Open-source News

Linux Kernel 6.0 Reaches End of Life, Users Urged to Upgrade to Linux 6.1  9to5Linux

Discourse 3.0 is an Amazing Release With Much-Needed Feature ...  It's FOSS News

Steam & Steam Deck Beta improves controller configurator plus ...  GamingOnLinux

AMD Updates Linux Patches For Automatic IBRS On Zen 4  Phoronix

Since early November AMD has been working on Linux patches for Automatic IBRS. AutoIBRS is a new Zen 4 CPU feature intended to provide better performance than generic Retpolines as part of the Spectre V2 mitigations. Two months later the Linux AutoIBRS patches still haven't been merged yet but up to their sixth revision...

AMD today sent in a batch of AMDGPU and AMDKFD kernel driver fixes for the in-development Linux 6.2. Notable with this week's AMD graphics driver fixes are a few pertaining to the new Radeon RX 7000 series / RDNA3 hardware...

AMD Sends In Radeon RX 7000 Series Fixes For Linux 6.2  Phoronix

With the Intel VT-d 4.0 specification there is performance monitoring "PerfMon" infrastructure introduced. A new patch series from Intel is preparing for IOMMU performance monitoring with the Linux kernel code...

Intel Preparing New Linux "PerfMon" Performance Monitoring ...  Phoronix

In addition to the CentOS Hyperscale SIG making great progress on adapting CentOS Stream for hyperscaler needs, at the opposite end of the table is the CentOS Automotive SIG with their "AutoSD" platform they continue working on adapting to make CentOS Stream suitable for use within vehicles...

CentOS Automotive SIG Making Progress On Linux For Cars With ...  Phoronix

How to install the Kora icon theme on Linux  AddictiveTips

Ubuntu 23.04 “Lunar Lobster” Wallpaper Competition Opens for Entries  9to5Linux

Version 5 of the Endless OS enters testing  The Register

Monitorets is a Cute System Monitor Tool for Linux  OMG! Ubuntu!

Fork our open source onboarding program stackedsax Thu, 01/12/2023 - 03:00

Getting started as a contributor to an open source project shouldn't feel like getting bad customer service: "Please hold while we connect you with the first available representative," followed by mind-numbing elevator music on an infinite loop. Nor should new contributors feel they have to scale Mt. Annapurna and go before a wizened greybeard to get their first commit accepted. Too often, junior coders are scared away from open source altogether because everything they do is exposed for all to see.

When I was first starting in open source, after more than a decade of producing closed source, proprietary code for Fortune 500 software companies, I made some (ill-conceived) contribution suggestions to a widely known open source project, and I was taken aback by the abrupt nature of my interactions with the others involved. They were always too busy, or too uninterested, to look at what I was working on, let alone help me.

So what should starting in open source feel like?

We at G-Research are partnering with Major League Hacking (MLH) to bring more coders into open source. We aim to get them started with good, productive experiences so we can build a talent pipeline for the entire open source universe and keep it full for years to come.

MLH started in 2013 as a community for developers that runs hackathons and helps people secure employment. The MLH community is 600,000 strong and sees some 1,000 participants pass through its fellowship programs each year. The MLH Open Source Fellowship runs for 12 weeks and helps new coders get started with key concepts such as submitting pull requests, maintaining projects, and open source best practices.

Finding capable coders isn't easy for employers, and finding new employees empowered to execute on open source can be even more daunting. The Linux Foundation found in a recent survey that 93% of hiring managers had difficulty sourcing sufficient talent with open source experience. The need is particularly acute when it comes to welcoming traditionally underrepresented demographics in tech, such as women and minorities.

Creating good open source code is one thing, but we also see a strong need for maintainers to keep projects nourished and vital. Turnover for maintainers is high by any measure. Tidelift, a company that distributes funds to open source maintainers and connects those maintainers to the companies who use them, reports that 59% of project maintainers have considered quitting. That number is an indication that the experience for those who keep and improve the code needs to be better.

We have a fistful of open source projects ourselves: Armada, a multi-Kubernetes-cluster batch job meta-scheduler; Siembol, a scalable, advanced security analytics framework; and ILGPU, a just-in-time compiler for high-performance GPU programs. There's also the armload of projects we provide our employees time to support as maintainers: Consul.net, Thanos-remote-read, geras, ParquetShop, a Vault plugin database for Aerospike, Apache Ozone, and Fantomas.

These projects are integral components of what G-Research does, and their smooth operation makes our business stronger. Partnering with MLH will help ensure that the open source projects we rely on continue to attract and nurture top talent. We've already seen tremendous success directly within our team, having hired a number of the Fellows from the MLH program to continue working with us on our projects in some capacity.

Indeed, many contributors report that their time working with our engineers was one of the most positive experiences of their careers. And a few have gone on to work for us on our projects. "The best part of this program is getting to learn from the G-Research devs," says Victor Zeddys, an Apache Ozone Fellow. "They were really kind and informative, and I envied their capabilities to handle such a complex project."

More great content Free online course: RHEL technical overview Learn advanced Linux commands Download cheat sheets Find an open source alternative Explore open source resources

And Victor isn't alone. "I had an amazing experience and met lots of great people," says Celina Cywinska, a DevOps Fellow. "I've learned so much about real-world teamwork, and the maintainers shared knowledge I wouldn't have gained in the classroom." Gaining knowledge from your coworkers is one of the most important aspects of employment and can make an especially big difference for those just starting out.

Just as important as the people we have brought to our team is the sense that we are helping seed the wider open source universe with capable, confident open source engineers. "This fellowship has helped me evolve in ways I couldn't imagine," says Christos Bisias, an Apache Ozone Fellow. "It has been an amazing experience working closely with such professionals and learning all kinds of new technologies and best practices."

We're just as proud of the fellows who have come through our program and applied their experience to other projects or employment. We don't have to hire everyone that comes out of the program to benefit from the things MLH teaches and the experiences it equips its graduates with. We know that somewhere down the road, we will all reap the benefit of having a healthy open source talent pipeline from the very beginnings of the open source journey—no mountaineering required.

This article originally appeared on Major League Hacking and is republished with permission.

The open source software team at G-Research is helping establish an easier on-ramp for getting started in open source.

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Community management What to read next This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International License. 31 points London, UK

Max Mizzi, Head of Growth
Major League Hacking (MLH)

Max started out his career as software engineer, but quickly realised that whilst he loves writing code, there was the opportunity to make a lot of impact by enabling companies to better leverage technology, and making developers lives better. The journey first saw him setting up innovation labs, a chief data office, and a first tech strategy, before consulting on digital transformation and emerging tech adoption. The thread that run through all of this was that the biggest success factor in technology is people. This realisation saw Max move into the EdTech (/Tech Ed!) world, and spend several years at General Assembly running large scale transformational learning engagements in Tech and Data, before joining MLH to lead Growth. In his role at MLH the focus is on early career technologists, where he has established dozens of partnerships to empower hundreds of emerging developers to launch their careers.

Pronouns: He/Him

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Open source software is transforming healthcare James Ahern Thu, 01/12/2023 - 03:00

In the summer of 2022, the UK government and NHS England published its Open Source Policy, stating that open source technology is:

Particularly suitable for use within the healthcare industry where, through active collaboration between IT suppliers and user/clinicians communities, solutions can be honed to maximise benefits to delivery of health and social care.

The public statement by NHS England is just the latest development in a broader trend: The wholehearted embrace of open source software by the healthcare sector. And no wonder; open source presents myriad opportunities for this most complex of industries, with potential solutions across various sub-sectors. Yes, open source is now powering everything from medical wearables to healthcare human resource management.

Health informatics

Information technology is playing an increasingly vital role in every sector of the economy, with the healthcare industry no exception. One of the most important developments in this field is the growth of health informatics—in other words, the acquisition and analysis of all types of patient data, including test results, scans, and electronic health records (EHR).

Informatics is all about providing better health outcomes for patients, but essential to this are standardization and interoperability—and this is where open source can make a big difference because of its truly collaborative and "open" nature.

Open source developers have created numerous software solutions for various businesses and organizations within the healthcare sector. First, it is probably worth distinguishing between healthcare software and medical software.

Open source medical software

Medical software refers specifically to medical devices and direct patient care/treatment. It also includes tools for monitoring, analyzing and interpreting data, and a range of other functions. Medical software can be designed for treatment, simulation, or medical training.

Some of the best applications of this are in smartphone apps, allowing patients to track vitals from home. Glucosio is an Android and iOS app enabling people with diabetes to monitor glucose levels while simultaneously supporting diabetes research.

[ Also read Automation: 5 ways it can change lives ]

Imaging and visualization are other fields where open source software provides solutions. One of these is Slicer, a free, open source package written in C++, Python, and Qt. Slicer includes image analysis and scientific visualization tools. Medical professionals use it for various medical applications as diverse as autism, multiple sclerosis, systemic lupus erythematosus, prostate cancer, lung cancer, breast cancer, schizophrenia, orthopedic biomechanics, COPD, cardiovascular disease, and neurosurgery. Studierfenster is another free, open source product. It is an online server-based framework for medical image processing that displays 2D and 3D images in a standard web browser.

Open source healthcare software

Healthcare software is a broader term covering any software developed for the healthcare industry. It encompasses medical solutions, including tools for diagnosis or treatment optimization, but also covers tools that aid with infrastructure services, patient information, public health, and other auxiliary requirements. It is possible here that open source software has the biggest impact on the sector.

Perhaps the most ubiquitous examples of open source software in the healthcare sector are those designed to manage patient records, with applications such as Open Hospital, Open EMR, and Open MRS all helping hospitals and surgeries to hold and manage electronic health records (EHR). Open Dental offers a similar service for dentistry providers and can also be utilized for practice management, including billing and electronic charting.

Hospital Run is another patient record application specifically designed to improve the accessibility of healthcare in developing countries, with an "offline-first" approach to managing healthcare records.

Governments also use open source software for applications in health system management, public health, and biosurveillance. The integrated Human Resource Information System (iHRIS) developed by IntraHealth International helps countries track data about their healthcare workforce and is already being used in over 20 countries worldwide.

Epi Info is statistical software for epidemiology, an open source, public domain tool developed by the USA's Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Another tool used to model and visualize the spread of infectious diseases is the Spatiotemporal Epidemiological Modeler, originally developed at IBM Research but freely available through the Eclipse Foundation.

Unique solutions are also being developed for disease management, including collections of applications like Breathing Games—a series of research-backed games under Peer Production licenses created for the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of chronic respiratory diseases—and Nightscout—a suite of software tools which allow continuous glucose monitoring from the home using cloud technology.

More great content Free online course: RHEL technical overview Learn advanced Linux commands Download cheat sheets Find an open source alternative Explore open source resources Benefits of open source in healthcare

Open source software has the potential to bring together a host of relevant healthcare stakeholders, including government agencies, medical equipment vendors, healthcare service providers, and research agencies, by facilitating standardization and interoperability in health informatics. But the benefits of open source go beyond this.

Because of the transparency of open source development, there is a large degree of flexibility, with many highly customizable solutions. Furthermore, the open source community has a clearly defined vision with strong motivation from users and developers alike to improve and maintain applications. There is also the potential for open source software to provide increased security due to the reduced reliance on third-party suppliers and the adoption of blockchain technologies—most of which remain open source.

And finally, for a sector struggling with many global crises, the improved cost-benefit ratio of open source software is not an insignificant consideration.

Open source—the answer for a sector under unprecedented pressure?

The healthcare sector is being forced to adapt rapidly due to multiple pressures, and as a result, technological solutions are becoming increasingly important. As open source software becomes more reliable, healthcare organizations realize tangible benefits from its transparency, security, and flexibility. It's clear that open source presents an array of benefits for the industry, aiding not just developed but also developing economies.

Healthcare organizations realize tangible benefits from using open source tools. Explore these examples.

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