4 BlueHats prizes of € 10 000 in 2024

The French public administration is rewarding maintainers of critical Free Software that it uses. Its Free Software unit (an OSPO) has partnered with NLnet to put four notable projects in the spotlight and award them the BlueHats 2024 prizes.

Anyone can nominate projects using the form on this page. The nominated projects will be evaluated by a jury and a new choice will be announced on the first of April, May, June and July. The chosen project will be featured on this webpage with the jury report and will receive a prize of € 10000 to be spent freely.

Why BlueHats

BlueHats are civil servants who promote using and developing Free Software in public administrations.

The winning projects

April 2024: dnsmasq
May 2024: to be announced in May 2024
June 2024: to be announced in June 2024
July 2024: to be announced in July 2024

Nominate a project

You can nominate a project for the BlueHats prize. For a project to be eligible, it should:

be used by at least one agency of the French administration,
be maintained by a natural person or a non-profit association or foundation,
have a license recognized as a Free Software license by both the OSI and the FSF.

Projects may be nominated for a number of reasons: the quality of the code, documentation, governance, and number of external contributors may be outstanding. Or the contribution to the administration autonomy and transparency might be notable. Or you may know of other reasons why a project is excellent.

You may want to check code.gouv.fr to see whether the project is listed here. Projects not in this list of dependencies can also be nominated.

Nomination
Please provide the details of the project that you wish to nominate.
Name of the project
Website of the project
Which public agency uses it?
Motivation: why does this project deserve to win the BlueHats prize?
Contact information
You will receive a copy of your nomination by e-mail.
Your name
Your email
Your affiliation
I have read and understood NLnet’s Privacy Statement. I agree that the NLnet and the French Free Software unit at DINUM can collect, use, and share my personal information as described in the statement. I also understand that I have rights over my personal information, such as the right to access, correct, or delete it.

Questions concerning the nomination process can be sent to NLnet or DINUM's Free Software unit.