4 ms·

Schleswig-Holstein is not poor. It is next to Denmark, and it is really nice and well developed. I think transitioning to a different platform is mostly an org

by nextos 3y ago

Schleswig-Holstein is not poor. It is next to Denmark, and it is really nice and well developed. I think transitioning to a different platform is mostly an organizational and political, rather than technical problem, and the main roadblock is educating users and altering processes to migrate away from MS Office. That said, modern Linux distributions like NixOS or Guix could be great to manage large fleets of computers, keep them up-to-date, and upgrade things without fear. In my experience, that is the main technical issue administrations are experiencing. And of course, running free software is great because it brings freedom to change things.

maxcoder4 3y ago
As a long time Linux user, I think problems are partially technical. For example: * A lot of software used by them is certainly Windows only (they will have to find alternatives, change their workflows or invest in some windows virtual machines) * Windows tooling for organizations is much more mature. There's a reason virtually everyone uses AD. * Linux is very focused on user freedoms. This is not usually important in the office. But freedom to configure things is a freedom to break thinks, and cause admin headache. The problems are solvable, but it doesn't mean they don't exist. Oh and I love nixos, and I always wonder how realistic would it be to use it in a company for management of thousands of desktop machines. Sounds like it would be perfect for it, but i don't know any stories.
- tichiian 3y ago
  > There's a reason virtually everyone uses AD. The reason everyone uses AD is that you can have a functional Linux client in AD. But you cannot have a Windows client in any Linux-based LDAP+Kerberos setup. The problem isn't that there isn't a good solution for Linux in big organisations, the problem is that Windows is only compatible with AD, nothing else, so the more compatible system (Linux) gets shoved into AD.
  - briHass 3y ago
    AD is also better and more feature complete. It was born out of necessity, but it's had decades of refinement in thousands of deployments that the OSS solutions haven't had.
    - Zardoz84 3y ago
      So, why does Microsoft want to kill AD and move everything to their cloud ?
      - tichiian 3y ago
        Because AD is a security nightmare. It is a collection of ~30 distinct protocols, e.g. bastardized versions of LDAP, Kerberos, DNS, DHCP, X.509 and a few RPC protocols that are all weirdly intertwined, with 30 year old designs. Every few months there is another CVE like 'oh, we forgot to checksum and sign that one field over there, please install this incompatible patch or you will have unauthed RCE'. Since all those patches make things break, there is a lot of vulnerable AD installations out there because most people need to be on "compatibility settings" that are insecure. And even the "secure" settings drop a CVE every few months.
      - briHass 3y ago
        They want you to move everything to the cloud, for obvious reasons. However, if you have on-prem/non-cloud servers, AD is still in the mix. They actually recommend running an AD DC as a VM in the cloud as a backup and to integrate cloud resources in scenarios that are more complex than Entra and Intune can handle.
  - BikiniPrince 3y ago
    Every large organization that I have worked at has a solution for desktop and server Linux. The downside is you typically have a password hash stored in ad or a separate service. Ultimately, it isn’t terrible, but you do have a lot of enforcement at the border. So trouble can surprisingly appear when you connect remotely.
- mairusu 3y ago
  The reason everyone uses AD isn't that AD is good. It's that they either have no other choice, or they don't have any competent people in setting up other tools since all basic sysadmins only learn AD in schools.
mandevil 3y ago
According to wiki here (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_German_cities_by_GDP https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_German_cities_by_GDP) Munich in 2021 had a per capita GDP of 86k euro. According to wiki here (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_German_states_by_GRP_per_capita https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_German_states_by_GRP_p...) Schleswig-Holstein had a per capita GRP of ~42k euro in 2022 (note that the years are different). So these figures suggest that Munich is roughly twice as rich as S-H, which they list as below average for the BRD, as the 8th richest of Germany's 16 Lander. I took German in high school (back when I was on slashdot), I actually had tests on where all of the Lander were, I know a few things!
- nextos 3y ago
  That's a bit of an unfair comparison as Munich is a city, whereas Schleswig-Holstein is a state. It's not very different from Bavaria or neighbouring areas such as Jylland or Lower Saxony: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_German_states_by_household_income https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_German_states_by_house...

by nextos 3y ago

maxcoder4 3y ago

As a long time Linux user, I think problems are partially technical. For example: * A lot of software used by them is certainly Windows only (they will have to find alternatives, change their workflows or invest in some windows virtual machines) * Windows tooling for organizations is much more mature. There's a reason virtually everyone uses AD. * Linux is very focused on user freedoms. This is not usually important in the office. But freedom to configure things is a freedom to break thinks, and cause admin headache. The problems are solvable, but it doesn't mean they don't exist. Oh and I love nixos, and I always wonder how realistic would it be to use it in a company for management of thousands of desktop machines. Sounds like it would be perfect for it, but i don't know any stories.

tichiian 3y ago
> There's a reason virtually everyone uses AD. The reason everyone uses AD is that you can have a functional Linux client in AD. But you cannot have a Windows client in any Linux-based LDAP+Kerberos setup. The problem isn't that there isn't a good solution for Linux in big organisations, the problem is that Windows is only compatible with AD, nothing else, so the more compatible system (Linux) gets shoved into AD.
- briHass 3y ago
  AD is also better and more feature complete. It was born out of necessity, but it's had decades of refinement in thousands of deployments that the OSS solutions haven't had.
  - Zardoz84 3y ago
    So, why does Microsoft want to kill AD and move everything to their cloud ?
    - tichiian 3y ago
      Because AD is a security nightmare. It is a collection of ~30 distinct protocols, e.g. bastardized versions of LDAP, Kerberos, DNS, DHCP, X.509 and a few RPC protocols that are all weirdly intertwined, with 30 year old designs. Every few months there is another CVE like 'oh, we forgot to checksum and sign that one field over there, please install this incompatible patch or you will have unauthed RCE'. Since all those patches make things break, there is a lot of vulnerable AD installations out there because most people need to be on "compatibility settings" that are insecure. And even the "secure" settings drop a CVE every few months.
    - briHass 3y ago
      They want you to move everything to the cloud, for obvious reasons. However, if you have on-prem/non-cloud servers, AD is still in the mix. They actually recommend running an AD DC as a VM in the cloud as a backup and to integrate cloud resources in scenarios that are more complex than Entra and Intune can handle.
- BikiniPrince 3y ago
  Every large organization that I have worked at has a solution for desktop and server Linux. The downside is you typically have a password hash stored in ad or a separate service. Ultimately, it isn’t terrible, but you do have a lot of enforcement at the border. So trouble can surprisingly appear when you connect remotely.
mairusu 3y ago
The reason everyone uses AD isn't that AD is good. It's that they either have no other choice, or they don't have any competent people in setting up other tools since all basic sysadmins only learn AD in schools.

mandevil 3y ago

According to wiki here (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_German_cities_by_GDP https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_German_cities_by_GDP) Munich in 2021 had a per capita GDP of 86k euro. According to wiki here (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_German_states_by_GRP_per_capita https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_German_states_by_GRP_p...) Schleswig-Holstein had a per capita GRP of ~42k euro in 2022 (note that the years are different). So these figures suggest that Munich is roughly twice as rich as S-H, which they list as below average for the BRD, as the 8th richest of Germany's 16 Lander. I took German in high school (back when I was on slashdot), I actually had tests on where all of the Lander were, I know a few things!

nextos 3y ago
That's a bit of an unfair comparison as Munich is a city, whereas Schleswig-Holstein is a state. It's not very different from Bavaria or neighbouring areas such as Jylland or Lower Saxony: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_German_states_by_household_income https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_German_states_by_house...