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FOSS News No. 9 - Review of free and open source news for March 23-29, 2020



Hello everyone!

We continue to review the news of free and open source software and hardware (and a bit of coronavirus). All the most important thing about penguins and not only in Russia and the world.

In the issue No. 9 of March 23–29, 2020:

  1. Open Source vs. COVID-19: How Developers Can Help Fight the Virus
  2. SUSE Offers Help Against COVID-19
  3. Open Source Ventilation Machine Development
  4. China prepares to replace Windows with GNU / Linux
  5. Megvii Opens Chinese AI Platform
  6. Mozilla ,
  7. Linux,
  8. Strace Linux: ,
  9. Nextcloud:
  10. Shortwave – Open Source GNU/Linux
  12. OpenShift Kubernetes. 1
  13. Smart TV KDE Plasma Bigscreen
  14. Android 2020 .
  15. System76 Lemur Pro
  16. Nintendo Open Source
  17. ,
  18. PostgreSQL Open Source
  19. exFAT Linux
  20. Cloudflare has prepared patches that dramatically accelerate disk encryption in Linux
  21. Microsoft Defender released under GNU / Linux
  22. Audacious 4.0 music player release
  23. LLVM 10.0 compiler suite release
  24. Release of the MythTV Media Center 31.0
  25. Apache Foundation turns 21
  26. Modern GNU / Linux systems must support running old games - community opinion

Open Source vs. COVID-19: How Developers Can Help Fight the Virus




Programmers are in a unique position, they can not only work at home during the COVID-19 pandemic, but they can help, writes Jaxenter and gives examples:

  1. 2019 Novel Coronavirus COVID-19 (2019-nCoV) Data Repository by Johns Hopkins CSSE - visualization of the spread of the virus in the world.
  2. The COVID Tracking Project - “raw” data on the spread of the virus in the United States.
  3. COVID-19 Italia - Monitoraggio situazione - virus data from Italy;
  4. CoronaTracker is an application for iOS and macOS with maps and spread charts of the virus.

In addition, there is the Folding @ Home project, which allows you to lease out the power of your computer for scientific research on countering the virus.

Details
Details specific to The COVID Tracking Project

SUSE Offers Help Against COVID-19




SUSE, one of the largest open-source software companies, lends a helping hand to organizations that manufacture medical devices to combat COVID-19, Tfir reports. “ The current global pandemic requires more than just an attempt to survive ,” said SUSE CEO Melissa Di Donato. “ We have advanced open source technologies and know-how that can help others in the struggle to save lives, and we will share them immediately and for free .” SUSE has made the support and maintenance of its operating system free for medical organizations, and versions of this OS are also available for servers and desktop computers and for embedded equipment.

Details

Open Source Ventilation Machine Development




Just two news about the Open Source development of ventilators.

A team of engineers, doctors and programmers, united on the basis of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, one of the best universities in the world, has begun work on a cheap Open Source ventilator, according to the official publication of MIT and TechnologyReview.

Details [1] , [2]

Engineers from the Polish Urbicum have teamed up to launch the VentilAid project to develop an open source ventilator that can be reproduced using a 3D printer and assembling basic, easily accessible parts, 3D Pringing Media reports.

Details

China prepares to replace Windows with GNU / Linux




China's plans to replace Windows and switch to a homegrown operating system are not new, but this year everything can finally happen, Softpedia reports. This is what the Chinese company Union Tech promises, as its unified Linux UOS-based operating system has achieved tremendous success over the past couple of months. In particular, the Chinese firm worked with other local companies to launch the Linux operating system on chips developed domestically.

Details

Megvii Opens Chinese AI Platform




Megvii, an artificial intelligence company, has launched its own MegEngine deep learning tool, which allows developers around the world to use and improve this platform, Technode said. This is important because China has set ambitious goals to become a leader in the field of artificial intelligence by 2030, but usually relies on open source software of American origin from technology giants such as Google and Facebook.

Details

Mozilla is testing a site financing service promoted as an alternative to advertising




As part of the Test Pilot program, Mozilla invited Firefox users to test the new Firefox Better Web with Scroll service, which is experimenting with alternative types of site financing, OpenNET reports. The main idea of ​​the project is to use a paid subscription to the service to finance the creation of content. The service is organized jointly with the Scroll project - the user pays for the subscription to the service ($ 2.49 per month) and has the ability to view sites that have joined the Scroll initiative without advertising inserts.

Details

Linux console utilities that can make your life easier




The second part of the review of useful console utilities, prepared for beginners, was published on Habré, but experienced users will be able to find something new for themselves. The new part addresses:

  1. htop analogues - gotop and glances;
  2. Web development tools - JSShell, live-server, wp-cli, surge, httpie, hget;
  3. configuration applications - nmtui, alsamixer, neovim, browsh, fzf.

Details:


Linux Strace: History, Design, and Usage




In Unix-like operating systems, the program communicates with the outside world and the operating system through a small set of functions - system calls. So, for debugging purposes, it is useful to spy on system calls performed by processes. The strace utility helps to monitor the "intimate life" of programs on Linux, which the new article on Habr is dedicated to. Examples of using spyware include a brief history of strace and a description of the design of such programs.

Details

Nextcloud: a Swiss knife from tools for remote work




Nextcloud is open source software that you can use to store files, photos, and videos for personal use, such as Dropbox. But this is more than just a private cloud service, It's FOSS writes. You can add multiple users to Nextcloud and turn it into a collaboration platform for real-time file editing, user communication, calendar management, appointment and task management, and much more.

Details and feature overview video

Shortwave - Modern Open Source Internet Radio Player for GNU / Linux




Shortwave is an interesting open source radio player that offers a nice user interface and great listening capabilities to Internet stations. It uses a community-generated online radio database. Shortwave is actually the successor to the popular GNU / Linux Gradio radio application. Its developer Felix joined GNOME and discontinued Gradio to create Shortwave from scratch in the Rust programming language. If you used Gradio as your preferred internet radio player, you can also import the library into Shortwave. Shortwave recently released its first stable release and seems to continue to release updates after that.

Details

Video player overview for the web




On Habré there was an overview of open-source web players, data on popularity, functionality and "freshness" is given. Considered:

  1. Video.js;
  2. Shaka Player
  3. Plyr;
  4. MediaElement.js;
  5. Flowplayer
  6. jPlayer

Examples of private players are also provided.

Details

OpenShift as an enterprise version of Kubernetes. Part 1




A series of articles about OpenShift, a family of containerization software developed by the company itself, began on the Red Hat blog on Habré. The article discusses the relationship of OpenShift with Kubernetes and the new that OpenShift brings to the containerization technology stack.

Details

How to turn a regular TV into Smart TV using KDE Plasma Bigscreen




Plasma Bigscreen is a new project from KDE whose goal is to provide an interface and functions similar to those provided by Smart TV, writes It's FOSS. All you need is a single board computer, such as a Raspberry Pi, and a TV with an HDMI port. Install Plasma Bigscreen on your device and connect it to the TV. The article provides a brief overview of the functionality of the project.

Details and video presentation of the project

Best Android tablet in 2020




Android tablets rarely justify abandoning the Apple iPad, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t any good options, CNet writes and gives an overview of their favorites:

  1. Google Pixel Slate
  2. Amazon Fire HD 10 (2019);
  3. Samsung Galaxy Tab S6;
  4. Lenovo Smart Tab P10.

Details

System76 Launches New Lemur Pro Laptop




System76 has been manufacturing GNU / Linux-based PCs for more than a decade, and the company continues to release new systems for those who prefer an “alternative” Windows hegemony operating system. With its new Lemur Pro laptop, the company is complementing an already strong line of laptops, desktops and servers, ZDNet writes. Lemur Pro becomes the third System76 laptop to use 10th generation 14nm processors (or Comet Lake), combining the Galago Pro and Darter Pro models, offering either the Core i5-10210U or Core i7-10510U. It supports up to 40 GB of RAM and, with a pair of M.2 SSD slots, up to 4 TB of memory. It also features a 14.1-inch Full HD 1920x1.080 display, as well as a pair of USB 3.0 ports and a USB 3.1 Type-C port with a charge option.

Details

Nintendo Motherboard for Open Source Generation




The original hardware of the golden era of 8-bit computer games is becoming inaccessible, its support has become of particular interest to enthusiasts. Many platforms of that time were restored and now it’s the turn of the NES (Nintendo Entertainment System) console, writes Hackaday. OpenTendo is a completely open replacement for the original Nintendo Entertainment System motherboard, using both the original chips and other components still available.

Details

Elizabeth Warren's election campaign is over, but technology can continue to live




The presidential campaign of a member of the US Democratic Party, Elizabeth Warren, gained a good reputation due to two things: detailed plans for solving specific problems and a strong game in the field, writes Wired. These attributes also appeared in the work of the technical team of the campaign. This was not enough to win, but the veterans of the team want to make sure that their work was not in vain. They created seven of their own software projects, now available to everyone for free on GitHub. Few political campaigns are large enough and well funded enough to develop their own software. Even less open source software. For example, campaign organizers noted that the process of registering new volunteers may be more personal than in existing systems.Therefore, they created a tool called Switchboard, which allowed the organizers to personally contact the volunteers as soon as they registered. Other projects include an automated system for sending event-specific e-mails to volunteers; a backend tool for synthesizing various streams of voter data and an application for caucus (D.V .: a meeting of supporters or members of a political party or political movement). The team also made improvements to Spoke, an existing open source text messaging application.Other projects include an automated system for sending event-specific e-mails to volunteers; a backend tool for synthesizing various streams of voter data and an application for caucus (D.V .: a meeting of supporters or members of a political party or political movement). The team also made improvements to Spoke, an existing open source text messaging application.Other projects include an automated system for sending event-specific e-mails to volunteers; a backend tool for synthesizing various streams of voter data and an application for caucus (D.V .: a meeting of supporters or members of a political party or political movement). The team also made improvements to Spoke, an existing open source text messaging application.



PostgreSQL Open Source




Linux.com publishes an article with a brief overview of the underlying principles of PostgreSQL. Prevalence and democracy are the two words that best describe the PostgreSQL open source database management system. And, like Linux, it is a great example of "open source at its best." In terms of its prevalence, Postgres has existed for more than 30 years, and today it seems to be working locally or as a hosting service from dozens of suppliers around the world. And, from a democratic point of view, the software project is managed by The PostgreSQL Global Development Group, which is developers and volunteers from around the world, with more than 500 participants. No company is liable, dominates or controls the design and development of software,therefore there is no danger of dependence on any particular person or organization. No one can "capture" Postgres. Together, prevalence and democracy create freedom.

Details

About the debate over enabling exFAT support on Linux




Ars Technica understands the next dispute between supporters and opponents of Open Source and writes that when in August the software giant Microsoft announced its support for the inclusion of the exFAT file system directly in the Linux kernel, this did not receive much attention in the press. But recently, the Paragon Software file system vendor has noticed that this month, Microsoft-approved, largely Samsung-created version of exFAT merged into a VFS repository for the next Linux kernel release. And this did not please Paragon, leading to the publication of an article criticizing the Open Source solution to the issue with exFAT.

Counterargument against Paragon

Cloudflare has prepared patches that dramatically accelerate disk encryption in Linux




Cloudflare developers talked about working to optimize the performance of disk encryption in the Linux kernel, according to OpenNET. As a result, patches were prepared for the dm-crypt subsystem and the Crypto API, which allowed the synthetic test to more than double the bandwidth for reading and writing, as well as halve the latency. When testing on real equipment, the overhead from encryption was reduced to almost the level observed when working with a disk without using data encryption.

Details

Microsoft Defender released under GNU / Linux




Microsoft security tools go beyond the company's own platforms. Although the ambitions for Defender for Linux are wide, the first demo version is aimed only at servers and has less functionality than on Windows, Techrepublic writes.

Details

Audacious 4.0 music player release




The release of Audacious 4.0, a lightweight music player, branched off from the Beep Media Player (BMP) project, which is a fork of the classic XMMS player, is presented, writes OpenNET. The interface, visualization and work with sound are improved, proxy support is added, other improvements are made.

Details and a complete list of improvements

LLVM 10.0 compiler suite release




After six months of development, the release of the LLVM 10.0 project, a GCC-compatible toolkit (compilers, optimizers, and code generators), compiling programs into an intermediate bitcode of RISC-like virtual instructions (a low-level virtual machine with a multi-level optimization system), is presented, OpenNET reports.

Details and a complete list of improvements

Release of the MythTV Media Center 31.0




The release of the platform for creating the MythTV 31.0 home media center, which allows you to turn a desktop PC into a TV, VCR, music center, album with photos, a station for recording and watching DVDs, has been released, OpenNET reports. At the same time, the release of the separately developing MythWeb web interface for managing the media center through a web browser was formed. The new version supports Python 3. The capabilities related to video decoding and playback have been significantly improved: OpenGL is now used for video playback, support for accelerating video decoding using VAAPI VDPAU, NVDEC, VideoToolBox, Video4Linux2, MMAL and MediaCodec is provided. Support for the DataDirect service has been discontinued, and XMLTV should be used instead. Significantly expanded channel scan tools.

Details

Apache 21




The nonprofit Apache Software Foundation is celebrating its 21st anniversary. Initially, the organization was created to provide legal and financial support for developers of the Apache http server, but later it was transformed into a neutral and independent of individual manufacturers platform for developing a wide range of open projects that use the Apache license, general development rules, meritocracy principles and a unified communication culture . At the same time, Apache httpd HTTP server, 25 years old Apache OpenOffice office suite and 20 years Apache Jakarta, Subversion and Tomcat are celebrating 25 years. The number of Apache-developed projects has exceeded 350 (of which 45 in the incubator), covering areas such as machine learning, processing large volumes of data, build management, cloud systems, content management, DevOps, IoT,mobile application development, server systems and web frameworks. The development is supervised by more than 7600 committers. The number of participants supporting the fund over the past 21 years has increased from 21 to 765. The total cost of developing from scratch 300 Apache projects with more than 200 million lines of code is estimated at $ 20 billion when calculated using the COCOMO 2 cost estimation model.

Source

Modern GNU / Linux systems must support running old games - community opinion




LibrePlanet 2020, organized by the FSF, was held at a high level on March 15, 2020. There were many things discussed at the online conference. One topic of discussion was games on GNU / Linux systems. Developer Dennis Payne tried to look back and pointed out that old free games no longer run on modern distributions, writes FossBytes. According to Payne, FSF needs to use their “freedom to learn and modify” old free games for modern versions of distributions. This is the only way to get them to the next generation, and losing them is like losing a part of our history.

Details


That's it, until next Sunday!

Thanks to Linux.com for their work, a selection of English sources for my review is taken from there.

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