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Up one levelCommunesPlone organizes the first Plone e-Gov international workshop
A growing number of local governments are choosing the open source Plone CMS for their web infrastructure. Doing so they provide new services to their citizens and improve internal administrative processes. Mutualization of resources opens the way to a new form of collaboration. The workshop goal is to bring together experts from several regions. The expected benefits of this transnational collaboration are to share applications, best practices and investments.
FLOSSImpact presented CommunesPlone as an ICT project unusual in terms of opportunity
In the Flossimpact report, Zea Partners is presented as an innovative business model part of a thriving new economic ecosystem. It also includes a number of references about Plone and Zope, outlining the maturity reached by these technologies in term of technical achievement and community organization. The project CommunesPlone, lead by local governments, is presented as an ICT project unusual in terms of opportunity for innovation, standardization and economy of scale.
3 open source e-Government projects merge and launch PloneGov.org
Open source experts from the public sector, community and SME's participated in the first Plone e-government international workshop. After two days of intense work the group decided to merge into 1 common project 3 e-government initiatives: CommunesPlone (Belgium, France), PloneGov.ch (Switzerland) and UdalPlone (Basque Country, Spain). The new project, based on the open source Content Management System Plone, will be named PloneGov.org. It now reaches over 40 local governments and 2 regions in 5 countries.
PloneGov won the biggest French open source project award
We are proud to announce that the new Plone e-government initiative won the biggest French award for open source projects on Jun13 during a ceremony held in the town hall of the city of Paris. This award, called "Grand prix du jury des Lutèce d'Or 2007", demonstrates PloneGov work quality and encourages us to continue on this way.
Bungeni, a United Nations collaborative development initiative, joins the PloneGov project.
Bungeni is a Parliamentary and Legislative Information System for drafting, managing, consolidating and publishing legislative and other parliamentary documents. It is being developed within the context the "Africa i-Parliaments Action Plan" of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA). It is meant to contribute to making Parliaments more open and accessible to citizens ... virtually allowing them "inside Parliament" or Bungeni -- the Kiswahili word for "inside Parliament". PloneGov and Bungeni decide to join efforts to share experience and their developments.
Belgian Minister Courard met the community
Local and regional governments and SME from Europe, North and South America and Africa participate in the PloneGov project. The goals of this close collaboration is to develop in a cooperative manner, applications and websites suited for public organization for their own use as well as for their citizens’. In June, this innovative project was awarded the Lutèce d’Or 2007 Grand Prix du Jury. Philippe COURARD, Walloon minister of Homelands affairs, met the PloneGov Belgian Community to congratulate them for their exceptional implication.
PloneGov selected as a finalist of the European e-Government Awards 2007
PloneGov is selected among the 52 best European e-Government projects, and is invited to present the project at the fourth Ministerial eGovernment Conference held in Lisbon in September 2007. PloneGov projects relies on 2 renowned open source software : Plone and Zope. Its success results from a close collaboration between public organizations and Zea Partners, an international network of SME building Zope and Plone solutions.
Rosario received Plone training
As a part of the PloneGov integration, different IT teams of the Municipalidad de Rosario in Argentina received Plone training
PloneGov: vote for the “most innovative good practice” EU award
PloneGov has been selected amongst 53 finalists for the Third European e-Governement Awards. PloneGov's goal is to develop a set of generic tools matching the needs of local government and other public administrations. The initiative is open and aims to reach many more organizations. Each of you can vote for PloneGov in the "most innovative good practice" category and thus help, in concrete terms, this new e-Government open source initiative.
Open eGov, a US collaborative software initiative, joins PloneGov
Open eGov is a project launched by the City of Newport News, Virginia. The intent is to create a collaborative software ecosystem, where government organizations, non-profits and the private sector work together to share the cost of enhanced capabilities. The software and related documentation is available today for free download.
PloneGov : 2 online demonstrations available
Demonstration of two of our major products are available on CommunesPlone website. Don't hesitate to test it.
Tabellio, a Belgian collaborative development initiative, joins the PloneGov project
Tabellio [http://www.tabellio.org] is a parliamentary toolbox, consisting of an information system for drafting, managing and publishing legislative documents and other parliamentary data; and of other generic tools for public administration.
Rosario, the third largest Argentinian city, joins PloneGov
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.
PloneGov in WhyFloss2007, Buenos Aires
During december 6-7 in the WhyFloss 2007 conference to be held in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Roberto Allende will present the talk: PloneGov: an international project for cooperation between governments open to Latin America.
PloneGov awarded by the European Commission
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.
PloneGov : Bringing Plone to Local Governements
Plone is one of the best known Free Software Content Management Systems (CMS) in the market. Much of the importance of Plone lies in its power and flexibility, enabling it to be applied in a wide variety of contexts.
PloneGov: Public Sector achieving independence from large IT providers
The European Commission recently released a detailed case study about our innovative collaborative project. In the weeks to come, Zea Partners proposes to publish excerpts as a serialized novel, this is a link to the first episode about independence from large IT providers.
PloneGov : a young eGovernment project with great promises
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.
Public Health geospatial data with Zope
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.
New impulse for PloneGov from Plone Sorrento Sprint 2008
Italian ZEA Partners members are planning a number of initiatives to launch the PloneGov branch in Italy: an italian PloneGov site, a stand at COMPA 2008, and the organization of special event dedicated to Public Administrations.
Plone: Kent Connects project makes final four in Innovation Awards
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.
PloneGov: Health Atlas Ireland wins the Irish Public Service Excellence Award 2008
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 : Newport News wins the 2008 Havlick award
Newport News, a 180.000 inhabitants city of Virginia (USA), is the leader of the Open e-Gov open source project, one of PloneGov subcommunities. Following Paris, Lisbon, Brussels and Dublin, this new award becomes the 5th nomination in less than a year for the PloneGov initiative and collaborating Public Organizations.
CommunesPlone, a successful experience of software mutualization
CommunesPlone is a fast growing open source software mutualization project led by local governments. Open to international collaboration, the project outlines the benefits of open source and mutualization for the Public Sector. This case study presents CommunesPlone, analyzes best practices and challenges.
Network effects : Plone for Belgium and beyond
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 over 50 members. Organised like a FLOSS community, the group develops applications in the Plone. Taking this idea to the international level, the PloneGov project, started in June 2007, brings together 55 public bodies on four continents to produce Plone-based software that fits their needs.
Health Atlas Ireland: Open source mapping, database and statistical system
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 enables controlled access to maps, data and analysis for service planning and delivery, major incident response, epidemiology and research to improve the health of patients and the population.
Open eGov: an award winning collaborative software ecosystem
The City of Newport News, VA developed Open eGov, a web software application which is available to any other local government and it is offered free of charge. We are creating a Plone based collaborative software ecosystem, where government organizations, non-profits and the private sector work together to share the cost of enhanced capabilities.
Plone: Official launch of PloneGov in Italy
The Chamber of Commerce of Ferrara, the first PloneGov Italian member, invites 100 representatives from the public sector and open source experts to participate to the official launch of PloneGov in Italy on September 16, 2008.
EISCO 2008: PloneGov an international project tackling the digital divide
EISCO conferences have become a major event for politicians and experts working at local and regional level to discuss e-Government and Information Society strategies. Representatives of the open source initiative PloneGov have been invited to share their experience in developing international collaboration and sharing open source software between public organizations worldwide.
PloneGov tour in Venezuela
During july 2008, members of the PloneGov project will visit and train different agencies of the government of Venezuela. PloneGov: an international project for cooperation between governments open to Latin America.
PloneGov.ch receives the Swiss eGovernment Award 2008!
At the annual eGovernment Symposium in Berne on November 18th 2008, the PloneGov.ch project was awarded with the Swiss eGovernment Award 2008.
The first European Plone Symposium 2009 takes place in Sorrento (Naples), Italy
Abstract Open Solutions organizes the European Plone Symposium 2009 from 11 to 17 May 2009. This symposium presenting new tools to fight the licensed software, and it will be the first Symposium to be held in Europe. A PloneGov event will complete the programme.
PloneGov: Distributing costs between Public Organizations
PloneGov applications are easily transferable to similar foreign authorities and their potentials for replication are enormous. This project open the way to international software collaboration. The development of such software sharing initiatives helps underpin the sustainability of public services and save public money.
Hungarian government goes 50 percent open source
The modification of the public procurement rules was announced at a press conference on April 2nd, Budapest. As a result, open source software gets green light in the Hungarian public sector.
eGovMoNet: eGovernment Impact Measurement Workshop report
eGovMoNet is a European thematic network dealing with measurement strategies for the impact and the perceived quality of eGovernment services. The workshop focused on eGovernment Impact Measurement. Participants in the network are leading organisations from eGovernment measurement including government, benchmarking practitioners, application developers, and users. As representative of the PloneGov project, an international open source software sharing initiative, Zea Partners got precociously involved in this network.
Open Source Initiative approves European Union Public Licence (EUPL)
The Open Source Initiative (OSI), one of the principal advocacy organisations on open source software, has unanimously approved the European Union Public Licence (EUPL) version 1.1 as an open source licence.
PloneGov Italy: already reaping in 2009 what we sow in 2008
ANCITEL, the institutional IT network and service provider for more than 7000 Italian Communes, expressed its interest in evaluating the implications of getting involved in the dissemination in Italy of CommunesPlone - presently being ported in an Italian language, Italian accessibility regulations-compliant version. Even though preliminary, this opening to an in-depth examination of CommunesPlone potential seems promising, as long as ANCITEL, under the direct control of ANCI, the association of more than 7000 of Italian Communes, serves 90% of the Italian population.
UK government backs open source
The UK government has said it will accelerate the use of open source software in public services.
Plone: Launch of a new user group focusing on Eastern Europe
The launch of the Plone EasternEurope user group reflects the growing interest for open source software worldwide. This user group will focus on the former East European block. It aims to regroup experts facing similar challenges and opportunities. By enabling cross-border collaboration it will foster the creation of innovative services and support the development of local economies.
Brazilian government lists preferred Open Source applications
The Brazilian government wants its public administrations to check an Open Source reference guide before launching new IT projects. This moves taken by the Government of the 5th world economy, confirms Brazilian leadership and long term commitment on open source software.
Budapest welcomes the Plone Conference 2009
The Conference is the biggest annual Plone event gathering over 400 open source experts from all over the globe. For the first time the event will be organized outside Western Europe and United States, becoming the largest Open Source event ever taking place in Hungary.
PloneGov Italy: a fast growing community
The Italian PloneGov community has been growing at an impressive rate since the launch of its national branch in September. This article presents in details a number of Plone based open source projects developed by a number of Italian public administrations.
Many software tenders in EU maybe 'illegal'
Software tenders by European public administration often may not comply with EU regulations, illegally favouring proprietary applications. "These tenders could be protested against, and if necessary the tendering organisations could be taken to court", said Karel De Vriendt, head of the IDABC unit responsible for the Open Source Software Observatory and Repository (osor.eu).
Open World Forum in Paris, 1 and 2 december 2008
An international conference will take place in Paris on December 1 and 2 in order to promote Open Source softwares and support the Open Source research and communities.
Python Shows Continual Growth in Open Source Projects
Python is a mature, flexible language that allows developers to concentrate on business solutions rather than technology problems, and has shown continual growth over the past decade.
Introduction to the European Union Public License (EUPL)
The EUPL is the first European Free/Open Source Software (F/OSS) license. It has been elaborated by the European Commission in respect of European law requirements and has official value in 22 languages. It can be used by anyone for software distribution.
EC to publish open source procurement guidelines
A new European Commission funded document aims to explain the benefits of open source software and open standards to government agencies and aid them in compiling invitations to tender
EU Research investigates the Quality and Socioeconomic aspects of Free Libre Open Source Software
As part of its research funding activities the European Commission has been funding research into Free, Libre and Open Source software (FOSS) for a number of years. Many projects make use of existing FOSS. Some focus on FOSS itself, seeking to improve the technologies used and to remove barriers for adoption and use.
GOSCON 2008: The Impact of Open Source Software on Transforming Government
Government Open Source Conference (GOSCON), Oregon State University and the World Bank’s e-Development Thematic Group have partnered to deliver a live webcast of a joint videoconferenced Global Dialogue workshop on the role of open source software in government transformation.
eGovMoNet: measurement of user satisfaction of e-Government solutions
Under the supervision of Agder University’s Mikael Snaprud, the second meeting of eGovMoNet (the European network focusing on strategies to measure user satisfaction of e-Government solutions) took place in Copenhagen on October 24-25, 2008. Zea Partners is involved in this European thematic network as representative of the PloneGov project, an international open source software sharing initiative.
GOSCON 2008 to feature Open Government Collaboratives panel
On October 22, government and private industry experts will debate the issues and opportunities presented by collaborative software development models. The distinguished panelists have direct experience with successful public/private consortiums based on the open source software model in which developers as well as business and technical users collaborate to create new applications while sharing both the costs and the benefits.
PloneGov: a successful project internationalization
PloneGov is an innovative collaborative e-government initiative. The project is open to any collaboration from any country. After 1-year existence, it already reaches 20 countries in 4 continents. This article investigates why over 100 public organizations including towns, cities, regions and parliaments from as many countries are working together to share software and best practices.
OSOR launch, Open Source World Conference in Malaga, Spain
The OSOR website will be launched in Malaga, at the Open Source World Conference. Xavier Heymans has been invited to present the PloneGov innitiative. PloneGov is a collaborative software ecosystem, where government organizations, non-profits and the private sector work together to share the cost of enhanced capabilities.
COMPA 2008: an opportunity to meet PloneGov experts
ComPa is maybe the most important Italian event for IT and technology in the Public Administration. Italian ZEA Partners have co-financed a PloneGov stand in this prestigious fair, and will manage the stand on behalf of PloneGov.
eGovernment: Official launch of PloneGov in Italy
On September 16, the first edition of a nationwide event will mark the official launch of the PloneGov initiative in Italy. The Chamber of Commerce of Ferrara, the first Italian participant in PloneGov, will host the event and share its experience with other Italian and European Public Administrations.
WoPDaSD 2008: International Workshop on Public Data about Software Development
FLOSSMetrics is pleased to announce the Third International Workshop on Public Data about Software Development (WoPDaSD 2008). This workshop will be held September 10th 2008 in Milan (Italy) colocated with The 4th International Conference on Open Source Systems (OSS2008).
The city of Modena switches to Open Source software
On its move to Open Source software, the city council of Modena, Italy, is replacing Microsoft Office with OpenOffice on all its 1600 PCs. It is also busy replacing its proprietary web site content management system (CMS) with the Open Source alternative Plone, running on top of Zope, an Open Source application server.
EU Competition Commissioner backs open standards in eGovernment
The EU Competition Commissioner, Neelie Kroes, publicly supported the use of open source software. She encouraged the public institutions to use open standards and suggested a much more active role of the European Commission in promoting open standards in eGovernment applications, by adopting an internal policy not to buy proprietary software.
United Nations University urges legislators to support open source software
United Nations University (UNU-MERIT) experts urge parliamentarians to support open source software and information technologies as a way to let citizens participate meaningfully in the information society. They also emphasize that policy markers should consider information and communications technologies from a social rather than technical viewpoint.
FLOSSInclude, a project to foster open source international collaboration
FLOSS is arguably one of the best examples of open, collaborative, internationally distributed production and development that exists today. With partners around the globe, the FLOSSInclude project will develop a roadmap for international cooperation to realise the potential of FLOSS as a tool for social and economic development.
Breaking Barriers: using free and open source software for development
The successful deployment of free and open source software (FOSS) in projects in Africa, Asia-Pacific, Europe and Latin America are described in a publication entitled "Breaking Barriers" by UNDP's Asia-Pacific Development Information Programme. In line with the book findings, Zea Partners, a non-profit network of Open Source businesses, provides additional cases studies outlining the positive impact of Open Source software as a tool for Social progress.
European Commission to increase its use of Open Source
The European Commission will take a more pro-active approach to its own use of Open Source and Open Standards. Xavier Heymans highlights the importance of a real and mature collaboration with communities where IT providers share their developments and adopt an "open source" philosophy.
eGovMoNet: kick-off meeting at the United Nations in Geneva
Zea Partners recently joined eGovMoNet a new European thematic network aimed at measuring the user satisfaction of e-Government solutions. In a previous article we announced the kick-off meeting, the first in a series of eGovMoNet events bringing together some of the most authoritative experts on measurement strategies, focusing their skills on the specific challenge of measuring in a consistent yet easily applicable way the levels of satisfaction relative to a great diversity of services and user catchments areas.
Book Review: Professional Plone Development by Martin Aspeli
Alan Berg from Free Software Magazine publishes a review of Martin Aspeli's new book. He introduces Plone and explains what the book is made for. In 300 pages, Aspeli systematically builds from scratch a viable example application based on Plone version 3.
OpenApp fixes sights on Open Community
The company more commonly known as OpenApp, was one of the first organisations in Ireland to parent the open source culture to its business and has received numerous accolades including An Taoiseach's 'Irish Public Service Excellence Award 2008' for their Health Atlas Ireland system, developed as part of the PloneGov project, an international e-government initiative.
Petition to the European Parliament on the implications of ICT lock-in
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.
PloneGov: a Community open to collaboration
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
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.
Linking up eGovernment: Building a Digital Europe
UNU-MERIT and RAND Europe organise an interactive workshop on how existing eGovernment solutions can better be shared for European eGovernment. This workshop will highlight the need, potential and benefits of international collaboration. Workshop attendance is free of charge.
FLOSSInclude wants to foster FOSS in emerging economies
The EU is sponsoring a new two year project called FLOSSInclude to explore the use of FOSS as a development tool. In particular, the aim of FLOSSInclude is to study what is needed to "increase the deployment, development and societal impact of FOSS in Africa, Asia and Latin America".
Plone: PLINKIT Collaborative receives ASCLA Leadership and Professional Achievement Award
The goal of the Plinkit Collaborative is to provide pre-built, easy-to-use and easy-to-deploy websites for libraries using Plone. While Plinkit was initially focused on serving small and/or rural libraries, Plone has made it easy to meet the needs of other library types (e.g. museum, school, and community college libraries). Currently, the four founding states have deployed Plinkit to over 225 libraries.
The need of libre software research in Europe
The European Commission, by means of the Framework Programme, is funding several research projects on libre software. In the sixth edition of this Programme, 25.13 million Euros has been dedicated to fund these research projects. Is this investment worthy? Can libre software help to development of Europe?
Plone community owns now the word Plone
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.
Kent Connects Information Sharing Portal
UK public organizations in Kent and Medway collaborate in an innovative open source project. The Kent Connects Information Sharing Portal has been developed to create a flexible, virtual online space for any Kent Connects partner to share information via the internet in a secure way. This allows groups, communities, partnerships or individuals across these partner organisations to access documents, minutes, agendas etc from a central, secure store.
PloneGov: presenting Open eGov, a US collaborative software initiative
Open eGov is a project launched by the City of Newport News, Virginia. This award winning project is an active SubCommunity of the international eGovernment innitiativ PloneGov. The intent is to create a collaborative software ecosystem, where government organizations, non-profits and the private sector work together to share the cost of enhanced capabilities. The software and related documentation is available today for free download.
The European Agency for Safety and Health shares its open source software
The European Agency for Safety and Health at Work (EU-OSHA) is one of the Community Agencies of the European Union and is located in Bilbao, Spain. Its central role is to contribute to the improvement of working life in an enlarged European Union by developing, analysing and disseminating information on occupational safety and health (OSH). EU-OSHA disseminates information and collaborates with its network through a Plone-base CMS which is now shared being shared to anyone interested in creating or maintaining a website in different languages.
EU-OSHA launches three calls for tender
Early August, the EU-OSHA launched three calls for tender to further develop its website, its web systems and to support its media and promotion activities.
PloneGov finalist of the European e-Government Awards 2009
The open source initiative PloneGov has been selected among the 52 best European e-Government projects, and is invited to present the project at the 5th Ministerial eGovernment Conference, - a joint event organised by the European Commission and the Swedish EU Presidency, which aims at monitoring progress in eGovernment, accelerating the adoption of eGovernment policies in Europe and identifying research priorities for the future.
28 October: PloneGov at the Technology Biz event in Naples
The best practices of the Public Organizations using Plone will be illustrated in the first edition of an event focused on the central theme "more ICT, less crisis"
PloneGov at the Com-PA 2009 Exhibition
PloneGov will be one of the case studies addressed by a panel of experts, discussing about open source in the frame of the e-gov 2012 Italian Government plan
PloneGov at the AICA 2009 Congress in Rome
The parallel sessions of friday 6 November afternoon will include a scientific workshop about PloneGov
PloneGov Italia: a very active spring is planned
By promoting two events, covered also in the "events" section of www.plonegov.org, the Italian branch of PloneGov shows its vitality and paves the road for new members willing to take advantage of the PloneGov collaborative model.
PloneGov Italia: a very active spring is planned