When trying to get a place in free software public administration

Will free software in French administrations get a place in the sun? This, in turn, is meant by the announcements of Amelie de Montzal, Minister of Change and Public Service, until proven otherwise.

Looks like nothing, the free software still has followers in the French administration. Last year, we saw a big effort on the side of national education. Apps.education, A site for teachers who want to prepare themselves with free tools such as Next Cloud, PeerTube or EtherPad during continuous imprisonment. Governments that have willingly turned to players like Microsoft to equip national education officials as a result of years of internal work to give substantial space to free and open source.

This time it is moving in the public sector. During the Open Source Experience Exhibition in Paris on November 9th and 10th, the Minister of Change and Public Service responsible for the state’s digital transformation, Amelie de Montsell, announced her commitment to free software and digital. Common in management. The result of a series of scattered state announcements throughout the year. Last April, Prime Minister Jean Costex In particular a circular was distributed In order to set up a mission dedicated to the intermediate animation and development of free software and digital commons in the intermediate digital direction (day).

30 million euros to local authorities

While waiting for decisive action on national education or security, the public administration will be at the forefront of these changes first. A team responsible for the file was set up within Dinum, as well as an expert panel consisting of management representatives and individuals from the bookstore and open source ecosystem. அதிகார 30 million will be allocated to develop free software for local authorities.

France, a pioneer in free software and open data, continues to strengthen its digital sovereignty. To be at the forefront, I declare @OSXP_Paris An action plan needs to be found in our administration https://t.co/fdoAccoDEm ⁇ pic.twitter.com/M3Cn065V2t

– Amélie de Montchalin (deAdeMontchalin) November 10, 2021

The government’s action plan is structured on three axes. The first will allow free software to be updated by the lists available to the authorities. The Ministry for Change and the Civil Service will encourage administrations “Launch the Dynamics of Digital Commons Creation in Public Policy Behavior Service”.

FranceConnect opens its code

The second point is about the opening up of source codes and the democratization of liberation. The site code.gouv.fr was created for this purpose “More than 9000 code repositories published by over 1000 public companies”, But it will be more fertile in the coming months. The source code of France Connect, which is used in many government services, is one of the examples of openness presented by the Ministry. An order permitting the use of two new licenses dedicated to the opening of public source codes will soon be issued: the Eclipse Public License issued by the Eclipse Foundation and the EU Public License issued by the European Commission.

The opening of public codes leads to the third axis of government planning, which, by applying these rules, “Strengthen management’s charisma for digital skills”. This particularly involves highlighting “Blue Hats” initiative, “Public Interest Hackers”, and in partnership with CentraleSupélec School, students will be invited to contribute to free software used by administrations.