For people with a level of technical literacy that has them interested in posting on HN, sure. But for typical government workers? I imagine the differences are going to be pretty significant. They're not programmers or "devops" people.

We're talking about users who are going to do almost everything through the GUI, and who will associate the "distro" with the default choice of DE/WM/etc. stack in whichever flavour of whichever distro it is. Understanding what a "package manager" even is, will be the responsibility of "IT" specialists. Assuming they don't decide that only, say, Flatpak-installable software can be approved.

We're talking about massively bureaucratic institutions that have been steeped in Windows orthodoxy for decades. That's the administration policy they know, so it's what they will forcibly adapt to Linux.

You're going to need user retraining because the GUI has its own file manager program and no matter which one you choose (and they will choose exactly one) it is not Explorer. Because LibreOffice is not the Microsoft Office suite, and neither is any of its FOSS competitors. And so on and so forth. There's no telling what idiosyncrasies people depend on. In organizations like this I really doubt you can count on everyone being generically computer literate. I really doubt that generic computer literacy (as opposed to demonstrated competence with specific applications) was ever part of the hiring requirements.

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ErroneousBosh 3 hours ago | parent [-]

> But for typical government workers? I imagine the differences are going to be pretty significant. They're not programmers or "devops" people.

How much retraining do you need for "click on the orange and blue spinny fox thingy and wait for your email to come up"?

> because the GUI has its own file manager program and no matter which one you choose (and they will choose exactly one) it is not Explorer

Nobody is ever going to use it. They're going to use a web browser.

> There's no telling what idiosyncrasies people depend on.

Funny way of spelling "Firefox bugs", but whatever.

> In organizations like this I really doubt you can count on everyone being generically computer literate

Basic adult literacy is computer literacy. If you can read you can use a computer.

	▲	phainopepla2 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I get the sense you haven't worked with many non-technical people in government or enterprise contexts. I've seen people struggle with their workflows after upgrading to a newer version of Windows, to the point where company wide training sessions have had to be held.