France has incorporated Linux desktops into its national digital-sovereignty strategy. DINUM, France’s Interministerial Digital Directorate, announced a transition from Windows to Linux workstations.
According to an official government press release, this change is part of a broader initiative to reduce reliance on non-European digital technologies (source, in French).
The government’s statement is notably direct. The section on workstation evolution confirms that DINUM will replace Windows with Linux systems. The press release also requires each ministry, including public operators, to develop a plan by autumn 2026 addressing desktop systems, collaboration tools, antivirus software, AI, databases, virtualization, and network equipment.
This initiative extends beyond a standard desktop migration. France positions Linux adoption as part of a broader policy focused on sovereignty, interoperability, and reducing dependence on foreign vendors. As the announcement comes directly from DINUM, which oversees digital strategy across ministries, it holds greater significance than a local pilot or isolated administrative project.
And as you can see, this is a big deal. It is not a leak, rumor, or unofficial plan. It is a formal declaration from one of Europe’s largest governments, explicitly designating Linux as the replacement for Windows workstations as part of a broader interministerial strategy.
The extent of the transition will depend on ministry-level plans due later this year, but France has clearly made Linux desktops a key component of its national digital-sovereignty agenda. For now, there are no specific details about which distributions will be used, as that decision will apparently come a bit later.
The Linux kernel development is largely driven by corporate contributors, with over 70% of contributions coming from developers employed by corporations.
We’ve heard this for 30 years now
All of this is nothing more than a convenient excuse for yet another round of embezzlement by officials and their cronies at the expense of ordinary people. All governments do this.
Remember Munich.
Apparently NixOS could be the French choice.
Do you have a source for this in EN/FR? would love to read up on any details of how they’d like to implement usage of NixOS.
Interesting move, definitely feels like Linux on the desktop is gaining real momentum at scale.
One thing that comes to mind with shifts like this is how important the delivery model is. In the Windows world, there are well-established ways of doing this at scale with solutions like Citrix or Horizon. With Linux, it’s absolutely possible too, but maybe not as widely known.
We develop ThinLinc, and lately we’ve been seeing a growing interest from the French public sector in testing and implementing it, which is exciting to follow, and it’s interesting to see how that demand seems to correlate with developments like the one you’re highlighting here in the post.
Centralized approaches can really simplify things when you’re dealing with thousands of users, both from a management and security perspective. Hopefully efforts like this help more organizations discover practical ways to adopt Linux at scale, and that as an effect we’ll see broader usage over time.
Curious to see how this plays out across other organizations.
… and since 1997 There is Mandrake / Mandriva / Mageia Linux from Gale Duval ! :: Mandriva Linux, a fusion of the French distribution Mandrake Linux and the Brazilian distribution Conectiva Linux, is a discontinued Linux distribution developed by Mandriva S.A.
Each release lifetime was 18 months for base updates (Linux, system software, etc.) and 12 months for desktop updates (window managers, desktop environments, web browsers, etc.). Server products received full updates for at least five years after their release.
The last release of Mandriva Linux was in August 2011. Most developers who were laid off went to Mageia.[5] Later on, the remaining developers teamed up with community members and formed OpenMandriva, a continuation of Mandriva.
Yes: absolutely. Mandrake Linux was one of the first, if not the first distro, with a graphical interface.
And now Gaël Duval is the leader of Murena phones with e/ os/ a degoogled android. 🙂
they will be demanding age verify and wokeness to be incorporated into every corner of linux in no time at all
how do you know?
because it seems like the entire planet is pushing that crap
I’d be more interested in the internals—such as which software they would prefer (apart from the obvious, like LibreOffice). Then we could focus on improving the stacks and making them more attractive to other national governments as well.
My thought exactly.
As more big governments transition, it will be very good for Linux driver quality, desktop software quality – everything about Linux on the desktop will progress forward. Windows has become obscenely bloated and painful to maintain at scale – the image that my corporate laptop ran (at a very large U.S. Corp) was ungainly and overwhelmed by all the security software that HAD to be loaded to connect to the corporate network.
Only good things come from this.
i highly doubt the government will be making drivers or making them better. Without all the code added to the kernel and other projects from corporate employees linux would would probably progress a 1000 times slower.
microshlop bad
About 20y late and probably only a negotiation strategy for better conditions from MS.
It would definitely be worth it for Europe.
It’s just pathetic how many billions we send to the US for their crap
If they couldn’t save themselves from Nazi occupation during WWII, then they can’t save themselves from Micro$lop.
Which country was well prepared in 1939 to counter a blitzkrieg waged by soldiers high on Pervitin?
Even the British were soundly defeated alongside the French, in fact, it was thanks to the French that hundreds of thousands of British soldiers had time to reach their ships and return to their island which was far easier to defend to continue the war. And between the Resistance and the Free French Forces, the French proved they could still make a difference in the war. (For example, the decisive Battle of Bir Hakeim, or the magnificent work of the 2nd Armored Division…)
The French Gendarmerie has been using Ubuntu (GendBuntu) successfully for nearly 20 years.
Windows is and always has been a criminal organization focused on extorting money from people. Good move France. They have been convicted of anti-trust violations in just about every developed country in the world.
And let’s not forget MS Windows Embrace, extend, and extinguish
Making sure you would have no alternatives to their software.
“Embrace, extend, and extinguish”, also known as “embrace, extend, and exterminate”, is a phrase that the U.S. Department of Justice found to have been used internally by Microsoft to describe its strategy for entering product categories involving widely used open standards, extending those standards with proprietary capabilities, and using the differences to strongly disadvantage its competitors.
“Embrace, extend, and extinguish”, also known as “embrace, extend, and exterminate”, is a phrase that the U.S. Department of Justice found to have been used internally by Microsoft to describe its strategy for entering product categories involving widely used open standards, extending those standards with proprietary capabilities, and using the differences to strongly disadvantage its competitors.
many worthwhile responses here and some just duck crap floating, imo. I won’t add to the mess but have a personal opinion coming from inside the ludicrous curtain of the US. Seeing this attempt at change is great because any divorce from what the US dishes out feels like the right move since the US is doing just that from it’s allies; or should I say the current administration is doing. Change can be painful and at the same time can be rewarding and strengthening your independence which is Linux in a nutshell.
I’m a Ununited-States born citizen living in another country now. It’s not just the “current administration”. There are good people here, to be sure. But if you look at American life, you will come to the inevitable conclusion that 97,000,000 people. despite seeing what happened on Jan 6, 2020, voted for the “current administration” again. They knew exactly what they were doing.
This isn’t a government problem. it’s a “the people” problem. The US needs to split up. Until then, the world needs to reduce contact in every way possible.
Realistically, it won’t take a new administration – it won’t take a generation. It will take several generations to separate the ideals by geographic segregation, much like Belgium separates their languages. If there is any kind of federation between the regions, however, there will always be the fools that push to consolidate power like convicted felon Trump or Vietnam’s To Lam (https://www.cnbc.com/2026/04/07/vietnams-top-leader-to-lam-consolidates-power-gets-china-style-mandate.html).
Welcome to the new world.
also US born here, still here, and I totally agree that it is not just a “our current administration” problem. There’s a broader cultural issue that gets these guys into the positions they are in. The constant back and forth of power in this country that’s been going on since long before I was born, and the constant focus on “RIGHT NOW” politics, ensures that nothing productive for the actual people of this country ever proceeds. Just an obsession with doing “peacekeeping” in places we have no business in at the expense of the common man.
There should be some cooperation with German authorities or other European authorities that have already made the move. Ideally the EU itself should fund and setup a body that will create a government focused European OS that caters for all the operational concerns of public sector. If a bunch of hobbyists can build a decent OS for free then EU should be able to do it too
Exactly, this should be EU level strategy. No to software dictatorship.
The Gendarmerie and all parliamentarians run Ubuntu on their PCs and laptops, so I guess this is the most likely candidate.
The real problem will be to convince companies and enterprises because many employees in IT departments have only a “Microsoft Certified Software Engineer” (one Saturday afternoon) as qualification and will stick to MS and Windows at any price.
companies? this is not about private sector its about the government.
I’d argue the bigger problem will be to get managements and users to adopt Linux. Management will only see costs and won’t care about digital sovereignty and users are just lazy and hate change. Onboarding will be an absolute pain in the ass.
But it’s probably the best long term strategy.
I don’t think users are the hurdle anymore,
They are now use to clicking that single browser icon and navigation through to variety of systems an solutions
The days of navigation through the operating system is gone in most ways
The learning curve is now on the it staff to facilitate a standard operating environment that group policy and Intune offered.
Business would be brutally happy to free themselves from the open ended deliberately increasingly confusing monthly Microsoft plans and pricing
Business?
Next: Spain 😀
in the early 2000’s, many local goverments created their own linux distro (just a few customizations for their needs): Guadalinex, MoLinux, Linkat, Lliurex and many others.
https://informatecdigital.com/en/History-of-Linux-in-Spain-and-the-rise-of-regional-distributions/
Nice. Windows is overpriced, sloppy spyware. Way to go, France!
As a French citizen with some knowledge of the place of the DINUM in the grand scheme of things, I am not particularly optimistic reading this announcement.
The DINUM does lead the way on some fronts, and LaSuite is one Hell on an achievement in that respect. However, migrating the desktop OS is still a few difficulty levels above, and the announcement “only” says “everyone must come with a plan to improve sovereignty before winter”. There has already been numerous plans, mandates and announcements. My workstation is still running Windows.
I’ll start believing when our Ministry of Defense will stop contracting with Microsoft.
Contracting with microsoft is not going to stop, at least for the next decade. Some software and drivers currently don’t exists elsewhere (everything related to NI for a start, and that’s almost ubiquitously used in the research field). But if we could just move away from azure, one drive, office and windows for simple desktop use, that would be a huge win. And then things could move on from there.
Mine is running a Windows VM on Linux and it’s totally transparent for the user, they all think their machine is only running on Windows
I’m from Finland. Linux is a Finnish invention. It is appalling that Finnish government is not doing the same, we are paying Microsoft over 1 billion euros every year for bare license fees…
I’m surprised Linus hasn’t been asked to drive this European OS initiative. With a single driver you’d remove the splintering across the European member states
i do not think linus is a good choice for such a task and i doubt he would even bother even if asked.
I think this wasn’t thought it completely. While I agree that governments shouldn’t rely on Microsoft to keep their data and secrets safe, there a lot for technical considerations and said months will not be enough for an actionable plan to transition from the ecosystem that manages your AAA, update policy, data security, document handling and all the other considerations and needs of any company, let alone a whole country,
While Linux has solutions for server farms and data centers (both are the historical main focus), the individual desktop management and security is another story and I don’t know if there is a solution for all those needs that is comprehensive enough to complete with Microsoft’s ecosystem. There needs to be endpoint security solutions, central management, update policies, access policies, office solutions and more,
I think France is being a little baby having a tantrum in response to the US policy makes (which is understandable) and they need to think more about how this could be done and give it longer (I would sit down with other European nations in the EU to form a body to create the systems needed inside the EU on the linux basis and then advice member nations to switch to them instead of this rash reaction to one crazy president across the ocean that will not be around in a couple of years)
You’re drawing a lot of conclusion from things you’ve incorrectly assumed. The current goal is just to establish plans to move away from microsoft. It will take probably years before things start to move fast in any direction. If the next government don’t stop the project before anything is accomplished.
As for document handling this is already something that France DINUM has an answer for. It’s still a work in progress but La Suite already has a credible solution for most commons office tasks.
What’s really missing is a credible management solution for devices.
Unattended remote access and accessibility for users with impairments are both huge problems with Linux desktops, Wayland essentially makes those things completely impossible to solve properly.
Unattended remote access to the desktop is completely impossible in Wayland so any organization that expects to access desktops without someone clicking a dialog to allow access won’t ever be able to migrate to Linux.
Even with explicit permission from the user, only certain applications that implement a particular desktop environment’s extensions will appear, other applications may appear but not allow interaction or not appear at all. For example LibreOffice may not show up on KDE and/or Gnome during remote access because it uses neither the Gnome nor KDE base libraries – in practice, hopefully it has implemented the protocol extensions for both DE’s
Similar problems exist with accessibility tools like screen readers and assistive input methods, making access for people with physical impairments a minefield, and in some cases presenting legal discrimination liabilities for organizations trying to migrate users to Linux.
These are showstopping issies that are now inherent to Linux after the reckless migration to a desktop graphics standard that is intentionally designed to be fundamentally incompatible with basic requirements for business adoption.
It couldn’t be worse if it were intentional sabotage and couldn’t have manifested itself at a worse time. Linux desktop environments are their own worst enemies and Linux as a whole is reaping the harvest of the stupidity that they have sown.
The months is to come up with a plan, not to complete a transition.
The hardest of the factors you listed is document handling. There are various people that will die on the hill of Excel. The rest is not too difficult to plan (and even implement) as for AAA, as a transition you can still use AD with a Linux client.
You can use Google Sheets in Chrome?
Yes, but using Chrome or Google Sheets isn’t really making it more sovereign.
Or you can use LibreOffice Calc
There are other open source Office suites:
Open-source office suites:
LibreOffice
Apache OpenOffice
OnlyOffice (Community Edition)
Calligra Suite
WPS Office (free version — not fully open source)
SoftMaker FreeOffice (proprietary with free tier — not open source)
Most compatible with Microsoft Office formatting:
LibreOffice — best overall compatibility for .docx/.xlsx/.pptx; frequent updates and import/export filters.
OnlyOffice (Community Edition) — very good native support for MS formats and collaborative features.
Apache OpenOffice — older; reasonable for basic documents but weaker with newer MS formats (.docx/.xlsx/.pptx).
Recommendation: Use LibreOffice or OnlyOffice for highest fidelity with MS Office files.
I read yesterday that MS disable a dev account for a encryption system, today, I read the France is moving government desktops to Linux, Steam is based on Linux, Wine/Proton are very stable, many advanced gamers are using Wine, some weeks ago I read that the Adobe installer works well in Wine with a patch (XML parser), small moves, will produce a good movement….
I highly doubt gov employees will be playing games on their gov machines somehow
I don’t trust Microslop as far as I could throw them. Zorin OS would make the transition easy.
This is amazing news. It’s not an easy thing for an entire ecosystem to transition. France is big mad and distrustful of US tech (as they should be). It should be clear by now that US bigtech is an extension of a US regime that has gone quite rogue over the last few years.
I’m just surprised that the rest of the EU has not reacted the same. Maybe they will when the US makes another push for Greenland.
bazza385@gmail.com
If they actually do pull this off, it will be amazing for the Linux community. It will only push the OS further. I work at a software company and a lot of businesses now are starting to deploy Linux as a desktop environment for their end users. It’s a nice thing to see people moving away from Microsoft
Google uses linux, though they made their own OS:
Google still uses Linux operating systems in-house, specifically their own Debian-based distribution called gLinux. This system replaced the previous Ubuntu-based distribution, Goobuntu, to better meet their operational needs.
This is very interesting, I didn’t know about Goobuntu. KDE neon was formed years ago and all the main Kubuntu devs left. I hope the France plans to evaluate KDE neon! In my opinion, it includes both the best overall desktop experience and all the development tools to create your own cross-platform desktop software.
The aim of this decision is to free ourselves from the burden and dominance of US technology companies
As a US citizen I applaud this move, a great decision for France and hope to see much more of this
Same here, US citizen, Open source, Linux user for twenty years now. The last 16 on Ubuntu Mate.
Linux mint
that will never happen. it will either be there own version of a major linux distro or they will just use a major linux distro. Linux mint also does not meet all the required criteria that governments usually require.
Probably the easiest flavor of Linux, considering the tech abilities of government workers is so varied.