OSS in Big Cities Initiative


Status: In preparation

Initiative Objective: The initiative will be a platform for like-minded practitioners to exchange experiences and best practices. OW2 OSS in Big Cities will aim at providing benchmarks that can be shared between large cities in the world. The international dimension of the initiative is essential. Global cities may be determined by different regulations and organizations but their expectations are similar. OSS in Big Cities initiative will leverage real life OSS applications to help build strategic awareness among CIO/CDO, Political stakeholders and Architects/Consultants.  

Initiative Name:
The official name is "OW2 OSS in Big Cities" (OBCi), but we are open to any suggestion for a more "marketing" name.

Initiative scope

For conventional IT areas such as back-end information systems and schools, this 5' video (in French) helps define the scope.

The initiative also concentrates on areas with less legacy, where cities can more readily share experience, concerns, best practices, etc. These areas might be the sweet spot for the initiative. New areas offer a level playing field, cities are evaluating the same technologies in e-government, e-smart services, and any  new applications related to the interaction between the city and its citizens, its ecosystem (utilities, etc.).

Initiative participants

OW2 OSS in Big Cities is spearheaded by OW2 Member City of Paris. Additional participants such as Cities involved in the Paris Open Source Summit OW2 OSS in Big Cities session will be announced shortly.

Initiative Projects

lutece

The initiative flagship project is Lutece, the open city service platform developed and used by City of Paris. Other projects will be added soon.

Initiative Events

A session "Open Source Software in Big Cities Information System" is regularly organized at Paris Open Source Summit.
Cities represented at POSS 2017 included: Paris, Munich, Amsterdam, Bolzano and Sud Tyrol region.
Cities represented at POSS 2018 included: Paris, Barcelona, Bolzano, Baltimore, French Local Administrations represented by ADULLACT.
Cities and organizations represented at POSS 2019 included: Paris, Barcelona, Baltimore, CSI-Piemonte, Public Code Foundation, Mosslabs.
Then on Dec. 12, 2019, OW2 co-organized an Open Cities Collaboration Workshop

You are welcome to participate

As the name indicates, we invite Big Cities to participate. Why not just “Cities”? Well, we think Big Cities are different. They have a complex information systems run by in-house IT teams, they support multiple technology generations; they look at implementing smart-city applications, their decision process is complex, they are submitted to the pressure of proprietary vendors. In a word, their information systems are unique and they follow long-term strategic IT plans that may consider open source software as a key component.

Stay in touch with BigCities

More information about the projects and meetings can be found on the private wiki: https://bigcities.ow2.org/
To set up your private account, you need to register online first, then we will configure your privileges in the wiki.

A mailing list is used to share ideas between participants: Please, subscribe here