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Links 3/5/2020: KaOS 2020.05 is Out and ODROID-Go Advance Improves



  • GNU/Linux

    • Audiocasts/Shows

    • Kernel Space

      • Linux 5.8 Will Finally Be Able To Control ThinkPad Laptops With Dual Fans

        Long overdue but for Lenovo ThinkPad laptops sporting two fans, the Linux 5.8 kernel will see the ability to control both fans.

        On the likes of the Lenovo ThinkPad P50, P51, P52, P70, P71, P72, P1 Gen1, P2 Gen2, X1 Extreme Gen1, and X1 Extreme Gen2 there are two fans that the Linux kernel's ThinkPad_ACPI driver will now be able to control.

      • Linux Device Mapper Adding An "Emulated Block Size" Target

        Device Mapper, a key piece to Linux Soft RAID, dm-crypt, and other storage capabilities, is with Linux 5.8 seeing the new EBS target. EBS allows for emulating a smaller block size than the native capabilities of the underlying storage device. The original use-case for DM EBS is for emulating 512 byte sectors on 4K native disks.

        The Device Mapper Emulated Block Size target supports logical block sizes from 512 to 4096 bytes. This new target was contributed by Red Hat. Basically it's similar to the 512e local block size emulation offered by some disk drives currently while this emulation is implemented within the Linux block layer for dealing with software that isn't optimized for 4K sectors.



      • Intel 11th Gen Rocket Lake CPUs Support Added To Linux Graphics Driver, Compatible With 400 & 500 Series Chipsets

        In the report, the source states that the first patches have been added to the Linux graphics driver that adds support for the Gen 12 Xe graphics featured on Intel's Rocket Lake CPUs. A total of 23 patches were included in the i915 Linux Kernel driver with over 700 lines of code. As of now, there are a total of 6 six PCI IDs for Xe graphics featured on Rocket Lake CPUs.

        [...]

        This is essentially referring to the mobile parts but we also confirmed in our exclusive report that Intel's Rocket Lake-S Desktop CPUs will be compatible with the newly introduced 400-series for the desktop platform including the Z490 motherboards. This has further been confirmed by board makers such as Gigabyte who revealed that next-gen Rocket Lake CPUs will be compatible with their Z490 lineup.

    • Applications

      • Android Screen Mirror Tool ‘Scrcpy’ Adds Rotation Lock, Improves Quality

        Handy mobile tool scrcpy app gains rotation locking and improved quality on smaller displays in its latest release.

        If you’re not familiar with scrcpy it’s a small app that lets you mirror your Android phone screen on your desktop via a USB cable (or wirelessly using android adb). You can interact with your device and all of its apps using a regular mouse/touchpad and keyboard.

        What’s particularly great about Scrcpy is that it is open source, cross platform (works on Windows, macOS and Linux), and doesn’t require any sort of root access. You just plug and play.

      • The 10 Best Linux Speed Reading Tools Available in 2020

        In this modern era, people hardly get time for distraction-free reading. Everyone wants to read more in less time. For this reason, people have developed many speed reading techniques. Nowadays, the readings are mostly done on digital screens rather than on paper pages. You will be amazed to know that there are many speed reading tools made for your smart device or computer to speed up your reading. Some people have developed their skills so far that these tools let them read up to a thousand words per minute. This is insane, right? But this thing is possible. So, if you are a Linux user, you can skim a few news articles while waiting for the morning coffee by using a Linux speed reading tool.

    • Instructionals/Technical

    • Games

      • The 20 Best War Strategy Games for Android Device in 2020

        More or less, everybody loves to play war strategy games on android. As a 90’s kid, you must be familiar with the pc game of Starcraft, Age of the empire, Civilization II, and other strategical war games. Such games are available to play on any android devices. Hundreds of army/military strategy games take a new revelation on android gaming sectors. By the time, it gets a high turnover on war strategy gaming position onto play store. Day-by-day, the users involve more and more into these war games. With lots of tactics, planning, brain streaming facts come while you are playing such war strategy games on your android phone.

    • Desktop Environments/WMs

    • Distributions

      • New Releases

        • elementaryOS 5.1.4 Is a Massive Update, New Features Announced

          elementaryOS 5.1.4 brings massive improvements to the operating system, including lots of new features and under-the-hood refinements that the developing team has recently shared in a blog post.

          More specifically, this new update renames Parental Controls to Screen Time & limits, but also introduces new capabilities, such as the possibility of setting special rules for any account, including your own. Previously, this was limited to non-administrator accounts.

          The Applications Menu has also received new polishing for trackpacks, as the dev team wanted to improve responsiveness and fluidity. The keyboard navigation and performance and the a scrollable list for the category view have also been added here.

        • KaOS 2020.05

          KaOS is very proud to announce the availability of the May release of a new stable ISO.

          This release is unlike the February version, not about many new features, but rather about updates and rebuilds. Most of the base of this distribution has been rebuild on a new GCC 9.3.0, Glibc 2.31 & Binutils 2.34 based Toolchain. Other rebuilds were needed for ICU 66.1, Boost 1.72.0, Krb5 1.18, Glib2 2.64.2 based stack, Guile 2.2.6, Mesa 20.0.6, NetworkManager 1.22.10, Perl 5.30.2, Linux 5.6.8 and Qt 5.14.2.

          [...]

          KaOS’ creation Croeso (Welsh for welcome) for helping with configuring a new install is included. It will run on the newly installed system and offers to adjust some 15 commonly used settings, includes a custom Wallpaper selector, distribution info and the option to select packages to install from six different groups. It is written in QML and fits well with the Welcome application used in the Live system. The latter includes an Installation Guide.

      • SUSE/OpenSUSE

        • iValue Partners With SUSE To Offer Open Source Solutions For Enterprise Digital Transformation

          iValue InfoSolutions announced it is partnering SUSE, the world’s largest independent open source company to offer leading enterprise-grade, open source solutions for Linux, software defined infrastructure and application delivery that give enterprises greater control, flexibility and cost efficiency while businesses undergo digital transformation.

          Entering its 13th year of operation, iValue, has continued to stay ahead of the curve by consistently partnering with the right mix of popular and niche technology providers thus helping customers in their digital transformation journey.

      • IBM/Red Hat/Fedora

        • Women in Open Source Award winners announced

          The winners of both the 2020 Women in Open Source Community and Academic Awards are currently involved in open-source projects that are directly or indirectly associated with COVID-19 related projects.

          However, their activities in this field were not the reason for their success in the Red Hat-sponsored annual awards which attract nominations from around the world.

          The winners, who each received a US$2 500 “stipend” for the suggested use of supporting open source projects or efforts, were announced during the Red Hat Summit 2020 Virtual Experience this week.

          Megan Byrd-Sanicki, manager of research and operations at the Open Source Program Office at Google, won the 2020 Community Award for her “leadership in creating sustainable and thriving open source communities”. She is currently involved with Covid Act Now, a COVID-19 data modelling project.

        • Crossvale, Inc. Wins Red Hat North American Partner Award

          Crossvale, a Red Hat APEX Partner, is proud to announce it has been named NA Leading Edge Partner of the Year by Red Hat, Inc., the world's leading provider of open source solutions. This award is part of the annual Red Hat North American Partner Awards, which aim to honor partners for continued efforts to support customers on the path to IT modernization.

          Crossvale was honored for its dedication to providing innovative open source solutions to customers in the commercial and public sectors. Specifically, Crossvale was recognized for the outstanding use of the Red Hat platforms and solutions.

        • What's New In Open Source With The Latest TRs

          New technology is exciting. And when it can help you run your business more profitably or efficiently, well, it becomes very exciting. With IBM i, the open source community is arguably the biggest contributor of new technology to the platform. IT Jungle recently checked in Jesse Gorzinski, the IBM i open source architect, to hear how the open source story has improved with the recent technology refreshes.

          Arguably the biggest open source-related enhancement with IBM i 7.4 TR2 and 7.3 TR8 revolves around a change in RPM, the new delivery method that IBM adopted two years ago to distribute new and updated open source libraries to IBM i users.

          Up until now, IBM i shops had to connect their IBM i server to the Internet to access the RPM repository that contains IBM i distributions of open source software, such as Node.js, Python, and PHP. But thanks to the new support for SSH tunneling in this month’s unveiling of 7.4 TR2 and 7.3 TR8, customers can now shuttle the open source libraries from an adjacent PC workstation running ACS, eliminating the need to expose the IBM i server to the Internet.

    • Devices/Embedded

      • The new ODROID-Go Advance adds WiFi and more buttons (Linux handheld game console)

        The Hardkernel ODROID-Go Advance is an inexpensive portable gaming device with a 3.5 inch display, an quad-core ARM Cortex-A35 processor, and Ubuntu Linux software. Designed for emulating classic game consoles, Hardkernel introduced the device late last year and began shipping it earlier this year.

        Now the company is preparing to launch a new batch, and it includes a number of hardware updates.

      • ODROID-Go Advance Black Edition Gets WiFi, R2/L2 Button, and USB-C Power Input

        At the end of last year, Hardkernel launched ODROID-GO Advance portable Linux retro game console powered by a Rockchip RK3326 processor with 1GB RAM, and a 3.5″ color display. While it was fairly well-received, people wished it would not come with a large power barrel jack and included WiFi among a few other requests.

        COVID-19 also delayed mass-production of the device, but the silver lining is that the company decided to make a new revision 1.1 PCB with a USB-C port for power input, a WiFi module, and R2 and L2 buttons that’s planned to launch soon under the name ODROID-Go Advance Black Edition.

      • Open Hardware/Modding

        • Build Your Own 3D Printed Open Source Motorized Microscope

          I always enjoy a good 3D printed DIY project, whether it’s truly helpful or just for fun. These projects are even cooler when you add Legos into the mix, like Reddit user DIY_Maxwell did. He posted about his work using 3D printing, Arduino, Raspberry Pi, and Lego bricks to make an open source, motorized microscope. But, the microscope itself is not fully 3D printed – instead, the body was built with Lego bricks and some 3D printed components. What makes this project more awesome is the stop motion-style video he made showing the various parts of the project and how they all fit together to make a working microscope.

        • Before We Welcome Open-Source Ventilators With Open Arms, We Need to Talk About IP

          Medical device manufacturers have been historically secretive about their designs. Now, they've flung the doors open on ventilator specs. Could this lead to sticky IP problems down the line?

          With the global COVID-19 crisis, medical manufacturing companies have pushed ventilator productions to its limits. But still, it hasn't been enough. These medical device manufacturers cannot produce ventilators as quickly as hospitals need them. As the race for medical equipment continues, certain medical device providers have made their ventilator designs public for third parties to help increase output.

        • Can Free Open Source Hardware Tackle The Shortage Of PPE And Ventilators During The Coronavirus Pandemic?

          While globally hospitals are grappling with the acute shortage of personal protective equipment (PPE) and ventilators, a group of researchers at the University of Sussex recently published a study that says free and open source hardware can help in meeting the ever-increasing demands in the midst of the COVID-19 crisis.

          Free and open source hardware refers to the blueprints for tools and new hardware designs that are available online for free for others to access. These blueprints can be studied, customized, modified, and even used for learning purposes to create face masks, PPE, diagnostic tools, valves, and even ventilators.

          In the PLOS Biology study, the authors suggest that this open source hardware can be used in disaster situations as these designs can be shared globally and have lower implementation costs to meet local needs as compared to mass manufacturing. These designs can be used even with the help of 3-D printers.

        • Boston Dynamics Open Sources Their Healthcare Robotics Toolkit

          Boston Dynamics has released a payload and application architecture for their mobile robot in order to protect healthcare workers amid COVID-19.

          In a recent blog post, the robotics firm stated — “Mobile robots play a vital role in removing people from dangerous environments. We have spent the last six weeks building and testing a payload and application architecture that would enable our robot — ‘Spot’ — to help reduce exposure of frontline healthcare workers to the novel COVID-19 virus.”

          The company further stated that it has developed and tested the payload, hardware, and software for this application in order to generalise it as well as make it easy to be deployed on other mobile robotic platforms with APIs and capacity for custom payloads.

        • Nvidia’s top scientist develops open-source ventilator that can be built with $400 in readily available parts
        • NVIDIA created a $400 open-source ventilator to combat COVID-19

          In the last two months of the fight against Coronavirus, many well-known companies undertake the development of mechanical ventilation devices – whether it is a British company, Dyson, electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla or auto giant General Motors.

          Recently, Bill Dally, a chief scientist at NVIDIA, has developed a low-cost, open-source pulmonary ventilator. It can be assembled quickly and could be used to treat patients with COVID-19 admitted to intensive care units (ICUs) and with severe respiratory problems. The price? $400.

        • NVIDIA Chief Scientist developed an open source ventilator that can be made under 100

          NVIDIA Chief Scientist Bill Dally has created an open-source design of a low-cost, ventilator that is also easy to assemble, as a contribution to the global fight against the Novel Coronavirus pandemic. Dally has developed the ventilator in just a few weeks and made it around readily available components.

          The ventilator that Dally has designed needs a proportional solenoid valve and a microcontroller. The scientist believes the ventilators can be assembled for a few hundred dollars.

          The ventilator can also be assembled in a few minutes. It can be attached to a simple display and packed into a Pelican carrying case. The prototype that Dally built was made using off-the-shelf components for $400 (roughly Rs 30,000). When produced at bulk, Dally believes manufacturers can shave off another $100. If 3D-print parts are used, the whole can be manufactured for under $100, which is quite impressive. According to NVIDIA, the cost of a traditional ventilator is around $20,000.

        • Open access hardware and 3D printing can help tackle demand for health supplies

          In a study published by PLoS Biology, Professor Tom Baden and Andre Chagas at the University of Sussex have suggested that this could be a viable option to provide our health services with the tools and equipment they so desperately need.

          The study provides an overview of the blueprints which are currently available for free online and which could be used to help in the fight against coronavirus, focusing on personal protective equipment, ventilators and test kits.

        • UJ creates cheap, open-source ventilator as Covid-19 spreads

          multidisciplinary team of engineers and healthcare practitioners at the University of Johannesburg (UJ) has used open-source designs to develop a cheap, minimal viable ventilator with elements that can be produced through 3D printing and laser-cutting techniques.

        • UJ creates low-cost, open-source ventilator prototype as Covid-19 infections increase

          The group has identified several simple, safe and scalable open-source designs that could meet the strict specifications for use on patients once these designs are further developed and tested.

          In response to the Covid-19 crisis in South Africa, a team of engineers and healthcare practitioners from the University of Johannesburg (UJ) aim to create low-cost open-source ventilators, reports Randburg Sun.

          According to the team from the Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment, the Covid-19 crisis has highlighted the skills shortage in facility and technical equipment maintenance at healthcare facilities in South Africa, and Africa at large.

        • UJ creates low-cost, open-source ventilators as Covid-19 infections increase

          In response to the Covid-19 crisis in South Africa, a team of engineers and healthcare practitioners from the University of Johannesburg (UJ) aim to create low-cost open-source ventilators.

          According to the team from the Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment, the Covid-19 crisis has highlighted the skills shortage in facility and technical equipment maintenance at healthcare facilities in South African, and Africa at large.

          Led by Dr Deon Sabatta and Dr Samson Masebinu, the group has identified several simple, safe and scalable open-source designs that could meet the strict specifications for use on patients once these designs are further developed and tested.

        • UJ designs open source, cheap ventilators to fight COVID-19

          The University of Johannesburg (UJ) has created open source, cheap ventilators to help fight the COVID-19 pandemic.

          South Africa has recorded 4 996 confirmed cases, 2 073 recoveries and 93 deaths to the coronavirus, to date.

          The university believes it may have the solution to help curb the effects of the devastating virus.

        • Amid SA’s looming shortage, UJ creates open-source, cheap ventilators

          As the world continues to fight the coronavirus pandemic, with over 2.3 million reported cases at the time of publishing this article, many countries are seeing a rise in cases – South Africa included.

          As of 28 April, the country has a total number of 4 793 confirmed cases, and 87 confirmed deaths. And, according to News24, Africa, and by extension South Africa, is not currently on the top of supply lists for life-saving ventilators.

    • Free, Libre, and Open Source Software

      • Every ProtonMail app now open source after beta phase

        ProtonMail is an encrypted mail service that has received its own Android app way back in 2016. The last related update was when ProtonMail mobile was updated to have encrypted contacts. Many things have happened since then but it’s only now that we are revisiting the service. All ProtonMail apps are now said to be open source which means more people will get to enjoy them in a more convenient way.

        A ProtonMail inbox can be accessed from some compatible apps. With the latest development, the apps you use are now open source. They have passed an independent security audit as the company behind it lives by the principle of transparency. With this in mind, ProtonMail is now open source so many people will understand the program better.

      • Encrypted email service ProtonMail makes Android app open-source

        Encrypted email service ProtonMail has made it’s Android app open-source.

        The service announced the move in a blog post, noting that with the ProtonMail Android app going open-source, now all its apps are open-source. That includes the ProtonMail web app, iOS app, Bridge desktop app and all ProtonVPN apps.

        “One of our guiding principles is transparency. You deserve to know who we are, how our products can and cannot protect you, and how we keep your data private. We believe this level of transparency is the only way to earn the trust of our community,” reads a line from the blog post.

      • Make It Easier For Your Software Project To Accept Contributions

        [Flameeyes] has heard complaints (and at times, he admits, has complained himself) about big companies not contributing improvements to projects they seem to find useful, or rolling their own implementation rather than use and contribute to an existing code base. Having recently left Google after seven years, he has some insights into some of the reasons big corporations (at least Google, anyway) may sometimes seem to eschew making code contributions, and some of the reasons might come as a surprise.

        There are things a corporation can do differently, but there are also some things that can be done on the project’s end to make accepting contributions easier. [Flameeyes] took some time to write out a few pointers on how to make it easier for others (particularly large corporations) to contribute code to a software project.

      • Classic Westwood strategy games live on as 'OpenRA' has a new major stable release

        OpenRA, the excellent free and open source RTS game engine for playing classic Westwood titles has a huge new release finally out as stable today.

        This stable release has been a long time coming too, as it's quite a big overhaul. With a more up to date rendering engine, along with proper zooming support it makes OpenRA feel a lot more modern with niceties you find in newer games. It also includes better HiDPI support with scaling, high-res artwork and other tweaks to be a more comfortable experience. Tiberian Dawn and Dune 2000 gained support for more missions, modding support expanded and the list goes on.

      • Couchbase goes cuckoo for Kubernetes with v2.0 release of Autonomous Operator

        The latest release from Couchbase finally includes support for Kubernetes, which is becoming something of a de facto standard among databases.

        Couchbase is a NoSQL database of the document-oriented kind, used by global players such as airline ticketing company Amadeus, American Express, Cisco and eBay.

        The Autonomous Operator for Kubernetes 2.0 is designed to allow developers and database managers to deploy Couchbase in any cloud with, so it hopes, as little work as possible.

      • How to value cloud-based open source software services

        The public cloud and open source software are pretty much coupled these days. No matter if you’re running Kubernetes-as-a-service, MySQL, Linux, or that open source text editor you’ve used since college, it’s all there for the taking, as-a-service.

        However, it’s really not free. Cloud providers charge for usage, either by time or other resource-units consumed. Indeed, it’s half or more of the cloud computing bills I’ve seen recently. Some enterprises have not yet used open source on premises, not to mention cloud. Now that they are moving to the public cloud, both developers and infrastructure engineers are finding some very compelling reasons to “go open” in the cloud.

      • Determined AI makes its machine learning infrastructure free and open source
      • Now is the time to Embrace Open Source – Servian

        I live in New Zealand currently under level 3 lockdown€¹ and work for a cloud services company, and I am assisting and supporting our clients through the economic slowdown. I understand that the human cost is more important than the economic price we are paying at the moment but we all need jobs to come back to when we appear out of hibernation in our homes. I hope that all of you are staying home and staying safe where ever you are.

        I am working with some essential NZ businesses and Government agencies, and industries that have completely blighted by Covid-19 lockdown like our New Zealand Tourist Industry. We also have a responsibility to our own employees within our own company to keep our business going so that we have a job throughout this crisis and come out the other end.

      • Interview: Greg and Keith Bentley discuss open source, 4D digital twins and more

        3D scanning is a key part of reality capture, but the next phase of “going digital” especially in architecture, engineering, and construction, is to create an ecosystem in which project designs keep up with construction, changes, and can provide valuable information throughout a building or asset’s lifetime. Bentley Systems has been focused on creating solutions that bring together reality capture inputs, but also to start to create “digital twins” that keep up with reality over time – bringing them into 4D.

      • Latest Version of Open Source IPFS Improves Performance

        IPFS is a distributed file system that makes use of a global namespace to connect all computing devices. The fundamental difference between IPFS and other distributed file systems is a decentralized system of operators who hold a portion of the overall data, which serves to create a highly resilient system for storing and sharing files. Any operator on the network can serve a file by its content address, and IT teams can find and request content from any node using a distributed hash table (DHT).

        Molly Mackinlay, project lead for IPFS and a senior product manager for Protocol Labs, which provides protocols, systems and tools to improve how the internet works, said the latest 0.5 update to IPFS significantly improves the content routing performance in addition to adding support for the Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocol.

      • Deploying OpenStack: Pick a Distribution With These 7 Qualities

        How do you know which is best? It’s an important question because, despite OpenStack’s popularity, companies often face serious challenges when adopting and deploying it. Put simply, OpenStack can be time-consuming and skill-heavy in order to deploy it, unless the chosen distribution is equipped to overcome those challenges.

        Thus, anyone planning to deploy OpenStack should make sure the distribution they pick meets the following seven criteria.

      • Commercial open source software startups will thrive during the coronavirus crisis, VCs say. Here are 31 they believe are poised for success
      • What Open Source Technology Can and Can't Do to Fix Elections
      • NEC’s world first open source 5G network could help stimulate Africa’s economy

        he world’s first 5G mobile network radios based on open and fully virtualised architecture, built by NEC in partnership with various vRAN platforms for Rakuten Mobile, will cut the costs to build and operate 5G networks, give operators the opportunity to lower tariffs and enable them to deliver a raft of new services to help the economy recover.

      • Open Source Automation Platform Lets DevOps Teams Define Infrastructure as Code

        Open-source DevSecOps company Chef this week released v16 of its Chef Infra infrastructure provisioning automation platform. This release adds half a dozen new features, including support for YAML, a new Unified mode, an automation upgrade for its "cookbooks," and expanded platform support.

        Chef Infra is designed to allow DevOps and infrastructure-and-operations teams to define infrastructure as code using simple, declarative definitions for common administrative tasks. Chef Infra "ensures painless migration and management with a single process to manage on-premises and cloud estates," the company says.

      • Monitor and Tune Your Open-Source Database for Maximum Performance
      • Events

      • COVID-19 Software

        • Blueprints for better healthcare: tackling supply demand with open source

          A new study has highlighted how free, open source hardware and 3D printing can help global healthcare systems tackle the demand for health supplies in light of the COVID-19 crisis.

          The burden of COVID-19 on healthcare systems could be alleviated if local communities were to use both open source hardware and 3D printing according to scientists at the University of Sussex.

          Free and open source hardware (FOSH) follows an ethos where blueprints for a tool are made freely available so that anyone can study, learn, modify, customise, and commercialise them.

        • How open-source medicine could prepare us for the next pandemic

          The old drug discovery system was built to benefit shareholders, not patients. But a new, Linux-like platform could transform the way medicine is developed—and energize the race against COVID-19.

        • Corona Diaries: Open-source project chronicles pandemic life via voice notes

          On March 28, 1944, the Dutch minister of education, Gerrit Bolkestein, sent a message to radio listeners asking them to “preserve your diaries and letters” of their experiences of World War II.

          “Only if we succeed in bringing this simple, daily material together in overwhelming quantity, only then will the scene of this struggle for freedom be painted in full depth and shine,” he said.

          As in 1944, the world faces an unprecedented challenge with the coronavirus pandemic. The outbreak has put tens of millions of people under lockdown, with restrictions preventing many from going outside except for essential trips.

          With some turning to their diaries to document this incredible time, fellows from Harvard University's Neiman Foundation for Journalism had a different idea to chronicle daily life.

        • This open-source project is looking for local solutions and responses to the coronavirus

          “At Outride.rs we cover global issues which have local impact — and there never was a bigger challenge than COVID-19 to show how something originating far away can influence our daily lives,” said Jakub Górnicki, Outriders co-founder, in an email with Poynter. “At the same time — we don’t do news. So we asked ourselves what we want to give our audience? And then we asked our community. And the answer is — sense of hope, ideas, solutions — something which will help them get through today and prepare for tomorrow.”

          The new project, launched today, is called Radar, and it’s meant to be an open marketplace to collect ideas and solutions to the many problems caused by COVID-19. And many of those responses and solutions can best be found in the work of journalists at the local level.

        • ‘Committed to Making Aarogya Setu Open Source Soon’: App Official

          The source code of Aarogya Setu, Government of India’s contact tracing app, will be made open to the scientific and research community soon, a top NITI Aayog official and member of the app’s core team has confirmed.

          At a time when the app has come under sustained criticism for lack of transparency, Arnab Kumar, Program Director, Frontier Technologies at NITI Aayog, said the app development team was “committed” to making Aarogya Setu “open source soon once the product has stabilised”.

        • COVIDSafe coronavirus contact-tracing app faces software bugs and lingering iPhone issues

          The app, which aims to speed up the process of identifying those who may have been exposed to COVID-19, uses Bluetooth to record encrypted IDs from nearby devices that also have the app.

          Almost one week since launch, the Government is yet to release its source code, but that has not stopped software specialists from dissecting it.

          The industry consensus so far suggests the app works largely as described — it does not collect your GPS location and deletes all information held on the app older than 21 days — but that some of its design could be improved.

        • COVIDSafe tracking app reviewed: the government delivers on data security, but other issues remain

          About 1.13 million people had downloaded the federal government’s COVIDSafe app by 6am today, just 12 hours after its release last night, said Health Minister Greg Hunt. The government is hoping at least 40% of the population will make use of the app, designed to help reduce the spread of the coronavirus disease.

          Previously dubbed TraceTogether – in line with a similar app rolled out in Singapore – the coronavirus contact tracing app has been an ongoing cause of contention among the public. Many people have voiced concerns of an erosion of privacy, and potential misuse of citizen data by the government.

        • FOSS Responders Group Brings Financial Help to Open Source Ecosystem Affected by COVID-19

          FOSS Responders is a working group of volunteers that aims to future-proof the open source infrastructure we rely on by helping sustain those who maintain the software. The group’s website allows those in need to apply for emergency funds. FOSS Responders is raising money on Open Collective and 100% of donations go to open source technologists in need. So far the group has an estimated annual budget of $8,145.05. Open Collective is also waiving its platform fees on COVID-19 solidarity collectives until the end of June. On May 22, FOSS Responders plans to host a virtual funding event to provide financial support for organizations affected by the profound economic disruptions caused by the pandemic. Organizers have a $5,000 goal for ticket revenue from general event ticket sales.

        • 28 covid apps used by Centre, States not open source, cannot be checked for vulnerabilities

          There has been an explosion of mobile apps since the covid-19 crisis began in the country.

          Apart from Aarogya Setu, the Centre and state governments are using at least 28 mobile applications to tackle the covid-19 pandemic.

          These apps have varied purposes — some disseminate information on cases, deaths and so on to users while others are used by officials to track people under quarantine.

          There is one common aspect to all of them: None of them is open-sourced.

          One of the most famous apps is the Centre’s Aarogya Setu, which collects users’ Bluetooth and location data to track their whereabouts and alert them if they come in contact with a covid-19 positive patient. The app, which has been controversial given privacy concerns, has been downloaded by over 7.5 crore people.

        • Hack the crisis: Open-source site helps engineers get organized to fight COVID-19

          “While there are many initiatives around the globe to encourage scientific collaboration, there is unfortunately little coordination among these teams.”

          So says Frédéric Vacher, Head of Innovation for the 3DExperience Lab at Dassault Systèmes. Dassault created an online Open COVID-19 Community which is designed to be a place where engineers, designers and manufacturers worldwide can work together on innovative solutions during the pandemic and stay in touch throughout the process.

        • Jesse Kline on COVID-19: Keeping government secure and saving taxpayer money with open source

          The company outright lied about using end-to-end encryption. We learned that it has access to decryption keys, meaning it can potentially snoop on conversations. A team from the University of Toronto found that the software was sometimes sending encryption keys through servers located in communist China, even if none of the participants in the call were from that country. And the term “Zoombombing” has entered the lexicon, with many meetings being spied on or actively disrupted by people spouting racism and displaying Nazi imagery.

        • Open-Source AI-derived drug discovery data to help combat COVID-19

          Recursion, a digital biology company industrialising drug discovery, released its open-source RxRx19 dataset; the first human cellular morphological dataset of SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19). The human cellular morphological data and over 1,600 small molecules has been released to help clinical researchers and machine learning experts around the world who are working to make advances in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.

        • Tech and Covid-19: open source needed for acceptance and success of contact tracing apps

          The inevitable and necessary responses to Covid-19 — from the lockdown itself, to the underlying and rapidly approved legislation behind it to the contact tracing apps that are now being developed — raise concerns about our civil liberties that in a different time would all have been hotly debated over a considerable time period. Thanks to Covid-19, time is no longer a luxury at humanity’s disposal.

      • CMS

        • Contegix Appoints Jon Pugh as Director of Product, Open Source

          Contegix, the leading provider of managed IT solutions and managed application solutions, announced that Jon Pugh, Drupal expert, evangelist and creator of DevShop, has joined the company as Director of Product, Open Source. In this role, Pugh is responsible for guiding the company's Drupal strategy to build products to ensure a seamless developer experience.

          [...]

          Contegix is committed to supporting the Drupal and Open Source DevOps communities, and is demonstrating that commitment by investing in the OpenDevShop platform. Contegix will continue to offer its BlackMesh Drupal support services to organizations with highly complex and secure deployments.

      • Public Services/Government

        • Climate technology must be open source, available at affordable cost: Prakash Javadekar

          Union Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar on Tuesday said just like the world is unitedly engaged in finding a vaccine for COVID-19, countries should work towards making climate technology an open source which must be available at affordable cost.

          He was speaking during the first virtual interaction with 30 countries in the 11th session of the Petersberg Climate Dialogue.

          India along with 30 other countries participated in the dialogue, deliberating over ways and means to tackle the challenge of reinvigorating economies and societies after COVID-19, while enhancing collective resilience and catalysing climate action as well as supporting particularly those that are most vulnerable.

      • Openness/Sharing/Collaboration

      • Programming/Development

        • Delphix: managing your data like code (Project Titan)

          Developers need data to run their applications throughout the entire development lifecycle.

          With Titan, they can manage the data for their application as they would with Git.

          The current problems developers face with their application data are similar to the days before code was under version control. These challenges include using out-of-date local copies, the inability to share their data sets with other developers… and time-consuming processes to work around the issues with their application data.

          Git has been fundamental in allowing application code to be better managed by a team rather than an individual. Each member has the ability to undo mistakes, maintain code history and experiment with new code.

          Git also enables teams to create many different workflows to increase productivity. Workflows can be as basic as a single branch with multiple commits, allowing developers to easily share their work and navigate through a range of commits. Collaboration workflows can be as complex as teams need them, and there are some notable ones like feature branching or Gitflow.

          Only then can teams determine how best to collaborate, share their work and ultimately release the product to the end user.

        • Geany a lightweight text editor

          Other relevant features is the recognition of YAML file syntax. Geany allows to see blank spaces, tabs, line returns, convert tabs to blank spaces (useful when editing a YAML file), compile and execute projects among other functionalities. Geany has a terminal integrated into the editor which allows executing the OS command without having to leave the development environment. Here are some screenshots.

        • 3 out of 5 developers contribute to open source, new Slashdata report claims

          Slashdata’s Developer Economics report examines data from over 17,000 developers from around the world. See what devs think about open source, the rise of Kotlin for mobile programming, and what emerging tech is trending. Keeping a finger on the pulse of the developer community is important. It helps us see the bigger picture of where we are now, how far we’ve come, and what things will likely look like in the future.

          Slashdata’s Developer Economics report examines data from over 17,000 developers from around the world. Survey respondents were asked about their favorite programming languages, their contributions to open source, rising tech trends, and more.

        • Why developers contribute to open source software

          SlashData also found that not all contributors are professional software developers, or even work within the software industry, and they’re far more likely to be involved in multiple development areas than non-contributors. This includes developing software for emerging sectors such as machine learning, artificial intelligence (AI), and augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) where innovations are mostly driven by open source tools.

          An interesting trend the survey identified was that the majority of software developers in the emerging sectors are hobbyists although the majority (57%) also work professionally in at least one other development area.

          The survey revealed that most developers have multiple reasons for contributing to open source. Overall, the highest proportion (29%) do so to improve their coding skills and 26% have an ideological motivation – they believe in the benefits of open source. A large group (22%) do so because it’s 'fun', the same percentage as those who do so to solve an issue with an existing open source software project such as fixing a bug or creating a new feature.

        • UC Berkeley researchers open-source RAD to improve any reinforcement learning algorithm

          A group of University of California, Berkeley researchers this week open-sourced Reinforcement Learning with Augmented Data (RAD). In an accompanying paper, the authors say this module can improve any existing reinforcement learning algorithm and that RAD achieves better compute and data efficiency than Google AI’s PlaNet, as well as recently released cutting-edge algorithms like DeepMind’s Dreamer and SLAC from UC Berkeley and DeepMind.

        • Perl/Raku

          • The Weekly Challenge #058

            This week, I struggled with both the task, to be honest. Dealing with alpha part of the version was really pain in the neck. Every time, I struggle with any task, I follow the college days course of action i.e. pick a pend and paper. I start dribbling the thought process, it really helps in getting the idea out on the paper. Once the rough draft is ready, it is time to face the unit test trial. I make sure every solution of mine must go through the unit test trials. It flesh out edge cases most time, if I could come up with enough test cases.

  • Leftovers

    • Integrity/Availability

      • Proprietary

        • Pseudo-Open Source

        • Security

          • Hackers breach LineageOS servers via unpatched vulnerability

            Hackers have gained access to the core infrastructure of LineageOS, a mobile operating system based on Android, used for smartphones, tablets, and set-top boxes.

            The intrusion took place last night, on Saturday, at around 8 pm (US Pacific coast), and was detected before the attackers could do any harm, the LineageOS team said in a statement published less than three hours after the incident.

            The LineageOS team said the operating system's source code was unaffected, and so were any operating system builds, which had been already paused since April 30, because of an unrelated issue.

          • Android security: Patching improves, but fragmentation challenges remain

            Android device makers have improved their patching processes over the past two years according to a new analysis, decreasing the time gap between when security updates become public and their integration into firmware. This is good news for the Android ecosystem, which has historically been considered worse than Apple's iOS when it comes to patch hygiene. However, version fragmentation remains high in the Android world, with significant differences among device manufacturers and even across the same vendor's product lines. This leads to many devices running versions that are no longer supported.

          • Ghost Confirms Hack Attack: 750,000 Users Spooked By Critical Vulnerability

            Popular open-source blogging platform with more than 2 million installs confirms it has been hacked.

            Although most people tend to immediately think of WordPress when asked to name a blogging platform, it certainly isn't the only player in town.

            The self-proclaimed "world's most popular modern open-source publishing platform," Ghost, includes big-name customers such as Mozilla, NASA, and DuckDuckGo among its 750,000 registered users, according to its website. In the last week alone, Ghost users, including writers, podcasters, and video creators, set up 6,920 new publications.

          • Privacy/Surveillance

            • Zoom or Not? NSA Offers Agencies Guidance for Choosing Videoconference Tools. [Ed: NSA will just approve whatever NSA can snoop on... for security of course!]

              Video conferencing platforms Zoom and Microsoft Teams are both FedRamp approved, but while Zoom offers end-to-end encryption, Microsoft Teams does not, according to the National Security Agency.

              These are just two of nine factors the NSA cites in creating a guide to help federal workers choose commercial telework tools for “safely using collaboration services,” as necessitated by the coronavirus pandemic.

    • Monopolies

      • Patent exceptions in times of Covid-19: an Italian perspective

        To overcome the shortage of valves for respiratory equipment and the inability by patent owners to make timely supply, an Italian hospital has requested a local producer to make valves with 3D printers without authorization by said owners, here. The local producer itself has made them free of charge.

        The valves have been fixed on snorkeling masks, which a well-known multinational group has supplied as a gift to assist in meeting the need for respiratory equipment due to a sudden increase in the number of patients affected by Covid-19. The medical treatment rendered by the hospital in this connection has also been given free of charge.

        Based upon Italian patent law and the assumption that the patent at issue is valid, the focus of this post is how the local producer and/or the multinational group could defend themselves, should the rights holder take an action for patent infringement against either of them. An answer could be based on the private use exception, necessity exception or a compulsory license.

      • Supreme Court on Generic Functionality for Website Designs.

        Oral arguments are set in this trademark case for May 4, 2020 [Listen Live at 9:00 am EST]. Booking.com is seeking to register rights on their eponymous service BOOKING.COM. The basic question is whether the addition of “dot com” to a generic term can result in a protectable trademark.

        The company’s actually uses the word “booking” in its typical generic form: “The World’s #1 Choice for Booking Accommodations.” However, the company presented factual (survey) evidence that the addition of dot-com transforms the term in the eyes of consumers. Still, the PTO refused to register the trademark — holding that the “.com” addition is never enough. The PTO’s approach here relates back to the 1888 decision in Goodyear Co. v. Goodyear Rubber Co., 128 U.S. 598 (1888). At the time “Goodyear rubber” was seen as a generic term for a type of vulcanized rubber, and the Supreme Court held that adding the term “Company” would not change the matter — even if used for 20+ years with public understanding.



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