eGov News: Moves to Free/Libre Software
- Dr. Roy Schestowitz
- 2014-04-10 08:45:53 UTC
- Modified: 2014-04-10 08:45:53 UTC
UK
Influential government service supplier Memset has urged local and central government to ditch VMware in favour of open source alternatives, promising that open-source-based service suppliers can shave as much as 40 percent off government bills simply by removing the licensing fees.
HMRC
HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) is driving the use of open source technology with a Hadoop NoSQL big data engine to analyse corporate tax.
Continental Europe
The European Commission and European Parliament are doing nothing to rid themselves of their dependance on Microsoft, two lobby groups said Wednesday, Document Freedom Day.
The Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) and Open Forum Europe urged EU institutions to support open standards in an open letter to Giancarlo Vilella, president of the European Parliament's Directorate-General for Innovation and Technological Support. He also chairs the body that coordinates IT activities for government agencies including Parliament, the Commission and the Council of the E.U.
For most organisations the primary reason for moving from Windows to Linux is perceived cost savings. The secondary reasons are factors such as interoperability and greater compliance with standards, which themselves bring longer- term cost benefits. Unlocking interfaces and data from vendor lock-ins may be rather time consuming and costly in the short term, but doing so brings considerable cost and efficiency pay-offs in the long term.
One of the payoffs for the City Council, other German councils, the Linux community and other interested parties, has been the development of LiMux, the German language Linux distribution which has since been approved as an official distribution by the German government. The work of Munich will make it easier for others to follow.
In an ideal world, LiMux would provide a model that would inspire more government-sponsored IT projects in the UK, which are all too often outsourced to proprietary interests. Whether it does or not, is yet to be seen.
The TYPO3 CMS project has a long history as open source project, with its foundation going back as far as 1997 when it was initially developed by Danish Kasper SkÃÂ¥rhøj. Currently, the TYPO3 project has a solid foundation in Europe. Large cooperations like Deutsche Bank, Airbus, Air France, as well as, universities and non-governmental organizations like Food and Agriculture Organization, Greenpeace, and Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons run on the TYPO3 CMS.
National Geospatial Intelligence Agency
The National Geospatial Intelligence Agency did a first for a U.S. intelligence agency by opening an account on open source site GitHub earlier this month.
NASA
As a part of a federal order to make technology transfer faster, NASA is building a central location for the public to dig into more than 1,000 of its past projects.
The 330-pound Robonaut 2 measures 3 feet, 4 inches tall from the waist, and is equipped with more than 350 sensors. Its stomach-located brain runs Linux on 38 PowerPC-based processors. The robot is operated remotely by humans, using the Robonaut Tele-operation System (RTS). This telerobotics system requires a ground- or space-based user to wear a 3D visor, vest, and pressure-sensitive gloves. (For more on the R2, see our original coverage.)
Misc.
LibrePlanet examines our modern technological society and finds much to criticize. But it is not a crabfest for frustrated policy wonks: these people are making new tools in hardware, software, and networking — tools that may well become as mainstream as GNU/Linux is already in data centers, cell phones, and stand-alone computer systems.
Recent Techrights' Posts
- IBM is "Making an Exit". Only the Executives Will Get Rich.
- failure disguised as success
- 2026 is the Year of Blockchains, Says IBM's CEO a Decade Ago?
- "falling upwards"
- Most Coders Used to be Women, Not Men (and Men Who Dropped Out of College Now Plunder Everything They Can)
- "Ethics For Hackers"
- European Patent Office (EPO) Series: Down But Not Out – Costa's Comeback
- he managed to secure a top-level EU position in June 2024
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- Gemini Links 05/06/2026: Bears in the Streets, WWII Revisionism, and Westworld
- Links for the day
- Microsoft's LinkedIn Called "Dying Platform" by One Who Worked There
- The co-founder of LinkedIn has just stepped down too
- GAFAM (Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft) Layoffs Are Due to Surging Debt, or About 120 Billion Dollars Borrowed in One Year Alone
- It's well above 150 billion dollars if one adds Oracle
- After One Jeffrey Epstein Associate 'Leaves' Microsoft's Board Another Jeffrey Epstein Associate Steps Down, Workers Concerned About the Mass Layoffs
- How many more loans can Microsoft receive? Those loans are becoming increasingly risky.
- IBM Exploits Overambitious, Hungry Young Men to Help the "Great Quantum Hype Campaign" (Pumping the Stock Based on Deliberate Misinformation or Outright Disinformation)
- The boot-licking campaign is live...
- What Will Likely Happen When the Slop Bubble Pops (and When It'll be Widely Accepted That It Popped)
- all the "most successful" slop companies are so deep in debt
- The Register MS is Part of the Problem, It's Publishing "AI" SPAM Because it's Paid by Chinese Military-Connected Firms
- Given that The Register MS is run by a Microsofter (since last summer), destruction seems inevitable
- IBM's CEO Does Not Use GNU/Linux, So Why Did He Suggest Buying Red Hat Only to Lay Off Its Workers, Market Slop Instead of Linux, and Sack UNIX Professionals?
- Shortly after IBM had bought Red Hat and there were mass layoffs we pointed out that Red Hat's CEO was not using GNU/Linux
- If You're Not Focusing on Software Freedom, All You'll Get is Slopware and Buzzwords
- If you're not focusing on attaining Software Freedom (and remember "Linux" is just a brand), then you're losing sight of the goals that actually matter
- Red Hat/IBM: Microsoft is Our Partner of the Year
- Red Hat is a really bad gravy
- Gemini Links 05/06/2026: Enshittification of Institutes for Project Management, Codebases Contaminated With Slop, Personal Stories
- Links for the day
- Communicating With Freedom - Part II - Quibble Breathing New Life Into LibreJS
- Notice how work on one thing led to thousands of lines of code added to a mostly dormant (but nevertheless important) project
- Slop Has no ROI, an Economy Built on False Assumptions of Slop is Doomed
- we're all going to suffer from this Ponzi scheme
- Links 05/06/2026: More GAFAM Layoffs, Google Faces Regulatory Crackdown in UK Over Plagiarism in "AI" Clothing
- Links for the day
- Rumour That Layoffs at Microsoft Will Kick Off on July 1st, 2026 (Impacting 10,000 or More Workers)
- this is what the rumour mill or the word through the grapevine is
- Mission:Libre, Which Teaches Young People Free Software Ideals, Needs Financial Backing
- plea for assistance with Mission:Libre
- The Slop Ponzi Scheme is a Problem and Threat to All of Us (Even Those Who Don't Invest in or Use Slop at All)
- This problem is systemic, not contained
- "Blind Justice" Examines the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) Turning a Blind Eye to Abuse by British Solicitors
- We have some jaw-dropping examples of how the SRA does not do actual regulation - to the point where its staff does not actual work and does not look into any evidence at all!
- 7 Days From Now the FSF's Founder Gives a Talk in Bern, the FSF Has Just Advertised This
- Meanwhile the FSF (or GNU) processes and uploads many recent talks by RMS
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Thursday, June 04, 2026
- IRC logs for Thursday, June 04, 2026
- Links 04/06/2026: Self-hosting Remotely and GemText Emphasis
- Links for the day
- Links 04/06/2026: Ukraine’s Daily Moment of Silence and Uber Lays off 23% of HR
- Links for the day
- SLAPP Censorship - Part 98 Out of 200: Microsoft Threatening Real Security Researcher With Criminal Investigation for Talking About Microsoft's Bug Doors/Back Doors
- The crime should be the back doors (deliberate attack on every user's data protection), not talking about those back doors
- Microsoft Would Get Away Even With Pedophilia
- "Microsoft should never be above the law"
- Journalists Should be Ashamed for Parroting False Claims From IBM Management About "Quantum Computing", Say IBM Insiders Who Work on "Quantum Computing"
- IBM is a buzzwords vendor. International Buzzwords Machines.
- Free Software is Nourishment to Software Users, Unlike Proprietary Software
- Quit treating "mere users" of software "like animals"
- The "Peanut Gallery" of GAFAM Has Infiltrated Free Software Projects or Disrupts Free Software Communities
- They contribute nearly nothing and do substantial damage; they're freeloaders who attack the most productive members of projects
- Coding is Not a Quantity Game (It Never Was!)
- "less is more"
- Exposing Corruption Using a Highly Resilient Platform
- Growing levels of trust, based on our track record, help us attract whistleblowers
- Mass Layoffs Expected at Microsoft in July 2026
- They're preparing more "lists" of people
- Reflection on EPO Leadership That Harbours Cocaine, IBM Leadership That Pumps-and-Dumps the Shares, and More
- ManCity replaced Manuel Pellegrini with a more famous manager it didn't envision winning 20 titles in 10 years (it could only hope) [...] Team-building is something that "Pep" seemed to be good at, as was Jürgen Klopp
- Pump and Dump by IBM Insider Traders: Nickle LaMoreaux, Gary Cohn, James Kavanaugh, Arvind Krishna, Robert Thomas, and Others
- the shares are already collapsing
- FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) Has Weakened If Not Ruined What's Left of Big Media
- Many things that have existed for decades are now being rebranded as "AI"
- SLAPP Censorship - Part 97 Out of 200: Garrett in Hiding (From the Simple Observable Fact He's Closely Connected to the Microsofter Who Strangles Women, Tells Women to Kill Themselves, and Worse)
- They use one another; they are coordinating this via the SLAPP industry in another continent
- Links 04/06/2026: Microsoft Threatening Security Researcher for Naming Back Doors in BitLocker, "Demand is Booming for" Old Tech
- Links for the day
- Gemini Links 04/06/2026: "Word Vomit", Slop", and Moving to Gopher/Gemini
- Links for the day
- Rust Outsources its Financing (or Financial Control) to Microsoft
- How long before the third "E"?
- "Format Sovereignty" Can Only be Accomplished With LaTeX or OpenDocument Format (ODF) or Vendor-Neutral Standards for Editable Documents
- Microsoft is, in effect, above the law
- IBM's Shares Fell Nearly 13% in One Day (Including After Hours)
- its main product is false promises
- The Cyber Show on the Importance of Software Freedom and Why GNU/Linux Could Not be Stopped
- an excellent article
- Drew DeVault Can Still Redeem His Reputation. Revisiting His Attacks (and Attack Site) on Richard Stallman Might be a Good Start.
- DeVault has openly apologised (this past spring)
- The Register MS is Publishing Paid SPAM; Some of It is Designed to Prop Up the "AI" Pyramid Scheme
- The Register MS participates in scams
- European Patent Office (EPO) Series: "Operation Influencer"
- Costa's political career was far from finished
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, June 03, 2026
- IRC logs for Wednesday, June 03, 2026
- GNU/Linux Usage Rising Among Gamers, But "Hardware Survey Data Not Available."
- Not anymore, not for now anyway
- Jumping Up and Down on the Shoulders of Giants, Never Talking About What Bill Gates Did
- We're back to 2019
- Despite LLM Slop or Chatbots, Our Traffic Has Doubled Since We Moved Everything to the UK (in 2023)
- The demise of news sites was not what we thought it would be
- Software Developers Attacked by Plagiarism Engines Because These Developers Can Teach People How to Exercise Control, Not Outsource to Monopolies of Slop and Back Doors
- "Universities should be telling industry what is to be done next, not the other way about. Present education policy has the tail wagging the dog."
- Quantum Quantum Quantum Quantum (Pump, Then Dump)
- What has IBM become?
- Communicating With Freedom - Part I - Developing “Quibble” and Improving GNU LibreJS in the Process
- In the next part we shall examine where things currently stand
- Quantum Computers Are "All the Rage" (35 Years Ago, What IBM Promises This Year is What People Promised When the CEO Was in His 20s)
- "Quantum" hype is high on the agenda
- How IBM Removes 15% of Its Staff Without Even Checking Performance of Staff (or Calling That "Layoffs")
- Performance Improvement Plan (PIP) as veiled RAs
- Links 03/06/2026: Mobile Systems, Openwashing, and New Antenna
- Links for the day
- Canonical as Reseller of Back Doors in "Ubuntu" Clothing
- Microsoft is the antithesis of security and autonomy
- Romania Used to be Windows Stronghold, But That's No Longer the Case
- Windows was once upon a time so ubiquitous that institutions didn't bother supporting anything except it
- KDE Has Long Used Dragons, and Dragons Come From Hatched Eggs
- That Microsoft Lunduke tries to paint this as some "trans agenda" thing says a lot about Microsoft Lunduke and his COVID-19-damaged brain
- IBM Announces 5 Billion Dollars "Invested" in "AI", in "Security", and 10 Billion Dollars for "Quantum", But IBM Does Not Have This Kind of Money (It's Fake News to Manipulate the Share Price)
- IBM has fast-growing debt and liabilities, it does not intend to invest this kind of money, it's a smokescreen and false promises timed to alleviate the sagging share price (52-week low)
- When Science and Religion Are on the Same Side, United Against Slop Pushers
- The "Mathematics Pope" (sometimes known as "Pope Pi") brought together science and religion, united against technofascists who are mostly college drop-outs who abhor women
- Links 03/06/2026: "In Turkey, Criticizing a Corporation Can Land You in Jail" and "Court Bans X Account of Turkey's Oldest Newspaper"
- Links for the day
- Web Censorship Benefits the Corrupt and the Criminal
- More so when corrupt politicians are in charge
- Have a "Lifetime" Without Microsoft
- The online rage over this is still ongoing
- Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine Undoing Censorship of Corporate Wrongdoing
- That won't go away anymore
- "For Entertainment Purposes Only" But Everyone Must Adopt It for Work and Governance, Say Anti-Scientific Technocrats
- "The present mentality around "AI" is like driving to the gym to use a treadmill - it's walking for people who hate fresh air and beautiful changing scenery."
- Gemini Links 03/06/2026: Ian Murdock's Ex-wife Footprint in Debian and Alhena 5.6.1 Released
- Links for the day
- Irish Company statCounter Recognises It Overestimated Microsoft Windows' Market Share in Ireland
- it seems like the Irish people are gradually moving away from Windows
- Corporate Media Participates in the Lie That Mass Layoffs at GitLab and Loss of Geographic Footprint in More Than a Third of Countries is "AI" and Thus "Success Story"
- There's no way to spin this as positive news
- Slop Prompting is Not a Coding Skill and Slop Deserves Shunning
- Red Hat is hypocritically shunning the very same thing it keeps promoting
- IBM colleagues "handed out a PIP and then right after the end date they are gone"
- Some go into early 'retirement' to save face
- SLAPP Censorship - Part 96 Out of 200: When You Receive Death Threats From Anonymous Sockpuppets/Burner Accounts Connected to People Who Strangle Women and Tell Women to Kill Themselves
- Women are not objects and my wife ought not be mentioned in "threats to kill" (how cops have described this)
- European Patent Office (EPO) Series: A Tale of Two Antónios - Introducing the Other António
- António Costa
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, June 02, 2026
- IRC logs for Tuesday, June 02, 2026
