LPI LPIC-3 Mixed Environment

The LPIC-3 certification is the culmination of the multi-level professional certification program of the Linux Professional Institute (LPI). LPIC-3 is designed for the enterprise-level Linux professional and represents the highest level of professional, distribution-neutral Linux certification within the industry. Four separate LPIC-3 specialty certifications are available. Passing any one of the four exams will grant the LPIC-3 certification for that specialty.

The LPIC-3 Mixed Environments certification covers the administration of Linux systems enterprise-wide in mixed environments.

Current version: 3.0 (Exam code 300-300)

Previous version: 1.0 (Exam code 300-100) Available until February 23rd, 2022

Objectives: 300-300

Prerequisites: The candidate must have an active LPIC-2 certification to receive the LPIC-3 certification.

Requirements: Passing the 300 exam. The 90-minute exam is 60 multiple-choice and fill-in-the-blank questions.

Validity period: 5 years

Cost: Click here for exam pricing in your country.

Languages for exam available in VUE test centers: English, Japanese

Read More: 300-300: LPIC-3 Mixed Environment (LPIC-3 300)

Source: lpi.org

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RAIT and Microdevice Spearhead LPI's Mission in the Indian Subcontinent

Given India's four million computing jobs and 880,000 computer science students annually enrolled, it is an important part of the Linux Professional Institute (LPI) mission to internationally support open source professionals to offer certifications in that part of the world. I had the chance to talk with two leaders of Indian educational institutions that recently signed up as LPI partners:Govind Gaundalkar of Microdevice Technologies and associate professor Prasiddh Trivedi of the Ramrao Adik Institute of Technology (RAIT).

The Pitch to LPI and to Indian Partners

Govind Gaundalkar, at Microdevice, knew LPI and reached out to them to get certifications offered in India. LPI’s efforts in the Asia Pacific expanded greatly in 2019 with the support of a newly hired Partner Development & Success Manager, Jolly Villaviza, who is based in the Philippines and pursues opportunities for partnerships in that region. Jolly picked up and acted on an earlier request by Govind. “Govind is very passionate in presenting open source to organizations in India. He grasps LPI’s mission of supporting people who are working with open source in India,” Jolly said. 

Five months ago, Microdevice Technologies became an Approved Training Partner and Approved Channel Partner and started offering certification exams. Govind then became a strong advocate for LPI, persuading RAIT and three other colleges to become partners. RAIT came into partnership at the highest level—Platinum—right away. All four institutions are in Mumbai.

Offering LPI certifications is part of the larger task of teaching open source. Although Microdevice Technologies offers courses in Linux-related topics at about INR 1600(20USD) for Linux Essentials (partly in conjunction with the Xavier Institute of Engineering, another recent LPI partner), RAIT had nothing related to open source except courses on the MySQL and PostgreSQL databases. (One could also count other courses that cover programming languages.) Now RAIT is increasing its course offerings in open source.

Costs of Computer Education

One of LPI's most helpful actions recently, to spread certification in emerging markets, is their revision of exam prices. The cost to Indian exam-takers has been reduced by 35%, which is crucial for many students.

Trivedi told me that RAIT has worked very hard to keep the cost of an education affordable. A student can get a bachelor's degree in technology or engineering for 450,000 rupees, which is currently about $6,000 US or €5,000. RAIT has kept the cost of training students for LPI certification down to 1,000 rupees, which is $12 US.

Computers themselves are a significant cost. Many students can afford only a mobile device, not a laptop or desktop system. Luckily, all the computer courses taught by Microdevice and RAIT can be done on computers stored on their campus, and students can log in remotely. Some of these computers even have GPUs, which is crucial to study machine learning. Virtualization also lowers costs, because many students can work on one physical computer without a noticeable degradation of response time.

LPI has just approved a grant to Microdevice. This project will help create a 20-seat laboratory that will offer LPI courses to students and professionals. The space will also be a future center for LPI exams.

RAIT is considering a move to a cloud vendor such as AWS during its next major upgrade. However, it is important to give students accounts through the university; it should not be necessary for a student to get an account directly with AWS. Among other problems, AWS requires a credit card, and many students are too young to get one or don't qualify for one.

Govind is also lobbying LPI to grant permission to Indian institutions to offer in-person certification exams. These can be offered at a much lower cost because, among other things, one proctor can perform the test for many people at the same time. Furthermore, Indian students are more comfortable taking tests with pencil and paper.

Tools that Facilitate Getting a Certification

The Learning Materials, a relatively recent initiative at LPI, is enormously beneficial to people seeking certification. Govind is talking to LPI about two other types of offering that other certification organizations offer: on-demand training (especially useful for the low-level Essentials certifications) and practice exams.

Finally, Govind seeks to provide students for the unpaid internships that LPI plans to offer. A three-month internship adds a lot of value to their resumes.

Currently, the Mumbai institutions offering LPI-related training and certification are only a tiny toehold. LPI’s mandate covers the entire world, so any expansion into emerging markets is news worth reporting.

Source: lpi.org

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IpCert is now an LPI Gold Partner

IpCert is an Italian company specializing since 2009 in the provision of highly professional courses in IT, aimed at helping students gain the most critical industry certifications. The company offers courses toward Linux Professional Institute (LPI) certifications, along with other technologies (Microsoft Azure, VMware VCP-DCV certification, Cisco CCNP certification, etc.). An LPI partner since 2015, IpCert just renewed the partnership, upgrading it to the Gold level. 

Concerning the renewal with the upgrade of the partnership, Claudio Palombi, IpCert’s CEO, said:

“I can only express my great satisfaction with the partnership renewal with LPI. This year we are doubly pleased because, in addition to continuing a collaboration that has lasted for several years, we have managed to make this link even more consistent by making an important upgrade in our level of partnership.

“Starting this year, IpCert Alta Formazione IT Online can boast of being an Approved Training Partner Gold, and this is,  for us, a further stimulus but at the same time an element that makes us even more responsible towards the students who turn to us to acquire specific skills in the use of the Linux operating system and open source software.

“I would like to thank the Linux Professional Institute for this new opportunity, which I am sure we will make the most of.”

Daniele Cirio, LPI’s Account Executive for Italy, Ireland, and United Kingdom, added:

“We are delighted at LPI to see IpCert maintaining its commitment to the LPI’s mission through its partnership upgrade. The pandemic, and now its tail, demonstrated how important it is to keep high-profile IT training available. Scaling up that commitment, IpCert demonstrates how important it is for LPI to have in the field partners as receptive to the local needs as IpCert. In 2022 LPI has been decreasing the price of its exams in Italy: we look forward to seeing this increase uptake of certifications through participating in and improving the wider scenario of the Italian digital transformation. ”

IpCert provides its training for the Linux Essentials, LPIC-1, LPIC-2 exams in Frosinone, Italy, and worldwide, online.

Source: lpi.org

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LPI LPIC-3 Virtualization and Containerization

The LPIC-3 certification is the culmination of the multi-level professional certification program of the Linux Professional Institute (LPI). LPIC-3 is designed for the enterprise-level Linux professional and represents the highest level of professional, distribution-neutral Linux certification within the industry. Four separate LPIC-3 specialty certifications are available. Passing any one of the four exams will grant the LPIC-3 certification for that specialty.

The LPIC-3 Virtualization and Containerization certification covers the administration of Linux systems enterprise-wide with an emphasis on virtualization & containerization.

Current version: 3.0 (Exam code 305-300)

Previous version: 2.0 (Exam code 304-200) Available until June 20th, 2022

Objectives: 305-300

Prerequisites: The candidate must have an active LPIC-2 certification to receive the LPIC-3 certification.

Requirements: Passing the 305 exam. The 90-minute exam is 60 multiple-choice and fill in the blank questions.

Validity period: 5 years

Cost: Click here for exam pricing in your country.

Languages for exam available in VUE test centers​: English (Japanese coming soon)

Read More: 305-300: LPIC-3 Virtualization and Containerization

Source: lpi.org

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Strengthening Transgender Access to Jobs in Brazil: educaTRANSforma Supports the Whole Person

The transgender movement has created a cascade of coming-out, not least in Brazil, where researchers found that 0.69% of the population identifies as transgender, and 1.19% as non-binary. Employers in Brazil, as elsewhere, have also realized that creating safe spaced for transgender and non-binary people can tap a vibrant workforce.

educaTRANSforma, supported by a grant from the Linux Professional Institute, is throwing a lifeline to transgender people. We'll look at the inspiring story of educaTRANSforma in this article.

What They're Dealing with: Conditions for Transgender People in Brazil

Many transgender people are bullied and threatened with violence at school, or mistreated in many other ways that deny their identity. If they are rejected by their families, they often end up living on the streets with negative consequences on their education. Such neglect, in combination with similiar discrimination by employers or fellow employees, prevent a lot of transgender people from obtaining stable, professional jobs..

According to Noah Scheffel, CEO and founder of educaTRANSforma, 90% of Brazilian transgender people have resorted to sex work to stay alive. Murder rates of transgender people are extremely high. (In the United States, too, alarming numbers of transgender and non-binary people die each year, mostly people of color.) Under such dire conditions, it's not surprising that drug abuse and suicide are also common.

Despite intense transphobia (rejection and violence against transgender people) in Brazil, many companies have adopted diversity, inclusion, and equality (DIE) campaigns to employ and support marginalized parts of the society, including transgender people. There are opportunities for transgender people, but they need the education to get jobs.

The students also need more than education, according to Scheffel: they need support for entering workplaces. Despite consultations with employers, there will be employees who treat the transgender employees poorly or ignore their basic dignity with aggressive acts such as challenging their right to use the public bathrooms. educaTRANSforma offers support for its students during their emotional and physical journeys, while advising companies about how to respect their rights.

Scheffel formed educaTRANSforma after being severely rejected in his own job. He was already a manager in his high-tech firm, with a tenure that had lasted 10 years, when he transitioned. But the reaction of his coworkers and managers was nasty.

At the same time, Scheffel realized that computing—and open source software in particular—provided an entry point into the workplace for marginalized people. The costs of learning computer skills are modest, compared for instance to medical training, which requires labs and experience in clinical settings. People who have been excluded from mainstream schools and colleges can learn skills without getting official degrees. (Only 0.02% of people who identify as transgender in Brazil attend college, and few know English at the level most companies require.)

Finally, computing is congenial to some transgender programmers and administrators because they can thrive without playing a public role where they might continually encounter and have to deal with people who express transphobic views.

Founding and Building educaTRANSforma

Scheffel launched educaTRANSforma shortly before the COVID-19 pandemic required physical distancing. educaTRANSforma was working in a local computing center known as a "technology park," providing labs with computer systems for where students without access to computers or the internet could study. When distancing requirements were imposed, the organization started remote training.

LPI offered a grant at that point, and helped educaTRANSforma find other donors as well. An LPI partner donated free training. educaTRANSforma collected computers discarded by other organizations and set them up with GNU/Linux and other free software for students.

Victória Cristine Corotto, whom I also interviewed for this article, was the first student of educaTRANSforma. She helped the organization work on its methods and has stayed active in it after graduating.

She is now working at a major computer company, coding an online interface in JavaScript for Human Resources. She also started working on her employer's diversity efforts, after having been there only two weeks. She emphasized how grateful she was to educaTRANSform, and that she wants many other people to benefit from it.

Progress and the Path Ahead

So far, 87% of the students graduating from educaTRANSforma have gotten hired. To maintain the supportive community that can give them the strength to face transphobia and difficult conditions at work, educaTRANSforma has a private portal. People share information about job openings and form supportive groups in the portal. Graduates also recruit other transgender people in their circles or "trans families" to join the program.

To explain what the new workforce needs, educaTRANSforma is acting as a consultant to interested companies.

Does educaTRANSforma have advice for people who want to set up similar organizations in other countries, or for organizations working with other marginalized populations? Scheffel and Corotto stress the importance of the support network.

They also say that hiring companies need to work hard to make sure that their diverse workforces are supported after hiring—nobody should have to go through what Scheffel suffered at his job, or even the micro-aggressions and misunderstandings Corotto has encountered at her new position.

Companies may also have to support transgender people by offering some of the training—in the English language, for instance—that other employees got in school and college, because these institutions often fail to accept and educate transgender people. 

To support educaTRANSforma's work (sites are in Portuguese):

Make a one-time donation

Set up a monthly donation

Become a partner or patron

Source: lpi.org

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Creating NFTs with Free and Open Source Software

An unusual educational opportunity came to Linux Professional Institute (LPI) over the summer of 2021. Two interns–Alex, a Public Relations student and myself, Rozilyn, studying electrical and computer engineering–decided to create a set of NFTs as a learning excercise. This article describes the tools used by Alex and I in enough detail that you can try them out yourself.

Until we started our internships, Alex and I didn't know any more about NFTs than what we had casually read in the press. When we decided to do an NFT project for our internships, we had to quickly come up to speed on cryptocurrencies: graphics that could be licensed through NFTs, and NFT contracts. In this posting, I’ll describe the technologies used to 1) create the artwork, and 2) write a smart contract that can mint (i.e. create) the NFTs for the corresponding images.

LPI has no plans to use or distribute these NFTs at present, but images of a dressed-up Tux penguin make for an appealing and fun summer project to help young IT professionals learn more about emerging technologies.

The Development Process

Convenient tools exist for developing NFTs and smart contracts, which can be used by those with limited technical skills. For example, OpenSea and Rarible make it easy to create and market NFTs. In our case, because our primary goal was to learn the technology, we opted for using open-source tools and going through the process more manually. By the summer’s end, we: 

◉ Created artwork for LPI based on a CC-licensed image of the popular Tux penguin representing Linux

◉ Created NFTs with a customized Solidity contract

◉ Deployed and verified the contract on a public test network (testnet)

◉ Minted NFTs that our testers could manage in their wallets

The rest of this posting walks through how we created a series of NFTs using entirely open-source tools.

Creating the Images

For the artwork, we adopted the method common to many popular existing NFTs (e.g., CryptoPunks and CryptoKitties): Generating a random combination of attributes to customize a base image. This process creates several variations of a common character or theme in a series of NFTs.

Alex created the images for the base Tux and additional attributes using GIMP and GraphicsMagick. The images were organized into designated directories (Figure 1) for each area of Tux that Alex customized: shirts, pants, hats, beak, flippers, and so on.

Figure 1: Component image layout (partial)

The final images were created using a Bash script. First, the script randomly selected one out of several base images of Tux. Then the script overlaid one attribute from each attribute directory onto the base image and saved the final, combined image. Since we were picking random attributes, the script also checks before saving the new image that the new combination of attributes did not repeat an existing combination. The entire process is repeated until the desired number of images is fulfilled.

The GraphicsMagick gm composite command combined the images. Since the gm command works with one base image and only one overlay image at a time, the script made wrapped calls to the command in a loop (Figure 2) to have the resulting image include multiple attributes.

Figure 2: Layering process

The key command-line tools used in the script were: 

◉ sort: Used with the little-known --random-sort or -R option, this command returns the attributes in each directory in a randomized order.

◉ head: This command selects the first image from the previously mentioned, randomly ordered  list.

◉ sed: A streaming text editor, this command creates the metadata file from the template (shown below), by replacing ##TOKENNUM## and ##TOKENURI## with the current number and URI for the image the script is currently generating.

Each NFT was supplemented by documentation specifying its title, description, and image URI (similar to an address). These details were implemented in our smart contract using a metadata file specified in the ERC-721 JSON standard for NFTs, as seen in the following sample:

{

    "title": "MyToken",

    "type": "object",

    "properties": {

        "name": {

            "type": "string",

            "description": "MyToken ###TOKENNUM##"

        },

        "description": {

            "type": "string",

            "description": "MyToken ###TOKENNUM##"

        },

        "image": {

            "type": "string",

            "description": "##TOKENURI##"

        }

    }

}

Example 1: NFT template metadata file for sed to transform

While we opted for our metadata files to solely contain the base provided by the ERC-721 standard, you may want to include different, unique features in your own. 

Writing an NFT Contract

Smart contracts are software programs that are stored and executed on a blockchain network. This software is used to add additional features to transactions, such as allowing the licensee to transfer NFTs to other people. Smart contracts can serve a wide variety of possible functions, including facilitating the storage of transaction information on the network, verifying ownerships, and transferring tokens. 

The main tools and resources that I used to create the contracts were: 

◉ OpenZeppellin: Described on Zeppelin's website as “an open-source framework for building secure smart contracts”, this project provides documentation, libraries, and support for the construction of smart contracts on decentralized blockchain networks.

◉ Solidity: Used by me to create our smart contracts, this is the programming language for both the sample work and OpenZeppelin’s Contracts Wizard. It is also commonly known for its usage in writing and implementing smart contracts in general.

◉ Truffle: Described as a “personal blockchain for Ethereum development you can use to deploy contracts, develop your applications, and run tests”, Truffle provides an isolated environment to test smart contracts prior to deployment on an active blockchain. You can use Truffle to compile, deploy, and interact with your software on your local system. 

◉ Ganache: A subset of the Truffle ecosystem, this  is a developer environment and command-line tool that assists in the development, testing, and deployment of safe (that is, secure) smart contracts on a local (personal) Truffle blockchain network. Developers using Ganache gain the added benefit of not requiring personal test or real ether (ETH), the cryptocurrency used on the Ethereum blockchain. Avoiding ether is convenient for reasons outlined in the following sections.

◉ Ropsten: This is a public Ethereum testnet. We used it in our final testing phase, as it has the closest resemblance to the Ethereum Mainnet. Ropsten is the only proof-of-work testnet. It requires developers to have personal test cryptocurrency.

◉ Etherscan: This is a search engine that allows you to view contracts, tokens, accounts, transactions, and blocks stored on Ethereum Mainnet or testnets. Because Etherscan can search for smart contracts, it can be used after deploying your own to verify that the contract has successfully become active.

◉ MetaMask: A blockchain wallet–much like those in real life–that acts as digital storage for information that provides access to assets (the assets themselves are stored on a blockchain). Metamask is a wallet specified for the Ethereum blockchain in the form of a browser plugin and mobile app that allows users to view or transfer (and swap, when on the Mainnet) assets.

Creating and interacting with a smart contract for an NFT is very manageable using OpenZeppellin’s smart contracts documentation and Contract Wizard, with or without knowledge of Solidity. However, with a working knowledge of Solidity, a programmer can easily add their own customizations to the generated contracts.

For example, the code produced by the wizard for a contract includes a function for minting the tokens, safeMint. The function mints only one token at a time. Thus, to mint 10,000 tokens, you have to call the mint function 10,000 times. I added the following code written to a contract to handle multiple mints at once: 

function mintMany(uint256 num, address to) public onlyOwner {

    for (uint256 i = 0; i < num; i++){

        safeMint(to);

    }

}

Example 2: Basic custom contract function sample

One of the more important features to note on the Contract Wizard is selecting your contract’s token standard. Standards have been developed for tokens to keep their contracts compatible with each other and to ensure that they provide the basic functionality (ex. minting, owning, transferring, tracking, etc). ERC-721 is the standard interface when creating non-fungible tokens–that is, tokens that cannot be used interchangeably but are each unique–and was what we selected when creating a contract with the wizard. 

Transactions on a blockchain network have an associated cost in a given cryptocurrency. This fee is commonly referred to as gas. For the Ethereum blockchain, ether is the currency used to pay the gas fee in the unit of gwei, equivalent to 10E-9 ether. 

With the current market value of ether (ETH, the coin used on the Ethereum blockchain), it is relatively expensive to deploy contracts. So when you do it on the Ethereum Mainnet, you’d want to be certain there won’t be any issues or errors that would cause you to have to redo a transaction. You pay the gas whether or not a transaction is successful.

Taking the financial costs into account, if you’re just learning how to interact with blockchain networks, you wouldn’t want to do your practice on the Mainnet. Instead, you would likely do so on a testnet where you can pay gas fees with test ether that has no real value.

Therefore, in order of testing, we first learned the basics of deploying and interacting with the sample contracts provided by OpenZeppellin on Ganache, a local, personal network. Then, after some practice, we moved to Ropsten, a public test network.

Because our testnet of choice was Ropsten, we needed currency to use on the network–in this case, ropsten ether (rETH). Unlike normal ETH, rETH can be obtained for free using rETH faucets. These faucets allow you to enter the address you wish to transfer the test ether to, typically once every 24 hours. This delay is part of what makes Ganache’s wait-free network ideal for initial experimentation. There are various faucets that drip different amounts at different time intervals. The faucets we used were:

◉ MyCrypto: Can request  0.01 RopstenETH as frequently as you’d like 

◉ Dimensions Network Faucet: Can request 5 rETH every 24 hours

◉ Ropsten Ethereum Faucet: Can request 1 rETH every 24 hours 

After you have your test ether to cover the gas price, you can then proceed with deployment to your chosen public testnet. You can confirm and see your work using Etherscan and MetaMask by using the contract address from the deployment receipt (see the following Javascript output from deploying the contract) to search for your contract (Figure 3) and import your tokens to your wallet (Figure 4). 

2_deploy.js

===========

    Deploying ‘MyToken’

    - - - - - - - - 

    > transaction hash:    0x1b2f67de68204ae3c137985379103ce8435a51a45452f624487e13b182ab2052

    > Blocks: 1            Seconds: 18

    > contract address:     0x3dd50Bcb9E125f1B7537f257fB6f4C165a02cB0f

    > block number:        10822250

    > block timestamp:        1628784232

    > account:            0x6dfA9B40F8a6AC500BcD0F09Bfa7709c6bD74dBC

    > balance:            16.44630489

    > gas used:            3171561 (0x3064e9)

    > gas price:        20 gwei

    > value sent:        0 ETH

    > total cost:        0.06343122 ETH

    > Saving artifacts 

    - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 

    > Total cost:        0.06343122 ETH

Example 3: JS output (deployment receipt) from deploying MyToken contract

Figure 3: MyToken Contract on Etherscan

Figure 4: Test NFT called MyToken (MTK), viewed in a MetaMask wallet

You can verify your deployed contract manually on Etherscan; however, we had difficulties doing so as our contract had imported files. Running the following Truffle command on the command line was successful and effortless:

truffle run verify <contract name> --network <network name>

Verifying your contract makes the code public on Etherscan, allows for transparency with users, and gives them the ability to query and write to available public functions. Although there are various functions to have publicly accessible in your smart contract, the only one we included in our test contract was for non-owners to be able to transfer their NFT.

    

While testing, the first way we found to transfer a token from one owner to another was by connecting to Web3, via MetaMask or WalletConnect (both Web3 wallets), on Etherscan and using the safeTransferFrom function with the wallet account number of the NFT owner, the account to transfer to, and the NFT’s ID. We successfully transferred an MTK token (after a 0.00010114 rETH gas fee) using this method. 

An alternative method, which is potentially more user friendly, is MetaMask’s own “Send” feature. Noting that this functionally is currently available only on the mobile app and not the extension. 

We noted with concern that functions that should only be usable for the contract owner were publicly available functions – specifically the ownership and the minting functions. While all functions can and should be publically viewable for transparency, only the NFT owner should have access to privileged functions. So I attempted to use the previously mentioned mintMany function with an account that was not the owner of the contract, and appropriately, the transaction was not successful. To its credit, MetaMask advised against attempting the transaction, warning, “This transaction is expected to fail. Trying to execute it is expected to be expensive but fail, and is not recommended.” After we continued anyway, the transaction did indeed report  “Fail with error 'Ownable: caller is not the owner'”.

Source: lpi.org

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Sonia Ben Othman: Achieving Equity and Supporting Growth for Women and Girls in FOSS

Part of the Linux Professional Institute (LPI) mission of “promoting the use of open source by supporting the people who work with it” is facilitating equity. Supporting the adoption of FOSS and professional development of those that use it, in turn, allows Linux professionals to aid their communities, and creates opportunities for international development where access to IT may otherwise be infeasible. 

Women are a vital part of the history of free and open source software - and its future. On this International Women’s Day, we publish the following interview to celebrate the contributions women have made to FOSS and to Information and Communication Technologies for Development (ICT4D), as well as gain insight into what supports can help create change within an environment that can pose challenges to the bright and capable minds that help develop it. We had the privilege of interviewing a member of the LPI team with experience both building her career as a woman in FOSS and helping women succeed through open source in North Africa.

Sonia Ben Othman is the LPI Partner Development & Success Manager for Maghreb, a region with existing barriers to gender equity and rights and freedoms for women. In addition to being a valuable member of the LPI team, and a supportive colleague who has approached all of our interactions with warmth, her path provides key insights into how FOSS can uniquely contribute to autonomy and professional success for women in developing regions. A transcription of our interview follows.

Thanks for meeting today to share your thoughts on how we can support equity in the FOSS community, and celebrate the success of women in IT! To start, can you share your professional and/or academic background?

Thank you for giving me the opportunity for an interview, and I appreciate your consideration and interest in me. I have a Master's degree in Educational Technologies, have been part of the LPI Maghreb team since 2006, and I currently Partner Development & Success Manager at Linux Professional Institute. I run a Linux training and certification company based in Tunisia, founded in 2004. I have also been professionally involved in national and international projects with universities in North Africa and France through the university networks as a professional and as a volunteer.

Tell us about your path in free and open source software; how you first became involved and where you are now.

I started to get interested in open source software when I did my Master's degree in new educational technologies. My surprise was great when I discovered the accessibility and ease of working with these tools!

What has your experience been as a woman in IT and/or FOSS communities?

In the beginning, they [those in positions of authority] will tell you that you are not doing it right because you do not know enough and that they should do it for you. But I persisted and took the time to learn and ended up running projects on a national as well as international level. 

Describe the relationship between FOSS and women you have seen in your career. How can FOSS and ICT help empower women, and in turn, how have women students and professionals succeeded in and/or contributed to FOSS? 

FOSS and ICT continue to grow by leaps and bounds. This sector has a lot to offer, including numerous job opportunities, competitive salaries, work/life balance, and more. These are the major factors that encourage women to learn FOSS, to find a better job, and to be economically independent.

What changes would you like to see to the open source community to make it more encouraging and inclusive to women? Are these the same changes you would make to IT overall?

We should create safe online spaces where girls can access reliable information tailored to them, discover valuable services in their area, and connect with other professional women facing and overcoming the same challenges. The goal is to boost self-confidence and empower girls to pursue work in the IT sector.

Are there any specific resources or organizations you have had positive experiences with and would recommend to women interested in IT and FOSS?

I had the pleasure of collaborating with the international organization of the Francophonie through the Francophone Fund. I was sponsored to create a Moodle platform and to give free courses on system and network administration under Linux for the French-speaking countries. These courses drew more than six thousand participants.

Do you have any advice or encouragement for young women looking to become involved in IT? 

The IT sector is dynamic and is evolving rapidly. It can be said that societal changes and innovation are progressing at about the same pace as the adoption and use of ICT in everyday life and work. This is driving the creation of ICT jobs, which are incredibly diverse and include a wide variety of options from jobs specializing in the production and management of ICTs to jobs that rely heavily and directly on ICTs to manufacture or produce goods.

The ICT sector remains a very attractive market, providing employment and income opportunities for skilled and qualified women. So the only option that we have as women is learning and learning!

Sonia Ben Othman is just one of the many talented women professionals, both within LPI and outside of it, that contribute to FOSS and ICT4D around the world. Science and technology is a field where all individuals, regardless of identity, should have the opportunity to work, contribute and thrive. LPI is delighted to welcome more people to become part of the free and open community. We hope through the celebration of success and consideration of different perspectives to shape the future of open source, we can continue to encourage an equitable environment for everyone in FOSS - “promoting the use of open source by supporting the people that work with it”.

Source: lpi.org

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A hackathon's story: first GHOFOSS hackathon, Italy

Since the start of the project for an open history of FOSS, the Linux Professional Institute (LPI) defines it as a “glocal” one. By glocal, we mean the best possible mix of global and local history, stories, and initiatives.

Sunday, October 24th, we had a great glocal hackathon to support the project: GHOFOSS. This project was enhanced immensely by the participation of the Italian Linux Society (ILS), which recently joined LPI as a Community Partner. It was a logical consequence to apply the relatively new concept of Community Partner—designed by LPI for organizations with their own communities and partner groups—to a friendly relationship spanning more than two decades.

A “LinuxDay Italia” with a “tail”

The yearly apex of the relationship between LPI and ILS is LinuxDay, the Italian community celebration of all that constitutes Linux and FOSS. In 2020, LinuxDay had to become an online event. LPI was very happy to sponsor the event once again in such troubled times. For the 2021 edition, ILS decided to switch to a hybrid environment, with mainly online talks but local in-person events as well. This was what you could call a special edition: made even more special by the decision to dedicate a second day to a hackathon boosting our GHOFOSS project.

“From a messy start”...

The first GHOFOSS hackathon: six hours of pure, productive nerdiness

At 2:00 PM CEST, we gathered at an online conference using the Italian Linux Society’s instance of Big Blue Button. (And yes: if you are not already aware of this open source virtual classroom platform, a great fit for virtual meetings, classes, and conferences, do take a look at it.).

The available raw material consisted of some data about Linux and open source events from a worldwide and an Italian point of view.

By the way: because GHOFOSS is an ongoing project, you can keep on contributing to it providing more data about the history of your own Linux and FOSS communities using these forms:

◉ Google form (English)

◉ Gitpull form (Italian)

At the start of our meeting, we were prepared with a mockup simulating—even if just in a static way—what we want to achieve with GHOFOSS in terms of usability and usefulness. Our goal is an interactive experience that—almost literally—connects the dots. Those dots are, on one side, different places in the world; and on the other side, a specific time in what is going to be the Global+Local stream. We decided to use, as our T0, the seminal email from Linus Torvalds introducing Linux in 1991.

Roberto “MadBob” Guido, the President of the Italian Linux Society, started coordinating our hackathon’s participants in two teams: one committed (pun intended…) to the back end; the other to the front end. We had allocated six hours to finalize some sort of MVP. 

I hadn’t attended a hackathon in ages. And it was my first online one. Not being a programmer (sometimes I define myself as diversely nerdy), a hackathon is always a potentially awkward environment to me. This time the level of awkwardness could have been even worse than usual because GHOFOSS is kinda my brainchild. For a second, I felt like when you leave your cat in the hands of the vet. But I was in good hands indeed.

The two teams immediately started analyzing what we had on the table. It was not long until some great suggestions came up. For example, about the format of data, the teams found ways to give them more consistency and coherence. A very good hint was to start thinking about our GHOFOSS data, our “atoms” of Linux and open source history, in terms of Schema’s categorization. The concept of Database Rights arose as well: one we’ll have to take into consideration once the body of data and number of contributors scale up.

… to a hackathon in full display!

I love when a hackathon comes together

Six hours we had, and six hours were very well spent, for six hours later we had our MVP.

You can find it here: https://ghofoss.madbob.org/. The Italian Linux Society’s GHOFOSS repository is on GitHub.

In this prototype, the backend infrastructure delivers the information related to the various historical events in API form, divided and browsable by geographic area. The front end provides a web client to present the information.

What’s next?

As mentioned already, putting our brains at work highlighted some issues we have to work on before scaling up. The next steps will address those issues, bringing a better organization of the data archive to make it richer and easier to consult.

Once the structure is stronger and more sound, we will be able to work further toward the internationalization of the client, and, on the back end, a set of filters making the actual data more usable.

Well, it sounds like another hackathon is not far away… because LPI is sponsoring DevOpsDays Vitoria in the state of Espírito Santo, in Brazil, on June 24th, 2022. Join us if you can!

Source: lpi.org

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Switching to GNU/Linux

Switching to GNU/Linux

Switching to a new and very different operating system is quite an endeavour - of course you don't have to switch entirely, nothing prevents you from using multiple operating systems - even on the same computer. This chapter describes some of the things to consider before venturing into the wonderful world of GNU/Linux.

Why use GNU/Linux?

There are many reasons why millions of people enjoy using GNU/Linux - they can be either of a technical, financial, ethical or philosophical nature depending on each person's personal views. Here's a list of some of the most common reasons for choosing GNU/Linux:

◉ Security - Viruses, spyware etc. are virtually non-existant issues.

◉ Maintanence - Forget about scanning for viruses and spyware, defragmenting, cleaning registry database, frequent rebooting etc.

◉ Stability - GNU/Linux is very stable. Individual apps might crash, but the operating system itself crashing is very rare.

◉ Software freedom/open source - You may run the software as you wish, study the source code, modify it, share it. No tricky End User License Agreements.

◉ Open standards - GNU/Linux and the applications for it, generally support open standards, making it possible to interoperate seamlessly with other platforms and helps you avoid vendor lock-in.

◉ Community - GNU/Linux has been described as a "world wide team sport".

◉ Economy - Most GNU/Linux-distributions can be downloaded gratis and the same goes for a huge amount of applications for it. Furthermore comparatively modest hardware requirements mean you won't need to upgrade your hardware often.

◉ Legality - Getting high quality gratis software legally, means less temptation to use unauthorized illegal copies of proprietary software. You also won't support a well-known monopolist with multiple convictions for abusing its dominant market position.

◉ Transparency - Most GNU/Linux distributions are developed in the open, using public mailinglists, public IRC channels, public bugtrackers, public feature trackers etc.

◉ Diversity - There are many different GNU/Linux distributions from different vendors or community projects, for different purposes, providing very different user experiences.

◉ Privacy - Free software will generally respect your privacy, and publicly available source code provides some protection against backdoors and such.

◉ Trying something new - Simply trying something new and different can in itself be motivating for many people.

◉ And... it's a lot of fun!

Challenges of switching

While there are many advantages of using GNU/Linux, it can also be challenging to switch to something new and different and less mainstream.

◉ Learning curve - You'll need to learn how to use a new and quite different operating system and some new applications too- and you'll need to unlearn much of what you've learnt using other operating systems.

◉ Missing applications and games - You may miss familiar applications, typically Microsoft Office, Adobe Photoshop and most popular, big mainstream games. Dual boot, WINE or virtual machines offer partial solutions to this problem. And of course high quality native GNU/Linux alternatives exist.

◉ Lacking hardware support - Most hardware is supported, but not all - before buying new hardware components it's recommended to do a bit of research - the newer and less widespread the components are, the bigger the risk of problems.

◉ Harder to get help - Often friends, family and co-workers won't be able to help you with GNU/Linux related issues, so you'll need to get help online, which is often not as effective as getting help "on-site" from a friend.

Strategy

Since switching is not always easy, here's some advise:

◉ Be realistic - Do not expect to master GNU/Linux within a week or two, like you've mastered your previous operating system after maybe 10 years of using it or more. And don't expect GNU/Linux to be perfect.

◉ Switch gradually - Start by installing GNU/Linux on a secondary computer or in a dual boot setup with your previous OS or perhaps running in a virtual machine. Start by learning the basics and solve any problems calmly one at a time.

◉ Get help - Don't be afraid to ask for help online or elsewhere.

GNU/Linux Apps on MS Windows and Mac OSX

If you start using applications available for GNU/Linux in your familiar environment, switching later will be that much easier. These are some examples of gratis applications available for both GNU/Linux and MS Windows for common tasks - most of them are available for Mac OSX too.

Source: opensuse-guide.org

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IT-Schulungen becomes a Linux Professional Institute Platinum Partner: a decade of educational success

The Nürnberg Education Center, IT-Schulungen, celebrates a twofold achievement this month. First, March 2022 marks ten years of offering a complete set of courses for Linux Professional Institute (LPI) certification. At the same time, IT-Schulungen has reached the highest stage of excellence in LPI's partnership program by becoming a platinum partner.

IT-Schulungen has taken a vendor-neutral approach to technical education since it started 15 years ago. That orientation clearly called on the center to offer a broad palette of courses in open source, ranging from content management systems (CMS) to complex topics in big data (Hadoop, Apache Spark, etc.). The center's focus on skills required in the marketplace led it early on to seek out a collaboration with LPI, which sets the standard globally for certifications in open source.

LPI's goals go far beyond offering certifications: Their mission involves support for open source software and the professionals who program and administer it everywhere. With more than 200,000 active certification holders, LPI is the pre-eminent certification provider for Linux and open source. LPI works with training partners like IT-Schulungen in more than one hundred countries.

IT-Schulungen.com is located in Nuremberg in the south of Germany.

"It gratifies us greatly at the Linux Professional Institute for IT-Schulungen to join LPI in a closer partnership to build greater collaboration possibilities on Linux and on free and open source software (FOSS). With this agreement, IT-Schulungen supports not only LPI's own mission, but the greater professionalization of IT staff in FOSS and the wider career opportunities in these fields," said Rafael Peregrino da Silva, LPI Director of Partnerships.

"IT-Schulungen sought excellence very early in our long collaboration with the Linux Professional Institute. We have been able to offer hundreds of LPI courses and certifications in Germany during these past ten years," said IT-Schulungen CEO Atasoy Altinci. "We direct our focus and efforts toward top quality when expanding knowledge of open source in our courses. LPI is an outstanding partner, and our highly successful collaboration has led to LPI awarding us the highest level of partnership."

"IT-Schulung has emphasized the study of open source software from the start. Early in our history, we based programs on the fields of big data, business intelligence (BI), and data science. The digital transformation of business and its processes continually erodes the boundaries between IT and management. Management determines technology, while technology determines management. These developments also bring open source software into the center of the enterprise," said Reiner Brandt, CEO of Open Source Certification GmbH and one of LPI's leading channel partners in Central Europe. "IT-Schulungen offered an exemplary, innovative collection of courses early in its existence. Its LPI partnership was not simply following the development of the digital market but represented a collaboration of equals."

IT-Schulung has also optimized and digitized its own processes, such as offering digitized, secure badges and course certificates to its students, and digital LPI certificates to its graduates.

About ITS/NE

Under the IT-Schulungen, for more than 15 years, New Elements GmbH of Nürnberg has operated one of the largest education centers in Germany. The education center is located in the legendary Bell Laboratories building in Alcatel-Lucent in the Nürnberger Northeast Park. Companies and individuals make more than 8,000 applications for training each year and are handled by about 20 advisory and management staff.

IT-Schulungen's range of courses is wide, including some of the earliest courses in big daat analysis, business intelligence, and machine learning. Topics such as digital transformation and cultural sensitivity broaden the organization's portfolio. Its training partnerships involve international institutions, including LPI, the Linux Foundation, the EC Council, and CompTIA, along with major corporations such as Microsoft and Alibaba Cloud.

More than 500 approved, certified coaches teach IT-Schulungen’s broad portfolio of professional topics. New Elements, along with the Qualiero virtual academy, has developed an innovative platform for social learning, organizational knowledge transfer, and managed training services.

Source: lpi.org

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Open source careers: A tough start, a different future, a lot of FOSS

Hi, it's Dani here; Milo for my friends. I was born 40 years ago in Bogotá, Colombia, yes: the country tagged as violent and poor. That is not something you think about when you are a child and your dreams, no matter how ambitious they are, are within your grasp. My dream was to become a scientist: to be wearing a white gown doing experiments, knowing how things work. That child had to realize that he would need to study a lot if he wanted to design robots and rockets one day… 

Memories

Probably one of the most cherished memories of my childhood is the math, drawing, and natural science classes at school, or watching Carl Sagan's "Cosmos" and the 1990's "Beyond 2000" show on TV.

Then something happened. My family had financial problems. I had to withdraw from the third year of high school and start working. Things only got worse after my father left my mother, me, my two younger sisters, and my niece. At that time, my options were not the most favorable, since I didn't have a job and I lacked a secondary education.

I had hit the bottom. But it's where the story gets interesting… 

In 2000, a good friend helped me get an interview at an ISP in Bogotá for a support agent role. Curiosity led me to install my first Linux distribution (Suse 9) on a home machine with 256MB of RAM. I realized immediately that Linux was my cup of tea: I remember how happy I was installing and learning how to compile the drivers for my PCTel modem!

I made my decision: I wanted to learn more about the nuts and bolts that made Linux work. I realized I could modify and adapt my operating system, and I felt that inner child and scientist appearing to me every time I could make some new component work.

This job allowed me to finish high school by studying at night and on weekends, but the wage was not enough for me to go to university.

Linux

In 2008, the Linux engineer of the company I was working in moved to another company and recommended me to take his place. I became a Linux Junior engineer: I was paid now to do what I liked so much. It was time to delve into administration and troubleshooting secrets and then certify the skills I learned about Linux.

With this in mind, I embarked on my own informal curriculum with one goal: to improve my skills, getting what technology companies are looking for.

Cutting a long story short, from 2012 to 2016, I learned everything that was possible about how to configure hardware, install software, troubleshooting, etc. in different Linux flavors. I managed to obtain several Linux-related certifications, among the most important being the LPIC-1. More recently, I became a certified DevOps Tools Engineer (LPI 701-100)

Since 2017, I have been a consultant and instructor for various companies. I have had fun travellng and teaching open source in various Latin American countries while improving my English language skills.

Lifetime Learning

A couple of lessons I learned in the process:

1. You cannot change your past; you can only cultivate in the present what you want to harvest in the future.

2. Today's me is the result of my decisions from five or ten years ago; one of them was to become an IT certified professional.

3. I didn't only improve my life options, but am now giving back to my family, my country, and my community.

4. If something is really worth it, it will not be easy, and it will ask you for a sacrifice and the fee of discipline. Therefore, love what you do, take one step at a time, and have fun while you live it–because in the end life is a marathon, not a sprint.

Source: lpi.org

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