FreeSoftware &mdash; julian https://wrily.foad.me.uk/tag:FreeSoftware FOSS dev, self-hosting fan, Matrix, degoogling, small tech, indie tech, friendly tech for families and schools. Let's own our own identity & data. Wed, 15 Apr 2026 00:25:53 +0000 FOSDEM '23 Interesting Talks https://wrily.foad.me.uk/fosdem-23-interesting-talks <![CDATA[These are some of the talks I'm most interested in, at FOSDEM '23. I won't be there in person, I'll be watching some from home and in the matrix. By Tracks or Dev Rooms | Times are UTC+1 Special Extras Sat 18:00 Book reading: Ada & Zangemann - A Tale of Software, Skateboards, and Raspberry Ice Cream -- “In this hopeful story Ada and her friends join a movement that started back in 1983. Their courageous adventure of software freedom and learning how technology works is a wonderful way to introduce young people everywhere to the joys of tinkering!” —Zoë Kooyman, Executive Director, Free Software Foundation Main Tracks (Janson, K Building) There are a lot of good main track talks. Sat 11:00 Can we do an open source chip design in 45 minutes? -- The state of free and open source silicon Sat 14:00 Linux Inlaws -- A how-to on world domination by accident -- the story of this podcast and its tech stack Sun 12:00 Rosegarden: A Slumbering Giant -- How a 20-year old OSS project is still going strong -- music composition and score software Sun 12:00 Practical Computerized Home Automation -- "Home automation is an elusive technology — often desired, rarely achieved. This talk explores a successful ten-year home automation deployment, outlining the challenges that derail many attempts. It will cover technology choices, programing basics, and a dozen successful applications." Sun 13:00 Podcasting 2.0: it's all about Interoperability -- How Podcasting 2.0 will save the Open Internet Sun 14:00 Decentralized Social Media with Hachyderm -- The unexpected Mastodon cooperative that broke Silicon Valley Sun 15:00 Running a Hybrid Event with Open Source -- The Plumbers Experience Sun 15:00 Clear skies, no clouds in sight. Running a 14 person company on only free software. -- They say it can't be done, they say it's too much work. But is it really? After 5 years of running Prehensile Tales on entirely free software I think I can answer this. Sun 16:00 Matrix 2.0 -- How we’re making Matrix go voom Sun 16:00 The End of Free Software -- How the Cloud threatens FOSS and what we can do about it And one of the Keynotes I'd like to call out: Sun 17:00 Open Source Software at NASA !--more-- Public Code and Digital Public Goods devroom My first impressions: "Only half a day? There's so much more to do!" and, "Where's the ed-tech?" Surely ed-tech -- and at the very least the education it supports -- is firmly in the area of "public goods." Sun 10:15 Public Money? Public Code! in Europe -- A policy brief of the state of play of Free Software in the European Union Sun 11:40 The New EU Interoperable Europe Act and the Reuse of Software in Public Administration -- Implications for OSS in Public Administrations Surely there's room for cross-over with ed-tech here? For a start, at the level of regional government education departments sharing infrastructure that they provide to schools. Legal and Policy Issues devroom Sat 10:35 A Service as a Software Substitute (SaaSS) is unjust like proprietary software -- Thinking carefully about services Sat 14:00 Learning From the Big Failures To Improve FOSS Advocacy and Adoption -- How Are Big Companies Benefiting So Much from FOSS, and Individuals So Little? -- the story and future of FOSS advocacy strategy Sat 15:00 Reckoning with new app store changes: Is now our chance? -- Recent legal and policy developments around app stores and what they mean for free software Sat 15:30 How to get public administrations to use more FOSS -- "... Open Source Business Alliance [worked] with the German Ministry of Interior ... to remove existing barriers and ... reform ... contracts. Additionally a survey ... revealed ... problems that companies face when offering Open Source Software or corresponding services to public administrations." Sat 16:00 EU alternative to app stores -- Guardian Project tooted: "At #FOSDEM, @marcelkolaja will present the #EU pilot project to look into open-sourcing the EU's apps and publishing them outside of #BigTech including on @fdroidorg. @eighthave will join, talking about how F-Droid will help pull the EU towards #FreeSoftware. Join us!" Energy devroom Note: some on line, others on campus Sat 11:15 Challenges in Home Energy Management -- How to best use your own PV-generated power -- real-world issues deploying openHAB for EV charging, heat pump and white goods Sat 12:00 EVerest: AC and DC electric vehicle charging with open source software and hardware Sat 12:30 European Eichrecht -- E-Mobility with Love & Security -- "... From a software developer's point of view the German calibration law is not so much about measuring energy correctly or invoicing the correct prices, but a first step towards a more modern zero trust architecture for the e-mobility charging infrastructure. ..." Sat 15:10 V2GLiberty: The open stack that could -- How we enable EV owners to be ahead of the industry, with open source software -- Vehicle-to-grid charging (V2G), also referred to as bidirectional charging, using HomeAssistant, FlexMeasures and NextCloud ... "Soon, the commercial world will roll out more bidirectional chargers and cars..., as well as home energy management solutions which lock users into specific vendor relationships (where the car is just one of the managed services). It's crucial to provide an open-source alternative, to provide independence for users, and to inspire startups." Sat 16:05 4 Years of Energy Management with openHAB -- A personal story about smart homes, PV systems and EVs Matrix devroom Matrix is awesome! Lots to hear about: more than ten talks in this track, in addition to the main track Matrix 2.0 talk. As I follow Matrix closely I am already aware of some of the things being presented, especially its technical developments. Here I single out presentations about how matrix is connecting people in the real world. Sun 11:05 Widgets in the "Sovereign Workplace" for the German public sector Sun 12:15 Bridging ActivityPub with Kazarma -- Interoperability and "beyond-chat" Matrix Sun 12:35 All your base are belong to us -- A crazy ride through lots of matrix projects -- featuring Matrix the movie and highlighting the diversity of matrix clients and bridging -- I originally didn't have this on my list but ended up watching it and enjoying the presenter's fast paced and humorous style. Sun 14:30 Building a social app on top of Matrix -- Fighting surveillance capitalism for fun and profit Sun 15:00 Decentralizing moderation -- Mjölnir for all Sovereign Cloud Sat 13:05 From Zero to Hero with Solid -- Lessons learned making apps using the Solid Protocol Sat 13:50 Operate First community cloud -- A blueprint for a sovereign cloud? Sat 14:40 The Co-operative Cloud -- Public interest infrastructure Sat 15:45 The Importance of Collaborative Applications for European Digital Sovereignty -- Progress and challenges of alternatives facing the BigTechs Sat 18:25 Effective management of Kubernetes resources for cluster admins -- about using Kustomize.io in Operate First Community Cloud BSD devroom Sat 11:00 Game of Trees Daemon -- A Git repository server for OpenBSD and other systems -- because I have a personal interest, knowing the speaker from our work on development of Subversion, and also having done some work using libgit2 and using git-svn, and being interested in interoperability. Collaboration and Content Management Lots about deploying Nextcloud etc., which might come in useful for building Open EdTech. Lightning Talks Sat 16:40 Passbolt -- Open source password manager for teams -- I am interested to contrast Passbolt with Bitwarden which currently is my recommendation for a self-hosted password manager for individuals which does have a "team" sharing feature. Sun 10:20 Breaking away from Big Tech -- Using open source infrastructure in a convenient way Sun 11:20 A GitLab forge for all teachers and students in France? -- A project of the French Ministry of Education Sun 11:40 FOSSbot: An open source and open design educational robot Sun 14:20 Self-hosting for non-coders? -- The open-source approach -- about Caprover (and Gardens built on it), a container-based self-hosting framework. Until now I had been thinking Yunohost (not container-based) was the leading contender; it will be interesting to compare them. Other Fun Stuff Sat 17:30 Become a rockstar using FOSS! -- Or at least use FOSS to write and share music for fun! -- "... talking about the different applications I've used to compose, orchestrate, process, mix, master and so on ... also talk a bit of the community aspects ..." Sun 10:40 Grottocenter -- An open source database for cavers !--more-- ---- Follow/Feedback/Contact: RSS feed · Fedi follow this blog: @julian&ZeroWidthSpace;@wrily.foad.me.uk · matrix me · Fedi follow me · email me · julian.foad.me.uk Donate: via Liberapay All posts &copy; Julian Foad and licensed CC-BY-ND except quotes, translations, or where stated otherwise ]]> These are some of the talks I'm most interested in, at FOSDEM '23.

I won't be there in person, I'll be watching some from home and in the matrix.

By Tracks or Dev Rooms | Times are UTC+1

Special Extras

Main Tracks (Janson, K Building)

There are a lot of good main track talks.

And one of the Keynotes I'd like to call out:

Public Code and Digital Public Goods devroom

My first impressions: “Only half a day? There's so much more to do!” and, “Where's the ed-tech?” Surely ed-tech — and at the very least the education it supports — is firmly in the area of “public goods.”

Energy devroom

Note: some on line, others on campus

  • Sat 11:15 Challenges in Home Energy Management — How to best use your own PV-generated power — real-world issues deploying openHAB for EV charging, heat pump and white goods
  • Sat 12:00 EVerest: AC and DC electric vehicle charging with open source software and hardware
  • Sat 12:30 European Eichrecht — E-Mobility with Love & Security — “... From a software developer's point of view the German calibration law is not so much about measuring energy correctly or invoicing the correct prices, but a first step towards a more modern zero trust architecture for the e-mobility charging infrastructure. ...”
  • Sat 15:10 V2GLiberty: The open stack that could — How we enable EV owners to be ahead of the industry, with open source software — Vehicle-to-grid charging (V2G), also referred to as bidirectional charging, using HomeAssistant, FlexMeasures and NextCloud ... “Soon, the commercial world will roll out more bidirectional chargers and cars..., as well as home energy management solutions which lock users into specific vendor relationships (where the car is just one of the managed services). It's crucial to provide an open-source alternative, to provide independence for users, and to inspire startups.”
  • Sat 16:05 4 Years of Energy Management with openHAB — A personal story about smart homes, PV systems and EVs

Matrix devroom

Matrix is awesome! Lots to hear about: more than ten talks in this track, in addition to the main track Matrix 2.0 talk. As I follow Matrix closely I am already aware of some of the things being presented, especially its technical developments. Here I single out presentations about how matrix is connecting people in the real world.

Sovereign Cloud

BSD devroom

  • Sat 11:00 Game of Trees Daemon — A Git repository server for OpenBSD and other systems — because I have a personal interest, knowing the speaker from our work on development of Subversion, and also having done some work using libgit2 and using git-svn, and being interested in interoperability.

Collaboration and Content Management

Lots about deploying Nextcloud etc., which might come in useful for building Open EdTech.

Lightning Talks

Other Fun Stuff

  • Sat 17:30 Become a rockstar using FOSS! — Or at least use FOSS to write and share music for fun! — “... talking about the different applications I've used to compose, orchestrate, process, mix, master and so on ... also talk a bit of the community aspects ...”
  • Sun 10:40 Grottocenter — An open source database for cavers

Follow/Feedback/Contact: RSS feed · Fedi follow this blog: @julian​@wrily.foad.me.uk · matrix me · Fedi follow me · email me · julian.foad.me.uk Donate: via Liberapay All posts © Julian Foad and licensed CC-BY-ND except quotes, translations, or where stated otherwise

]]> https://wrily.foad.me.uk/fosdem-23-interesting-talks Fri, 03 Feb 2023 11:25:36 +0000 EU Pilot Project: Public Apps in F-Droid https://wrily.foad.me.uk/eu-pilot-project-public-apps-in-f-droid <![CDATA[Great news: someone at the EU understands that public services must not foist Big Tech on their citizens. F-Droid.org tooted the news yesterday: "EU Pilot project — De-monopolized access to EU applications" What does this mean and why is it important? I recently framed a take on this issue as "FOSS Apps Live In FOSS App Stores". Free (Libre) Open Source Software apps should be distributed in such a way as to be available to everyone, not only to Apple's and Google's users. !--more-- The same fundamental issue applies to apps provided by governments for public use. Today, our governments are distributing their apps only through Google's and Apple's stores, and so are requiring their citizens to be signed-up users of these particular Big Tech companies in order to use them. We citizens do not all want to be under the control of such companies: many of us opt out, and many others wish to opt out but find too many obstacles such as this. The governments must stop doing this. How are they looking at solving this? The long EU paper says, under "Item PP 02 23 02": "The focus of the pilot project includes EU institutions releasing their apps on existing alternative app stores, including f-droid that aims at promoting apps released under open source licenses". Saying "alternative app stores, including f-droid" recognises that the goal is to have app stores that are independent of the Big Tech corporations, and that currently there is one well established technology for independent app stores, called F-Droid. How does F-Droid come in? To understand better the role that F-Droid will likely play in this pilot project, it is important to understand that F-Droid refers to two things. First, F-Droid is a curated app store, known for its ethic and strong enforcement of only Free (Libre) Open Source Software, and warnings about anti-features in the apps it distributes. Second, F-Droid is also an open standard mechanism by which other organisations can set up their own curated app stores¹, and by which people can search and install apps from those independent f-droid app stores in just the same way as from the F-Droid.org app store. (I'll use lower-case "f-droid" as a reminder.) Unlike most well known Big Tech platforms, independent f-droid app stores are absolutely independently governed by their creators: they are not created inside some platform controlled by the F-Droid.org team. Anyone can use F-Droid on a Google-Android phone and also, importantly, on a phone that is android-compatible but not connected to a Google account and perhaps not running any Google software, especially not their Play Store. Such a phone is also known as "a degoogled phone"). A citizen using a degoogled phone, or one who does not want to get an app via Google for other reasons, can search and install apps from both the F-Droid.org app store and also any other compatible app stores to which the user opts in. It is entirely feasible and I would suggest likely that the EU would evaluate running their own F-Droid app store for their apps, either in addition to or instead of submitting their apps to the F-Droid.org store, so as not to be dependent on it, and to have control over their terms and conditions and schedule of distribution. Hurray! and may others take up the idea too. Read More FOSS Apps Live in FOSS App Stores! F-Droid's fediverse feed FOSDEM '23 talk Sat 15:00 Reckoning with new app store changes: Is now our chance? -- Recent legal and policy developments around app stores and what they mean for free software FOSDEM '23 talk Sat 16:00 EU alternative to app stores -- Guardian Project tooted: "At #FOSDEM, @marcel_kolaja will present the #EU pilot project to look into open-sourcing the EU's apps and publishing them outside of #BigTech including on @fdroidorg. @eighthave will join, talking about how F-Droid will help pull the EU towards #FreeSoftware. Join us!" ---- a id="fn1"¹]/a The f-droid mechanism is quite Small Tech, and open to anyone with technical skills. For example, I [run a little f-droid repository myself, with currently just one app in it. degoogled !--more-- ---- Follow/Feedback/Contact: RSS feed · Fedi follow this blog: @julian&ZeroWidthSpace;@wrily.foad.me.uk · matrix me · Fedi follow me · email me · julian.foad.me.uk Donate: via Liberapay All posts &copy; Julian Foad and licensed CC-BY-ND except quotes, translations, or where stated otherwise ]]> Great news: someone at the EU understands that public services must not foist Big Tech on their citizens.

F-Droid.org tooted the news yesterday: “EU Pilot project — De-monopolized access to EU applications”

What does this mean and why is it important?

I recently framed a take on this issue as “FOSS Apps Live In FOSS App Stores”. Free (Libre) Open Source Software apps should be distributed in such a way as to be available to everyone, not only to Apple's and Google's users.

The same fundamental issue applies to apps provided by governments for public use. Today, our governments are distributing their apps only through Google's and Apple's stores, and so are requiring their citizens to be signed-up users of these particular Big Tech companies in order to use them. We citizens do not all want to be under the control of such companies: many of us opt out, and many others wish to opt out but find too many obstacles such as this.

The governments must stop doing this.

How are they looking at solving this?

The long EU paper says, under “Item PP 02 23 02”: “The focus of the pilot project includes EU institutions releasing their apps on existing alternative app stores, including f-droid that aims at promoting apps released under open source licenses”.

Saying “alternative app stores, including f-droid” recognises that the goal is to have app stores that are independent of the Big Tech corporations, and that currently there is one well established technology for independent app stores, called F-Droid.

How does F-Droid come in?

To understand better the role that F-Droid will likely play in this pilot project, it is important to understand that F-Droid refers to two things.

First, F-Droid is a curated app store, known for its ethic and strong enforcement of only Free (Libre) Open Source Software, and warnings about anti-features in the apps it distributes.

Second, F-Droid is also an open standard mechanism by which other organisations can set up their own curated app stores¹, and by which people can search and install apps from those independent f-droid app stores in just the same way as from the F-Droid.org app store. (I'll use lower-case “f-droid” as a reminder.) Unlike most well known Big Tech platforms, independent f-droid app stores are absolutely independently governed by their creators: they are not created inside some platform controlled by the F-Droid.org team.

Anyone can use F-Droid on a Google-Android phone and also, importantly, on a phone that is android-compatible but not connected to a Google account and perhaps not running any Google software, especially not their Play Store. Such a phone is also known as “a degoogled phone”).

A citizen using a degoogled phone, or one who does not want to get an app via Google for other reasons, can search and install apps from both the F-Droid.org app store and also any other compatible app stores to which the user opts in.

It is entirely feasible and I would suggest likely that the EU would evaluate running their own F-Droid app store for their apps, either in addition to or instead of submitting their apps to the F-Droid.org store, so as not to be dependent on it, and to have control over their terms and conditions and schedule of distribution.

Hurray! and may others take up the idea too.

Read More

[¹] The f-droid mechanism is quite Small Tech, and open to anyone with technical skills. For example, I run a little f-droid repository myself, with currently just one app in it.

#degoogled

Follow/Feedback/Contact: RSS feed · Fedi follow this blog: @julian​@wrily.foad.me.uk · matrix me · Fedi follow me · email me · julian.foad.me.uk Donate: via Liberapay All posts © Julian Foad and licensed CC-BY-ND except quotes, translations, or where stated otherwise

]]> https://wrily.foad.me.uk/eu-pilot-project-public-apps-in-f-droid Fri, 20 Jan 2023 12:41:26 +0000 FOSS Apps Live in FOSS App Stores! https://wrily.foad.me.uk/foss-apps-live-in-foss-app-stores <![CDATA[Don't lock a FOSS Android app in Google's proprietary store! Many of us are looking to FOSS solutions in order to keep our digital lives under our own control. We don't accept that any Big Tech company should hold the keys to a vast swathe of our digital life. !--more-- So on our smart phones we may choose to use a FOSS version of Android. That means one that uses the open source parts of Android but avoids the proprietary Google lock-in parts. These so-called "deGoogled" Android-compatible operating systems include LineageOS, Murena /e/-OS, CalyxOS, GrapheneOS and more. Users of non-Google phones can find various "back door" ways to obtain apps from Google's play-by-our-rules-store, but that's completely the wrong way. FOSS apps should be available through FOSS app stores such as F-Droid. F-Droid is not only an app store, it's also a protocol or "app store kit" that allows anyone to publish their own F-Droid-compatible app store. (I set up one up just to publish one camera app for myself and friends.) Each app publisher can choose whether to publish their app in the F-Droid store following its rules and conditions, or publish on their own store where they can set their own rules and conditions. Each user can decide which F-Droid-compatible stores they want to use, according to their own assessment of the publisher's reputation. Read more about F-Droid: "Why curation and decentralization is better than millions of apps" These fine FOSS people do it right FUTO Circles a.k.a. Circuli, matrix-based private social media -- published in the main F-Droid ... TODO: add lots more examples These fine FOSS people need a nudge Pocket Casts -- issue "Add to F-Droid" disappointingly closed as "wont fix". ... TODO: add lots more examples These Fine People Understand EU Pilot Project: Public Apps in F-Droid Read More FOSDEM '23 talk Sat 15:00 Reckoning with new app store changes: Is now our chance? -- Recent legal and policy developments around app stores and what they mean for free software FOSDEM '23 talk Sat 16:00 EU alternative to app stores -- Guardian Project tooted: "At #FOSDEM, @marcel_kolaja will present the #EU pilot project to look into open-sourcing the EU's apps and publishing them outside of #BigTech including on @fdroidorg. @eighthave will join, talking about how F-Droid will help pull the EU towards #FreeSoftware. Join us!" ---- [1] An f-droid repo link is not a web page. To use it, you open your f-droid app's "repositories" settings and add the link there. Related: FOSS Apps Live in FOSS Forges Your FOSS Project Deserves its Own Domain More: #degoogled #awesomeFOSS #selfHosted #GiveUpGithub #DitchDiscord #FreedomTech #useOpenTools !--more-- ---- Follow/Feedback/Contact: RSS feed · Fedi follow this blog: @julian&ZeroWidthSpace;@wrily.foad.me.uk · matrix me · Fedi follow me · email me · julian.foad.me.uk Donate: via Liberapay All posts &copy; Julian Foad and licensed CC-BY-ND except quotes, translations, or where stated otherwise ]]> Don't lock a FOSS Android app in Google's proprietary store!

Many of us are looking to FOSS solutions in order to keep our digital lives under our own control. We don't accept that any Big Tech company should hold the keys to a vast swathe of our digital life. So on our smart phones we may choose to use a FOSS version of Android. That means one that uses the open source parts of Android but avoids the proprietary Google lock-in parts. These so-called “deGoogled” Android-compatible operating systems include LineageOS, Murena /e/-OS, CalyxOS, GrapheneOS and more. Users of non-Google phones can find various “back door” ways to obtain apps from Google's play-by-our-rules-store, but that's completely the wrong way. FOSS apps should be available through FOSS app stores such as F-Droid.

F-Droid is not only an app store, it's also a protocol or “app store kit” that allows anyone to publish their own F-Droid-compatible app store. (I set up one up just to publish one camera app for myself and friends.) Each app publisher can choose whether to publish their app in the F-Droid store following its rules and conditions, or publish on their own store where they can set their own rules and conditions. Each user can decide which F-Droid-compatible stores they want to use, according to their own assessment of the publisher's reputation.

Read more about F-Droid:

These fine FOSS people do it right

  • FUTO Circles a.k.a. Circuli, matrix-based private social media — published in the main F-Droid
  • ... TODO: add lots more examples

These fine FOSS people need a nudge

These Fine People Understand

Read More

[1] An f-droid repo link is not a web page. To use it, you open your f-droid app's “repositories” settings and add the link there.

Related: – FOSS Apps Live in FOSS Forges – Your FOSS Project Deserves its Own Domain

More: #degoogled #awesomeFOSS #selfHosted #GiveUpGithub #DitchDiscord #FreedomTech #useOpenTools

Follow/Feedback/Contact: RSS feed · Fedi follow this blog: @julian​@wrily.foad.me.uk · matrix me · Fedi follow me · email me · julian.foad.me.uk Donate: via Liberapay All posts © Julian Foad and licensed CC-BY-ND except quotes, translations, or where stated otherwise

]]> https://wrily.foad.me.uk/foss-apps-live-in-foss-app-stores Sat, 19 Nov 2022 15:43:34 +0000