We are a small company, but we think a lot about our IT systems.
About 17 years ago, we switched to a Linux server. The daily stoppages stopped, stability improved hugely. We upgrade it when we plan, not when a US company plans. Our current OS is Arch, a Linux distribution that starts with the basic and allows you to install only what you need. No gaming functions, no apps constantly contacting obscure external sources for unknown purposes, no dross.
With the server, we installed our own encrypted e-mail solution, we ditched Outlook and never looked back.
In the following years, our workstations moved from Windows to Linux. Everyone complained – for a week. Then with growing familiarity they found that it was just as easy, or easier to use.
We moved from MS Office to Open Office, then Libre Office. The only difficulty we experienced with this shift lay in certain formatting differences with clients who use MS Office. This has required some creative solutions but it’s only a minor inconvenience.
“Yeah, but…” (I can hear it coming), “we use some applications that can only run on Windows”.
So do we. In fact, one of our key pieces of software requires a Windows OS. We have it sitting on its own server with a stripped-down version of Windows running on a virtual machine, with its own safeguards and with minimum contact to the outside world. It works just fine like that, though we would rather have a Linux-based version, which would save resources.
Our data sits on a file server in our office, with a hard-wired backup in a neighbouring property and remote backups beyond. Nobody else uses the hardware it is stored on. We know exactly where it is. It is not in Virginia or California, nor in the fog.
We have a reliable, convenient system for our translation business. It has a good degree of security, minimum reliance on foreign companies and their opaque conditions of contract – and it is cheap.
If we can do it, so can anyone.