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FOSS Force

SF Hosts AnsibleFest Nov. 19

It has been a busy couple of weeks for Ansible, a provider of powerful automation solutions designed to help enterprises move toward frictionless IT.

First, Red Hat acquires Ansible two weeks ago, which is both no small feat and a coup for the folks in Raleigh. The acquisition was a smart, yet expected, move: It marries Ansible’s ease of automation to the wide portfolio of Red Hat clientele, driving down the cost and complexity of deploying and managing both cloud-native and traditional applications across hybrid cloud environments. In short, by writing a check, Red Hat expanded its leadership in hybrid cloud management.

AnsibleFest logoIn addition, related to the purchase or not, Ansible has also started getting some traction at this week’s OpenStack Summit in Tokyo this week, and as that show progresses we will see where Red Hat will guide its new acquisition.

Ubucon Slated for SCALE 14X, Bassel Offered MIT Job & More…

FOSS Week in Review

I don’t say enough good things about Ubuntu, so when they give me reason to, I’m on it. I also don’t talk enough about openSUSE either; good, bad or indifferent. Not that I’m turning over a new leaf or anything, but this week’s wrap up contains two items about these distros, and more. Don’t just sit there: Read on&hellip.

Ubuntu logo
Ubucon, a series of Ubuntu-based conferences, brings its traveling salvation show to SCALE 14X in January.
Ubucon at SCALE 14X: SCALE 14X is pleased to announce that Ubucon, a network of conferences focusing on Ubuntu, will take place during the four-day expo at the Pasadena Convention Center.

Saying Goodbye to ‘All Things Open’ Until Next Year

The 2015 edition of the Raleigh based open source conference, All Things Open (ATO), is now one for the history books. It’s also one for the record books.

We knew going in there would be a record number of speakers this year — 131 according to a count on the ATO website — and we learned on our way out — at the closing ceremonies — that this year’s attendance topped 1,700, much more than last year and nearly doubling the attendance from the first ATO in 2013. Todd Lewis, the master of ceremonies for the event — his official title, chairperson, doesn’t begin to describe what he does — said that next year they’re aiming for 2,500, a number they probably have a good chance of hitting.

All Things Open 2015The odd thing was that if you didn’t know that attendance was up, you might’ve thought that the numbers were actually going down.

Pitching Microsoft to a Linux Crowd

On Monday, in Red Hat’s backyard at All Things Open in Raleigh, word was that Microsoft representatives were saying an “important” announcement would be made at Tuesday morning’s keynote address by Mark Russinovich, CTO for Microsoft Azure. I was expecting something earth shattering, like maybe Redmond was going to port Office to Linux, or that Red Hat and MS were going to get together on some major project.

Mark Russinovich
Mark Russinovich , CTO of Microsoft Azure, keynotes at PDC in 2010.
It was nothing like that. But it was pretty big, given Redmond’s history with open source.

Evidently, the news was that the company is looking for more than a few good men and women who know their way around open source software. I use the word “evidently,” because the announcement was made rather subtly and without fanfare near the end of the keynote. It was slipped in as just another note in a talk about how Microsoft is serious about becoming a good open source citizen.

Ubuntu MATE’s Martin Wimpress Talks Raspberry Pi & FOSS

The FOSS Force Interview

Recently, I had the privilege to sit down and interview Martin Wimpress, who among other things is the project lead for Ubuntu MATE. One reason I interviewed him was because I wanted to see what he’d have to say about his work with Ubuntu MATE and the Raspberry Pi, as well as to get a gleaning of his overall thoughts on free and open source software. As you will discover, Wimpress is definitely not a person who’s short on thoughts, or shy about expressing them.

Ubuntu Mate logoThe other reason for this interview, perhaps the main reason, is because from one developer to another, I look up to Martin quite a bit and admire him for the things he is accomplishing and doing.

Going Gonzo at ‘All Things Open’

“Footballs in a basketball state,” I said wryly, looking down on a guy who was sitting across the table, absently playing with some small swag footballs imprinted with a company logo.

He didn’t catch my drift.

“What?”

“This is a basketball state,” I explained.

“You’re right!” He seemed as if this had just dawned on him.

Linux: When Uniformity is Good

We’ve been in this bid’ness for ten years now. The business of giving Linux-powered computers to kids who cannot afford this technology, or any technology for that matter. And so far so good. There have been some lessons learned along the way. Some of those lessons small but valuable. Some of those lessons so painful that we had no choice but to change the way we do things. And never doubt…there were uh, spirited discussions about this change. Yeah, we’ll stick to “spirited”. I’ve been to football matches in Great Britain and Germany that couldn’t come close to such levels of “spirit.” So which thing could bring about this measure of “spirited” discussion?

KDEThe Linux desktop environment. Environments such as Unity, KDE, Mate, Cinnamon, etc.

These environments all have their strengths and their weaknesses, just like any number of things you might put up for comparison. But this business of desktop environments, well…there are a lot of moving parts here. A lot of things to consider, and most importantly, the mechanics that lead us to our decision to use one environment over the other.

Linux Users, Start Your Engines

Unless you’re a motorhead to a varying degree — and an older one at that — you probably don’t know who John Cooper is. His contributions in racing circles — putting the engine behind the driver in his Cooper racing cars in the 1950s — would normally cement his place in automotive history, but he didn’t stop there.

The thing for which Cooper is more widely known is modifying the British Motor Corporation’s Mini in the 1960s, adding his name to make it the Mini Cooper while adding a higher degree of performance that won the little-car-that-could a warehouse full of rally trophies and Sports Car Club of America club racing victories.

Cory Doctorow at SCALE & CAH Linux-Style…

FOSS Week in Review

What could be a better combination than one of the world’s foremost digital freedom advocates and Cards Against Humanity? Read on.

Cory Doctorow at SCALE 14X: While the Call for Presentations for SCALE 14X is ongoing and closes in two weeks — on Friday, Oct. 30, at midnight Pacific, so at 12:01 a.m. on Saturday morning the 31st, your unsubmitted proposal turns into a pumpkin — the SCALE team has announced it has chosen one of the keynoters for the four-day, first-of-the-year Linux/FOSS event.

Cory Doctorow will give the Friday morning keynote at SCALE 14X in Pasadena, Calif., in January.
Cory Doctorow will give the Friday morning keynote at SCALE 14X in Pasadena, Calif., in January.
Science fiction author, activist, and journalist Cory Doctorow has been tapped as one of the keynote speakers for SCALE 14X. Doctorow, the co-editor of Boing Boing and an author with a wide portfolio, works for the Electronic Frontier Foundation and co-founded the UK Open Rights Group. Born in Toronto, he now lives in Los Angeles.

Microsoft Infects Windows Computers With Malvertising

I thought about ignoring this one and letting it slide, but it’s too priceless, too typically Microsoft, not to pass on. It seems that Redmond has been inadvertently infecting Windows computers with ransomware through its MSN website. Not to worry, however. The company is happy to hand you a tool to remove the malware, which is akin to locking the door after the horse is gone, as your files will by then be locked up tighter than a waterproof safe.