KIT and managing rights granularity in academics

The Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) is one of the largest research centers in Europe, being the only German university that combines a long university tradition with large-scale national research.

The institution has a strong focus on energy system transformation, climate and resource protection, mobility and transportation, as well as data and information.

KIT is renowned for its numerous inventors and entrepreneurs who studied or taught there:

• Karl Benz, the inventor of the first self-propelled automobile,
• Heinrich Hertz, who first conclusively proved the existence of the electromagnetic waves,
• Emil von Škoda, founder of Škoda Works, the predecessor of today's Škoda Auto and Škoda Transportation, and many more.

Professors and alumni have received 6 Nobel Prizes and 10 Leibniz Prizes, the latter being Europe's most prestigious and well-funded award.

Over the past 15 years, KIT faced escalating costs and maintenance challenges with Confluence.

The critical turning point came when Atlassian announced the mandatory migration to their cloud platform, which was incompatible with KIT's extensive on-premises integrations needs, including their local databases like Jira for IT system insights and GIT repositories.

These integrations were crucial for maintaining a single source of truth, preventing documentation discrepancies that could arise from data being stored in multiple, potentially unsynchronized systems.

Furthermore, the price for maintaining their Confluence instance became financially unfeasible, leading KIT to explore alternative tools. After a thorough evaluation of options on the market, which included a detailed analysis of macros compatibility and integrations through APIs, XWiki was chosen as the optimal solution.

XWiki's open-source nature, combined with its ready-to-use Confluence Migrator (Pro), and the technical consulting offered by XWiki's highly competent Client team, enabled KIT to migrate and transition to the new solution in a seamless and timely manner.

The entire consulting, planning, migration and customization process was completed within 10 months, resulting in a highly tailored intranet and documentation system that met all of KIT’s stringent requirements.

The migration was realized with the help of XWiki’s Confluence Migrator (Pro), which facilitated an efficient and accurate transition of data, including 50 spaces, 9431 pages, 250 users, and their permissions.

The collaboration between KIT and the XWiki Client team was very efficient, from communication to technical diagnosis, solutions, and implementation. During the project, the XWiki consultant (also a KIT graduate), with deep knowledge of XWiki and extensive programming experience, provided invaluable support throughout the consulting, development, and migration process.

By selecting XWiki, KIT not only transitioned fast to a much more cost-efficient solution, but also benefits from unmatched flexibility, security, and control over their data and hosting. The tailored intranet and documentation system allows KIT to manage and develop their knowledge base on their terms, free from the constraints of a cloud-only vendor platform.