April 29, 2026
Commit drama goes national
Soft launch of open-source code platform for government
Dutch government dumps Big Tech code homes and commenters are absolutely losing it
TLDR: The Dutch government has launched a new homegrown platform for sharing public software, aiming to keep control in its own hands instead of relying on major tech companies. Commenters are thrilled but also roasting how late it took, with side arguments about whether governments should run even more of the digital world.
The Dutch government has quietly flipped the switch on code.overheid.nl, a new home for publicly shared government software built on Forgejo, an open alternative to the usual Silicon Valley giants. In plain English: the Netherlands wants its own place to store and build code, on its own servers, under its own control. It’s only a pilot for now, and not every government office can join yet, but the reaction online was less “neat update” and more finally, about time.
The loudest mood by far? National pride mixed with long-simmering frustration. One self-described “proud dutchie” cheered that the government seems to be moving away from GitHub, while another Dutch commenter said they’d spent years begging government departments to embrace open source and got basically ignored. That sparked a mini soap opera of bureaucratic heartbreak: people who wanted to help, tried to help, and got ghosted. The vibe was very you love to see it, but wow did this take forever.
Then came the hot takes. One commenter zoomed out and argued that governments probably should control critical digital infrastructure, even app stores and operating systems, which turned the thread from software launch to full-on sovereignty debate. Others compared the Dutch move to Germany’s opencode.de, giving the whole thing a subtle Eurovision-of-government-tech energy. And there was one deliciously confused reaction to a project that turns legal rules into machine-readable decisions: essentially, “Can someone explain why this exists like I’m a normal person?” Honestly, same.
Key Points
- •The Dutch government has launched code.overheid.nl as a government-wide platform for publishing and developing open-source software.
- •The platform is fully self-hosted and is intended to support digital sovereignty.
- •The current rollout is a pilot built on Forgejo, described as an open-source European alternative to GitHub and GitLab.
- •Not all government organisations can use the platform yet during this pilot phase.
- •The initiative was started by the Open Source Program Office at BZK with DAWO (SSC-ICT), Opensourcewerken, and developer.overheid.nl as collaborators.