Google previewed the new technique at the 2019 Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition in June and recently implemented it in MediaPipe, a cross-platform framework for building multimodal applied machine learning pipelines to process perceptual data of different modalities (such as video and audio). Both the source code and an end-to-end usage scenario are available on GitHub. (Source: VentureBeat)
Knoppix 8.6 First Wide Public Release To Abandon Systemd
Version 8.6 of the popular Debian-derived Linux distribution Knoppix was released on Sunday, rebasing the distribution on Debian 10 (Buster)—released on July 9—with select packages from Debian’s testing and unstable branches to enable support for newer graphics hardware. TechRepublic reports, “The still controversial startup systemd, which has been a little outrageous due to security vulnerabilities just recently, has been integrated in Debian since Jessie [8.0], and has been removed since Knoppix 8.5. I bypass hard dependencies on the boot system with my own packages.” (Source: TechRepublic)
Gerald Pfeifer Appointed Chair Of The openSUSE Board
Seasoned open source leader Gerald Pfeifer has been appointed chair of the openSUSE board. Pfeifer’s new responsibilities will begin immediately and run concurrently with his role as SUSE CTO in EMEA. Current chair Richard Brown, who was appointed in July 2014, is resigning after five years of service for a combination of personal reasons and his desire to focus on his career at SUSE, from where he will continue his contribution to openSUSE. Brown and Pfeifer will work closely together to transition responsibilities.
Microsoft Buys jClarity To Jolt Java Support In Azure
Microsoft acquired London-based jClarity in a move to bolster support of the Java programming language for workloads running in its Azure cloud platform. It’s also the latest open source push for the cloud-computing giant. The jClarity team has been a contributor to the AdoptOpenJDK project that helps users build binaries of OpenJDK for platforms like Linux and Windows. (Source: SDX Central)
NSA Researchers Talk Development, Release of Ghidra SRE Tool
The National Security Agency released its classified Ghidra software reverse-engineering (SRE) tool as open source to the cybersecurity community on April 4. NSA researchers Brian Knighton and Chris Delikat shared how Ghidra was built and the process of releasing it at Black Hat 2019. Ghidra is a framework developed by the NSA’s Research Directorate for the agency’s cybersecurity mission. It’s designed to analyze malicious code to give security pros a better understanding of potential vulnerabilities in their networks and systems. (Source: Dark Reading)
Google Cloud Adds Compute, Memory-Intensive VMs
Google added virtual machine (VM) types on Google Compute Engine including second-generation Intel Xeon scalable processor machines and new VMs for compute- and memory-heavy applications. The former, available in beta, are general-purpose VMs. They provide greater than 20% price-performance improvement for many workloads and support up to 25% more memory per virtual CPU compared with first-generation machines, according to Google. These N2 VMs offer a balance of compute, memory, storage, and network resources for general-purpose workloads such as web and application servers, enterprise applications, gaming servers, content and collaboration systems, and most databases. They are available in Google’s U.S.-Central, Europe-West, and Asia-Southeast region now and will be available in most Google Cloud Platform (GCP) regions in the next few months. (Source: SDX Central)
CloudBees And Google Cloud Partner To Accelerate Application Development On Anthos
CloudBees and Google Cloud are collaborating to deliver a modern DevOps platform based on open source technologies powered by Google Cloud’s Anthos. The companies are using transformational technologies like Jenkins X, Kubernetes and Tekton to create a unified, end-to-end software delivery system. CloudBees provides companies large and small with Jenkins-based continuous delivery solutions that are secure, open toolchain-enabled and scalable to transform software delivery processes across hybrid computing environments. Google Cloud is delivering to enterprises a secure, open, intelligent and transformative enterprise cloud platform. Anthos, a hybrid and multi-cloud platform, is built on open source technologies pioneered by Google Cloud and enables consistency between on-premise and cloud environments. (Source: Press Release)
rideOS Launches Ridehailing Platform
rideOS, a technology platform designed to accelerate the safe, global rollout of next-generation transportation fleets, today launched its new Ridehail Platform — including a Ridehail API and open-source mobile apps. The Ridehail API offers an easy way for automotive original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), autonomous vehicle (AV) companies, and transportation network companies (TNCs) to create and manage their own ridehailing network using rideOS’ underlying technology. (Yahoo!)
CNCF Reaches 100 End User Community Members
The Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF), which sustains and integrates open source technologies like Kubernetes and Prometheus, today announced that its End User Community has grown to 100 members. The CNCF End User Community consists of enterprises and startups that are committed to accelerating the adoption of cloud native technologies and improving the deployment experience. (Yahoo!)
VMware In Talks To Acquire Pivotal
VMware today confirmed that it is in talks to acquire software development platform Pivotal Software, the service best known for commercializing the open-source Cloud Foundry platform. The proposed transaction would see VMware acquire all outstanding Pivotal Class A stock for $15 per share, a significant markup over Pivotal’s current share price (which unsurprisingly shot up right after the announcement). (Source: TFiR)