I will hold it, I guess.
So I'm a product manager at denim, working on last feed
docs, which is a note-taking, real-time note-taking,
and documentation platform.
Today we'll be talking about the role of libraries
as infrastructure to build products.
And we'll have three cores in this menu.
First, we'll be a short last feed docs intro.
Then a testimony by USF about blocknotes
cooperation with us, denim, and then we'll
propose a playbook for collaboration with first libraries.
So going right into it, let's read docs.
So what is it, it's this, it's the application
you're seeing on the screen, and you might ask why
and other not taking application.
Well, we work in the government.
There's a lot of world document out there.
And I really like this screenshot in French
from Reddit, who basically says, well, this
is like a bad restaurant with a thousand mediocre options.
I couldn't have phrased it better.
So in docs, you have very few options.
No, not much formatting.
You come choose your phone, you come choose your spacing,
you just write your contents, use some sort of cat,
and you're done.
So basically, this is what this docs, you write text,
you format a little, you collaborate in real time.
So you see the cursors of your friends.
And what's nice is because it's web first.
It's also suited for documentation.
So you can put docs inside docs.
You publish a link, and you have a documentation platform.
Believe it or not, it was quite a success
in the open source community.
Someone published it on a hacker news.
And it was a huge success.
It wasn't the front page for two days.
And now Docs is a 15K plus star project on GitHub.
It's probably the most star repository in the French government.
And you can see it was, this is Hacker News, boom.
And I love because Hacker News is super drama,
and you have like, Americans saying, like, it really feels
like we are in a time where the EU countries
are taking front and center on the world stage,
with school, progressive, and unified stuff.
And the US is in the ally, it's not in crack.
Go Europe.
So first and foremost, Docs is the proof that EU cooperation
between member states can make great software.
So government can code, and they should code,
if they want to have real autonomy.
And also, it's a great success story of direct cooperation
with OSS libraries that make Doc possible.
Docs at the government were not doing the hard stuff.
We are just doing a jungle application,
plugging OIGC doing some permissions on the docs,
handling the subdocs and the UI.
This guy is doing the hard stuff with a few other libraries.
Basically, the hard stuff is what you're seeing here in the middle.
Where people collaborate in real time,
you have really metal mats going on down there,
that are called CRDTs, config, conflict resolution,
data types that allow people to work on different versions
of a document and have the conflicts resolved in real time.
This is pretty crazy that we have this in open source
these days, 10 years ago, no way.
And now we can just do this project.
Like Docs has only one and a half years old.
And it's already looking pretty sleek.
So we also do a lot of stickers,
because Docs is not only a French project.
It's a German and Dutch project.
That's why we have Baguette, Goudar,
and the Bratzel behind the European computer.
We believe that CRDT is so crucial to collaboration
that we change the slogan of the French Republic
to liberty, equality, serdity, of course.
We welcome every word user as refugees inside Docs.
We feel you, we feel for you of his users,
you're living a nightmare, your document format,
is a black box.
Come to Docs, he will be much better.
If you want, you can join me on this document
by scanning this QR code.
I'm gonna publish the document.
It's already published.
We should see people, oh sorry, the QR code.
Yeah, if someone, I'm seeing some scans.
Okay, and now people are messing with my document.
This is the beauty of collaboration.
One day you go on scratch pad, official scratch pad.
We had a really bad experience of conspiracy theory
and sexual content.
So I'm not doing public documents anymore.
But I have the perfect feature for that.
We have a history version and I can just restore
back my document to normal without the mess you just created
and I will lock my documents because now you have the URL
and you can actually make me give me a lot of trouble.
And I will put it in private because why is this public as well?
Okay, shit.
Okay, okay, hang on, hang on, yes, here, the document.
Oh no, all right, maybe the document above.
Anyways, don't mess with medic.
I don't remember, I don't remember where the master of the document is.
Anyway, I will restore again and we are switching to UCF now.
We've been collaborating for at least a year and a half now.
We send this with denim and it has a presentation for you.
Thank you.
Not sure if I can top this.
There you go.
There's no people going to insert funny emojis in my slides.
We need collaborative slides then as well.
So maybe next year.
Cool, so I'm a UCF of a long history in startups.
A little bit shorter in open source.
Actually, as part of this history, I built many products also on top of open platforms.
Only to find out later after building cool stuff and after getting a lot of people.
Using it, that those so-called open platforms run by US companies.
Then suddenly shut down the platforms as soon as you come competitive.
So I'm really excited here now to be working in the open source space to really show what's possible and that we can do things in a different way.
So that brought us to our mission.
Yeah, how can we bring the modern editing layer that Europe can rely on?
Yeah, quick show guys.
If what block now this, you're just in the editor, but it's kind of like the editing components.
This is a demo with AI integration collaboration that you just played around with all the menus.
So we try to make this simple and have all the things that you might need to build in.
Why does this matter?
A little bit to put it in context.
Of course, everyone in the office, which you do all day, is collaborate on documents.
And these kind of workflows.
Traditionally, you do this in software dominated by Microsoft Google or VC back challenges, challenges like notion.
And yeah, if we have good open source software that can power this, we can build our own things like dogs, like something you want to build yourself.
And take back control, create independent alternatives.
As I mentioned, we try to do this in a new way.
So we held off outside investors and want to do this independently.
And yeah, not as it started up chasing exit opportunities.
Originally, I think they also deserve a shoutout.
The initial R&D was based on another project and that was mainly found by NLNet.
So without them, this wouldn't have been possible.
Now of the last year or so, so I think 2025 for us was really a year where we grew something that kind of started as a side project to something that, yeah, now has a small team supporting it.
So away back there.
So this small team, like professionalizing the features, growing an organization around it, and really making it more sustainable.
And also the stuff that we've been able to do has been funded by the collaboration with Tzendis and Dinem.
So that's been really, really important for us in this phase.
And then we also have business sponsors at C-Tratio have a little bit of diverse streams.
To put this into context, because this talk is about funding libraries.
And of course, with open source, you have open source applications.
You have libraries, maybe have foundations.
So you just saw Docs, which really sits at the application layer.
So that's the thing that the end user uses.
Docs is being built with block now that makes the integration for them easier.
But actually, we also rely on some very important, very successful open source foundations.
So we directly also collaborate with YGS, with Kevin, who, unfortunately, is unfortunately for him.
He happens to be skiing and couldn't make it here.
But also pros, mayor, for some of the foundational stuff.
So this is really a collaboration of different open source things together for an ecosystem.
What I thought might be interesting for this room is to, of course, we talk about the theory of the benefits of open source.
To, with our use case, make this a little bit more tangible and really take that from theory to practice.
I'll walk you through, I think, some of the advantages that we already see or the impacts that we have across these categories.
So the first one is obvious.
So the tools, yeah, your mission, Adina and other mission.
And then this is to enable digital autonomy.
So that was what we're doing with last suite.
But then also we see other companies now who are building part of open desk, for example.
So other open source companies like Open Project and XWC now because we're growing more mature,
also adopting block nodes and YGS in their system.
So, yeah, it becomes an even stronger ecosystem.
I think if you talk about talent.
So this, yeah, I don't think you can make, we know about the boss factor.
You cannot make open source sustainable without just relying on one person.
So this funding has been crucial for us to grow a small team.
Without the need for outside funding.
So for us, this has been really important.
And I think it's key also if you want to encourage technical talent to keep investing in open source.
And actually it can be a key benefit because if you look at this, this conference,
I think it's the only conference that I know that happens on the weekend.
It's because people are really passionate about this.
And it's really exciting for engineers for talented people to be working on open source.
Because you can impact so many other, you see other people building on top of what you build.
So it's also like a really key selling point.
I think there's many people telling the people locked inside of companies who would rather work on exciting open source projects.
But I currently not able to do so because a lack of funding, etc.
So I think that's a really, really key benefit.
Then more of the boring stuff, economy.
If we look at YGS, so there's this technology that's developed by Kevin and spirit famous,
like tomorrow in the local first bedroom, we'll talk a lot about it.
But there's like big companies building on this thing.
But it's also a very foundational company.
So if we look again at the layers that technology is built,
you have YGS, but then there's also companies around it.
But even these don't provide end user products.
Now these in their turn, they provide like infrastructure or in our case and editor.
That then enable like a gazillion of other companies that we can't even keep track of, right?
So that's the benefit.
If we talk about really investing in foundational stuff,
yeah, you get like an exponential amount of people,
developers, companies being able to build on this.
So yeah, obvious power of open source, but still cool to see.
Then for us, this is some of our clients using it.
And I think that's also fun or interesting to highlight.
We're talking about the global tech markets, the power dynamics there.
We actually see, we launched, for example, AI integration.
And we see lots of startups, including startups from Silicon Valley,
actually now using our software to build their products instead of the other way around.
So I think that's also a really positive impact.
Yeah, this kind of sum of that.
Then, of course, not all farm end games, there's some challenges.
I think we're all figuring this out together, right?
As a government, I think there's been a lot of talk in this room.
Okay, how do you, including my Julian just now?
Okay, how do you as a government invest in the open source?
There's no, from both sides, there's not really a playbook for that yet.
But it's important to figure this out.
This is like the mandatory XKCD.
I think everybody has seen 10 times, but still got to have maybe,
maybe a hundred times, but still put it in here.
Because that is the way it is.
And only, I think this is key message.
Like only sustainable, stable, revenue streams,
allow us to really grow teams.
And you need to be able to have teams that doesn't mean, like,
20 people, but you need to have some people to have that share responsibility.
Reduce that boss factor and also make sure that libraries can,
can stay maintained, so not just focus on building features,
but also keep them maintained in the long term.
So for us, like, I think for an open source project,
we're super, super fortunate to have this kind of collaboration.
That is really enabled a lot of for us this year.
But sometimes the funding is still unstable,
and this does make it difficult to make that next step.
I'm lucky, like, we have a little bit, sometimes I can,
I can bridge these financial gaps, but not every contributor or
maintainer is, yeah, has that possibility.
So there's a lot of opportunity being left on the table here.
Still challenging also to find different business models.
Like, I wouldn't want to rely purely on government collaborations.
You want diverse, right, revenue streams.
And of course, in building open source,
you're still giving a lot away for free.
And it's still difficult to actually do that.
I'm pretty confident we can, but it's still like, okay,
we're still exploring this.
And also, like, okay, this costs like now,
we have this public private sector partnership.
What does that mean?
What do we expect from each other?
So we're figuring out this playbook as we go,
and I think Fugile wants to share a little bit about that.
Yep.
So we thought the main problem that we identify
is that currently, like,
if you think of contracting IT contracting in general as a cake,
maintainers, they get the crops.
Usually it's the end product that gets the money to do the product,
sometimes financing what it needs,
but you don't even, as a maintainer,
you don't even get the piece of the cake.
Well, you do the work that is supporting all the people
that are above you.
So we are actually lucky enough to be able to work directly
with maintainers.
This is actually new, like, we are directly funding the libraries.
We are discussing with them, like, okay, what's your roadmap?
What's my roadmap?
If I finance this, like, is it worth it?
Is it good for you?
Is it good for me?
And you are able to get into that discussion?
And we are able to probably put, like,
flags on releases of libraries and say,
these friends finance comments.
Friends and Germany finance comments in blocknotes.
Friends and Germany finance attribution of edit in white days.
And white days is downloaded, like, millions of times every week.
So this is, I think, the piece that we need to figure out is, like,
these guys are actually companies, like, blocknotes of company.
White days is a company.
White are the not part of the contracting ecosystem.
White are not directly contracting these these guys,
because, I mean, like, this is the best ROI even if I speak with the finance dude.
I tell him, like, look at the ROI I have investing in libraries,
versus investing, like, in end user products.
Because libraries are actually used by all the end products.
So with yourself, we actually, like, wrote this document.
There are some comments also by Kevin.
You can scan this. This is a GitHub page where you can put issues.
You can put, pull requests.
But essentially, the playbooks, the playbook looks like this.
I just have one minute to go over a little bit more, five minutes.
So we sat down with, with yourself and Kevin.
And we say, okay, what is a good collaboration with maintainers?
Okay, so maybe, like, don't ask for exotic stuff that only you will use.
So first, I line on roadmap.
Let's find out the stuff that already is there that I also need.
A second one would be like, okay, it's cool that I invest with your libraries,
but libraries are ecosystems.
So they need to talk to each other.
So it's good to also find a standardization.
So maybe in the future, we might talk with yourself, like, hey, we are storing your weird formats.
How about, you make a format that talks to other documentaries.
Also, what we see is that people are very keen in investing features.
That's normal, like, as I said, you get your brand into the release note that soft power.
But once the future is out, the work just starts.
You know, like, the future is out there.
Then there are 10 versions where you need to fix a bunch of stuff.
Then there is compatibility with the rest of the code.
And the maintainer is basically taking on that all that costs on him.
And it's a small team always.
So like, I don't know, like, can we come up with some kind of rule where we say, like,
if I invest one, the 10-year-old in a future can I invest, like, three-year-old in the maintenance?
So I have some kind of balance because it's hard to put the price on maintenance,
but, like, a percentage on my budget feature would seem fair in our opinion.
Then, like, the problem is, like, how sustainable is defending?
The worst thing that can happen to a project this day,
I get 10-year-old, I do 50% of the project.
And then, I don't get the funding for the rest of the project.
My project is still, like, for six months.
I take that code again, I can put to trash because it's already outdated,
and I have to redo it again.
So, last time for the maintainer, lost money for the contractor, nobody wins.
Sustain funding, and actually, like,
defending the whole package of the feature you want to do, is crucial,
because otherwise, we are just wasting everybody's time and money.
Also, it's not because your contractor, private or public,
that you need to hide behind doors.
Like, if you are contracting with maintenance,
it's actually a good thing that you come inside the GitHub field,
or the GitLab field, and you put your issues,
and you put your plans out there,
and you say, actually, what is your plan with this library?
A citizen of open source, don't just say,
I need this by tomorrow, actually, like,
go in the issue, follow the issue, follow the updates,
look at the releases, like, don't just sit there thinking,
these guys are going to be done tomorrow,
because it doesn't work this way.
I have 10 dependencies, and maybe I'm relying on this guy to finish this,
and this other guy to finish this, though.
Not looking at what actually goes down in the libraries,
and investing into, it's not productive.
So you should be active, and if you are financing,
you should have people involved in following this project,
and that's how you will build it autonomy,
and also, self-power, because if you are inside there,
you can help make decisions for the future of the project.
And then, well, we already talked about this,
but every library has dependencies.
Open source is people standing on everyone's shoulders.
So you should definitely, like, we are working with blocknot.
JS with YJS, but we are not working yet with prosmear,
which is, like, a crucial dependency we have.
So we should look at, like, financing this person,
because, again, it's a solo maintainer.
YJS, surprise solo maintainer.
Only yourself has been able to grow a small team of three, four, four.
So we should, like, these guys are being downloaded millions of times,
every week, and it's a one-person job.
So we should think, like, okay, we can contract with these people.
We can give them a piece of the cake, and it's not that hard,
just like, let's look at the libraries we depend on,
because, as good as the libraries are, as good our product will be.
So, comment, scan that code,
then the effort on GitHub, and let's try to decide on a playbook,
so that we can actually directly work with libraries.
It will, I think, advance a lot, open source for everyone.
Do you want to add, uh...
No, thanks. Okay.
Thank you.