• Ioannis Stamelos, School of Informatics, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessalkoniki, Greece
  BlockAdemiC: An Approach for Open Certification of Micro-Credentials
  [Abstract and Bio]
  
• Anthony I. (Tony) Wasserman, Integrated Innovation Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, Moffett Field, CA, USA
  Learning about and Finding Open Source Software
  [Abstract and Bio | Presentation Slides]

Ioannis Stamelos

BlockAdemiC: An Approach for Open Certification of Micro-Credentials

Abstract

BlockAdemiC project mission is to create a digital open and distributed cybersecurity system for the certification and verification of educational activities, qualifications and skills in the field of higher education and lifelong learning, creating an inviolable educational passport. The approach is based on the specification and monitoring of learners' activities on a learning management system. Successful completion of assignments that prove the learners' knowledge and skills on a particular subject are registered on a dedicated blockchain. The approach is exemplified through the certification of students participating in an open source project in the context of a postgraduate course.

Bio

Ioannis Stamelos is a Professor at the School of Informatics of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece, where he carries out research and teaching in the area of Software Engineering and Information Systems. He holds a diploma of Electrical Engineering (1983) and a PhD in Computer Science by the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (1988). He has published approx. 250 articles in refereed international journals, conferences, etc. He is/was the scientific coordinator or principal investigator for his University in ~30 research and development projects in Information & Communication Technologies with funding from national and international organizations. Part of his research is in the field of open source software engineering and software education. He is currently running the Open Source Excellence Center of the Aristotle University and is President of the Board of Directors of the Hellenic Organization for Open Technologies. He was also adjunct Professor at the Hellenic Open University (2001-2017).

Learning about and Finding Open Source Software

Abstract

The acceptance and use of open source software (OSS) has grown exponentially over the past two decades. Many companies that once criticized even the concept of OSS have changed their position, and are now strong supporters and advocates for OSS. However, this acceptance is much more widespread among software developers in high tech companies than it is in the broader community. Government agencies, non-profits, and companies focused on manufacturing and consumer goods have been much slower to adopt OSS, and rely heavily on proprietary software, both to run on their premises and as hosted applications in the cloud.
These organizations are not well connected to the OSS community, and need help to learn about OSS and how it can help them. Beyond that, they need assistance in finding high-quality OSS that is well-suited for business-critical needs, and evaluating it against proprietary applications. This talk explains their situation more fully, and describes available resources for learning about OSS, as well as techniques for finding and evaluating OSS and the business case for using OSS.

Bio

Anthony I. (Tony) Wasserman is a Professor in the Software Management program at Carnegie Mellon University's Silicon Valley campus, where he teaches courses related to product management, people management, and open source. His research interests include evaluation, adoption and use of open source software, software development environments, and software engineering practices for startups.
Previously, Tony was the founder and CEO of Interactive Development Environments (IDE), one of the first 100 dot-coms and developer of the innovative multiuser Software through Pictures development environment. He later served as VP of Engineering for a dot-com startup and as VP for Bluestone Software. Early in his career, Tony was Full Professor of Medical Information Science at the University of California - San Francisco, leaving to start IDE.
Tony is a Life Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), a Fellow of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), and a Fellow of the International Federation for Information Processing (IFIP). Since 2015, he has been the chair of IFIP Working Group 2.13 (Open Source Systems), organizer of an annual research conference focused on open source. Tony holds a Ph.D. in computer sciences from the University of Wisconsin - Madison and a B.A. in mathematics and physics from the University of California, Berkeley.

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