NASA To Host Open Sourse Summit March 29-30 in California

[David Wonderly]

FYI For anyone interested in attending via online or in person. It sounds like 
a fantastic opertunity! 

Cheers!
David Wonderly
DarwkingDuck on FreeNode

March 10, 2011

Katherine Trinidad 
Headquarters, Washington                           
202-358-3749 
katherine.trinidad at nasa.gov 

Gretchen Curtis/Jessica Culler 
Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif. 
650-604-3460/650-604-4110 
gretchen.curtis at nasa.gov/jessica.culler at nasa.gov 

RELEASE: 11-070

NASA TO HOST OPEN SOURCE SUMMIT MARCH 29-30 IN CALIFORNIA

WASHINGTON -- NASA will host a summit about open source software 
development on March 29-30 at the agency's Ames Research Center in 
Moffett Field, Calif. The event runs from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. PDT on 
both days. 

NASA's first Open Source Summit will bring together engineers, policy 
makers and members of the open source community. Participants will 
discuss the challenges within the existing open source policy 
framework and propose modifications to facilitate NASA's development, 
release and use of software. 

"Open source brings numerous benefits to NASA software projects, 
including increased quality, reduced development costs, faster 
development cycles and reduced barriers for public-private 
collaboration to commercialize agency technology" said NASA's Chief 
Technology Officer for Information Technology Chris C. Kemp. "The 
full benefits of open source can only be achieved if NASA is able to 
establish the processes, policies and culture needed to encourage and 
support open source development." 

Goals for the summit include establishing a method to support 
collaboration with the public throughout the development lifecycle; 
exploring NASA's ability to release and develop software under varied 
open source licenses; determining whether and to what extent NASA can 
participate in open source software governance bodies; and gleaning 
best practices from private industry and other federal agencies. 

Guest speakers will provide insights into best practices and share 
valuable lessons learned in building and using open source 
communities. Confirmed speakers include Kemp; Pascal Finette, 
director of Mozilla Labs; Robert Sutor, vice president of Open 
Systems at IBM; Chris Wanstrath, CEO and co-founder of Github; and 
Brian Stevens, CTO and vice president of Worldwide Engineering at Red 
Hat. 

The summit will include sessions on licensing, government 
restrictions, such as the International Traffic in Arms Regulations, 
governance, and risk assessments. 

Seating at the event is limited. However, virtual participation is 
open to the public through online media, including live video 
streaming, electronic discussion and collaborative note taking. For 
more information or to register for the summit, visit: 
http://www.nasa.gov/open/source/