Linux @programming.dev erin @social.sidh.bzh 3 days ago

A petition has been created by an Austrian EU rep. to replace Windows with GNU/Linux in all Europe

www.europarl.europa.eu Home | PETI | Committees | European Parliament

Main page of the Petitions Portal. General information, most recently uploaded petitions and further links to procedural pages. Further links to the European Parliament website.

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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131 comments

Based.
This is an uphill battle in the face of corporate lobbying, learned fixedness, and, let's face it, unintuitive UX that is found in some selection of FLOSS which is often absent in proprietary counterparts: something that people who are not tech savvy (tech-indifferent?) would prefer not to put up with.

However, I think the latter can be mitigated with the right focus and funding from such initiatives.

There have been many such initiatives[0][1] over the years in different countries where they eventually lose steam and fade away.

Also, is there an operating system backed or sponsored by EU that is actively maintained, analogous to BOSS[2] and Pardus[3]?

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:State-sponsored_Linux_distributions

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Linux_adopters

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bharat_Operating_System_Solutions

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pardus_(operating_system)

E: typo
I've always said governments and public institutions funded by taxpayers should use FLOSS and not be beholden to private companies. Any shortcomings or unfulfilled needs in Linux and FLOSS software would quickly be dealt with once large organizations like these started using it as the default, since they could easily fund whatever features or fixes are needed for significantly less money than they pay for proprietary software (especially now that these days they're forking over annual subscriptions), and thus they'd also have much more control over the making sure the software meets their needs.

It seems like a no-brainer to me. Maybe it wasn't in the earlier days of Linux but not for the last decade or so.
I like and support the idea in general, but the petition's scope is just too broad and lacks focus. Migrating to Linux? Sure, but let's not force a single distribution across the EU. New EU mobile OS? Nice idea, but there is no solid alternative unless a lot of time and money is spent on developing it.
Adopting Linux is the best way to help ensure European sovereignty from maga meddling.
PSA: You can support this petition even if you're not an EU resident
If they can keep the MS lobbyists out, it's feasible, just ask Munich.
I mean I'd be fine with BSD too. the point should be to force public institutions to use FOSS
It’s ridiculous that governments don’t use customized Unix/Linux builds.
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.
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?
Maybe it's too early in the morning, anyone got a link, I couldn't find any?
dunno how many online petitions actually worked, but "kay guys... now... linux!" ain't gonna work.
Why creating a new distro instead of using a big one and contribute to it?
Supported!
"I'd just like to interject for a moment..."
I feel like they don't know the magnitude of that what means.

Very cool but unlikely to work
Cope

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