"In recent weeks, the military has launched a
collaborative platform called Forge.mil for its developers to share
software, systems components and network services.
"The agency also signed an agreement with the Open Source
Software Institute to allow 50 internally developed workforce
management applications to be licensed to other government
agencies, universities and companies.
"Taken together, the two developments show how the Defense
Department is trying to take advantage of Web-based communities to
speed up software development and reduce its costs."