The Dutch government wants the country’s public services to share as open source any software solutions that are written for or by them. “My appeal to public services is to release the source code, unless they have good reasons not to,” writes State Secretary for the Interior Raymond Knops in a letter to the Dutch parliament. “A public service that uses open source software can also be expected to actively share with society software that it develops itself.”
Publishing software source code benefits public interests including innovation, economic activity, openness and information security, and reduces the amount of money wasted, the state secretary writes. Exceptions to the new ‘open, unless’ policy include software affecting national security or public safety, or where certain working methods must be kept confidential.
See Legal barrier to be removed
The Dutch government wants the country’s public services to share as open source any software solutions that are written for or by them. “My appeal to public services is to release the source code, unless they have good reasons not to,” writes State Secretary for the Interior Raymond Knops in a letter to the Dutch parliament. “A public service that uses open source software can also be expected to actively share with society software that it develops itself.”
