Timeline: software procurement, open standards and software-patent policy

Software policy developed through several kinds of events: licenses were published, standards were agreed, agencies issued guidance, legislatures considered bills and courts decided cases. Those events belong to different processes. A software license establishes permissions and conditions. A standard describes a shared technical specification. A purchasing policy concerns how public bodies select systems. A court decision concerns the legal question before that court.

The sequence below keeps the action and its outcome together. A proposed requirement is not described as an adopted law. Where a policy survey classified a bill as failed, the entry preserves that status rather than suggesting the proposal remained pending. Publication of guidance is distinguished from the adoption of a mandate. A standardization decision is distinguished from the software applications that later implemented the format.

Dates here identify events recorded by the named sources. The CSIS survey covers government actions at its own time of publication; later reference accounts provide subsequent markers where they state them. Entries about a particular institution or jurisdiction do not imply that the same rule applied elsewhere. The sequence includes both unsuccessful proposals and adopted measures because each helps explain the policy discussion.

The world survey groups policy records by region. The EU proposal page follows the legislative sequence in greater depth, and the document-formats page explains the standards and public-record questions behind several entries.

1980 — Wikipedia’s Bayh–Dole account records the act’s adoption and the contractor-ownership arrangements for inventions arising from federally funded research.
1983 — Wikipedia’s free-software movement account dates the launch of the GNU Project to this year, placing it within the development of the movement.
October 4, 1985 — Wikipedia’s Free Software Foundation account records the foundation’s establishment to promote the free-software movement.
1988 — Wikipedia’s BSD-license account records a predecessor of the later BSD license forms used in releases of the Berkeley Software Distribution.
25 February 1989 — Wikipedia’s GPL account dates the first GNU General Public License release to this day.
14 May 1991 — Wikipedia’s Computer Programs Directive account dates the EU directive governing legal protection of computer programs to this day.
June 1991 — Wikipedia’s GPL account records publication of the next major version of the license.
1993 — Wikipedia’s OASIS account records the consortium’s founding under the name SGML Open.
1998 — Wikipedia’s Mozilla Public License account dates the first version of that license to this year.
February 1998 — Wikipedia’s Open Source Initiative account records the organization’s founding; it maintains the Open Source Definition.
July 23 1998 — Wikipedia’s State Street case account records the Federal Circuit decision associated with the practical-application approach to patent eligibility.
Apr. 2001 — the CSIS policy survey classified Argentina’s legislative free-software bill as Mandatory and Failed; its details record expiration in March 2002.
May 2001 — Wikipedia’s Shared Source account dates Microsoft’s source-access initiative to this month. The program encompassed different licensing arrangements.
Jan. 2002 — the CSIS policy survey classified Portugal’s Council of Ministers resolution as Advisory and Approved; it promoted open-source use through a nonbinding measure.
20 February 2002 — Wikipedia’s directive account records the European Commission’s proposal concerning patentability of computer-implemented inventions.
Mar. 2002 — the CSIS policy survey classified a reintroduced Argentine bill as Mandatory and Failed; the details record its expiration in March 2004.
May 2002 — Wikipedia’s Initiative for Software Choice account records the lobby group’s founding in response to government interest in open-source software.
2003 — Wikipedia’s LiMux account records Munich City Council’s examination of replacement systems and vote for a Linux-based solution.
May 28, 2003 — an Open Data Format Initiative post described both the Initiative for Software Choice and the rival Sincere Choice campaign.
June 2003 — the CSIS policy survey classified the United States Department of Defense’s rules on open-source use as Advisory and Approved.
June 2003 — the CSIS policy survey classified Denmark’s software strategy as Advisory and Approved, describing value for money, competition, choice and interoperability.
24 September 2003 — Wikipedia’s directive account records Parliament’s first-reading amendments, which placed limits on software patentability.
Oct. 2003 — the CSIS policy survey classified Portugal’s mandatory public-administration bill as Failed; its details record rejection on October 10, 2003.
Nov. 2003 — the CSIS policy survey classified Brazil’s national initiative encouraging open-source use and evaluation as Advisory and Approved.
January 2004 — Wikipedia’s Apache License account records publication of the permissive license revision described in the article.
April 27, 2004 — Wikipedia’s National Coordinator account records the creation of the federal office coordinating health-information technology.
18 May 2004 — Wikipedia’s directive account records the Council’s advisory agreement on a revised version of the computer-implemented-inventions proposal.
June 2004 — the CSIS policy survey classified another Argentine free-software bill as Mandatory and Failed, recording that it expired before passage.
July 2004 — the CSIS policy survey classified the Office of Management and Budget’s technology- and vendor-neutral procurement memo as Advisory and Approved.
November 2004 — Wikipedia’s framework account records publication of the first European Interoperability Framework.
Dec. 2004 — the CSIS policy survey classified Venezuela’s decree on public-administration migration to open source as Mandatory and Approved, with a process for exceptions.
2005 — Wikipedia’s OpenDocument-adoption account records Massachusetts’ policy requiring open document formats for executive-branch documents, with implementation questions following the decision.
7 March 2005 — Wikipedia’s directive account records the Council’s formal approval of its position and resubmission to Parliament.
1 May 2005 — Wikipedia’s OpenDocument account records the initial release of the office-document format developed through OASIS.
6 July 2005 — Wikipedia’s directive account records Parliament’s rejection of the proposal: 648 in favor of rejection, 14 against and 18 registered abstentions. The proposal did not become law.
October 2005 — Wikipedia’s account of the Peruvian legislation records passage of a law mandating consideration of open-source software. Its account also describes the earlier bill introduced by Congressman Edgar David Villanueva.
2006 — the CSIS policy survey records the Department of Defense’s Open Technology Development roadmap and classifies the action as Advisory and Approved.
3 May 2006 — Wikipedia’s OpenDocument account records passage of the international-standard draft ballot and approval for release as an ISO and IEC standard.
December 2006 — Wikipedia’s Office Open XML standardization account records the start of the standardization period through Ecma and later ISO and IEC.
January 2007 — Wikipedia’s European Union Public Licence account records the first publication of the European Commission’s software license.
29 June 2007 — Wikipedia’s GPL account records release of the later major GPL revision described in the article.
November 2008 — Wikipedia’s Office Open XML standardization account records the end of the period in which the format was standardized first through Ecma and then ISO and IEC.
2009 — Wikipedia’s HITECH account records enactment of the law associated with incentives for meaningful use of certified electronic health records.
27 January 2010 — GOV.UK’s action-plan publication page records publication of an open-source strategy for government.
April 16, 2010 — the CSIS policy survey’s publication record dates the survey organizing national and local government open-source actions by type and status.
June 28, 2010 — Wikipedia’s Bilski case account records the Supreme Court decision that the machine-or-transformation test was not the sole process-eligibility test.
16 December 2010 — Wikipedia’s framework account records the European Commission’s adoption of the next European Interoperability Framework.
February and June 2012 — GOV.UK’s Open Standards principles page records the public consultation that preceded development of the government’s principles.
June 19, 2014 — Wikipedia’s Alice case account records the Supreme Court decision that generic computer implementation did not make an abstract idea patent eligible.
December 13, 2016 — Wikipedia’s 21st Century Cures Act account records enactment of the law, including provisions concerning health-information exchange.
May 2017 — Wikipedia’s European Union Public Licence account records publication of a revised license.
November 2017 — Wikipedia’s LiMux account records Munich City Council’s decision to reverse its migration. This is a dated policy decision, not a comparison of software quality.
2018 — GOV.UK’s Open Standards principles page records an update to language, structure, links and references while the policy remained the same.