. It doesn't force anything.

Unless I'm looking at the wrong kind of petition to the EU Parliament?

[–] MrSoup@lemmy.zip 8 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (2 children)

Why creating a new distro instead of using a big one and contribute to it?

[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 12 points 2 days ago

They aren't building something from scratch. They probably are just going to make a base image with everything configured in a standard way.

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