We are Nextcloud fans!

At Semaphor we have been using Nextcloud (ownCloud) for more than 10 years and it is still our daily driver for sharing files both internally and externally. The evolution of Nextcloud over the years has been no less than impressive and the current state of the software allows Nextcloud to solve a large number of every day office tasks.

To grasp the power of the Nextcloud software, let’s look at the psdroducts that the server installation offers from the top down. The umbrella term for all of Nextclouds products is called ”Nextcloud Hub”. At the time of writing, the most recent Nextcloud Hub version is 8 with version 9 releasing in less than a month. Nextcloud Hub encompasses four key Nextcloud Products: Files, Talk, Groupware and Office. Below is a break down of the four key Nextcloud products.

Nextcloud Files is the file sharing and collaboration part of Nextcloud. This functionality allows the end user to share and synchronize seamlessly between multiple platforms.

Nextcloud Talk is the part of Nextcloud that offers various communication channels between end users. Integrated audio/video conferencing with screen sharing, instant messaging and support for SIP integration are the core components of this product.

Nextcloud Groupware covers, among others, the built in calendar, contact and mail features that allow coworkers to plan and communicate across teams.

Nextcloud Office is the icing on the cake of Nextcloud Hub and this product is a “LibreOffice-based online office suite with collaborative editing”. It supports browser based editing of multiple document, spreadsheet and presentation file types.

The most important reason why we like the feature rich software suite of Nextcloud, is the fact that the code base is open source. This means we confidently can install, use and recommend Nextcloud, without having security or privacy related concerns.

The Hub is described by Nextcloud themselves as ”A new generation of online collaboration that puts you in control.” And that is exactly what it is. But it doesn’t stop here. Nextcloud has a wide variety of apps available from the internal app catalogue, that a user can use to tailor Nextcloud to their specific needs. Whether only a small file sharing platform with 2-3 local users is needed, or a organisation-wide multifunctional eco system with login and groups synchronized from a directory or identity provider, Nextcloud is the answer.

At Semaphor, we have set up many Nextcloud servers, all with various sizes, configurations and use cases, and every time we are impressed how this free and open source software solves a problem. And this is why we enjoy Nextcloud. With the rapid development of Nextcloud and almost a thousand contributors to the Nextcloud server repository, we are excited to follow the future progress and development of the project.

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