Open source software – Photo © Anterovium – Fotolia
(BRUSSELS) – The European Commission adopted new rules on Open Source Software Wednesday, to enable its software solutions to be publicly accessible with benefits for companies and public services.
A recent Commission study on the impact of Open Source Software and Hardware on technological independence, competitiveness and innovation in the EU economy showed that investment in open source leads on average to four times higher returns.
The EU executive says its services will be able to publish the software source code they own in much shorter time and with less paperwork.
“Open source offers great advantages in a domain where the EU can have a leading role,” said Budget and Administration Commissioner Johannes Hahn: “The new rules will increase transparency and help the Commission, as well as citizens, companies and public services across Europe, benefit from open source software development.”
The Commission cites as an example of the benefits of open sourcing eSignature, a set of free standards, tools and services that help public administrations and businesses accelerate the creation and verification of electronic signatures that are legally valid in all EU Member States.
A second example is LEOS, (Legislation Editing Open Software), the software used across the Commission to draft legal texts. Originally written for the Commission, LEOS is now being developed in close collaboration with Germany, Spain and Greece.
The Commission says it will make its software available as open source in one single repository to facilitate access and reuse. Before its release, each software will be checked to avoid security or confidentiality-related risks, data protection issues or infringement to intellectual property rights of third parties.
With this decision, many actions will be facilitated and improved:
- The dissemination of software under an open source licence will no longer require a Commission Decision.
- Where possible, Commission services will progressively review all software developed prior to the adoption of these new rules and identify the ones that have the potential to bring value outside the Commission.
- The Commission now allows its software developers to contribute to open source projects with improvements that they developed as part of their work.
The Commission already shares hundreds of software projects as open source, including software developed for the Connecting Europe Facility, Eurostat, the Interoperable Europe Programme (Interoperability solutions for public administrations, businesses and citizens programme, the former ISA² programme), and for the Joint Research Centre.
