A couple of decades ago, the thought of open-source software being embraced by traditional enterprise was almost laughable. But, as the value of collaboration becomes accepted by the corporate world, companies are increasingly putting diverse sets’ of open-source experts on the payroll.

“Open source is no longer the disruptor,” said DeLisa Alexander (pictured, left), executive vice president and chief people officer at Red Hat Inc. “Now, you think about most companies, there is some form of open source that is part of their infrastructure.”

Alexander spoke with Stu Miniman, host of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s mobile livestreaming studio, during the Red Hat Summit Virtual Experience. They introduced the recipients of the 2020 Women in Open Source Awards and discussed how Red Hat is encouraging diversity and inclusion in open-source communities. During the interview, Miniman also spoke with award winners Megan Byrd-Sanicki (right), manager of research and operations for Google LLC’s Open Source Program Office and Netha Hussain (center), Ph.D. candidate in clinical neuroscience at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden. (* Disclosure below.)

“As the open source leader, we wanted to shine a light on the contributions that some of our underrepresented populations are making in open source,” Alexander said. “The tech industry is a great industry for diverse populations, but a lot of diverse population don’t realize that.”

This week theCUBE spotlights Women in Open Source Award winners Megan Byrd-Sanicki and Netha Hussa in its Women in Tech feature.

Byrd-Sanicki honored for creating sustainable open-source communities

The Women in Open Source Awards are presented in two categories: Community and Student. Byrd-Sanicki was selected as this year’s Community award winner based on her commitment to open source over more than a decade, both in her current position at Google and her past work at educational non-profit Drupal Association.

“I had been with Drupal for eight years helping to build that foundation and supporting that community in lots of different ways from fundraising to community events, running sprints, and helping with their developer tools,” she said.

Google is “an expression of open-source,” with “thousands of people using thousands of projects” according to Byrd-Sanicki. Her current responsibilities at the Open Source Program Office include making sure all open-source contributors within Google feel supported, do quality work, and are good citizens within the projects they participate in.

Hussain advocates for open research

Student award winner Hussain was recognized for her involvement with open-source projects started long before her current research.

“There are multiple ways by which I have engaged with open source,” she said, describing how she started by editing Wikipedia entries and contributing articles on medicine and healthcare before moving onto collecting study data on stroke patient recovery for her Ph.D. Study participants wear virtual reality headsets to play a “game” that involves reaching out to touch virtual objects in space. The data is then analyzed to track the patient’s recovery. To improve her research, Hussain uses an open-source tool that enables her to look inside the code of the VR app for detailed statistics.

“For example, [if] I would like to know the size of the target that is shown in the original space, I can know that correctly to the millimeter because it’s available to me in open source,” she explained.

Alongside tools that assist research, Hussain is part of a group of academics that advocate making all research open source. Not only is there a call for papers to be available in open-access journals, but “researchers want to have their data put in some open data repository so that everybody can have a look at it and do analysis on the data and build up on that data,” Hussain stated.

Open source and COVID-19 research

Both Byrd-Sanicki and Hussain are working on open-source projects to help gather and disseminate data on the SARS-CoV-2 virus strain.

“We have a very cool project called WikiProject COVID-19 on Wikipedia where people who are interested in writing articles, reading data, uploading images related to COVID-19 come together,” Hussain stated. “I am a very active participant there.”

In a separate initiative, the COVID Act Now community is a combination of developers, data scientists, epidemiologists, and U.S. State government officials gathering data on the virus to help track spread across the nation.

“It is a tool that’s being used today by many decision makers here in the U.S.,” Byrd-Sanicki stated. “It’s looking at what does the curve look like and how does that curve get flattened if governors made decisions faster or differently than what they’re making today — and how does that impact the availability of intensive care unit beds and ventilators.”

Several Google employees are working on the COVID Act Now project, and thanks to being connected with Byrd-Sanicki through the Red Hat award, Hussain is going to join the community.

This networking and encouragement is exactly the outcome Red Hat hopes to encourage through the Women in Open Source Award. “There are more and more impressive people that are joining the community,” Alexander said. “They’re making those connections so that together we can really shine a light on the value that women bring to the communities and continue to inspire other underrepresented groups to join in and participate.”

Here’s the complete video interview, part of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of the Red Hat Summit Virtual Experience. (* Disclosure: TheCUBE is a paid media partner for the Red Hat Summit Virtual Experience. Neither Red Hat, the sponsor for theCUBE’s event coverage, nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: SiliconANGLE