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I'm not thinking only to "from Microsoft Office to Libreoffice" but also a change of OS. What distro would be best? A rolling release distro is a great idea (no reinstallations) or a terrible idea (possible instability)?
Probably old Windows XP computers would be the majority... Keep in mind that pcs will be old and people slow to learn and Linux ignorant-hater, thinking that "all works" and a change is unnecesssary.
The change would be done in a "public" service of a city municipality... It's not a big city too.
I hope you have understood and many thanks to any answers!
Happy Holiday!
PP
As for the operating system, I'd probably go for something super stable instead of going rolling and risking some machines suddenly borking, especially if the systems will be used by ex-WinXP users. Something like Debian with LXDE or Xfce. You'd probably also want to modify the desktop environment so that the panel is at the bottom of the screen to make sure it kinda works like Windows.
Our office runs Mint Xfce, so we have a wide selection of software available thanks to the widely supported Ubuntu base and the PPA system, with a very usable, if mostly traditional desktop. Since version 17, Mint releases always build on whatever happens to be the latest Ubuntu LTS, so updates aren't likely to ever break anything, while the hardware enablement stack gives us recent enough drivers/kernels. If you were thinking of converting a larger corporation or city, a commercial distribution that offers paid support would possibly be a better choice, but in your case probably not. You could even argue that for a small office, the best distro is whatever your IT guy is most familiar with.
About the feasibility of such a conversion project, it's pretty much guaranteed to be an excercise in frustration (if not futility) if your users are already dead set against any change in their work flow. We've been running our little office on Linux and nothing but open source software for more than a decade, but that doesn't really mean much as we were already Linux users before we even thought of starting the business. Also, our needs and expectations aren't likely to be at all similar to those of a small town municipal office...
Maybe you could start the process by switching over only a part of the office, starting with users who are open to it? Just make sure you've got the transition planned and tested to the last detail before you do anything at all. First impressions are important.
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Then roll it out to a percentage of the users (maybe 20/30%) and in the whole process try involve and listen carefully to what they have to say. You will probably run into issues you had not thought about. Try gathering as much feedback as you can in the experimental period. Work out any prioritized issue and only when ready start rolling out to more and more users where you then fix any issue as you go.
And if you happen to run into any bug of any scale then please - PLEASE - file a bugreport so it has the possibility to get fixed for the future!
Maybe the whole process will go buttersmooth without any big issues at all and everyone will be superexited, but any large change to a business can go opposite as well. Doable? Yes of course! Just do it in small steps, and listen carefully to the users needs, and you'll very likely be perfectly fine!
As choice of distro I would suggest Ubuntu (which is based on Debian) with the MATE desktop. It should be familiar to use and it's "Software Boutique" and "MATE Tweak" is a real winner. The latter let's you supersimple redefine the desktop experience from a dropdown-menu. I'm sure that will be appreciated!
Check it out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hCXwmKg4VU
Get it: https://ubuntu-mate.org/
Whatever you decide to use, it should probably be a LTS release of some sort as it is much more manageable for a business.
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As already said it would be wise to ask who's interested in using it and then set up some PCs for them.
Probably the Linux PCs will run faster and have way less hassle to deal with (such as antivirus, auto-updates, useless waste of resources..), at the end you may have people asking you to change their OS to Linux!
On the other side you can install the same software that you have on the Linux machines, like LibreOffice, same browser, etc.. so that the switch would be easier.
I won't choose a rolling release because I don't think you need to always have the latest and greatest kernel, software, drivers and so on..
In my opinion Debian, *ubuntu or Linux Mint are the way to go (I will skip Ubuntu because Unity is too 'love it or hate it' in my opinion).
The fact that Debian is criticized for the very slow updates can be a huge PRO for your situation, where you may not want to upgrade too often (like with a rolling distro).
As for DE I suggest a lightweight one such as Xfce, Mate or Lxde, you can also think about a WM-only setup with OpenBox, Enlightment or JWM that are even more lightweight.
As for the set-up I think that panel on top + dock on bottom + a good wallpaper is the best way to go!
something like this for example, where the most common applications are on the dock ready to be launched with a click, instead of going through a menu and sub-menu.
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Regarding Libre Office I'm here with Samsai - if you don't care about legacy documents (written in MS Office) layout, Libre Office should fit standard user needs.
Regarding this (most important) part - you need to be perfectly sure, that there is no legacy, Windows only, irreplaceable software, that someone from the team uses.
When my girlfriend worked in a polish municipality, there was a software for ID documents management, and it was written in C# with WinForms (this information I know, because once she did a printscreen with stacktrace when software crashed :D )
Such a software is very often irreplaceable and I wouldn't try to permanently move it to Wine, because even if you test it hard, it's possible that one particular, very specific part of the software won't work and you'll have serious problem. However, for such a person there is a workaround, like Windows XP run in VirtualBox, only for this software.
If you're sure that nobody is using windows-only software, that has no substitute in Linux and the only thing that is necessary for team members is stable software, that allows them to edit some spreadsheets, write documents and use web-based software, then you're good. If for some reason they do other stuff, like graphic/music/video edit, programming etc. they will also be able to use various great software. However, not necessarily their favorite one.
Personally, I am a Java programmer, who worked 3 years on Linux on computer at work, and now for 1 year I am forced by the employer to use Windows (no particular reason, just received email with something like "Please install Windows on your machine. That's an order."). So I am in reverted position, than the team that you are about to force to change OS. I see no benefit of Windows, I use no Windows-only software at work and I am not happy. But it's worth to keep in mind that they may not be happy because of Linux.
However, having machines running Windows XP this times is pointless and risky, so switching to Linux is a great idea at least from security point of view.
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As for the distro, it depends on the work. For Game production/3D modelling/Animation/artwork, I would recommend an Ubuntu variation. For other work, like web development, RHEL/Centos or SLES/OpenSUSE would be better.
For replacing an old Windows XP, I would recomend using XFCE or LXDE as the Desktop Environment, maybe even customize it to look like Windows XP.
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On a related note, I'd love it if colleges and universities adopted LibreOffice as a standard. It makes financial sense because any student can get it for free, and it makes infrastructural sense because it's 100% cross platform, so if a student creates a presentation on his Linux computer, he won't have to concern himself if the classroom system happens to be Windows or Mac.
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1. Caseware - Audit/Accounting software that is not running in Linux
2. Office - Excel - the formulas that are using in excel is so complicated that none open source office suite software can handle them
3. Outlook they just simply cant work without it.
4. Custom software that are only running in Windows so no way to go with Linux (they dont even run in Windows 10)
5. Active Directory / Windows Server/ SQL Software like SAP Business One
So far I have 0 companies running in Full Linux environment except me :P
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I've been using Linux exclusively for work for 10+ years and I am never going back, how people get any work done with that sorry excuse for a terminal is beyond me :|