Open Source Federal Income Tax Software

niiler writes "There is finally a usable US federal income tax program for Linux users who don't wish to file online. TaxGeek is a Mozilla-based US income tax program that includes Form 1040, Schedules A, B, C, C-EZ, D, E, K-1 (1065), SE (Short and Long), W2, Forms 8880, 8853, 8863, 8812, 5695, 4952,3903, 2106, 2106ez, 2441 with access to most other files as PDFs. It is intended to be extensible so that developers can easily add other forms that are needed without affecting the existing file formats and stored data. TaxGeek will also create PDFs of all the supported forms so that you can print them and send them in to the IRS. (PDF creation support requires the installation of Perl PDF::Reuse.) At this point, e-filing is not supported."

Comments

Re:A step in the right direction, I think.

[darthpenguin]

Government support is unlikely, according to this excerpt from the FAQ:
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6. Why can't I e-file with this program?

Because of the lack of cooperation of the IRS and the API. When I wrote to the IRS regarding this, I received the following reply:

Thank you for your inquiry.

The government believes that private industry, given its established expertise and experience in the field of electronic tax preparation, has a proven track record in providing the best technology and services available. In addition, the government believes a partnership with private industry will: provide taxpayers with higher quality services by using the existing expertise of the private sector; maximize consumer choice; promote competition within the marketplace; and meet objectives in the least costly manner to taxpayers.

We hope the above information will prove helpful to you.

Sincerely,
The IRS Website Support Team

I suspect that there will either need to be an outcry, or we will need to present this project as a corporation of sorts for cooperation from the IRS. For more info, see the previous FAQ entry.
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April 18

[ballmerfud]

Subject : [TAX GEEK] Announce
Date: April 18, 2007

We are pleased to announce our latest update of Tax Geek, which fixes a critical off-by-one error in the previous release, which could in some cases lead to (severe) inaccuracies. Please update your current version ASAP. As always, if you find any additional errors, please submit bug reports (and preferably patches) on Source Forge, and Joe will look into when he gets home from class.

The Tax Geek Team