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Draft of Free Software Bill (V6)





DEFINITIONS

Article 1.- For the present law, the following terms are defined:
a) Program or "software" is any instruction sequence used by a digital processing device to carry out a specific task or solve a particular problem.

b) Execution or use of a program is the act of using it in any digital processing device to perform a function

c) User is any person (real or juridical) who uses the software.

d) Source code, or source program, is the complete set of original instructions and digital files created and/or modified by the programmer, and all digital support files as data tables, images, specifications, documentation, and every other element needed to produce the executable program from them.

As an exception, this set can exclude those tools and programs usually distributed as free software by other means, as compilers, operating systems, and libraries.

e) Free program (software) is any which use gives the user, without an additional price, the following rights:

d.1) unrestricted execution of the program for any purpose.

d.2) unrestricted access to its source code

d.3) exhaustive inspection of all internal operating mechanisms of the program.

d.4) use of internal mechanisms and of any arbitrary part of the program, to adapt it to user needs.

d.5) production and public distribution of copies of the program

d.6) modification of the program and free redistribution of these modifications and of the resulting program under the same conditions of the original program.

Besides these rights, the cost for obtaining a copy of the program source code can not be significantly higher than the usual market cost of materials, labor and logistic required for making that copy.

f) "Non-free" or "proprietary" program is any which doesn't meet the requirements stated in the preceding article 1 section e).

g) Open data format is any digital information coding method that meets the following conditions:

g.1) its complete technical documentation is publicly available.

g.2) the source code for at least one complete reference implementation is publicly available.

g.3) there are no restrictions for writing programs that store, transmit, receive or access data codified this way.

RANGE OF APPLICATION

Article 2.- The Executive, Legislative and Judicial Powers, decentralized organizations and companies where the National State is a major stockholder, will use only free programs (software) for their systems and IT equipment.

Article 3.- The Application Authority or Enforcer of this law will be the Secretary of Public Function of the National Executive Power.

EXCEPTIONS

Article 4.- If there is no free software solution that satisfies a specific need, state organizations mentioned in article 2 can adopt one of the following choices, in decreasing order of priority:
a) If there is no non-free software solution that satisfies the specific need and, consequentially, the decision to develop a solution is made, the resulting technical solution must be free software in all cases, as defined in article 1 of this law.

b) If there are verifiable time constraints to solve the technical problem, and there is a non-free solution available, the organization requiring it can request a temporary authorization for non-free software use from the Application Authority . The selection criteria will be made with the next preference order:

b.1) Programs satisfying all the criteria mentioned in article 1, section e, except for the right to distribute modified copies of the program. The exemption can be permanent only in this case.

b.2) Programs for which there exists a compatible free software project in advanced stage of development that can replace it. In this case, the exemption is only temporary and becomes null when free software with the necessary functionality becomes available.

b.3) Other non-free programs. In this case, the authorization will periodically turn void in a term of two years, and will be reissued only after checking that there are no free-software solutions yet.

The Application Authority will grant exceptions only if the requiring state organization warrants data storage in open data formats.
Article 5º.- National Public Universities and other educational entities dependent on the National State will also be allowed to request an authorization for use of non-free software to be used in research, as long as the research objective is directly associated to the non-free program requested.

PUBLICITY OF EXCEPTIONS

Article 6.- The exceptions authorized by the Application Authority must be founded and published in the media designed by the regulation. Those justifications must include the concrete functionality requirements that must be satisfied by the program.

Article 7.- If any state organization specified in article 2 is authorized to acquire or use non-free software or programs to store or process data of privacy or security critical for the State, the Application Authority must also publish a report in the media designed by the regulation. This report must explain the risks associated to non-free software use in that area

RESPONSIBILITIES

Article 8.- The highest administrative authority and the highest technical authority of each State agency covered by article 2, will be jointly responsible for carrying out this law.

TRANSITION TERMS

Article 9.- The Executive Power will rule in a term of a hundred and eighty days the conditions, dates, and ways for the transition from the present situation to one satisfying the conditions of the present law, and will turn future bids and contracts for computer software in that direction .

Article 10.- The Provincial and City governments, and the Autonomous Government of the City of Buenos Aires are invited to join this initiative.

Article 11.- Communicate this to the National Executive Power

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& Beatriz Moisset, Aug 21st, 2001.
Last modified: Monday, 10-Nov-2003 22:01:25 ART