Press Release: Okular, world's first eco-certified software product!

Wed Mar 16 10:43:52 GMT 2022

Dear Jos,

yes, it is very exciting news for Okular and KDE! :)

Thank you for your questions. The Blue Angel award criteria for desktop 
software can be found here:

https://www.blauer-engel.de/en/productworld/resources-and-energy-efficient-software-products

You can find all of KDE's Blue Angel applications at the following link, 
including for Okular. Unfortunately, we received no specific feedback 
from RAL, the awarding body, beyond successful fulfillment of the criteria.

  https://invent.kde.org/teams/eco/blue-angel-application

KDE Eco and allied organizations like SDIA's SoftAWARE project are 
working on tools for measuring energy consumption and integration into 
CI pipelines. KDE Eco is currently planning to set up a community lab at 
KDAB Berlin in the very near future (April?). We will document the 
process so others can follow our lead, and of course the lab will be 
available for KDE and the FOSS community. The first step to driving down 
the energy consumption will be measuring how much energy a program 
already consumes. For CI integration check out the SoftAWARE project:

   https://sdialliance.org/steering-groups/softawere

By the way these are the kinds of conversations we are pushing in the 
KDE Eco project. All are welcome to join through one of our many 
channels or at our monthly community meetup on the 2nd Wednesday of the 
month at 19 CET.

   https://eco.kde.org/get-involved/

All the best,

Joseph

On 3/16/22 11:26, Jos van den Oever wrote:
> Congratulations Okular!
> 
> Is the actual certificate available? I'd like to know what criteria are 
> part of Blauer Engel and how Okular scores on them. If this is easy to 
> find, other projects could know how to improve their software too. Did 
> certification lead to additions the the CI?
> 
> Best regards,
> Jos
> 
> Joseph P. De Veaugh-Geiss schreef op 2022-03-16 10:23:
> 
>> Apologies for cross-posting!
>>
>> [Deutsch unten]
>>
>> Today KDE is excited to announce that Okular, the multi-platform 
>> universal document viewer, is the first ever eco-certified computer 
>> program!
>>
>> *First Ever Eco-Certified Computer Program: KDE's Popular PDF Reader 
>> Okular*
>>
>>> The multi-platform Free and Open-Source Software product is now 
>>> officially recognized for sustainable software design
>>
>> https://eco.kde.org/blog/2022-03-16-press-release-okular-blue-angel/
>>
>> /Summary/: Okular, KDE's popular multi-platform PDF reader and 
>> universal document viewer, has officially been recognized for 
>> sustainable software design. In February 2022 Okular was awarded the 
>> Blue Angel ecolabel, the official environmental label awarded by the 
>> German government. Introduced in 1978, Blue Angel is the world's 
>> earliest-established environmental label, and Okular is the first 
>> software product ever to be certified with its seal. What is more, 
>> Okular is the first ️ever eco-certified computer program within the 30 
>> organizations of the Global Ecolabelling Network!
>>
>> Released under the GPLv2+ license, Okular is Free and Open-Source 
>> Software, and so it was also already fulfilling many of the user 
>> autonomy criteria necessary to obtain the Blue Angel seal of approval. 
>> Further work was carried out to make Okular fully compliant with all 
>> of the Blue Angel criteria, and become officially recognized as 
>> providing transparency in energy and resource consumption, extending 
>> the potential hardware operating life of devices, and enabling user 
>> autonomy.
>>
>> Today we are celebrating the achievement together with the wider Free 
>> Software community [1], as well as with the computer science 
>> department at Umwelt Campus Birkenfeld [2], where researchers measured 
>> the resource and energy-consumption of Okular and other KDE software.
>>
>> KDE and the Free Software community would like to send a heartfelt 
>> thank you to the Okular developers for making environmentally-friendly 
>> software for all of us!
>>
>> Mastodon toot: https://mastodon.social/web/@BE4FOSS/107965444323062309
>>
>> Best wishes,
>> Joseph P. De Veaugh-Geiss
>>
>> [1] https://fsfe.org/news/2022/news-20220316-01.en.html
>> [2] 
>> https://www.umwelt-campus.de/en/forschung/projekte/green-software-engineering/news-details/first-blue-angel-for-software 
>>
>>
>> == Deutsche Version ==
>>
>> KDE freut sich, heute ankündigen zu können, dass Okular, der 
>> plattformübergreifende universelle Dokumenten-Viewer, das erste 
>> öko-zertifizierte Computerprogramm überhaupt ist!
>>
>> Pressemitteilung: 16. März 2022
>>
>> *Erstes öko-zertifiziertes Computerprogramm überhaupt: KDEs beliebter 
>> PDF-Reader Okular*
>>
>>> Das plattformübergreifende Freie- und Open-Source-Software-Produkt 
>>> ist nun offiziell für nachhaltiges Software-Design anerkannt
>>
>> https://eco.kde.org/blog/2022-03-16-press-release-okular-blue-angel/
>>
>> /Zusammenfassung/: Okular, KDEs beliebter plattformübergreifender 
>> PDF-Reader und universeller Dokumenten-Viewer, ist offiziell für 
>> nachhaltiges Softwaredesign ausgezeichnet worden. Im Februar 2022 
>> wurde Okular mit dem Umweltzeichen Blauer Engel ausgezeichnet, dem 
>> offiziellen Umweltzeichen der deutschen Bundesregierung. Der Blaue 
>> Engel wurde 1978 eingeführt und ist das älteste Umweltzeichen der 
>> Welt. Okular ist das erste Softwareprodukt, das mit diesem Siegel 
>> zertifiziert wurde. Darüber hinaus ist Okular das erste jemals 
>> öko-zertifizierte Computerprogramm innerhalb der 30 Organisationen des 
>> Global Ecolabelling Network!
>>
>> Okular wurde unter der GPLv2+-Lizenz veröffentlicht, ist also eine 
>> freie und quelloffene Software und erfüllte somit bereits viele der 
>> Kriterien der Benutzerautonomie, die für die Verleihung des Blauen 
>> Engels erforderlich sind. Es wurde weiter daran gearbeitet, dass 
>> Okular alle Kriterien des Blauen Engels erfüllt und offiziell 
>> anerkannt wird, da es Transparenz beim Energie- und 
>> Ressourcenverbrauch bietet, die potenzielle Hardware-Lebensdauer von 
>> Geräten verlängert und die Autonomie der Nutzer*innen ermöglicht.
>>
>> Heute feiern wir diese Erfolge gemeinsam mit der Free Software 
>> Foundation Europe [1] sowie mit der Informatikabteilung des 
>> Umwelt-Campus Birkenfeld [2], wo Forscher*innen den Ressourcen- und 
>> Energieverbrauch von Okular und anderer KDE-Software gemessen haben.
>>
>> KDE und die Freie-Software-Community möchten den Okular-Entwicklern 
>> ein herzliches Dankeschön dafür aussprechen, dass sie 
>> umweltfreundliche Software für uns alle entwickelt haben!
>>
>> Mastodon toot: https://mastodon.social/web/@BE4FOSS/107965444323062309
>>
>> [1] https://fsfe.org/news/2022/news-20220316-01.en.html
>> [2] 
>> https://www.umwelt-campus.de/en/forschung/projekte/green-software-engineering/news-details/first-blue-angel-for-software 
>>

-- 
Joseph P. De Veaugh-Geiss
BE4FOSS Project and Community Manager (KDE Eco)
OpenPGP: 8FC5 4178 DC44 AD55 08E7 DF57 453E 5746 59A6 C06F

---
KDE Eco: Building Energy-Efficient Free Software!

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