 the first year under which agencies are operating under their Open Government Plans. As such, the results show solid commitment to transparency and public feedback, as well as recognition and growing use of open technologies within the federal government. Based on this initial benchmark, it will be essential for agencies to evaluate and incorporate open technologies into their IT plans. For most agencies, there is certainly room for improvement in the coming year. OSFA encourages agencies to take the following actions to achieving the Administration’s goals of openness, transparency, and collaboration within the federal government:
1. Adopt policies and guidance allowing for procurement of open source software and recognizing it as ‘commercial’ software
2. Adopt policies that favor open standards in technology procurement and development
3. Adopt policies that allow government employees as well as citizen volunteers to collaborate on open source projects
4. Release all public data in open, search-able formats on the agency’s website Open Source for America hopes government agencies will use the Federal Open Technology Report Card and its results to continue working toward the exchange of open information and the use of open source technologies and open formats within their department.
ABOUT OPEN SOURCE FOR AMERICA
Open Source for America (OSFA) is an organization of technology industry leaders, non-government associations and academic and research institutions dedicated to advocating the use of open source software in the U.S. federal government. Participation in Open Source for America is open to any individual or entity signing the campaign’s mission pledge at: www.opensourceforamerica.org.
This study represents OSFA’s first effort to evaluate this historical policy initiative. Comments, suggestions, and input regarding this and future research projects are always welcome and can be sent to firstname.lastname@example.org.