The green-red alliance, which has been in power in Munich since spring, wants to fulfill promises from its coalition agreement and, despite the end of the Linux-based desktop project LiMux, again rely more on free software. The two government factions have now launched an application package. Among other things, it provides for the IT department to propose five projects to the city council that are to be implemented as open source in the short term.

Free software wherever possible According to the coalition agreement, new software for administration should generally be developed with open source code and made freely available wherever this is “technically and financially possible” . In the application, Grün-Rot now explains: “Necessary criteria” for the selection as an open source project are also the performance and user-friendliness of the programs in productive use. If a project is classified as unsuitable for this route, “this decision must be made known to the IT committee and substantiated”.

The “first stage” are to form the five projects available in the foreseeable future, for which the coalition does not initially make any further specifications. From the 4th quarter 2021 on, new individual software will be “developed on the basis of open source”. The office packages Open Office and LibreOffice were explicitly not included.

Development on a public repository The relevant source code is according to the plan made publicly available under a “permissive” license such as the MIT or the European Public License (EUPL). The EUPL, which has been adapted to European law, is expressly compatible with the better-known GNU General Public License (GPL) in version 2. External contributions should be made possible on the basis of special rules, whereby “no liability is assumed and no support can be provided”.

“The development takes place from the beginning on a suitable public repository such as https : //github.com/it-at-m, also on an internal mirror like https://git.muenchen.de, “says the application. The user manual must at least be available in German. Furthermore, “open, exchangeable interfaces must be used”. Additional expenses due to “clean code”, ie following a code for clean source code, are “basically to be borne in the project”.

The IT department should also train developers in the area of ​​open source “depending on Application area on Windows, Linux or other operating systems and platforms “. The open source community should be encouraged to participate in the corresponding projects of the state capital.

Unbureaucratic and unconventional Another proposal is new, according to which the IT department will set up an “open source hub”. At the center, employees “with dedicated human and financial resources” as well as “committed external parties should be able to work together on open source IT solutions for the state capital”. Green-Red wants to give free software “the priority now required in the coalition agreement”. The aim is to find “unbureaucratic and unconventionally innovative solutions for small and large IT projects in the city”.

Two other projects are already part of the coalition agreement and are now to be tackled. The city will therefore maintain a publicly accessible “IT dashboard” including a cost balance. This should show which software is used in the municipality and its own operations. The aim is to illustrate the extent to which free software is already running and where this is planned.

Green-Red also wants to allow “technically qualified” programmers to do a “sabbatical” for “a certain time “to work hard on open source projects. The scholarship should be compensated “at an attractive rate” and advertised internationally, whereby a “special interest” in applications from women should be included in the advert. The coalition justifies this with the fact that free software “promotes the common good”.

“Public Money, Public Code” All in all, Grün-Red wants with the package that is still from the St