Articles

Petition to the European Parliament on the implications of ICT lock-in by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-05-07 11:25

Open source communities delegates draw the attention of the Members of the European Parliament to the current situation where the institution’s ICT systems are locked into the products of one vendor, warns about the implications of this for participative democracy and for fair competition, and calls for action to promote Open Standards and Interoperability.

Announcing plone.it - italian community website for Plone by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-05-06 15:10

The new Plone.it portal is addressed to the italian community of Plone users and developers: it aims to provide documentation about Plone in italian, visibility and aggregation for the italian community, and a channel to find and contribute localized material for the promotion of Plone.

Free and Open Source Software Guide for SMEs by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-05-06 14:19

Two EU-funded projects in the area of Free and Open Source Software (F/OSS), namely OpenTTT and FLOSSMETRICS, have recently published a F/OSS guide for SMEs. Different types of software applications and businesses are addressed, making this guide useful for most SMEs that wish to simply use F/OSS or even build a F/OSS-based business approach.

European Organisations Sign Up a Declaration on the Future of the Internet by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-04-29 14:49

25 experts from across the world discussed in depth the relationship and importance of Open Standards to the Internet. They wrote a call upon the European Commission, National Governments, Standards Bodies, Industry, the Community and the Market about the future of the Internet. Zea Partners supports the Geneva Declaration on the Future of the Internet.

Grok, an application that helps Python developers by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-04-25 12:26

Grok is a web application framework for Python developers. It is aimed at both beginners and very experienced web developers. Grok is an easy and powerful project that has an emphasis on agile development.

PloneGov: Health Atlas Ireland wins the Irish Public Service Excellence Award 2008 by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-04-24 17:00

Health Atlas Ireland is an open source application developed to bring health related datasets, statistical tools and GIS together in a web environment to add value to existing health data. The application is part of the PloneGov project, an international Plone based egovernment collaborative initiative.

PloneGov: a Community open to collaboration by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-04-24 10:50

Cities, regions and public agencies participating in the PloneGov initiative are developping cross collaboration. They help each other and form a large open source Community. Private sector is also involved, bringing technical expertize to the public sector developers. Every one is welcome to join the project and support the Community.

Open Standards and Open Source in Public Administrations by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-04-21 17:22

Participative democracy relies increasingly on the ability of citizens and stakeholders to access public information and to communicate with officials and elected politicians electronically. To highlight the impact of open standards on democracy, the Greens/European Free Alliance organized a half day event at the European Parliament in Brussels on April 17, 2008.

Plone: Kent Connects project makes final four in Innovation Awards by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-04-18 11:25

The Kent Connects 'Portal of Portals' project has been shortlisted in the final four in the category of Best Government to Government Project in this year's GC Awards for Innovation. A central part of the Kent Connects is built on the Plone content management system.

Public Health geospatial data with Zope by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-03-27 18:40

Health Atlas Ireland is an open source Geographical Information System (GIS). The system enables to plan health services and health data analysis. The project, led by Irish Health Sector, is based on Zope3. OpenApp, a Zea member SME, was in charge of the technical development ensuring a smooth integration with the core technology.

Health Atlas Ireland GIS with Zope by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-03-27 07:10

Public Health geospatial data with Zope. Detailed presentation made in Mexico on August 2007.

PloneGov : a young eGovernment project with great promises by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-03-13 18:15

PloneGov shows something that hackers of FLOSS in the public sector have long talked about: Public bodies only stand to gain from cooperating in software development and procurement. Though developing applications is obviously not the remit of most public bodies, free licenses provide a highly efficient tool to share development cost and mutualise risks.

Python: fastest growing programming language in 2007. by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-03-11 12:39

According to the Tiobe Community Index - based on hits on major search engines - Python is now the seventh most popular programming language. Python had the largest increase in ratings of any language in 2007 and has become the de facto glue language at system level.

The Walloon Business Federation opts for Plone by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-03-07 11:44

The Walloon Business Federation (UWE) is the official voice of industrial, commercial and service sector businesses in Wallonia, Belgium. In a move to improve communication and services to its 6000 member businesses, the Federation recently launched its new Plone portal.

Case study OSOR PloneGov-final.pdf by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-03-04 16:46

 

PloneGov: Public Sector achieving independence from large IT providers by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-03-04 16:11

PloneGov is an award winning eGovernment open source initiative. The European Commission recently released a detailed case study about this innovative collaborative project. In the weeks to come, we propose to publish excerpts as a serialized novel, this article being the first episode.

Network effects : Plone for Belgium and beyond by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-03-04 15:53

CommunesPlone originated as an initiative to promote software cooperation between local governments in Belgium. Since its start in 2005, it has grown rapidly, with now 41 members. Organised like a FLOSS community, the group develops applications in Plone. Taking this idea to the international level, the PloneGov project, started in June 2007, brings together 72 public bodies on four continents to produce Plone-based software that fits their needs.

Belgian Police makes Microsoft's advertising by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-02-28 10:04

Microsoft Benelux broadcasts on its website a video showing Belgian policeman speaking highly of Microsoft Office products in comparison with those of Open Office, its open source rival.

Libre software communities meet research community at Fosdem 2008 by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-01-30 15:58

Researchers investigating open source software quality invite Fosdem participants to a research room. The goal is to explore opportunities of exchange and collaboration between open source researchers and open source communities. This workshop will take place in Brussels on Feb 23-24, 2008

OBOOE: Open source business sector launches a European federation by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2008-01-22 18:50

OBOOE is new umbrella Federation bringing together European business associations and organizations related to free, libre and open source software. The Federation goals are to encourage cross-border networking between national initiatives and to become a voice for the sector.

Plone community owns now the word Plone by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2007-11-30 11:20

Plone Foundation finalizes the trademark transfer. The community, via the Plone Foundation, now "owns" the word Plone in nearly all areas of the world. This article outlines Plone Foundation role protecting collective interests. It also highlights Plone Community values, base of the development of a thriving ecosystem where developers, SME and users work together for the benefit of all.

PloneGov awarded by the European Commission by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2007-11-26 12:20

The PloneGov team is proud to announce that their eGovernment open source initiative based on Plone has been awarded the “Good Practice label 2007”. PloneGov receives this prestigious label based on the recommendation from the 2007 European eGovernment Awards consortium.

GetPaid, e-commerce and donations with Plone by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2007-11-15 12:30

The last few months have seen the emergence of a new sub-community sponsored and developed e-commerce framework for Plone. Its goal is to develop a tool enabling a variety of use cases for monetization of a Plone site from traditional e-commerce stores, to donation processing and subscription sites.

European research confirms linkages between SME research and competitiveness by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2007-11-12 12:40

A research project examining the production of information and communication technologies by small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in the EU-25 has been concluded. One of the key findings of the study was to confirm the interlinkages between research, innovation and economic performance.

Plone Solutions rebrands company as "Jarn" by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2007-10-22 16:05

Plone Solutions announced at the Plone Conference 2007 that the company is changing its name to Jarn, and its corresponding web address to www.jarn.com.

PS-OSS and Gartner cite CommunesPlone by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2007-09-14 15:50

A case study about CommunesPlone is published in PS-OSS, a well know report commissioned by the European Union. CommunesPlone is a project part of the PloneGov initiative and located in Belgium and France. Moreover, CommunesPlone is also cited in the last 'Hype Circle of Government Transformation 2007" of Gartner.

Rosario, the third largest Argentinian city, joins PloneGov by Nicolas Bossut — Effective Date: 2007-09-12 17:55

Rosario, an Argentinian city of 1 million inhabitants, joins the PloneGov initiative. This new member highlights PloneGov ability to reach major cities and different continents.

Public Sector and Open Source : Final Report