Tag: open source

In "Seven Days That Changed the World", a small Chinese startup made a rapid and remarkable shift that splits the Artificial Intelligence (AI) atom. Last month, it went from quietly releasing a new AI chatbot to fending off cyberattacks, security leaks, accusations of theft and allegations of sanctions-busting.

Open source software has transformed the way we develop and use technology, facilitating a collaborative approach that allows developers to access, modify and distribute code, often without any obligation to pay licence fees to an upstream licensor.

At the end of March, a critical security breach was discovered within the upstream source code of XZ Utils, a collection of open-source tools and libraries for the XZ compression format. The breach affected versions 5.6.0 and 5.6.1 and spanned nearly three years. The potential disastrous implications of this breach, and any other, underscore the importance of continued vigilance in patching all software used in a business environment.

It is key for organisations to have line of sight into processes and procedures that clearly define employee use cases when it comes to ChatGPT. ChatGPT, a generative artificial intelligence (GAI) developed by OpenAI designed to generate human-like text based on the input it receives, was quick to break records when it was launched on 30 November 2022.

Though most people don’t realise it, much of the technology we use every day relies on open source software. Many of today’s phones, cars, and IoT devices use the open source Linux kernel operating system as well as over 60% of the world’s websites that run on Apache and Nginx web servers.

I feel so grateful to have a career in technology: a career in which change has been the only constant, keeping every day exciting and relevant. Arguably, the biggest change I am seeing right now has less to do with actual technology, and more to do with culture.

This year, open source will become even more fundamental to the success of companies as they transition to fully-fledged digitally-led businesses. In the coming months, proprietary software will lose relevance as local organisations start embracing the likes of the cloud and containers to deliver value and capitalise on growth opportunities.

Mobile apps are the easiest way to connect and communicate with customers and they are also changing the way clients interact with brands and businesses. Business leaders are fast realising that mobile apps are one of the most effective strategies to boost business growth.

There are some big things set for 2019. Customer expectations continue to evolve, new technologies are developed to push the envelope and all of that leads to continuous transformation of our business, our people, our processes and of course, the technology and infrastructure.