David A. Wheeler's BlogDavid A. Wheeler's weblog.Navy: Open Source Software IS Commercial Software- July 18, 2007 On June 5, 2007, the U.S. Navy released some guidance on Open Source Software. In particular, they noted that if Open Source Software (OSS) met the U.S. law definition of "commercial item", it was a commercial item. (They actually say OSS that meets that definition is commercial off-the-shelf (COTS), not just a "commercial item" - presumably because they had in mind the off-the-shelf open source software.) I'm delighted to see this guidance, because I've been saying the same thing. This Navy.http://www.dwheeler.com/blog/2007/07/18#navy-direction-unchanged FLOSS License Slide - Released!- July 11, 2007 There are a large number of Free-Libre Open Source Software (FLOSS) licenses, but only a few are widely used. Unsurprisingly, the widely-used licenses tend to be compatible -- that is, its possible to combine software under the different licenses to produce a larger work. But many people have trouble figuring out when they can be combined, or how. So I've created a little figure which I call the FLOSS license slide to make it easier to see if FLOSS licenses can be combined in many...http://www.dwheeler.com/blog/2007/07/11#floss-license-slide-2 Increasing Government Interest in Free-Libre Open Source Software (FLOSS)- July 8, 2007 There's more on the web now about governments and Free-Libre Open Source Software (FLOSS), both on my own site and other sites. I think this suggests more and more interest by governments in FLOSS. I've now posted Open Source Software (OSS) in U.S. Government Acquisitions, which is a slightly-updated version of my article which was published in the "DoD Software Tech News" issue devoted to free-libre open source software (FLOSS). As I noted earlier, this issue has lots of good...http://www.dwheeler.com/blog/2007/07/08#government-oss-interest-2007 |