this post was submitted on 29 Oct 2023
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Wormhole

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founded 1 year ago
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It was announced about one year ago

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[–] [email protected] 70 points 1 year ago (5 children)

I am curious how this will turn out. Germany is not known for state driven digital innovation and this is a huge project.

Even though I am highly sceptic, I hope they finally manage to get something going because Germany and whole Europe needs more independence from US hyperscalers.

I fear this will die in good old German bureaucracy though.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 year ago

I fear this will die in good old German bureaucracy though.

I believe so too, but there is hope because at least they're trying something. It should be "released" into the alpha stage in December, but I have no idea what it will look like.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (3 children)

[...] and this is a huge project.

This makes me skeptical too. I'd be interested to hear about smaller projects to replace some creaky system relying on the output of some long-gone contractor's overengineered software being faxed around.

Those projects have no cool name and are probably really hard to get funding for. But sometimes I can't help but feel that might be more effective than these "big bang" projects.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Oh clearly, let me fill my taxes online please

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago

Oh clearly, let me fill my taxes online please

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago

Oh clearly, let me fill my taxes online please

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

DE-mail was doomed to fail from the start. Here, they did some things right. Let's see how it turns out.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

German encrypted E-Mail service for official business (taxes and so on). Nice idea but execution was broken from start. German government doing IT is a running joke.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

It wasn't end to end encrypted though because that wouldn't have allowed server side virus scanning

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Pity :/ They have millions to spend.

[–] [email protected] 27 points 1 year ago (5 children)

After reading through the repo README, I have no idea what it is.

[–] [email protected] 30 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Looks to me like they're trying to build something like office 365, but open source. Mostly by wiring other open-source components together I think?

This is probably a better starting point, unfortunately the text is in German: https://gitlab.opencode.de/bmi/souveraener_arbeitsplatz/info

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

Exactly.

The goal is to allow a completely free and open-source deployment of an O365-like infrastructure in order to prevent being tethered to Microsoft, for example. The main use seems to be so that municipalities can set up something cheaply and quickly, without any licensing headaches.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

After reading through the repo README, I have no idea what it is.

A much better overview (in German):

https://gitlab.opencode.de/bmi/souveraener_arbeitsplatz/info/-/blob/main/OVERVIEW.md

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago

From that Overview.md:

openDesk auf gitlab.opencode.de Der openDesk integriert Open Source Anwendungen bekannter Anbieter zu einer browserbasierten Open Source Kollaborations-Suite.

Der openDesk ist ein digitaler Arbeitsplatz für die Öffentliche Verwaltung mit Fokus auf Digitale Souveränität, Nutzerfreundlichkeit und Zukunftsfähigkeit.

Das Open Source Softwareprodukt "openDesk" ermöglicht die Wiederverwendbarkeit von Open Source Quellcodes der Öffentlichen Verwaltung und gibt Raum zur Teilhabe an der Weiterentwicklung. Flexible Weiterentwicklungsmöglichkeiten erlauben das Einbringen eigener Ideen, Anforderungen und Anwendungen.

Als Betriebsumgebung von openDesk kommt Kubernetes zum Einsatz. Die teilweise nicht originär für den Containerbetrieb ausgelegten Anwendungen werden dabei mehr und mehr für dieses Betriebsszenario optimiert.

translates to

The openDesk integrates open source software of known publishers to a combined open source collaboration suite.

The openDesk is a digital workstation for the civil/public service with focus on digital sovereignty, usability, and future proofness.

[…] offers opportunities for collaboration for continued development. […]

openDesk runs in a Kubernetes environment. The in part not originally developed to be containerized applications are and will be further optimized for that runtime scenario.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago

I’m not sure, but I think this is a FOSS, Selfhosted, O365 replacement-in-a-box. Well, helm chart.

Pretty cool IMO.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago

I'm having trouble with that too. It seems to be a kubernetes deployment using helm charts of all the services they would like to have in every commune (or wherever this will be federated).

I was expecting the definition of OS and software to use locally as well. But dunno... it reads like it's written by bureaucrats.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Neither has the creator.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

They tried something similar in Munich, i think, dropping M$ and going full Debian. A few years later they reversed that 'cos the lusers couldn't handle it.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago

And because Microsoft moved their HQ to Munich

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago