Tag: open source

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LexisNexis to Open Source Hadoop Alternative HPCC Systems

LexisNexis is planning to release its internally developed supercomputing platform as open source, providing developers with an alternative to the Hadoop framework for large-scale data processing, the company said Wednesday.
LexisNexis has been developing the technology, dubbed HPCC Systems, for the past 10 years, according to the company, which provides a variety of information services to legal firms, libraries, corporations and government entities.

via Hadoop alternative to be open sourced – Computerworld.

It will run on commodity Linux boxes and will be released in Community and Enterprise flavors. The Community version will have a GNU Affero GPL v3 license.

And there is one important note:

LexisNexis stressed that HPCC Systems won’t involve the release of any of its “data sources, data products, the unique data linking technology, or any of the linking applications that are built into its products.”

It will be very interesting to see how this develops.

 

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Oracle Gives OpenOffice to the Apache Software Foundation Starting Incubation Process

IBM, which had lobbied for Oracle to spin out the OpenOffice project after it was clear that the company had no commercial interests in continuing its development, also issued a statement today, saying that “We look forward to engaging with other community members to advance the technology beginning with out strong support of the incubation process for OpenOffice at Apache.”
But those community members may be elsewhere, as the creation of The Document Foundation included some of the leading developers on the OpenOffice project. While Oracle has handed over its OpenOffice code, the move does not reunite these two groups.
The Document Foundation stressed the importance of bringing these communities together in its statement in response to todays news: “The step Oracle has taken today was no doubt taken in good faith, but does not appear to directly achieve this goal. The Apache community, which we respect enormously, has very different expectations and norms – licensing, membership and more – to the existing OpenOffice.org and LibreOffice projects. We regret the missed opportunity but are committed to working with all active community members to devise the best possible future for LibreOffice and OpenOffice.org.

via Oracle Donates OpenOffice to the Apache Software Foundation.

Seems like a good move all around, but there is still a lot of work that needs to be done to undo the mess that followed Oracle taking over Sun and the OpenOffice project.

 

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Beware of Openwashing as “Open” Becomes the New Black

The old “open vs. proprietary” debate is over and open won. As IT infrastructure moves to the cloud, openness is not just a priority for source code but for standards and APIs as well. Almost every vendor in the IT market now wants to position its products as “open.” Vendors that don’t have an open source product instead emphasize having a product that uses “open standards” or has an “open API.”

“Openwashing” is a term derived from “greenwashing” to refer to dubious vendor claims about openness. Openwashing brings the old “open vs. proprietary” debate back into play – not as “which one is better” but as “which one is which?”

What does it mean to be open? And how can you tell if a product is really “open”?

via How to Spot Openwashing.

The article goes on to recommend paying close attention to licensing, the community, and a vendors proprietary products to see if their software and APIs are truly open source or just wrapped in a open blanket to take advantage of the latest buzz words.

Over the years I’ve seen a number of instances of openwashing, most notably with companies who built commercial products around a core of open source projects. The companies would make big noise about being open source and such, but community releases would just be a mash-up of other open source projects with the glue and features that comprised the real product they wanted to sell held back as proprietary.

So, buyer/developer beware. That open source based product that looks so cool may really just be a mirage.

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Guess What? Diaspora Not Bug Free and Totally Secure

The code release was accompanied by a warning that it is by no means bug free. “We know there are security holes and bugs, and your data is not yet fully exportable,” Diaspora said in announcing the Alpha release.
Even with that caveat, though, early reviewers have been unsparing in their criticism of Diaspora’s security features — or lack thereof.

via Facebook wannabe Diaspora hit on security issues – Computerworld.

OK, so the initial release of Diaspora for developers is out and it isn’t ready for prime time. Hmm, let’s take 4 college students give them $200K and 90 days and see if they can create a “better” Facebook. Really? C’mon, lighten up. This project is just in its infancy, of course the code is a bit dodgy. But remember it’s an open source project now, so don’t just complain, join the community and contribute.