free software | Steve Woods

Public money, public code – new FSFE brochure

24/01/2019 Steve WoodsLanguage, Open Source, Open Standards, Politics, Tech

Let’s start with a trio of questions.

1. Why should governments develop free software*?
2. Where is free software already generating benefits in the public sector?
3. What are free software business models?

Answers to the above questions and practical guidelines are given in the new expert policy brochure published today by the Free Software Foundation Europe.

Entitled “Public Money Public Code – Modernising Public Infrastructure with Free Software“, the brochure aims to answer decision-takers’ questions about the benefits of using and developing free software for public sector organisations.

To help understand the important role that public sector procurement plays in this, the brochure presents an overview of EU free software projects and policies, uncovering legislation on software procurement.

The FSFE will use this brochure in the forthcoming European Parliament elections to inform potential MEPs how to speed up the distribution and development of free software in the public sector and putting appropriate legislation in place.

Download the brochure (PDF).

The brochure evaluates the modernisation of public infrastructure by using free software from the perspectives of academia, law, business and government. Expert articles, reports and interviews help readers to understand the opportunities for free software in the public sector. Practical guidance is provided for decision-makers to move forward and start modernising public infrastructure with free software.

FSFE President Matthias Kirschner states: “Free software licences have proven to generate tremendous benefits for the public sector. This is not a trend that will pass, but rather a long-term development that is based on very positive experiences and strategic considerations resulting from serious vendor lock-in cases in the past. In a few years, free software licences could become the default setting for publicly-financed IT projects. The Free Software Foundation Europe watches these developments very carefully and we want to contribute our knowledge to support the public sector in this transition.”

Initial steps for making free software licenses the default in publicly-financed IT projects are outlined in the brochure. Other topics include competition and potential vendor lock-in, security, democracy, “smart cities” and other important contemporary topics. The language and examples used have been specifically chosen for readers interested in politics and public administrations.

The brochure features leading experts from various ICT areas. Amongst others, these include Francesca Bria, Chief of Technology and Digital Innovation Officer (CTIO) for the Barcelona City Council, Prof. Dr. Simon Schlauri, author of a detailed legal analysis on the benefits of free software for the Swiss canton of Bern, Cedric Thomas, CEO of OW2, Matthias Stürmer, head of the Research Center for Digital Sustainability at the University of Bern and Basanta Thapa from the Competence Center for Public IT (ÖFIT) within the Fraunhofer Institute for Open Communication Systems.

The brochure is available in both digital and printed formats, and is published under a CC BY-SA 4.0 licence and I’ll be sending a copy of the PDF to my MP for her information.

* = In this context the definition of free software is free as in freedom, not beer.
April 27th is the first LibreOffice 6.1 bug hunting session

23/04/2018 Steve WoodsLinux, Open Source, Open Standards, Tech

The first bug hunting session for the forthcoming LibreOffice 6.1 release will be held on Friday, 27th April, The Document Foundation blog has announced.

LibreOffice 6.1, the next point release of the free and open source office suite which emphasises the use of open standards, such as the Open Document Format (ODF), is due to be made available in August this year.

To help ready the software for its release date, the LibreOffice Quality Assurance community is organising an initial bug hunting session this Friday to find, report and triage bugs. Details of the event can be found on the dedicated wiki page.

This first Bug Hunting Session will involve the first Alpha version of LibreOffice 6.1, which will be available on the pre-releases server on the day of the event. Builds will be available for Linux (DEB and RPM package formats), macOS and Windows. Users will be able to run the Alpha release in parallel with their production version – thus enabling testing without affecting users’ existing stable installations.

Mentors will be available on April 27th 2018 from 8.00 a.m. UTC to 8.00 p.m. UTC for questions or help in the IRC channel: #libreoffice-qa (connect via webchat) and its Telegram bridge. During the day there will be 2 dedicated sessions focussed on two of the tenders implemented in LibreOffice 6.1: the first between 10.00 a.m. UTC and 12.00 a.m. UTC to test improvements in image handling; and the second to test the HSQLDB import filter for firebird between 2.00 p.m. UTC and 4.00 p.m. UTC.

According to the release plan, the LibreOffice 6.1 office suite will enter beta stages of development at the end May, with a second beta planned for mid-June. After that, there should be about three RCs released between the first week of July and the first week of August with the final release being available in mid-August.
German Federal government opts for open source cloud

18/04/2018 Steve WoodsOpen Source, Politics, Tech

Within the scope of its own cloud computing environment, the German Federal administration has opted for Nextcloud, heise reports. The software will in future be running by the Federal administration’s central IT service provider, the Federal Information Technology Centre (ITZBund). Unlike services such as Google Drive or Dropbox, Nextcloud is an open source project which users can install in their own computer centres.

The project is targeted at some 300,000 users in various authorities and ministries. They will be able to share and synchronise files centrally using the service. Stuttgart-based Nextcloud GmbH is supporting the ITZBund based on an enterprise subscription for operation and support. However, individual licences per user or per system shall not be incurred.

ITZBund tested Nextcloud with some 5,000 users in a pilot project before making its decision in favour of open source.
Dortmund plots course for open source

12/04/2018 Steve WoodsOpen Source, Open Standards, Politics, Tech

The City of Dortmund wants to examine the potential of free software and open standards for the city council until the end of 2019, German IT news website heise reports.

Munich’s decision last year to abandon open source is not the final word in open source matters in German local authorities. Dortmund’s city council has decided to investigate the potential of free and open source software “systematically” in the field of municipal ICT.

Dortmund panorama. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

A free software working group has been established and will work together with the council’s personnel board and Do-FOSS citizens’ action group in developing a free software strategy which should be produced by the end of 2019. Dortmund is thus an open source pioneer in North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW). The NRW E-government Law stipulates that open and standardised file formats shall be used by public authorities for sending files to citizens and companies.

Less dependence, more flexibility

Amongst other things, efforts will be made to reduce reliance on suppliers and become more flexible in software use. The aspect of transparency and “Green IT” are also pre-requisites for the strategy. The German Federal Environment Office has determined that free software could save resources due to lower hardware requirements and longer life cycles. Moreover, a more flexible choice of suppliers could also improve local authorities’ negotiating position with proprietary software vendors.

Do-FOSS, which has been calling for years for a switch in public sector procurement towards free software and open standards, is hailing the decision as a “milestone“. In addition, a draft for the introduction of “Open Data Dortmund” is to be submitted to the local authority by next summer. DO-FOSS is now hoping that a comprehensive approach will now be developed within the council for the free and open source IT.

Back in January Mayor Ullrich Sierau and the personnel board signed the Digital Dortmund 2018-2030 Charter (PDF, German), in which the use of open standards was agreed for the council’s ICT.
LibreOffice 5.4.6 released

22/03/2018 Steve WoodsOpen Source, Open Standards, Tech

Today The Document Foundation (TDF) announced the availability of LibreOffice 5.4.6, the sixth minor release of LibreOffice 5.4 family which is currently targeted for deployment in an enterprise or corporate environment and conservative users.

Download LibreOffice

LibreOffice 5.4.6 is available for immediate download.

LibreOffice 5.4.6 includes almost 60 bug and regression fixes. Technical details about the release can be found in the RC1 and RC2 change logs.

Professional support

TDF advises mainstream users and companies to deploy LibreOffice with the support of certified developers, migrators and trainers.

Several companies sitting in TDF’s Advisory Board provide either value-added LTS versions of LibreOffice or consultancy services for migration and training.

Donate to help LibreOffice development

LibreOffice users, free software advocates and community members can support The Document Foundation with a donation. Donations help TDF to maintain its infrastructure, share knowledge and fund attendance at events like LibreOffice Conference, which this year takes place in Tirana.
LibreOffice 5.4.2 released

06/10/2017 Steve WoodsLinux, Open Source, Open Standards, Tech

Yesterday The Document Foundation (TDF) announced the release of LibreOffice 5.4.2, the second minor release of the LibreOffice 5.4 family. LibreOffice 5.4.2 continues to represent the bleeding edge in terms of features and as such is targeted at technology enthusiasts and early adopters.

TDF suggests that more conservative users and businesses deploy LibreOffice 5.3.6 with the support of certified professionals.

LibreOffice 5.4.2 includes approximately 100 bug and regression fixes. Technical details about the release can be found in the RC1 (release candidate) and RC2 change logs.

Download LibreOffice

LibreOffice 5.4.2 is available for download for all major platforms (Linux, MacOS and Windows).

Donate to LibreOffice

LibreOffice users, free software advocates and community members are invited to support the work of The Document Foundation with a donation. Donations help TDF to maintain its infrastructure, share knowledge, and organise events such as the LibreOffice Conference, with the next one taking place next week in Rome.

LibreOffice wins survey amongst Ubuntu users

LibreOffice was the runaway winner in a survey of Ubuntu Linux users for desktop productivity software with 85.52% of the votes. The closest competitors were Google Docs with 4.29%, WPS Office with 3.22% and Apache OpenOffice with 1.96%, while all other office suites accounted for less than 1% responses.

“Even with Windows shipping Ubuntu/Bash on their desktop, even with Google shipping Chromebooks with Linux+Chrome pre-installed, even with Mac OS running away with a premium segment of the desktop market, even with Android phones and tablets, there are many tens of millions of passionate Ubuntu desktop users who are eager to have their voices heard! And LibreOffice continues to be THE enabler of local office productivity on the Ubuntu Desktop,” says Dustin Kirkland, Vice-President of Product Development for Ubuntu at Canonical.

The results of the Ubuntu 18.04 LTS Default Desktop Applications Survey were presented by Dustin Kirkland at the UbuCon Europe conference in Paris in September.
That Florence speech… in foreign

24/09/2017 Steve WoodsLanguage, Open Source, Open Standards, Politics, Tech

It’s a well-known fact that when the Brits go abroad and want to converse with Johnny Foreigner, the most convenient is (for Brits of course) to speak English very s-l-o-w-l-y and very LOUDLY; there’s no need to go through all that tedious process of learning how to have intercourse with the locals in the vernacular.

Mrs Theresa May, a woman who does very poor Prime Minister impressions, went to Florence in Italy on Thursday to make a speech (posts passim). However, it is unlikely that non-Brits understood it as it was delivered sotto voce.

As my working life as a linguist has been devoted to improving international understanding, I felt it was my duty to help the EU negotiators understand what Mrs May said and have therefore translated her Florence speech into foreign, as per the screenshot of her opening paragraphs below.

To convert May’s speech into foreign was simplicity itself. Indeed it was so simple I don’t know why Theresa’s staff at 10 Downing Street didn’t bother to do it themselves.

The first stage was to copy the transcript of May’s speech from the government’s website, open a new document in the excellent free and open source LibreOffice productivity suite (other, usually proprietary, office suites are available. Ed.), paste the content from the operating system’s clipboard, then hit Ctrl+A to select all the text, followed by going to the Format menu and selecting Text -> UPPER CASE.

Job done! I now had a copy of Mrs May’s Florence speech in easily intelligible foreign and one perfect for online use as it is also 100% shouty. 😉

Your ‘umble scribe’s version in foreign is available to download (PDF) should readers also wish to promote international understanding. 😀
Public money? Public code!

13/09/2017 Steve WoodsOpen Source, Open Standards, Politics, Tech

Digital services provided and used by public sector organisations are the critical infrastructure of the 21st century. Central and local government agencies must ensure they have full control over systems at the core of our digital infrastructure to establish trustworthy systems. However, this is rarely the case due to restrictive proprietary software licences.

Thirty-one organisations are today publishing an open letter in which they call for lawmakers to advance legislation requiring publicly financed software developed for the public sector be made available under a Free and Open Source Software licence, the Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) reports. The initial signatories include CCC, EDRi, Free Software Foundation Europe, KDE, Open Knowledge Foundation Germany, openSUSE, Open Source Business Alliance, Open SourceInitiative, The Document Foundation and Wikimedia Deutschland.

All the signatories are asking individuals and other organisation to sign the open letter, which will be sent to candidates in the forthcoming German parliamentary election and, during the coming months, to other representatives of the EU and EU member states until the 2019 European Parliament elections.

Public institutions spend millions of euros each year on the development of new bespoke software. The public sector’s procurement choices play a significant role in determining which companies are allowed to compete and what software is supported with taxpayers’ money. Public sector organisations often have problems sharing code with each other, even if they fully funded its development. In addition, sensitive personal data on citizens is at risk if there is no option for independent third parties to run audits or other security checks on the code.

FSFE President Matthias Kirschner says:

We need software that fosters the sharing of good ideas and solutions. Only like this will we be able to improve digital services for people all over Europe. We need software that guarantees freedom of choice, access, and competition. We need software that helps public administrations regain full control of their critical digital infrastructure, allowing them to become and remain independent from a handful of companies. Public bodies are financed through taxes. They should spend funds responsibly and in the most efficient way possible. If it is public money, it should be public code as well!”
Two point releases for LibreOffice

02/09/2017 Steve WoodsLinux, Open Source, Open Standards, Tech

On the last day of August, The Document Foundation (TDF) announced two point releases for the popular LibreOffice productivity suite: LibreOffice 5.4.1 “Fresh”, the first minor release of the new LibreOffice 5.4 family; and LibreOffice 5.3.6 “Still”, the sixth release of the mature LibreOffice 5.3 family.

LibreOffice 5.4.1 represents the bleeding edge in term of features, and as such is targeted at technology enthusiasts and early adopters, whereas LibreOffice 5.3.6 is targeted at more conservative users and enterprise deployments.

As regards enterprise use, TDF suggests deploying LibreOffice 5.3.6 with support from certified professionals. Furthermore, many companies sitting on TDF’s Advisory Board also provide either value-added Long Term Supported versions of LibreOffice or consultancy services for migration to LibreOffice and training.

LibreOffice 5.4.1 includes approximately 100 bug and regression fixes, along with document compatibility improvements. Technical details about the bug fixes can be found in the RC1 and RC2 change logs.

LibreOffice 5.4.1 (Writer) in action

LibreOffice 5.3.6 includes approximately 50 bug and regression fixes. As with 5.4.1, technical details about the release can be found in the change log.

Download LibreOffice

LibreOffice 5.4.1 and LibreOffice 5.3.6 are available for immediate download for GNU/Linux, Mac OSX and Windows. Select the version you desire for your preferred operating system.

Please note that if you’re still using Windows XP or Windows Vista, LibreOffice 5.4 will be the last release that will run on those legacy operating systems.

Support LibreOffice

LibreOffice users, free software advocates and community members are invited to support The Document Foundation with a donation. Donations help TDF to maintain its infrastructure, share knowledge and organise events, such as this year’s LibreOffice Conference, which will be taking place in Rome in October.
LibreOffice uses Google’s OSS-Fuzz for quality improvements

25/05/2017 Steve WoodsOpen Source, Open Standards, Tech

For the last five months, The Document Foundation, the non-profit organisation behind the popular free and open source LibreOffice productivity suite, has made use of OSS-Fuzz, Google’s effort to make open source software more secure and stable, to improve the quality and reliability of LibreOffice’s source code still further. Developers have used the continuous and automated fuzzing process, which often highlights problem just hours after they appear in the upstream code repository, to solve bugs – and potential security issues – before the next binary release.

LibreOffice 5.3.3 running on the author’s Debian GNU/Linux laptop

LibreOffice is the first free office suite in the marketplace to make use of Google’s OSS-Fuzz. The service, which is associated with other source code scanning tools such as Coverity, has been integrated into LibreOffice’s security processes – under the leadership of Red Hat – to improve the source code’s quality significantly.

According to Coverity Scan’s last report, LibreOffice has an industry leading defect density of 0.01 per 1,000 lines of code (based on 6,357,292 lines of code analysed on 15th May 2017). “We have been using OSS-Fuzz, like we use Coverity, to catch bugs – some of which may turn into security issues – before the release. So far, we have been able to solve all of the 33 bugs identified by OSS-Fuzz well in advance over the date of disclosure”, says Red Hat’s Caolán McNamara, a senior developer and LibreOffice’s security team leader.

Further information about Google OSS-Fuzz is available on the project’s GitHub homepage and on the Google Open Source Blog.