"People invited have been very interested in sharing ideas and working together where it makes sense," Waugh said. "We've had a lot of interest from around the world in what Australia is doing with open source, particularly since the [AGIMO open source procurement] guide."

As an example, Waugh said, the successful work of the National Archives with open source should be a learning experience for other departments.

"Malaysia will be speaking about the many initiatives it has done [as the] government has taken the challenge to [deploy open source] for internal use," she said.

Open source aside, Waugh said Malaysia is an "interesting lesson for Australia" because 70 percent of its IT industry is female.

"Up until recently Malaysia had issues getting women in IT," she said. "But separating primary computer classes into girls and boys, and computer clubs for boys and girls at a young age, had a huge impact for girls to go into computers."