Open Source Observatory and Repository (OSOR)

See the following -

European Union (EU) Joinup Web Site

I have been following Gijs Hillenius for the past year on several social media and news sites. He is a journalist with over 25 years of experience and is currently the news editor of the Open Source Repository & Observatory (OSOR). The focus of many of his posts is on the use of open source and open standards by national, regional, and local governments across the European Union (EU). Read More »

Extremadura Health Care Has Switched To Open Source [Spain]

Gijs Hillenius | JoinUp | June 10, 2014

The desktop computer systems of government healthcare organisations in the Spanish region of Extremadura all rely on free and open source software solutions. Over the past year, close to 10,000 computer workstations in public health care organisations have migrated to a customised version of the Debian GNU/Linux distribution...

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One Decade on, gvSIG Offers Powerful Open Source GIS Tools

Ten years after gvSIG’s start by the government of Valencia (Spain), the open source geographic information system (GIS) offers a broad range of GIS solutions. The software tools are used in sectors such as town planning, public transport, health care and environment management. “Software has become of strategic importance. All the more reason that we need to be free to use this technology however we want”, says Álvaro Anguix, general manager of the gvSIG association. “Freedom is central to gvSIG, right from the start.”

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OSS Procurement FAQ: Part 1

Michelle Koeth | Civic Commons | October 21, 2011

At the Code for America Summit last week, I introduced to the assembled community of civic technologists and supporters the Civic Commons Legal and Procurement Issues Guide as another tool in the reuse of “code.” It’s interesting to discover through the reuse of software code that there is an inherent ability to reuse another kind of code – regulations, policies and best practices of technology Read More »

Spain's Extremadura Region Switches Healthcare Sector to Open Source

The desktop computer systems of government healthcare organizations in the Spanish region of Extremadura all rely on free and open source software solutions. Over the past year, close to 10,000 computer workstations in public health care organizations have migrated to a customized version of the Debian GNU/Linux distribution. Read More »

The European Commission To Create Level Playing Field For Open Source

The European Commission (EC) announced on March 27 that it is going to create a level playing field for open source software when procuring new software solutions. Evaluation of open source and proprietary software will take into account their total cost of ownership and exit costs. “For all future IT developments, the Commission shall promote the use of products that support recognized, well-documented and preferably open technical specifications that can be freely adopted, implemented and extended. Interoperability is a critical issue for the Commission, and use of well-established standards is a key factor to achieve it”, the EC announces in a new ten point strategy.

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