DEV Community: Lorina Balan

Meet CryptPad: The open-source alternative to mainstream office suites

Lorina Balan — Mon, 06 Apr 2026 11:54:54 +0000

WHY IT MATTERS
Need a privacy-focused alternative for collaborative work?

Many people care about privacy, but still rely on mainstream tools for shared documents, notes, forms, and planning. That usually means trusting a provider with access to your content and data.

This webinar will show you a different approach.
FREE attendance, but registration is required here.

CryptPad is an open-source, end-to-end encrypted collaboration suite. It lets you work with others online in real time, while keeping your data private.

In this session, you will see how CryptPad works, what you can do with it, and why it is a strong option for individuals or organizations looking for a secure, privacy-focused online office suite.

You will leave with a practical understanding of encrypted collaboration and why CryptPad is the right fit for your everyday needs.

YOU'LL LEARN ABOUT

CryptPad’s core apps
Tour of the suite: drive, teams, functionalities of encrypted documents, spreadsheets, forms, Kanban boards, whiteboards, and other tools.
Private collaboration in practice
Demo of one or two workflows using CryptPad, sharing a file for example.
Is CryptPad right for you?
Learn whether CryptPad fits your privacy needs, workflows, and collaboration habits.
Live Q&A
Bring your questions and get direct answers from the team.

XWiki vs Confluence: Open source knowledge management and migration demo Register here: https://nextcloud.com/blog/event/xwiki-vs-confluence/

Lorina Balan — Mon, 23 Mar 2026 07:53:54 +0000

XWiki vs Confluence: Open source knowledge management

See how XWiki replaces Confluence Data Center with live migration demo, real-world examples, and a look at open-source knowledge management.

nextcloud.com

Documentation doesn't scale. Here's what we learned from organizations that made it work.

Lorina Balan — Mon, 23 Feb 2026 07:51:40 +0000

We've spent years helping organizations fix their documentation infrastructure—universities managing 145k pages, research institutes with 50+ spaces, teams where half the engineering time goes to “Where did we document that?”
The core problem isn't tooling. It's that documentation systems optimize for writing, not for surviving. And everything that doesn't survive eventually fragments.
What breaks at scale:

Hierarchical navigation fails around 1,000 pages.
People organize docs the way they think about them today.
Six months later, new people can't find anything because they think about the problem differently.
earch becomes the only navigation, but search assumes you know what you're looking for.

“Just write better docs” doesn't work. We analyzed documentation from teams with strong writing cultures. The issue isn't quality, it's just that context decays. A decision doc from 2022 doesn't explain why certain constraints existed, because everyone in the room knew. New people read it and make the same mistakes.
The wiki/Google Docs/Notion fragmentation is inevitable without structure. Teams start in one tool, hit limits, move some content elsewhere, now you have two sources of truth. We've seen orgs with documentation in 6+ different systems, all claiming to be canonical.
Link rot compounds exponentially.
People rename things, delete outdated content, don't update references. After 3-4 years, 20-30% of internal links are broken.

What actually works:

Structured content, not just markdown. Metadata about “what type of doc is this” lets you build views, enforce review cycles, track ownership. This sounds bureaucratic but it's the difference between searchable and findable.
Separation of content and presentation. The way you navigate docs should change as the org grows, but the content shouldn't need rewriting. Most tools couple these.
Explicit ownership and lifecycle. Every doc needs an owner and a review cycle, or it rots. The teams that made this work treated documentation like code—ownership, pull requests, deprecation policies.
Self-hosting when you care about longevity. SaaS vendors change pricing, deprecate features, get acquired. If your docs matter for 5+ years, hosting them yourself means you control the upgrade cycle.

*We're running a technical webinar on explaining what we've learned through direct experience, if people want the details: *
https://xwiki.com/en/webinars/XWiki-as-a-documentation-tool

But honestly, the interesting question is: has anyone solved this differently? What's worked for keeping documentation usable at scale?

A lot of meeting overload is really a documentation failure

Lorina Balan — Tue, 10 Feb 2026 15:39:57 +0000

In small teams, things work because decisions live in someone’s head. Usually the founder’s. That’s fast, but it doesn’t scale.

Once you add people, assumptions stop being shared. Decisions are scattered across slide decks, chat threads, or half-remembered conversations. When something changes, the safest move becomes another meeting to re-establish what’s still true.

Teams that invest early in durable documentation behave differently. Not “write everything down,” but things like:

explicit decision logs or ADRs
clear ownership of processes
a single place people trust as authoritative

The effect isn’t fewer meetings by policy, but fewer meetings by necessity. Meetings become for making decisions, not reconstructing past ones.

This is something we’re digging into in an upcoming webinar, mostly from a practical angle rather than theory:
https://xwiki.com/en/webinars/XWiki-as-a-documentation-tool

Curious how others here handle decision history and documentation rot as teams grow.

October recap: XWiki and CryptPad updates, insights, and what’s next

Lorina Balan — Wed, 05 Nov 2025 10:42:25 +0000

This month we’re sharing:
✔ Insights from our migration expert Stefana Bianca Nazare on choosing your next step after Confluence Data Center
✔ A new webinar with OpenProject on building an open-source stack beyond Atlassian
✔ News from our partnership with Dicode Oy in Finland
✔ XWiki 17.9.0 release highlights and the latest from our Pro Apps
✔ A fresh new interface in CryptPad’s Autumn Release

👉 Catch the full recap and updates in our November newsletter: https://lnkd.in/dF6NpHZz

Not subscribed yet? Our monthly newsletter is the easiest way to stay on top of XWiki and CryptPad updates, events, and community news.

🧩 Building a sustainable collaboration stack: XWiki + OpenProject live session

Lorina Balan — Mon, 03 Nov 2025 16:16:02 +0000

Choosing the right tools for your organization isn’t just about ticking feature boxes — it’s about control, interoperability, and long-term maintainability.

On November 19 at 15:00 CET, the teams behind XWiki and OpenProject are hosting a live webinar to show how two leading open-source platforms can work together as a full collaboration stack.

What you’ll learn

How XWiki and OpenProject complement each other: one for structured knowledge management, one for project and task delivery.
How both tools integrate for a seamless, open-source workspace.
Real examples of organizations moving away from Atlassian’s Data Center products.
Live Q&A with Ștefana Nazare (Product Owner, XWiki) and Robin Wagner (Director of Operations, OpenProject).

If your team is evaluating alternatives to Confluence and Jira or simply exploring interoperable open-source tools, this session will give you a practical look at what an independent, EU-hosted stack can look like.

👉 Register here: https://xwiki.com/en/webinars/Atlassian-Data-Center-alternative-webinar

💬 Let us know in the comments if you’d like a deeper technical dive — we’re planning a follow-up post with integration details, APIs, and migration workflows.

📚 Did you know that the Historical Dictionary of Switzerland (HLS) rebuilt their entire online encyclopedia using XWiki?

Lorina Balan — Thu, 12 Jun 2025 07:37:37 +0000

The Historical Dictionary of Switzerland runs their entire multilingual encyclopedia (all 36,500+ articles across 4 languages) on XWiki.
This is more than a customized wiki. It’s a platform that supports multilingual publishing, complex editorial workflows, Jira integration, and fast content discovery. All built on open-source software, developed in Europe.

🧩** Curious how they did it?**
We’ve put together a full story on how HLS modernized their platform with XWiki.

👉 Read the article: https://xwiki.com/en/Blog/HLS-open-source-modern-wiki/

And we’re going even deeper in an upcoming live webinar with HLS. Join us to hear what worked, what didn’t, and how to build a future-ready publishing platform with open tools.

🗓️ 24 June, 16:00 CEST
🔗 Register here: https://xwiki.com/en/webinars/How-HLS-modernized-with-XWiki

If you’re leading digital projects and looking for trustworthy, customizable solutions made in the EU, this is a great place to start.

Thinking of migrating from Confluence but worried about losing data?

Lorina Balan — Thu, 30 May 2024 08:25:45 +0000

There's still time! XWiki's FREE webinar on migrating to an open-source alternative starts TODAY, May 30th at 16:00 CET. ➡️ Register here!

Don't miss out on learning:

Challenges and solutions for migrating Confluence data (especially to open source!)
Effective methods to transfer macros, users, and permissions seamlessly.
The latest tools and upgrades to make migration a breeze.
Live demos and expert Q&A to answer all your migration questions.

This webinar is your one-stop shop for a smooth Confluence migration!

➡️ Register Now! Spots are filling up fast.

Is Confluence giving you headaches? Migrate to a Smoother Knowledge Base Manager with XWiki (Free Webinar!)

Lorina Balan — Wed, 29 May 2024 13:41:46 +0000

Join our free upcoming webinar and discover a smoother, more efficient way to manage your knowledge base with XWiki, the leading open-source alternative.
Level up your knowledge management with:
🚀Effortless Migration: Ditch the hassle! Our enhanced Confluence Migrator (Pro) makes switching to XWiki a breeze.
🚀Tailored Experience: Take control with automated setup and a wider range of configuration options for a migration that fits your needs. ️
🚀Live Demo & Expert Insights: Witness XWiki's latest migration advancements and powerful macros in action. Plus, get your questions answered by our Confluence migration specialist, Ștefana Nazare, in a live Q&A. ‍

Walk away with:
✅ A clear understanding of XWiki's advantages as a robust open-source alternative.
✅Practical knowledge to migrate your Confluence data seamlessly.
✅Valuable resources to keep your wiki thriving after the switch.

📆 Date: May 30, 2024
⏰ Time: 16:00 CET (Central European Time)

Stop managing your wiki, start optimizing it!
Register today and learn about a more efficient future for your knowledge base: https://xwiki.com/en/webinars/easiest-migration-from-confluence-to-xwiki

#XWiki #ConfluenceMigration #OpenSource #webinar #confluence #kbm

Why Google Analytics is problematic, and you should move away from it

Lorina Balan — Tue, 28 May 2024 10:19:25 +0000

The Pro Apps team from XWiki brings a major release in terms of Pro applications — Matomo web analytics integrated in your XWiki instance. 🎉 This has been a very requested application that we've worked on for the past year, and we're happy to present it to you today. So let's take a look at why you should opt for an open-source Google Analytics alternative and explore all the functionalities the Analytics Application (Pro) brings.

Why Google Analytics is problematic, and you should move away from it

It's owned by one of the biggest tech giants in the world: Google Analytics is a product of Google, one of the largest tech giants globally. Entrusting your data to an external entity raises concerns about data ownership, privacy, and potential exploitation for commercial purposes. At XWiki SAS, we emphasize the importance of maintaining control over your data rather than giving it to corporate entities that have been in public debate over the ethicality of their product.
It's a proprietary software: Google Analytics is proprietary software, meaning its source code is closed and inaccessible to users. This lack of transparency hampers customization, limits innovation, and fosters dependency on a single provider. Furthermore, you are locked in with the vendor, meaning that you must accept any changes if you want to continue using the product. As you might already know, because we never lose the chance to speak about this, XWiki SAS advocates for open-source solutions that promote collaboration, transparency, and community-driven development. What's more, we believe in always having the freedom to choose where your data is stored and how it's handled.
It's non-GDPR compliant (along with other regulations): Google Analytics collects a significant amount of user data. This has raised concerns about compliance with privacy regulations such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in the EU and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) in the U.S.. Organizations using Google Analytics must ensure they comply with these regulations, which can be complex and adds additional workload to potentially multiple teams.
It's too complex for some use cases: Apart from the learning curve with the new GA4 which makes adoption painful, sometimes companies need basic data easy to find and read, without building extensive reports. Here is where our new Analytics Application (Pro) stands out — you have a default dashboard with main KPIs that you can check. If the need arises, you can customize your dashboard with the desired macros or integrate a specific macro into a wiki page to have easy access only to the essential metrics.

Why Analytics Application (Pro) is such a game changer

People have been looking for Google Analytics alternatives in order to avoid all the regulatory issues and the difficult transition to GA4. We think the new integration answers a good part of an organization's needs:

Easy to find and understand your data: One of the downsides of the new GA4 is that data retrieval is simply put painful. The significant change of the interface and reporting means that you need to learn a new tool and erase everything you used to know how to do — because now it's just different. Even for someone seasoned, it's overwhelming. In the Matomo extension from XWiki you can see at a glance how your intranet or public website is performing while also focusing on doing the things that really matter in your organization.
Open source & compliant with privacy regulations: Both products are open source and privacy-friendly. If you need only the essential information about what pages are the most visited, keywords searches, returned visitors, countries etc., you can configure Matomo in order to avoid collecting any personal data.
**Own & control your data: **You can maintain full control of your data, through a self-hosted Matomo server. This way, you protect your users' privacy while deciding how the data is used, without any third-parties involved.
Default or customized dashboards: The application comes with a default main dashboard that you can customize to your needs, by adding macros. Each macro comes with its own set of relevant metrics. Additionally, you can create multiple analytics dashboards for each section of your wiki to see easily the most important KPIs related to that section. Last but not least, you can insert specific macros in wiki pages for tracking or reporting. Right now, at the launch, the application offers 15 different macros (in other words, metrics) such as:

Time range
Visits overview
Returning visits over time
Site search keywords
Most viewed pages after a keyword search*
Entry pages
Exit pages
Countries
Browsers
and a few others.
If some entries do not have a link to a page and have "Others" in the title, you can modify the Matomo configuration according to this page.

"Does this app fit my organization?" Check for the answer below.
This is a question that only you and your team can answer. What we'll do instead is provide a series of use cases that we thought of when working on the Analytics Application (Pro).

💼 Administrators or marketing specialists of public websites that require insights into customer behavior and content effectiveness.
🌐 Administrators of companies intranet networks that look to enhance decision-making processes, improve the level of adoption of new tools or procedures, and know what pages have the most and least traction in their organization.
🎯 Administrators of support documentation that want to identify popular pages or topics, improve content discovery, and track the success of their self-help customer centers.
🫶 NGO public website or internal wiki to understand user behavior, measure the success of their campaigns, and use the data to improve the UX.
Besides all the use cases, we think that industries that require self-hosted solutions, total ownership and control of their data can take into consideration this app.

How to test our Analytics Application (Pro)

For an XWiki Cloud demo

For XWiki Cloud demos, we have created a dedicated Matomo server for testing purposes. This being said, when you create a demo, you will find in the left corner of your instance the Analytics application installed and ready to take for a spin. Start exploring your instance, create pages, and use the search bar in order to start seeing data in the Analytics Application (Pro) default dashboard.

If you enjoy the app and want to use it as web analytics for your website or for your company wiki, we recommend you configure a self-hosted Matomo instance or use Matomo Cloud. Afterward, you will need to purchase the application as listed below, and then link the Matomo server to the Analytics Application in your instance to start displaying data in your XWiki instance.

For XWiki on-premises

In order to test this application on your premises, you will need to configure a Matomo instance.

Next, install the extension follow these steps inside your XWiki instance:

Go to the Extension Manager of your XWiki instance, in the Extensions subsection
Search for the Analytics Application (Pro)
Click on the "Install" button
Go to Extensions Manager, Licenses subsection, and get a trial license (or an extension of the trial up to 30 days)
Last step is to link your XWiki instance with the Matomo instance according to this documentation.

*For clients
*
If you already have XWiki Pro on-premises or on the cloud, go to the Administration section in your XWiki instance (Extensions), install it, and test it out.

How to purchase the app

You can purchase the Pro App individually or as part of the XWiki Pro package.

Go to the Administration section of your XWiki instance in Extensions -> Licenses
Find the Analytics Application (Pro)
Click on "Buy" next to the application
You will be redirected to the XWiki Store, where you have to select the user tier
Click on "Create Purchase Order"
You will be redirected to the XWiki Network, where you will be able to complete your online purchase

What are your thoughts about Analytics Application (Pro)?

We would greatly appreciate your support as it helps us grow and perfect the app. Therefore, if you have suggestions for future improvements, you can leave them in this CryptPad survey or, if you have technical knowledge, you can open a ticket with improvements on GitHub.
#opensource #analytics #wiki #knowledgebase