openDesk Edu

A conservative analysis of a federated, open-source email and collaboration platform for 2.8 million students, modelled on Germany's federal education structure with one instance per Bundesland.

Data sovereignty is decided at the backup layer: openDesk Edu protects critical services with k8up and a 3-tier model (RPO/RTO/retention) on S3, verifies restores in production, and honestly shows what is still missing – 29 RWO PVCs await CSI snapshots.

openDesk Edu is nominated for the Open Source Competition 2026. We rank the project against the field — and explain why your vote matters for digital sovereignty in education.