Austrian ministry kicks out Microsoft in favor of Nextcloud

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

Nextcloud as an Office/Docs Replacement

  • Many discuss whether Nextcloud + Collabora/LibreOffice really competes with Google Docs or Office 365.
  • Consensus: feature set is broadly sufficient (editing, spreadsheets, collaboration), but UX, speed, and polish lag behind Google Docs and MS Office.
  • Some users run Nextcloud “office” happily for small groups; others note unreliability in collaborative editing and generally rougher experience.
  • Collabora/LibreOffice Calc is seen as “good enough” for many, better than Excel Web, but not as smooth as Google Sheets.

Self‑Hosting, Performance, and Setup

  • Nextcloud works on modest hardware (e.g., SBCs, low-end ARM boards) but is not fast; collaboration and online office need more CPU/RAM.
  • All‑in‑one Docker setups are seen as convenient but raise security concerns (docker socket, :latest tags) unless used on dedicated VMs.
  • Some consider Nextcloud bloated for personal use but well-suited to larger organizations due to its breadth of features.

Security, Privacy, and Sovereignty

  • Core justification: avoiding “trans‑ocean entities” and meeting GDPR/NIS2, plus broader “digital sovereignty”.
  • Some argue the legal compliance angle is secondary; the real value is control over data and independence from US cloud providers.
  • CryptPad is mentioned as a more secure, E2E-encrypted collaborative suite, but slower and with a different tradeoff profile.

Atos, Outsourcing, and Government IT Strategy

  • Big debate over the real story being “Microsoft → Atos”, i.e., one large vendor swapped for another.
  • Strong criticism of reliance on large consultancies (Atos, Accenture-like firms): accusations of overpricing, lock‑in, poor outcomes, and corruption.
  • Counterpoint: implementing/operating such systems requires skills many ministries lack; external integrators can be pragmatic, especially for one‑off projects.
  • Several argue for national or pan‑EU public IT organizations building and maintaining shared open source stacks; others note such bodies often still outsource heavily.

LibreOffice and the Quality of FOSS Office Tools

  • Sharp disagreement about LibreOffice:
    • Some say it’s “fine” and mainly underfunded charity work; governments should invest in it rather than MS.
    • Others say it’s so clunky and unattractive that users and SMEs prefer paying for MS Office; poor UX is blamed for MS dominance.
  • Suggestion that government MS license savings should be reinvested into a high‑quality, EU‑backed office suite (possibly building on LibreOffice/Collabora).

Usage Patterns and Collaboration

  • Disagreement on how “niche” real‑time collaborative editing is:
    • Some say it’s marginal in government workflows.
    • Others insist it’s central for many bureaucratic roles (constant commenting, shared document editing).

Broader European Trend

  • Participants link this move to a wider European shift: Austrian military and other countries (e.g., Denmark, parts of Germany) moving to LibreOffice/OSS.
  • “Digital sovereignty” is seen as slowly but steadily gaining traction at EU level.