I wanted to spotlight a quietly massive success story in European digital sovereignty: GendBuntu - France’s custom Ubuntu distribution used by the National Gendarmerie.
The GendBuntu project derives from Microsoft’s decision to end the development of Windows XP Back in 2005, France’s Gendarmerie began switching from Microsoft products to open-source software - starting with OpenOffice. Fast forward to 2024, and GendBuntu(Linux) is now running on 97% of their workstations (over 103,000 computers!).
France has shown what’s possible when a government actually backs open-source, in-house, and EU-grown solutions.
More countries should follow suit.
They could’ve had “GendArch”, what a missed opportunity.
Reposting because yeah
Nice! Hopefully their experience can be used to help other agencies to move to Linux and open-source software. It also shows how long time it takes to move for a big organisation, in 2018 it was 82% of the PC workstations that was running GendBuntu.
I hope word of this success story spreads, I could literally not find a single English news article about it. I feel there is still a sentiment that it’s too difficult, or the tools are not ready etc.
But this shows that it is possible at a large scale and has been done before
I found just one, and it’s some time ago :-)
French police move from Windows to Ubuntu Linux – (October 2013)
The big reason the French Gendarmerie made the Linux move? It saved them 40 percent in total cost of ownership over Windows.
In other news:
[After] the state’s cabinet had declared it would make the move [in April 2024, Schleswig-Holstein’s] goal is to fully transition from Microsoft programs to Linux and open-source programs within the next three months.
And:
Why Denmark is dumping Microsoft Office and Windows for LibreOffice and Linux - (June 2025)
Before the Danish government announced its move, Denmark’s largest cities, Copenhagen and Aarhus, had already announced plans to phase out Microsoft software and cloud services. Here’s why.
I am interested in seeing how the machines are managed, Windows uses GPOs, what does GendBuntu use?
Yeah that’s really the biggest issue with these deployments.
Some kind of Ansible based custom solution:
This project offers a complete solution reminiscent of SCCM from the world of Windows, but Ansible replaces Powershell DSC and we have a bonus in the form of version control system git.
According to this comment a custom solution based on ansible and got.
Here is its Github page for those interested.
But why did they do this quietly? Would also be interesting to know whether there are more of these “quiet” projects in Europe :-)
I’m surprised it has been so quiet, so many people know of LiMux why don’t more know of GendBuntu
Maybe because of the poor name choice, it should have been “Arch de Triomphe”
Several tax authorities in Germany used Linux until they were forced to change to Windows in the name of standardisation a few years ago
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Thank you for sharing. This is the kind of news that brightens my day. You see @EUCommission@ec.social-network.europa.eu , this is how it’s done.
The… year of…?!
Crazy how other countries are able to do this, but in germany it’s an impossible task… 🙄
It also worked for decades in Germany, until some politicians meddled with it
https://lstn.niedersachsen.de/aktuelles_service/pressemitteilungen/-67312.html
I hope LiMux makes a comeback, it’s much more well known than GendBuntu despite its issues
Germany, as regressive as ever.
Schleswig-Holstein is ditching MS for Linux and Open Source, and let’s hope many others will follow.
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