The aim of QualiPSo is to help industries and governments fuel innovation and competitiveness with trusted, low cost and flexible Free Open Source Software. QualiPSo’s launch comes at a time when major industries have experienced the power of Free Open Source Software to accelerate the development of global, low-cost and reliable information systems, but are waiting for ultimate proof of trust to definitively commit to large-scale deployment. By providing the prerequisites for trust – from the legal, technical and business points of view – QualiPSo intends to definitely foster Free Open Source Software deployment for business competitiveness and growth, in areas such as e-government, media, telecoms, manufacturing, distribution and finance.

The QualiPSo project includes 7 research and development domains (QualiPSo Competence Centres, business models, next generation forge, trustworthy results and process, information management, interoperability, legal issues), articulated in 10 work areas :

• LEGAL ISSUES: Providing guidelines and tools to facilitate an intellectual property tracking process with open source, and defining a coherent family of OSS licenses, compliant with national laws and European regulations.
• BUSINESS MODELS: Defining methods, development processes, and business models to facilitate the use of Free Open Source Software (FOSS) by the industry.
• INTEROPERABILITY: Providing test environments and qualified integration stacks to demonstrate FOSS interoperability across borders of any kind: technological, semantic and organizational.
• INFORMATION MANAGEMENT: Implementing best practices in information management (source code, documentation, etc.) to improve the productivity of FOSS development and support.
• TRUSTWORTHY RESULTS: Studying qualities that can sustain trust in Free Open Source components.
• TRUSTWORTHY PROCESS: Developing a new Capability Maturity Model-like approach to assessing the quality of FOSS. This model will be discussed with CMM’s originators, the Software Engineering Institute (SEI), with a view to formalising it as an official extension of CMMI®.
• QUALIPSO FACTORY: Designing and implementing the “QualiPSo Factory”, an integrated next generation forge that will facilitate and support the development of viable industrial FOSS systems.
• COMPETENCE CENTER: Developing a long lasting network of professionals caring for the quality of Free Open Source Software for enterprise computing. Six QualiPSo Competence Centres - running the collaborative platforms, tools and process developed in this project – will be set up to support the development, deployment and adoption of FOSS by private and public Information Systems Departments, large companies, SMEs, end users and ISVs. Of these Competence Centres, four will be based in Europe (in Berlin, Madrid, Paris, Rome), one in China and one in Brazil (São Paulo).
• EXPLOITATION AND DISSEMINATION: Promoting FOSS at a political level, promoting laws and regulations supporting FOSS, and marketing QualiPSo Factory, Competence Centres, research results and tools.
• TRAINING: Promoting and encouraging practical uptake of QualiPSo methodologies and tools.

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