Frances switchted to Linux on 2.5 million PCs
Boy I sure do remember a lot of people in the last ten years tell me its completely impossible to run any kind of modern enterprise set up without Windows.
Wow!
They were all fucking wrong!
Who could have guessed!
10 years ago, a significant number of enterprise software was written as windows native apps. What’s changed is now everything is a webapp and linux runs firefox/chrome/chromium/edge/etc just fine.
I wonder how much money the government is saving on Windows licences alone
I just checked Microsoft’s website. They’re trying to make windows enterprise a subscription model. The current cost for what they’re calling “windows 365” is $99/yr per user. They’re saving nearly $250 million a year, or €211 Million
Probably also saving 100 to 200 million euros more in servicing fees. Licenses are but one component of cost models these days for companies. Sure, they will still have to find a vendor to service their Linux systems, but there should be a lot more cost flexibility in that space.
That might be the MSRP, but it’s not what they were paying.
They’re going to have at minimum three different types of “discounts” applied to their price:
- Volume discount
- Government discount
- Tenure discount
If I had to guess, it would knock anywhere from 30% to 60% off MSRP.
Windows 365 is the “cloud PC” that Microsoft is hosting as a VM in Azure. So you have a thin client that only connects to the VM over the internet. It’s very niche and pretty expensive. Regular windows licenses, especially with their volume of licensing will be a lot less. But they still save millions on licenses, especially for the M365 office licenses that they now no longer need.
License costs for Windows alone for one single Bundesland in Germany are 15 Mio EUR a year, I read, and that doesn’t include other costs. France is probably paying Microsoft in the hundreds of millions currently. You can do a lot on your own with that kind of money, especially when using everything open source has to offer, as basis.
I’m seems pretty reasonable for a cloud PC.
I just ran the costs through the Azure calculator, and a D2asV6 system with a 100GB drive and licenseing running 16hrs a day, 30 days a month would cost approximately 1200 dollars annually, so 99 bucks a year seems like a steal.
And a D2asV6 is not a lot of compute power. 2 cores, 8Gb ram.
In summary, Azure is fucking expensive if you are keeping VMs online all the time.
Wouldn’t you have to include user CALs as well? Im long out of windows land thankfully but I do recall needing those.
And if they put something like 10% of those savings back into developing more open source tech it would be a huge boost to the global community.
The current cost for what they’re calling “windows 365” is $99/yr per user.
Windows 365 Enterprise basic starts $31 per user per month and goes up from there.
I suspect you are confusing Windows 365 with Microsoft 365. The former includes a virtual (Cloud) PC and licensing for Windows and Office, the latter only provides Office licensing. Additionally the price point you quoted makes me think you are looking at Personal / Home pricing because Commercial & Government Office 365 pricing is calculated per user / per month and will vary wildly in price from $10 pu/pm to $50+ pu/pm.
I hate MS product names I hate MS product names I hate MS product names
I’m surprised one of those hasn’t been rebranded to copilot 365 yet
Let’s be honest: If you’re buying 2,5 million licenses, you are not paying the price listed on the website
I’ve always wondered if the money saved from licenses would cover the cost of new full time employees to pick up support, it probably depends on the org size.
It’s not like they don’t need staff to support windows.
I read it as “pick up support for the FOSS projects” as opposed to user IT support.
So, contributing to the FOSS.
Even sponsorship would be awesome, in a “we can’t do the tech stuff, but here is 10% of what we saved” kinda way
Not only that, but also on not upgrading/replacing computers that don’t meet the requirements. Windows 11 runs perfectly fine on higher-end mobile Kaby Lake, but without unsupported workarounds one cannot install it…never mind that you can virtualize Windows 11 on Skylake and older without any issues.
What is saved, gets spent into operational costs now. Many cities tried the switch, had higher expenses and lower productivity, and switched back to Windows. Let’s hope France hired the right professionals for this migration
That article is trash. Ministries have only been asked to come up with a plan of what’s possible to do to switch but I highly doubt most will switch. The education ministry recently renewed it’s Microsoft contract and I don’t think there is anything enforcing a switch, it’s only a “please look at what could be possible” thing. The only thing switching for sure is the DINUM, about 250 people, a lot of them already using Linux. But this is the start of an experiment where they are building some NixOS configurations that could be used if a larger switch was to happen. Believe it or not, they NixOS configs are names Sécurix and Bureautix.
The source article from ZDNet they got the information from has been updated to correct the mistake.
Correction on April 16, 2026: An earlier version of this article stated that France was planning to replace 2.5 million Windows desktops with Linux. In fact, the Interministerial Directorate for Digital Affairs is initially migrating only its own internal workstations (about 350) and will coordinate a broader effort. Individual ministries have been instructed to develop their own migration plans by fall 2026. The article has been updated to reflect this clarification.
It’s overselling it, but the move towards digital sovereignty isn’t a passing fad.
The various revelations over the years about the US spying on allies and Microsoft famously telling the EU(?) that they could not guarantee that their data would not be turned over to the US government has all but ensured that this is going to happen as a matter of national security.
They can’t have their government dependent on systems that could be disabled at any time for political reasons, like the sanctions applied to the ICC judge on the genocide case against Israel.
It was one thing when the US was an ally, but now we are not a dependable ally and these countries are reorganizing their security posture in recognition of that fact.
Linux is the only viable operating system that is not vulnerable to US government sponsored supply chain attacks. While it may not be deployed everywhere immediately, the directive to agencies to start planning for the transition is the first step in the process and critical services will transition much sooner.
This will happen regardless of what happens in the election, Trump has exposed the weaknesses in our system of government and the attitude of US elites towards other countries. No sane country would trust US tech given the direction of things.
I hope you’re right but I can assure you our government is very good at making grand announces not followed by anything, or even by the opposite. Also our far right, which might very well win the next election, is very much pro-Trump.
Our education ministry keeps signing huge Microsoft contracts, our health data is stored by Microsoft, our intelligence agency use Palantir, our government is mostly on X… I’m forgetting a lot of other things. They are also pushing hard for regulations against privacy, weakening encryption, chat-control…
There are some small nice things here and there like our Gendarmerie using Ubuntu, the DINUM making a lot of open-source tools… But it’s really a drop in the water.
Our elites and politicians share a similar playbook when it comes to doing exactly what they want while pretending to struggle to do anything else.
Technology is important for making the government run more efficiently and the US tech sector has historically provided the tools for making that process more efficient. It was easier to use the tools available from a close ally than it was to devote the resources towards building up a domestic technology sector.
We’re in a different world now, both politically and technologically. The US government has been using this dependency to gain advantage in other areas by spying on our allies. The trend towards right-wing nationalism also creates a real danger that this could escalate into even more coercive tactics.
Now, the cost of cultivating a domestic tech sector is now much lower than the cost of having all of your government functions held ransom by a foreign power. Especially when everyone can see how rapidly the US’s posture towards allies has changed.
That being said, it takes time to build a tech industry and swap to domestic production. The US’s tech sector growth was subsidized by the entire world and built over decades. It will take time to replicate that in the EU (and even longer if there isn’t a unified initiative).
Until then, your governments cannot help but be dependent on Microsoft and other US technology companies who are using emerging technology to enable new capabilities (i.e. Palantir).
As one commoner to another, I hope your country is shocked by the turmoil that we’re going through and can build something better.
Free software activists in Europe have been saying for decades that it’s a matter of sovereignty and the investments may be painful at first but will end up saving untold amounts of money.
The Marshall plan goodwill has run out now.
Honestly if I had one wish is that government would be banned for saying any rental agreement was an investment.
It’s so frustrating, and brings me hope to see it change, that RnD and infrastructure investment funds got put into software rental agreement for windows and VMware and more recently into proprietary Cloud ecosystems.
Like you own nothing from that. That money is gone from the public good. It’s not an investment. I didn’t invest in an apartment, I rented, I don’t have any value left from that agreement I had my wants and needs temporally satisfied.
That is just the constant issue these people put in the public trust are learning but have to held to task to.
Linux is the only viable operating system that is not vulnerable to US government sponsored supply chain attacks
Well I certainly don’t agree with that, and in many cases (at least with specific Linux distros) I would even argue it IS vulnerable already. Maybe we have different definitions of “viable” or something. The Linux kernel itself has also been forced to make political decisions at the demand of the United States, such as removing support for Russian CPUs (but somehow Chinese ones are A-OK).
You seem to assume our president and its government act with intelligence and in the interest of our country. You could not be any further from the truth.
I certainly don’t assume that.
I expect your elites to operate with the same selfish motivations as ours. That includes wanting to exploit the situation in order to utilize public funds to grow a private tech sector where they stand to profit immensely.
They will also want to protect themselves personally from continuing to be predated on by their elite counterparts in the US who utilize this technological dependency for spying and coercive tactics.
Using NixOS as an imaging tool by distributing a config is pretty neat and I would love to see it happen. I’m surprised they were competent enough to see that route; I wonder who’s behind this initiative?
That’s the Interministerial Digital Directorate, they are very competent.
i never understood why my Government in Australia doesn’t have a tech division a Linux version to use, Libre Office software etc a messenger service, an email and a Mastodon instance. Doesn’t mean you have to use them by the Governments should and be available to all including our Oceania brothers if they wish including funding them.
Giving up digital sovereignty is beyond my understanding, let alone hosting Government. and financial services on foreign owned cloud services.
And they will be better served with this solution.
The most important benefit is that a fascist dictatorship can’t brick all your governments computers because an incontinent pedophile got his feefees hurt.
If you think that’s far fetched, you have no idea how mentally-ill and psychopathic fascists are.
So lucky. I hate W11 so much but dumb software developers keep me walled in
You could try running your windows-locked programs via Wine, Proton, or a VM-based solution for the worst offenders on a Linux distro (unless your employer requires you to run windows on bare metal, and I give you my condolences).
Nice, France
No, I think it’s everywhere.
Hon Hon hon.
lmfao
🤣
Title makes it sound like a done deal but so far there’s a promise that there will be a plan in a few months.
The shift to Linux is happening and every French government ministry is required to put its migration plan in place by the fall of 2026, including considering complementary software such as antivirus, collaborative tools, and so on.
The shift to Linux is happening
Sounds like the shift to Linux is happening. I’m guessing by law. So, the first step is prep and planning, they aren’t going to back out of it, it just takes time to move an entire government over to a new OS.
Nah, the article is trash. There is no law, ministries have been asked to come up with a plan of what’s possible to do to switch but I highly doubt most will switch. The education ministry recently renewed it’s Microsoft contract and I don’t think there is anything enforcing a switch, it’s only a “please look at what could be possible” thing. The only thing switching for sure is the DINUM, about 250 people, a lot of them already using Linux. But this is the start of an experiment where they are building some NixOS configurations that could be used if a larger switch was to happen.
@misk What could maybe work: it should be made law, that 1% (or 10%) of all license cost paid by governmental organizations, must go into open source development, or services. The organization could freely choice, into what, and what it wants to get back.
@misk @not_IO Normally it silently fails on the wall of stupidity, and on the silent, cooperative undermining of the local microsoft activists in all departments. You can be sure, they do not want to learn “yet another system”, they want to retire as a windows sysadm. And they work as a workplace mafia.
Sadly I can not see any good in this direction. Hope I see it badly!
Would be lovely if my Government would even consider that.
I hate using Win11, but it seems we’re so entrenched with Microslop that they’re even giving “officially endorsed” courses on how to use Co-Pilot.I understand that AI and Neural Networks have their uses, but why are people so willing to give up their ability to think and write for themselves??
Time is the main reason. In jobs where you write dozens of client-facing emails every day, small time savings compound fast.
Most people working in Outlook all day are doing exactly this kind of work: responding to clients, coordinating projects, clarifying requests, following up, documenting decisions, and managing constant communication.
Instead of writing every email from scratch, I can give AI instructions like:
“Read the email chain. The client needs X, Y, and Z. Write a draft reply in my voice.”
That takes seconds instead of several minutes per email. Across an entire workday, that can save hours.
Fair enough, but if you’re a manager isn’t that kind of the whole job? Communicating with people. If you’re not doing that, what are you getting paid to do?
I can’t imagine out-sourcing the skill-set you’re being paid for to an AI tool is a great way to build up that skill. Sounds like humanity’s typical great short-term idea with horrible long-term consequences.
I can write an amazing email word by word, or I can have my digital secretary draft it while I review, edit, and approve every part of it.
I don’t send anything I haven’t personally read and approved. The judgment, accountability, and intent are still mine.
You’re absolutely right that outsourcing learning and critical thinking to AI would have serious long-term consequences. But using AI to accelerate execution after you’ve already developed those skills is different.
I’m paid for the experience and judgment to know what needs to be said, what matters, and what outcome the communication is supposed to achieve.
Again, fair enough - treating it akin to a draft making machine isn’t a terrible idea…
But I would argue that reviewing an existing draft, while a perfectly valid skill to have, is not the same skill as actually writing that draft.
I can say from plenty of experience making and reviewing documentation, that making the first draft is always a much more demanding task than reviewing and making corrections.
And while there’s nothing wrong with making life a bit easier, maintenance of skills is just as important as making them in the first place. If you want to maintain skills for the latter, you need to let yourself write some drafts too.
I mean I have a microchasm example of this myself. I used to be good at remembering phone numbers prior to being able to store them all on a smartphone. Now, even if you put a gun to my head, I can really only remember my own. And that is because I outsourced that part of my memory to my phone, just as most people have - without any attempt to reinforce it.
I’ve genuinely enjoyed this exchange. It’s rare to find someone willing to refine an argument instead of just defending a position. I appreciate that you’re actually thinking through the implications instead of reducing this to “AI good” or “AI bad.”
And honestly, I think we agree on more than we disagree.
I don’t think replacing human thought with AI is healthy. Your concern about skill atrophy is legitimate, and your point about drafting versus reviewing is stronger than many people realize. Creating a first draft exercises very different cognitive muscles than critiquing an existing one.
Where I think we differ slightly is that I see an important distinction between:
- using AI to avoid developing competence
- using AI to accelerate execution after competence already exists
To me, that distinction matters enormously.
Someone blindly accepting AI output without understanding it puts themselves in a dangerous intellectual position. But someone who already has strong writing, reasoning, and communication skills can use AI more like a junior assistant or drafting tool while still retaining judgment, accountability, and intent.
What concerns me more is exactly what you’re pointing at: competence itself is becoming rarer.
If people start outsourcing the very processes that develop critical thinking, writing ability, synthesis, and communication before those skills fully mature, then we could absolutely weaken society’s long-term cognitive resilience.
That should concern everyone, regardless of whether they’re optimistic or pessimistic about AI.
Now for funzies, we need to get them to install the steam client.
Fantastic, it’s amazing what you can do when you don’t have billionaires on the stage patting each other on the back and laughing with each election.
Very cool! France is working towards achieving digital independent from US megacorps, and maybe this means more funding towards the development of open-source software!
Mistral AI!
97% of their police computers run on gendbuntu since at least 2017… they know linux already :)
why, great news!
So I suspect they are also dropping their plans to require age verification on social media?
After all, public code repositories which are essential for developing the software they’re switching to are… also a form of social media, correct? Surely they do not want to sabotage its development by requiring those repos to implement costly age verification? Right?
I can tell you one thing: French authorities don’t give a flying fuck about any right to privacy for commoners.
