Schleswig-Holstein's e-mail systems converted to open source

The Schleswig-Holstein state administration has taken an important step towards digital sovereignty: After a six-month conversion process, the Ministry of Digital Affairs successfully completed the migration of the state administration's entire email system from Microsoft Exchange and Outlook to the open source solutions Open-Xchange and Thunderbird at the beginning of October.

The digital department speaks of a milestone after a tour de force that involved the migration of over 40,000 mailboxes with a total of well over 100 million emails and calendar entries. From the State Chancellery and ministries to the judiciary and state police to other state authorities – Around 30,000 employees have now arrived in the world of free software.

Digitization Minister Dirk Schrödter (CDU) is relieved after he recently had to admit errors in the ongoing migration to open source software in a letter to all state employees. There had previously been complaints from the workforce about downtime and delays in email traffic. "We want to become independent of large tech companies," emphasizes Schrödter . Now, the public sector can also say: "Mission accomplished" when it comes to email communication.

Windows to be replaced by Linux

The changeover is a central component of the state's open source strategy, which has been prepared over several years. The northern federal state is therefore consistently working towards the goal of a digitally sovereign IT workplace. The introduction of LibreOffice as the standard office software began last year. Following the migration of the mail system, MS Office is to be gradually removed from all state computers.

Schrödter acknowledges the challenge and achievement of the employees: "We are real pioneers. We can't fall back on the experience of others –, there is hardly a comparable project of this magnitude anywhere in the world." The head of department emphasises the added value for other administrations: "In future, we will be able to use our experience from data analysis to monitoring in the data centre to help others and support them when they embark on the path that we are currently the first to take."

In September, the Austrian Armed Forces announced the successful switch from Microsoft's Office programmes to the open-source LibreOffice package. The decision was made in 2021, although even then the army was not using Microsoft's email or collaboration solutions, but self-hosted Linux servers with Samba.

The initiative in Schleswig-Holstein covers other central areas of the state's IT: the Nextcloud software is set to replace Microsoft SharePoint gradually as the central platform for inter-agency collaboration. The state is building on OpenTalk for video conferencing. The telephone systems are also to be converted to an open source solution. In the long term, the plan is also to replace the Windows operating system on all computers with open source alternatives such as Linux.

(ds)