Tag: Open Source

Is it the end of the traditional resume? [opensource.com]

Posted on March 1, 2017 by Doug Belshaw

Bryan Mathers and I have a post published at opensource.com. It was commissioned by Concentric Sky, who are the organisation behind Badgr.

An excerpt:

At the moment, we’re treating Open Badges in a similar way as traditional credentials, placing value solely on the destination rather than on an individual’s current journey. A single, big, showstopper badge shouldn’t necessarily trump a badge pathway showing a relevant trajectory. We should recognize that traditional credentials recognize activity that occurs on a very uneven playing field. Some people, for various reasons, have had a relatively smooth path to where they currently stand. Others, with less-prestigious traditional credentials, may be a better fit but do not come from such a privileged background.

Click here to read the post in its entirety.

Note that our original title emphasised the power of making credentials more transparent by bringing together open source, Open Badges, and open pathways. As ever with these things, we were at the mercy of the editor.

Taking back control of the web: an easy way to host and run secure open source apps

Posted on March 17, 2016 by Doug Belshaw

One of the most frustrating things about Open Source software is the lack of traction some genuinely great projects manage to achieve. There are countless examples of individuals deciding to ‘scratch their own itch’, and writing code that would also improve the lives of hundreds/thousands/millions of people. However, the the technical skills required to get it up-and-running, not to mention the security concerns of getting to scale, are often prohibitive.

That’s where Sandstorm.io comes in. I first heard about the project when I was still at Mozilla as the lead developer led a successful crowdfunding campaign that was supported by many readers of Hacker News. Essentially, it’s a incredibly simple, one-click way to install Open Source web apps. They’re deployed in containers called ‘grains’ which makes apps extremely secure and super-fast.

Sandstorm grains

As you can see, I’ve been playing about with all sorts of apps: note-capturing apps similar to Evernote, kanban tools that mimic the functionality of Trello, alternatives to Slack, ways to seamlessly pipe music to co-workers/conspirators, you name it!

There’s already an impressive selection of apps available in Sandstorm.io, with more being converted on a regular basis. Here’s the ones available at the time of writing:

Sandstorm apps

At the moment, I’m just playing around. I can see a time when I decide to use this across devices and collaboratively with other people. Relying on venture capitalist-backed companies to look after my data, privacy, and security on a long-term basis is probably a bad idea.

While there’ll always be a free tier, during the beta all of the plans are free:

Sandstorm - plans

As you can see, given that the ‘Power User’ plan is currently free, I’ve decided to make full use of it. The apps are blisteringly fast and, when the beta ends, I’ve got the option of either paying for hosting through Sandstorm.io, or hosting it on my own server (free!)

I’d have a play and see what you find. I think you’ll find something interesting, something to convince you that Open Source done right can be just as good, if not better, than proprietary, closed-source, VC-backed products!

Click here to go to Sandstorm.io

3 reasons open source needs Open Badges [opensource.com]

Posted on November 27, 2015 by Doug Belshaw

A few months ago, my friend and former colleague Laura Hilliger encouraged me to write something for opensource.com. She’d had a few posts published about the benefits of working openly.

Today, Bryan Mathers and I have had published an article that goes into why Open Badges are such a good fit for open communities.

The web is the perfect medium for a new credentialing system. Just like the web, Open Badges are democratic, open, and distributed. The OBI is itself open source, as are many badge issuing solutions found on GitHub and other code repositories. Open Badges help move forward the open web.

Read the post in full: 3 reasons open source needs Open Badges

I’m closing comments here to encourage you to add your thoughts on the original post.