The Office of Management and Budget has started to collect public comments on a draft policy that aims to facilitate reuse and sharing of federal custom software code across government agencies in an effort to promote innovation, reduce costs and benefit the public.
Federal Chief Information Officer Tony Scott wrote in a White House blog published Thursday the proposed federal source code policy is one of the initiatives under the Second Open Government National Action Plan.
The draft policy also proposes a pilot initiative that would require federal agencies to release a part of the custom code to the public as open source software in an attempt to avoid duplicate purchases of the code.
“We will also enable the brightest minds inside and outside of government to review and improve our code, and work together to ensure that the code is secure, reliable, and effective in furthering our national objectives,†added Scott, an inductee into Executive Mosaic’s Wash100 for 2016.
OMB will accept public comments on the proposed policy through April 11.
