Why a German State Is Ditching Windows for Linux: The Quest for Digital Sovereignty
After a successful pilot, the northern German state of Schleswig‑Holstein announced plans to replace 30,000 PCs running Microsoft Windows and Office with Linux and LibreOffice, emphasizing digital sovereignty, reduced reliance on proprietary cloud services, and the potential to boost local open‑source development and employment.
Source: OSC Open Source Community (ID: oschina2013)
Following a successful pilot, the northern German state of Schleswig‑Holstein decided to migrate 30,000 government PCs from Microsoft Windows and Office to Linux and LibreOffice.
The decision is driven not by technical superiority but by a desire for “digital sovereignty,” meaning greater control over IT solutions by using open‑source software rather than closed proprietary products.
The state’s prime minister highlighted that Schleswig‑Holstein will become the first German state to introduce a digitally sovereign IT workplace. Digital sovereignty allows public administrations to choose, fund, and modify open‑source solutions to suit their own infrastructure.
Dirk Schröder, head of the state’s digitalisation department, explained that reliance on proprietary cloud services makes it impossible to verify data flows, and that switching to open source can redirect license‑fee spending to domestic digital‑economy services, creating local jobs.
Germany’s experience with similar migrations includes Munich’s LiMux project, which began in 2003 by moving all government PCs to an Ubuntu‑based distribution. By 2013, 80 % of Munich’s desktops ran LiMux, but the city reverted to Windows in 2017 after 15 years of challenges.
Other governments are also adopting Linux, such as South Korea’s plan to replace Windows 7 with the Open OS Linux‑based platform.
References: https://www.schleswig-holstein.de/DE/landesregierung/ministerien-behoerden/I/Presse/PI/2024/CdS/240403_cds_it-arbeitsplatz.html , https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2024/04/04/german-state-moving-30000-pcs-to-libreoffice/ , https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2024/04/german-state-gov-ditching-windows-for-linux-30k-workers-migrating/
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