UK Government Finalizes Open Standards Principles: The Bigger Picture

Last week, the UK Cabinet Office released its Open Standards Principles: For software interoperability, data and document formats in government IT specifications. It became effective November 1, 2012, and applies to IT specifications for software interoperability, data, and document formats for all services delivered by, or on behalf of, central government departments, their agencies, non-departmental public bodies (NDPBs), and any other bodies for which they are responsible.

For the open source community and advocates of open standards, the UK’s Open Standards Principles policy is a welcome and positive development. It follows a lengthy, and often tumultuous, consultative process that began in 2011.

On behalf of Red Hat, I was pleased to work with our UK colleagues to voice support for the Cabinet Office policy consultation, including participating in one of the Roundtables, along with others in the community. Great to see Open Forum Europe, the Free Software Foundation Europe, and Simon Phipps, President of the Open Source Initiative, all welcome the policy. (Please send other statements of support and we’ll update!)...