US Government Opens Access to Federal Source Code with Code.gov

In March of this year, the Obama administration created a draft for Federal Source Code policy to support improved access to custom software code. After soliciting comments from public,  the administration announced the Federal Source Code policy in August. One of the core features of the policy was the adoption of an open source development model: This policy also establishes a pilot program that requires agencies, when commissioning new custom software, to release at least 20 percent of new custom-developed code as Open Source Software (OSS) for three years, and collect additional data concerning new custom software to inform metrics to gauge the performance of this pilot.

In an interview with ADMIN magazine, Brian Behlendorf, one of the pioneers of Apache web server and Executive Director of the Hyperledger Project at The Linux Foundation, said that any code developed with taxpayers’ money should be developed as open source. This month, the Obama administration delivered on their promises and launched www.code.gov, which hosts open source software being used and developed by the federal government.

Tony Scott, the US Chief Information Officer, wrote in a blog post, “We’re excited about today’s launch, and envision Code.gov becoming yet another creative platform that gives citizens the ability to participate in making government services more effective, accessible, and transparent.  We also envision it becoming a useful resource for State and local governments and developers looking to tap into the Government’s code to build similar services, foster new connections with their users, and help us continue to realize the President’s vision for a 21st Century digital government”...