AI plays a big role in Android 9, the latest version of Google's mobile OS. Called "Android Pie," it is designed to learn from its users' behavior, and apply those lessons to simplify and customize their phone experiences. Android 9 adapts to your life and the ways you like to use your phone," noted Sameer Samat, Google's vice president of product management for Android and Google Play. [More...]

The Linux Foundation's 2018 Open Source Technology Jobs Report shows rapid growth in the demand for open source technical talent, with Linux skills a must-have requirement for entry-level positions. Linux coding is the most sought-after open source skill. Linux-based container technology is a close second. The report provides an overview of open source career trends. [More...]

rate.io has introduced a commercial Machine Data Platform, along with a new version of its open source SQL database for the Internet of Things and machine data. The company also announced an US$11 M Series A funding round. The Machine Data Platform is Crate.io's first major commercial venture following last year's initial steps toward selling services around its free database. [More...]

Academics have been hard at work studying information security. Most fields aren't as replete with hackers as information security, though, and their contributions are felt much more strongly in the private sector than in academia. The differing motives and professional cultures of the two groups act as barriers to direct collaboration, noted CypherCon presenter Anita Nikolich. [More...]

News flash: Private cloud economics can offer more cost efficiency than public cloud pricing structures. Private, or on-premises, cloud solutions can be more cost-effective than public cloud options, according to a report by 451 Research and Canonical. That conclusion counters the notion that public cloud platforms traditionally are more cost-efficient than private infrastructures. [More...]

Microsoft sent tremors through the open source world last week, when it announced that it would acquire the popular developer platform GitHub for $7.5 billion in company stock. The acquisition is expected to close by the end of the calendar year. GitHub, one of the world's largest computer code repositories, is home to more than 28 million developers for collaboration and distribution of projects. [More...]

Red Hat has launched its Fuse 7 cloud-native integration solution and introduced Fuse Online, an alternative iPaaS. Red Hat Fuse is a lightweight modular and flexible integration platform with a new-style enterprise service bus to unlock information. It provides a single, unified platform across hybrid cloud environments for collaboration between integration experts, application developers and business users. [More...]

SparkyLinux is experiencing growing pains. You could say that this very capable Linux distribution was just too much of a great thing to last. Users previously had access to a continuously updated list of more than a dozen different download options. Depending on which variety you selected, you could choose from a wide range of desktop environments. [More...]

In spite of all the high-profile breaches that seem to sweep the headlines with greater frequency, companies slowly but surely have been getting a handle on internal security practices. At this point, it's hard to imagine any employee, in or out of the tech sector, who hasn't been run through antiphishing training. However, security is only as strong as its weakest link. [More...]

WhiteSource has launched its next-generation software composition analysis technology, dubbed "Effective Usage Analysis," with the promise that it can reduce open source vulnerability alerts by 70 percent. The newly developed technology provides details beyond which components are present in the application. It provides actionable insights into how components are being used. [More...]