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A Cure for the Common Troll

Anthony Biller | OpenSource.com | February 20, 2012

Our bridge into the 21st Century presently houses a nasty creature who demands a toll from the best and brightest in our community. The dreaded troll is a regular denizen of our current system of patent enforcement and he poses serious problems for technology companies.  Read More »

A Framework For Building Products From Open Source Projects

If your experience with technology resembles mine in any way, you know intuitively that the projects we DIY are not the same as the products we spend money buying. This isn't a new observation in the open source community...Sarah Novotny, who led the Kubernetes community and was heavily involved in the Nginx and MySQL communities, emphatically articulated at the inaugural Open Core Summit that the open source project a company shepherds and the product that a company sells are two completely different things. Yet, project and product continue to be conflated by maintainers-turned-founders of commercial open source software (COSS) companies, especially (and ironically) when the open source project gets traction. This mistake gets repeated, I believe, because it's hard to mentally conceptualize how and why a commercial product should be different when the open source project is already being used widely.

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A Guide To Productivity Management In Open Source Projects

Open source is one of the most important technology trends of our time. It’s the lifeblood of the digital economy and the preeminent way that software-based innovation happens today. In fact, it’s estimated that over 90% of software released today contains open source libraries. There's no doubt the open source model is effective and impactful. But is there still room for improvement? When comparing the broader software industry’s processes to that of open source communities, one big gap stands out: productivity management. By and large, open source project leads and maintainers have been slow to adopt modern productivity and project management practices and tools commonly embraced by startups and enterprises to drive the efficiency and predictability of software development processes. It’s time we examine how the application of these approaches and capabilities can improve the management of open source projects for the better.

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A Whirlwind Tour Of All The Connected Sites That Form The World Of Open Source Social Networks

People want to communicate over the internet as easily as they do in real life, with similar protections but, potentially, farther reach. In other words, people want to be able to chat with a group of other people who aren't physically in the same location, and still maintain some control over who claims ownership of the conversation. In today's world, of course, a lot of companies have a lot to say about who owns the data you send back and forth over the world wide web. Most companies seem to feel they have the right to govern the way you communicate, how many people your message reaches, and so on. Open source, luckily, doesn't need to own your social life, and so appropriately it's open source developers who are delivering a social network that belongs, first and foremost, to you.

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Accessibility In Open Source For People With ADHD, Dyslexia, And Autism Spectrum Disorder

For a long time, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), autism, Asperger syndrome, dyslexia, and other neurodiverse conditions were considered things that hold people back. But now, many researchers and employers recognize that neurodiversity is a competitive advantage, especially in technology, and especially when certain accommodations are provided. This is certainly true for me. I'm a 39-year-old teacher in Sweden diagnosed with ADHD and Asperger's (also referred to as Autism Level 1). I'm also an intermediate Linux user and use it daily for Java programming, productivity, and gaming. I've been using Linux since the late 1990s, and I've learned ways open source programs can be made more accessible for people with these conditions.

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An Android Operating System That Prioritizes Mobile Data Privacy

Android and iOS devices are notorious for uploading your personal data to their cloud services without your permission. If you are concerned about your mobile data privacy, you have another option to consider for your next smartphone: the /e/ operating system, a free and open source, Android-based operating system. The eFoundation community is led by Gaël Duval, a legacy Linux developer and entrepreneur who founded Mandrake Linux in 1998.

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An introduction to Hyperledger Fabric

One of the biggest projects in the blockchain industry, Hyperledger, is comprised of a set of open source tools and subprojects. It's a global collaboration hosted by The Linux Foundation and includes leaders in different sectors who are aiming to build a robust, business-driven blockchain framework. There are three main types of blockchain networks: public blockchains, consortiums or federated blockchains, and private blockchains. Hyperledger is a blockchain framework that aims to help companies build private or consortium permissioned blockchain networks where multiple organizations can share the control and permission to operate a node within the network. Since a blockchain is a transparent, immutable, and secure decentralized system, it is considered a game-changing solution for traditional supply chain industries. It can support an effective supply chain system by:

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Asciidoctor Coder Writes Less Documentation

I've been working as the documentation manager for the Koha project for six and a half years, so when I saw that Sarah White would be talking about documentation at OSCON this year I knew I wanted a chance to interview her. Sarah will be giving a talk entitled Writing Documentation that Satisfies Your Users. Sarah believes in helping users succeed at solving their problems by working on and helping others write documentation for open source software, and I have to agree with her that one of the best parts of working on an open source project (not just writing the documentation) is getting to meet awesome people! Read More »

Attract Contributors To Your Open Source Project With Authenticity

It's not a secret that maintaining an open source project is often thankless and time-consuming work. However, I've learned that there's one shared joy among open source maintainers: They love building with a group of technologists who passionately believe in their vision...Check out these methods that open source maintainers can use to attract contributors in a genuine manner.

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Best Of Open Hardware In 2014

Luis Ibanez | Opensource.com | December 22, 2014

Open hardware is the physical foundation of the open movement. It is through understanding, designing, manufacturing, commercializing, and adopting open hardware, that we built the basis for a healthy and self-reliant community of open. And the year of 2014 had plenty of activities in the open hardware front...

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Booktype Makes Book Collaboration Web-based and Simple

Ruth Suehle | OpenSource.com | February 21, 2012

If you've ever tried to collaborate with other authors and editors and the many other people who work to make a book successful, you know it's not easy... Last week at the O'Reilly Tools of Change conference, a new platform called Booktype was announced. It was created to help you collaborate on editing content and getting it ready for publishing. Read More »

Build An Open Source Project Using This Essential Advice

Open source is a flourishing and beneficial ecosystem that publicly solves problems in communities and industries using software developed through a decentralized model and community contributions. Over the years, this ecosystem has grown in number and strength among hobbyists and professionals alike. It's mainstream now—even proprietary companies use open source to build software. With the ecosystem booming, many developers want to get in and build new open source projects. The question is: How do you achieve that successfully? This article will demystify the lifecycle and structure of open source projects. I want to give you an overview of what goes on inside an open source project and show you how to build a successful and sustainable project based on my personal experience.

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Coders to Learn How to Deploy Humanitarian-Focused Apps on Openstack

Dana and I are passionate about making open source communities inclusive and welcoming. The codeathon is a terrific opportunity for us to be tour guides for women of all backgrounds as they explore open source projects like OpenStack. [Dana Bauer]: I love the humanitarian focus at Open Source Day. Egle and I are demonstrating how to deploy humanitarian-focused applications on OpenStack, and it's exciting to think that some of those apps could be the first steps toward making a difference in the world...

Culture Eats Strategy

Jonathan Becher | OpenSource.com | February 24, 2012

Understanding a company’s culture is a key component that leaders may ignore...It's an ongoing process of encouraging people to take the risks associated with making their own decisions, but it's paying off with faster decision-making, improved performance, and higher morale...Culture management and empowerment can improve a team’s performance more than dictating strategy. Read More »

Edge computing and the importance of open infrastructure

The "edge" is diverse, dispersed, often independently owned and operated, and comes with a set of constraints not addressed in the average data center. Old sci-fi films painted a picture of how computers would permeate every facet of life in the future. It has come to pass, and it happened almost without us noticing: having PCs at home became commonplace, our mobile phones turned into small smart devices, and our cars began making decisions for us, controlled by thousands of sensors and controllers. Self-driving cars, augmented and virtual reality, smart homes and more all underscore our rapidly emerging dependence on distributed computing infrastructure.