Textual VS openfisca-france

Textual's source is on GitHub, and the most recent commit was only 4 months ago, so it appears it's still being worked on.

Textual¹ is open-source but sells the precompiled app. Keka² has the app available for free on GitHub but charges for it on the Mac App Store, to support development.

¹ IRC client for macOS: https://github.com/Codeux-Software/Textual

² Un/archiver for macOS: https://github.com/aonez/Keka

Textual is often the most recommended IRC client for macOS. You can buy it for $7.99 or you can simply build it from source. Let us look at how to do exactly that.

Textual is a good example of this working IRL for me. Their app is one of the best IMO IRC clients on MacOS, is open source [1] and is also sold on the App store and their site.

1. https://github.com/Codeux-Software/Textual#original-limechat...

2. https://www.codeux.com/textual

Textual: https://www.codeux.com/textual/

Two quick examples: Keka and Textual[2] are both open-source and you can pay for them on the Mac App Store or by direct payment. The former gives you compiled builds either way, the latter only if you pay.

[1]: https://github.com/aonez/Keka

[2]: https://github.com/Codeux-Software/Textual

The french initiative started in 2013 is still alive (last commit a few days ago), and passes the gov test suite (they keep in touch with our version of the IRS): https://github.com/openfisca/openfisca-france

The way we got this is interestingly twisted.

French citizens requested the software used by the administration, and they managed to get it!

But, it's was written in Mlang is a proprietary language created by the french administration in the 90: https://github.com/MLanguage/mlang.

Someone then decided to create an OCaml compiler that takes mlang and emits python: https://arxiv.org/abs/2011.07966

As a result, we got we got open fisca. I know believe there are other techs in the mix...

A slide of the story: https://www.slideshare.net/Etalab/opening-up-the-french-tax-...

That line in the summary is a bit misleading. The authors didn't find a "bug" in any law - instead they found a corner case that wasn't included in an online tool hosted by the French government to estimate family benefits under French law:

> After close inspection of the OpenFisca code, a discrepancy was located with the Catala implementation. Indeed, according to article L755-12 of the Social Security Code, the income cap for the family benefits does not apply in overseas territories with single-child families. This subtlety was not taken into account by OpenFisca, and was fixed after its disclosure by the authors.

Here's the pull request for their fix to the benefits simulator: https://github.com/openfisca/openfisca-france/issues/1426