Below are updates, news and event information from some of our Affiliate Members.

OpenProject

Free and open source project management software.

• OpenProject, released a new integration into GitHub. With the integration of GitHub into OpenProject, any developer or stakeholder can see the overall status of the software development, from project timing, requirements specification, down to the respective pull requests being worked on.
• When working and collaborating online, your data is potentially exposed to the software provider and its data privacy regulations. Be wise and include these criteria in the decision-making process for a software to avoid data breaches.

JOOMLA (Open Source Matters)
A free and open source, mobile-ready and user-friendly way to build your website

• Joomla 4.0 and Joomla 3.10 are here! After 9 years of hard work by our volunteers, we are proud to announce the release of our new major version, Joomla 4.0, alongside Joomla 3.10, known as “the bridge”. Joomla enables website creators to create powerful websites, where maintaining its content is easy and seamless. Build a beautiful, scalable website that will grow with your business.

KDE

25 Years of Bringing Free Software to the People

• Within the FLOSS community, KDE is probably best known for its powerful and versatile Plasma desktop environment. Outside the Open Source bubble, KDE is known for its world-class apps, from creativity-boosting programs for artists and filmmakers, to educational software used by millions for children, as well as a never-ending stream of frameworks, IDEs and utilities that provide devs worldwide with the means to create applications for any platform.

OpenInfra Foundation

An open source foundation supporting a global community to build and operate open infrastructure software

• Join us for OpenInfra Live: Keynotes, a two day special edition of OpenInfra Live for you to meet the newest players to the open infrastructure space, interact with leaders of open source projects like OpenStack and Kubernetes to hear how the projects are supporting OpenInfra use cases like hybrid cloud, gain insight into public cloud economics and the role open source technologies play, and celebrate as we announce this year’s Superuser Awards winner. This will be the one time everyone will be coming together this year. Come interact with the global OpenInfra community—Live on November 17 - 18 at 9am CT/1500 UTC!

OpenForum Europe

A not-for-profit, Brussels-based independent think tank which explains the merits of openeness in computing across Europe

• The European Commission just published a landmark study on the impact of Open Source on the European economy (which was conducted together with Fraunhofer ISI). The study recommends setting up Open Source Program Offices in European governments and providing more official funding towards OS. It found that if there was a 10% increase in OS contributions in the EU, the region would see additional €100 billion in its yearly GDP.

Brandeis GPS

Graduate Professional Studies offering fully online open source microcourses

• Take part in a micro-course at Brandeis University and join your fellow peers and collaborators in a program endorsed by the OSI. The Open Source Technology Management program consists of six non-credit four-week micro-courses that can be accessed in any order with a seamless path to collect digital badges, earn a full-program certificate and the option to earn graduate-level credit. The next micro-course, Establish an Open Source Program Office, starts on October 18. To learn more, please visit their website or contact the Brandeis corporate team at partnerships@brandeis.edu.

The Xerte Project

Provide high quality free software to educators all over the world

• The Xerte Project is delighted to announce the release of Xerte v3.10, with a heap of new features and enhancements. See the release notes, download from https://xerte.org.uk. The recordings from our Xerte21 event are available here. Xerte is used by thousands of tutors around the world, and the content they create reaches millions of learners.

Open Research Institute

Non-profit research and development organization, provides their work to the general public under the principles of Open Source and Open Access to Research

• Open Research Institute, Inc. is the co-host of the upcoming IEEE Information Theory Chapter Event "Space and Satellite Symposium - The Role of Information Theory in Space with Special Emphasis on Amateur Radio and Amateur Satellite" to be held 30 October 2021 8am-12pm US Pacific. The event features open source and open access work in the space and satellite field. Register for free and if you are interested in presenting, please read through the call for participation.
• On 2 September, 2021, Open Research Institute, received an advisory opinion from US Commerce Department BIS.The letter confirmed that posting information on the internet so that it is available to the public means that open source amateur satellite communications work is not subject to the Export Administration Regulation (EAR). Michelle Thompson, ORI CEO, highlighted the value of the work for the amateur radio satellite service and also placed the results in a broader context. "This is a significant regulatory success for open source amateur satellite work and open source in general."
• All documents and links to presentations about the work are freely available on github. Ms. Thompson continued with appreciation for the team. "Thank you to those who have supported and assisted ORI during the many stages of this successful regulatory endeavor. Making a successful argument requires competence, persistence, and patience. ORI will build upon this work moving forward in order to advance the aims and purposes of open source amateur radio work."

Drupal

Free and open-source web content management system

• The Drupal Core Contribution Coordinators, supported by the Drupal Association, are holding their first Mentor Summit, to help train more mentors introducing contribution to Drupal, on 17th September. More details.
• DrupalCon Europe 2021 has just released its schedule for the event, taking place 4-7th October online. See the full schedule.

TODO Group

An open group of organizations who want to collaborate on practices, tools, and other ways to run successful and effective open source projects

• The TODO group is proud to announce OSPOlogy: A set of OSPO resources made up of monthly meetings, OSPO news, and open discussions with the aim to study the status of Open Source Program Offices.
• OSPOCon Europe is happening on October 6th in London, UK.
• OSPOCon is happening September 27th - 29th in Seattle, Washington and Virtual

CAVO

Mission to develop and make available open voting systems for use in public elections

• California Association of Voting Officials applauds Mississippi for breaking ground on open source voting.

TikiWiki

Free and open source Wiki-based content management system and online office suite

• Tiki Wiki CMS Groupware 23.0 was released.This release includes more than 500 contributions from 28 community developers.
• Open Source Web Monetization with Tiki: Final report for Grant for the Web (GftW), a $100M fund to boost open, fair, and inclusive standards and innovation in Web Monetization.

Breathing Games

Community of heath care professionals and open source developers collaborating to transform breathing therapy into games

• Global crises, democratic solutions—within days. Using Internet to empower citizens, reach popular consensus, and ensure democratic decision-making. Zenodo preprint.
• Research questions and methodologies: why science is always political​.

Sysarmy

Provides comprehensive cybersecurity solutions

• OSI affiliate sysarmy is organizing the 8th edition of nerdear.la, our yearly conference for nerds in Latin America. Last year’s event included 30,000 people registering to 130+ talks and workshops entirely for free and featured keynotes from legends such as Alan Kay, Brian Kernighan and Jon "Maddog" Hall.
  This year’s event (Oct 20-23) will have over 150+ sessions and workshops and will have even more legendary keynote speakers. More information on Nerdear.la official website.

OpenUK

Represents the business of Open in the UK

• OpenUK Kids Camp is back for a second year and this year has made 5000 OpenUK Gloves inspired by MiMu, making an open source based sustainable glove. 3800 gloves are available to individuals, schools and community groups, and 1200 are complete with microbit two and reserved for digitally excluded young people to help break down the digital divide. The second OpenUK Kids Camp will begin on 4 October and each Episode has been inspired by one of the 10 Open Source Definitions and additionally teaches coding in Make Code, Python and Java. Each Lesson is accompanied by an ezine to support the learning with educational content on individuals working in open source, Foundations, open data, belonging and sustainability. The content is all creative commons and free to use. Order a glove if you are in the UK or take a look at the Camp content from last year, and this year’s as it is shared at openuk.uk/openkidscamp #openkidscamp.
• The third and final phase of OpenUK’s report which established the UK’s leading position in open source software, as number one in Europe with up to 43.15bn per annum in contribtuion to GDP in phase one, then shared the output of a survey demonstrating 89% of UK businesses run open source software, will look at the Values of open source in the UK and be shared on 13 October. You can see Phases one and two at openuk.uk/stateofopen
• OpenUK will be hosting the Open Technology for Sustainability Day at the Skypark Fringe within the Security Cordon at COP26 on 11 November. The event will be for circa 200 in person delegates and content will be shared in two tracks across two domes, with the main dome content being live streamed. Booking details and the agenda for the day will be shared at openuk.uk/sustainability in early October. The event will be keynoted by the Hon Francis Maude, Lord Maude of Horsham, the instigator of GDS and the UK’s world leading policies on open source in the public sector, which have been replicated across the globe and is sponsored by Red Hat who will lead a session on collaboration. OpenUK’s Award presentation will be conducted in the evening from the stage at COP26 in a hybrid ceremony with 100 face to face attendees and 150 digital attendees. 

We’d like to take a moment to thank our community for making our event on Practical Open Source Information a resounding success -- with more than 300 attendees, 30 speakers, a brilliant keynote address from Heather Leson of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies about the role open source plays in humanitarian efforts, and three tracks, our half-day event proved to be a valuable space for many members of our community to come together and discuss a wide range of pressing issues affecting open source practitioners everywhere. (Recordings of all event talks and panels will be made available shortly!)

We’d like to thank our program committee members, Pam Chestek, Christine Lemmer-Webber, Sam Kimbrel, Justin Colannino and John Mark Walker for selecting our event’s final programming. We’d also like to thank our OSI staff members who made this event possible -- Deb Nicholson, Vladimir Bejdo, Betsy Waliszewski, Phyllis Dobbs, Jessica Iavarone and Stefano Maffulli -- and our volunteers, who played crucial roles in running the event itself -- Kenny Coyle, Sri Ramkrishna, Remy deCausemaker, and Salt Hale.

If you attended or spoke at POSI, please take a minute fill out the short survey we emailed to you, so we can make future events even better. Thank you all, once again, for making this event possible -- we couldn’t have done it without the support of people in the open source community like you!

Our new half-day event on Practical Open Source Information is coming up soon on September 16th. With a unique focus on discussions related to everyday open source issues in all types of organizational contexts, POSI is a can’t-miss event for anyone seeking to learn ways to deepen their participation in open source from experienced practitioners.

Though our schedule has been published for about a month, we are now proud to announce that our schedule has been finalized, with a big addition: our event will start off with a few words from our New Executive Director, Stefano Maffulli! Make sure to attend his opening remarks at 10:45 AM EDT, just prior to our Keynote.

We’d also like to point out several details regarding event administration. We will be using an instance of the open source web conferencing system, BigBlueButton, to stream our talks and panels at POSI, with hosting courtesy of our in-kind sponsors at Blindside Networks. 

Remember to register in advance for POSI -- registration is gratis, but tickets are limited as we use registration figures to plan for adequate bandwidth for the event. Please, don’t wait until the last minute to register! Register here, now.

Seeing this post during POSI? Seeking help? Contact us at vbejdo@opensource.org for day-of assistance during the event.

SAN FRANCISCO, September 8, 2021 -- The Open Source Initiative ® (OSI), stewards of the Open Source Definition that sets the foundation for the open source ecosystem, is excited to announce Stefano Maffulli as its first Executive Director.  The appointment is a key step for the transformation of OSI into a professionally managed organization, a process that the Board of Directors started in 2020.

After an expansive search led by OSI’s purpose-built staffing committee, the Board of Directors appointed Maffulli, an experienced international leader in enterprise and open source environments. OSI is grateful to Deb Nicholson, interim general manager, for her outstanding work in this transitional year.

“Bringing Stefano Maffulli on board as OSI’s first Executive Director is the culmination of a years-long march toward professionalization, so that OSI can be a stronger and more responsive advocate for open source,” says Joshua Simmons, Board Chair of OSI. “We can now deprecate the role of President transitioning to Chair of the Board with confidence about OSI’s future.”

Maffulli joins OSI after decades of open source advocacy, both as a contributor and leader. He co-founded and led the Italian chapter of Free Software Foundation Europe from 2001 to 2007, structured the developer community of the OpenStack Foundation and subsequently led open source marketing teams in several international companies. An enthusiastic open source user, he’s contributed documentation patches, translations and advocated for projects as diverse as GNU, QGIS, OpenStreetmap and WordPress.

“Open source software is everywhere, but its definition is constantly being challenged,” Maffulli says. “The zombies of shared source, limited-use and proprietary software are emerging from the graves where we put them to rest in the 90s, threatening the whole ecosystem.”

OSI’s definition - and licenses - keep pace with today’s whiplash technological advances. 

“Mobile devices, cloud, artificial intelligence/machine learning and blockchain offer new opportunities for developers, entrepreneurs and society as a whole who all deserve a strong OSI not only to maintain a definition of open source that works in modern settings but also forges a path for how to effectively produce modern open source software,” he adds.

Members of the wider open source community also welcomed Maffulli to the OSI.

• "Successful open source depends on the solid bedrock of open source licenses, but it also requires so much more," says Allison Randal, Chair of the Board of the Open Infrastructure Foundation. "The new structure of the OSI will enable the Executive Director and the Board to put renewed energy behind the practical aspects of producing open source software in open and collaborative environments, facilitating healthy dialog around how open source projects and communities can continue to evolve toward a more sustainable and equitable future."

• “Open source has no geographical barriers. Software produced and shared by the global community is one of the greatest human achievements. By hiring an ED with an international background, the Open Source Initiative is reinforcing its mission to steward the Open Source Definition for the wider community,” says Samson Goddy, co-founder of Open Source Community Africa.

• "This is an important change," says Karen Sandler, executive director of the Software Freedom Conservancy. “I congratulate the OSI for engaging in a critical re-evaluation of its role in the FOSS community and redefining how its board functions. I'm excited to see what the future holds for OSI with Maffulli's leadership.”

About OSI

The Open Source Initiative (OSI) is the steward of the Open Source Definition (OSD) and the community-recognized body for reviewing and approving licenses as OSD-conformant. The OSI is also actively involved in Open Source community-building, education, and public advocacy to promote awareness and the importance of non-proprietary software. The mission of the OSI is to educate about and advocate for the benefits of open source and to build bridges among different constituencies in the open source community.

The Open Source Initiative (OSI) is a California public benefit corporation, with 501(c)3 tax-exempt status, founded in 1998. For more information, visit https://opensource.org/

On September 16th, 2021, the Open Source Initiative will be hosting a free, virtual half-day event on Practical Open Source Information. Geared towards open source developers, scholars, lawyers and managers interested in learning about open source in practice, this unique event will feature speakers with extensive experience in the field -- with a focus towards new adopters and those looking to deepen their open source participation.

We’d like to thank everyone in the community for their support of this new event -- especially those in the community who contributed by submitting one of the many, high-quality submissions we reviewed in putting together our line-up! We are also pleased to share the schedule today -- it includes many sessions we think you can’t miss!

The schedule of talks and panels can be found at this link. At POSI, our events will fall into three tracks: OSPOs and Lawyers, focusing on open source compliance, procurement, and legal topics; The Open Source Journey, with talks and panels for open source professionals; and Academia & Beyond, geared towards discussions on open source community and education matters. Our speakers are sharing their own experiences in implementing and working with open source software and communities, and we are looking forward to lively discussions with and amongst audience members via several panel sessions.

We are also excited to announce that our keynote will be delivered by Heather Leson, who will be speaking about the role open source can play in furthering humanitarian efforts -- drawing on her experiences with the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, where open source, open data, and open principles drive humanitarian action.

Registration for the event is gratis, but is required to attend, and can be found at this link. As always, this event couldn’t happen without community support -- please feel free to share links to our event with people who might be interested in what this new event has to offer! 

For anyone who might be interested in volunteering at the event, we could use some room monitors for POSI! Room monitors welcome speakers and report any issues in the room to OSI staff -- if that sounds like something you’d like to get involved with, get in touch and let us know what talk(s) you may be interested in monitoring. 

Community support can also come in the high-impact form of sponsorship -- if your organization is interested in sponsoring this event, please reach out to us at sponsors@opensource.org. The event prospectus is available at this link.