The Netherlands is building its own Linux OS to break free from Microsoft
65 points by pocket_walrus
65 points by pocket_walrus
They kinda skim past it, but part of the reason is that the sanctions imposed on the ICC by the US don't exempt operating systems (unlike communication services and payroll software) so they can't get new Windows licenses even if they wanted to.
This is actually good. Nothing else so far has convinced the Dutch government to get rid of their absolute childlike dependence on Big Tech (in particular Microsoft).
I'm not Dutch, so wonder what you mean. I think of Netherlands as having best-on-planet tech in ASML, so i'm wondering how such a great vast range of tech exists.
Having best-on-planet ASML is super nice, but that doesn't solve the Dutch dependence on US Big Tech. You know, operating systems, productivity suites, cloud platforms, etc. That's not an issue just for the Dutch, it's pretty much a problem for all of us in Europe (and potentially rest of the world) and it'll take a bit of effort and time (and lots and lots of tax monies) to solve properly.
The US imposing sanctions across the world is a blessing in disguise; it empowers others to come up with their own solutions and be independent.
In an ideal world, the governance of NixOS too gets more stable because of this.
But, the counterintuitive thing is Nix is heavily dependent on GitHub, which is also owned by Microsoft. So, technically they didn't break free from Microsoft.
One step at a time. NixOS switching away from GitHub is easier than the government switching away from Windows. I'm very happy they're doing this and it's a massive change in perspective for a government that's been positively chained to Microsoft.
I agree. It's good that governments are ditching Microsoft and embracing sovereign open source software. I am happy about it, it just came out a bit pessimistic.
In what way is Nix heavily dependent on Github? If you're just referring to the fact that Github is used as a distribution channel for nixpkgs (and other flakes), I'd say that's a very different kind of dependence.
Firstly, I'm no expert on the sanctions on the international courts, but I would assume they block only the kind of interections that are governed by having a contractual relationship. Perhaps they could block ICC employees from having a Github account, but surely they wouldn't prevent them from accessing public repositories? Moreover, even if they did, AFAIA, nix is not tied to Github, specifically, so I would imagine it's not very hard to spin up a mirror of nixpkgs on some non-US-controlled domain, to avoid these sanctions.
Yeah! GitHub is a first class citizen but nix has a decentralized model. I was just stating the current state of distribution of nixpkgs, which can easily be cloned and accessed from another host. You're absolutely right.
spin up a mirror of nixpkgs
FWIW, it may be somewhat less trivial in that many (probably most) of the packages (a.k.a. "Nix expressions") pull the source/binary tarballs (or actual git snapshots) of the packaged apps from GitHub as well. This technically should also be possible to workaround, though I'd say quite laborious, and you'd still need access to GitHub in meantime to mirror all those tarballs. I hope eventually Nix gets an alternative fetcher for data from torrents (or IPFS, or some other such), but last I checked this is still a long open (if worked on from time to time by some brave soul) ticket.
That's a good point, I hadn't considered that! Would using cached binaries, rather than building from source, avoid using Github?
Earlier this year, the Netherlands blocked an attempt by a US company to buy a crucial app used by Dutch citizens.
That's kind of an understatement. They are talking about DigiD, the platform that handles authentication and digital signatures for all government and government-adjacent services. It's what you use to digitally sign your tax declaration and what you use to get a new passport.
It's also not entirely accurate as to what was being bought. I'm relatively sure DigID itself is developped and maintained by the Dutch government and was never for sale. However, the government rents server space from a private company on which to run the backend infrastrucure on which DigID runs. It's this company that was being sold.
Spain tried this in the past with multiple regional versions of Linux (e.g. Guadalinex). I hope it ends up better.