List of free and open-source software organizations

The following are notable organizations devoted to the advocacy, legal aid, financial aid, technical aid, governance, etc. of free and open-source software (FOSS) as a whole, or of one or more specific FOSS projects. For projects that have their own foundation or are part of an umbrella organization, the primary goal is often to provide a mechanism for funding development of the software.

For the most part, these organizations are structured as nonprofit/charity organizations.

This list does not include companies that aim to make money from free and open-source software.

Advocacy

• Ada Initiative – existed from 2011 to 2015; advocated the participation of women in FOSS development.
• Free Software Foundation (FSF) – founded in 1985; began as a development center for the GNU Project. It currently advocates for free software and against proprietary software and formats; and maintains and legally enforces the GNU General Public License. It also created the Free Software Definition.
• Open Source Initiative (OSI) – founded in 1998; promotes open source software from a pragmatic rather than moral perspective. Also created the Open Source Definition.
• Digital Freedom Foundation (DFF) – founded in 2004; organizes Software and other Freedom Days

Location-specific

• April – founded in 1996; promotes free software in the French-speaking world.
• Associação Nacional para o Software Livre – founded in 2001; promotes the use of free software in Portugal.
• The Free Software Foundation has three regional sister organizations: Free Software Foundation Europe (founded 2001), Free Software Foundation of India (founded 2001) and Free Software Foundation Latin America (founded 2005).
• Free Software Initiative of Japan – founded in 2002; supports free software within Japan.
• Free Software Movement of India – founded in 2010; a coalition of organizations that advocate the use of free software within India.
• Fundación Vía Libre – founded in 2000; advocates digital rights and the use of free software in Latin America, especially within government.
• Hamakor – founded in 2003; promotes the use of free and open-source software in Israel.
• Indonesia, Go Open Source – advocates the use of open-source software within Indonesia.
• International Open Source Network – promoted the use of open-source software in Asia.
• Irish Free Software Organisation – promotes the use of free software in Ireland.
• Ma3bar – a United Nations-affiliated organization that promotes open source software within the Arab world.
• Mil-OSS – founded in 2009; promotes the use of open-source software in the United States Department of Defense.
• New Zealand Open Source Society – founded in 2003; promotes the use of open-source software in New Zealand.
• OpenForum Europe – founded in 2002; advocates for the use of open source software in Europe.
• Open Source Alliance of Central Asia – founded in 2011; advocates for the use of open source software in Central Asia.
• Open Source for America – a consortium of organizations advocating for the use of FOSS in the United States.
• Open Source Industry Australia – founded in 2004; promotes open source in Australia, as well as the use of Australian open source software and services around the world.
• Open Source Software Institute – founded in 2000; promotes the use of open-source software in the United States within government, at all levels.

Legal aid

• IfrOSS – provides legal services for free software in Germany.
• Software Freedom Law Center – founded in 2005; provides free legal representation and other legal services to not-for-profit FOSS projects.

Umbrella organizations

The following organizations host, and provide other services, for a variety of different open-source projects.

• Outercurve Foundation – founded in 2009 by Microsoft as the CodePlex foundation, then renamed in 2010. It hosts around 25 open source projects, mostly Microsoft-related.
• Software Freedom Conservancy – founded in 2006; hosts around 30 projects.
• Software in the Public Interest (SPI) – founded in 1997, originally only for the Debian project; hosts around 35 projects, some of which are umbrella projects themselves.

Domain-specific organizations

The following organizations host open-source projects that relate to a specific technical area.

• freedesktop.org – founded in 2000; hosted by SPI since 2015.^[1] Hosts around 25 projects, mostly related to the X Window System.
• Open Bioinformatics Foundation – founded in 2001; hosted by SPI since 2012. Hosts around 10 bioinformatics projects.
• Open Source Geospatial Foundation – founded in 2006; hosts roughly 25 projects related to geospatial technology.
• OSADL – founded in 2005; supports the development of various projects, mostly Linux-based, for the machine tool and automation industries.
• Xiph.Org Foundation – founded in 1994 as the "Xiphophorus Company"; became a non-profit under its current name in 2003. Directly develops, and supports outside development of, multimedia-related software and formats.

Project-specific organizations

A large number of single-project organizations (often called "foundations") exist; in most cases, their primary purpose is to provide a mechanism to bring funds from the software's users, including both individuals and companies, to its developers.

• .NET Foundation – founded in 2014; supports the development of open-source projects around the (proprietary) .NET Framework.
• Alliance for Open Media – founded in 2015; attempting to develop a royalty-free video format.
• Apache Software Foundation – founded in 1999; manages the development of the roughly 100 Apache software projects, including the Apache HTTP Server.
• Blender Foundation – founded in 2002; supports the development of the computer graphics software Blender.
• CE Linux Forum – founded in 2003; supports the development of Linux for consumer electronics devices.
• Django Software Foundation – founded in 2008; supports the development of the web framework Django.
• The Document Foundation – founded in 2012; supports the development of the office suite LibreOffice.
• Drupal Association – founded in 2009; does advocacy of the Drupal content management system, including running the DrupalCon conference.
• Eclipse Foundation – founded in 2004; supports the development of the roughly 40 Eclipse projects, including the IDE Eclipse.
• F# Software Foundation – founded in 2013; supports the development of the F# programming language.
• Firebird Foundation – founded in 2002; supports the development of the relational database Firebird.
• FreeBSD Foundation – founded in 2001; supports the development of the operating system FreeBSD.
• GNOME Foundation – founded in 2000; coordinates the development of the GNOME desktop environment.
• KDE e.V. – founded in 1997; supports the development of desktop applications by the KDE community.
• Kuali Foundation – founded in 2005; develops the Kuali family of enterprise resource planning software for higher education institutions.
• Linux Foundation – founded in 2007; supports the development of various Linux-related projects, most notably the Linux kernel. Also does advocacy, training and standards.
• Mozilla Foundation – founded in 2003; supports and manages development of the Mozilla project, in conjunction with the Mozilla Corporation, a for-profit company it owns.
• NetBSD Foundation – founded in 1995;^[2] supports the development of the operating system NetBSD.
• Open Invention Network – founded in 2005; acquires patent non-assertion promises from its members towards other organization members, focused on Linux
• Open Whisper Systems – founded in 2013; supports the development of the encrypted voice calling and instant messaging application Signal.
• OpenBSD Foundation – founded in 2007; supports the development of the operating system OpenBSD and its utilities.
• OpenStreetMap Foundation – founded in 2006; supports the development of the OpenStreetMap mapping software.
• Parrot Foundation – founded in 2008; supports the development of the Parrot virtual machine.
• Perl Foundation – founded in 2000; supports the development of the Perl programming language, including running Yet Another Perl Conference.
• Python Software Foundation – founded in 2001; supports the development of the Python programming language.
• The Rosetta Foundation – founded in 2009; develops the Service-Oriented Localisation Architecture Solution.
• Ruby Central – founded in 2002; supports and advocates for the use of the Ruby programming language.
• SIPfoundry – founded in 2004; develops the sipXecs communications system, and does related advocacy.
• Sourcefabric – founded in 2010 as a spinoff from the Media Development Investment Fund; develops software for independent news media organizations.
• Symbian Foundation – existed from 2008 to 2011; supported the development of the now-defunct Symbian operating system.
• VideoLAN – founded in 2009;^[3] supports the development of the VLC media player and related software.
• X.Org Foundation – founded in 2004; hosted by SPI since 2014. Does funding and advocacy related to the X Window System.
• XMPP Standards Foundation – founded in 2001 as the Jabber Software Foundation; renamed in 2007. Supports development around the XMPP communications protocol.

User groups

• Linux user group – the general term for organizations of Linux users; see Category:Linux user groups.
• PyLadies – founded in 2011; advocates for female participation in the Python community.

See also

• Ubuntu Foundation – created in 2005, but exists only as an emergency backup in case the company Canonical stops supporting Ubuntu.

References

1. X.Org Is Formally Invited To Become An SPI Project, Michael Larabel
2. About the NetBSD Foundation
3. VideoLAN – History