Technology

Calling Out OkCupid

March 27, 2015 By Benjamin Kerensa

So the other day, Indiana’s governor signed a bill into law that the Republican controlled legislature passed called the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. The reality of this bill is it has nothing to do with freedom of religion and everything to do with legalizing discrimination.

Anyways, to the point, I hate to open a can of worms but when I heard this news I thought back to this same time last year and remembered how gung ho OkCupid was over Mozilla’s appointment of Brendan Eich because of his personal beliefs and that they ultimately decided to block all Firefox users.

I don’t really think OkCupid should block Indiana but their lack of even a public tweet or statement in opposition of this legislation leads me back to my original conclusion that they were just riding the media train for their own benefit and not because they support the LGBT community.

If you are going to be about supporting the LGBT community, try to at least be consistent in that support and not just do it when it will make you look good in the media!

Android 5.1: “ignore wireless networks without internet feature” fails

March 13, 2015 By Benjamin Kerensa

Android 5.1’s new “ignore wireless networks without internet” feature (which does not have any way to be toggled off) basically disconnects from wifi networks lacking internet. This will cause major issues for tech gadgets such as the Chromecast, GoPro, Parrot’s Lineup of Drones (Bebop, ARDrone, etc).

Basically all of these devices create a WiFi network that has no internet connectivity and in Android 5.1 the behavior is to automatically disconnect from these networks. I confirmed this on a Bebop and Chromecast so far as have other users.

Yikes! Wonder how many months until Google pushes out a maintenance release for this the good news is you can go into Airplane mode and still connect to these devices as workaround.

Google trying to win Firefox users back

March 11, 2015 By Benjamin Kerensa

Google is clearly feeling the crunch from Mozilla moving to Yahoo as the default search provider. I noticed this today on Google (I use Yahoo primarily but do use Google too).

After clicking this it brings up an overlay with instructions specifically for Firefox users and notably I did not get this message in other browsers I tried so clearly this detection code they added is specific to trying to win Firefox users back.

I wish Google instead of trying to fight over search dominance would instead focus on building an awesome open web with Mozilla and others

Outspoken on Open

February 10, 2015 By Benjamin Kerensa

One thing I have tried to advocate for no matter what project it is I’m contributing to is good process and transparency. You would think that things like good process and transparency come naturally to open source projects but the thing is, no matter how old or new the project is there are always people coming and going who have varying depths of experience in doing work in the open and as a result open is not always the default in open source projects.

Most recently, I have been pushing for more transparency in some programs at Mozilla and specifically in the area that deals with community and not product. You might have thought that teams doing work around community at Mozilla are already operating transparently while the reality is in practice open is hard.

One thing I am trying to convince folks though is that working in the open is not so hard that we ignore the principles of working in the open and avoid trying to build a good foundation of open processes. One thing I am finding when I have these discussions though is people do not always feel empowered to speak out about working in the open. Simply put teams and organizations will get in these status quos where they put off this hard work and nobody really comes around often to challenge the status quo because often the debates that pursue of working in the open are filled with disagreement.

Have you ever been outspoken in a open source project about working in the open?

I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments and this will probably be a series of blog posts I write over the coming months on working in the open.

Get a free U2F Yubikey to test on Firefox Nightly

January 23, 2015 By Benjamin Kerensa

Passwords are always going to be vulnerable to being cracked. Fortunately, there are solutions out there that are making it safer for users to interact with services on the web. The new standard in protecting users is Universal 2nd Factor (U2F) authentication which is already available in browsers like Google Chrome.

Mozilla currently has a bug open to start the work necessary to delivering U2F support to people around the globe and bring Firefox into parity with Chrome by offering this excellent new feature to users.

I recently reached out to the folks at Yubico who are very eager to see Universal 2nd Factor (U2F) support in Firefox. So much so that they have offered me the ability to give out up to two hundred Yubikeys with U2F support to testers and will ship them directly to Mozillians regardless of what country you live in so you can follow along with the bug we have open and begin testing U2F in Firefox the minute it becomes available in Firefox Nightly.

If you are a Firefox Nightly user and are interested in testing U2F, please use this form (offer now closed) and apply for a code to receive one of these Yubikeys for testing. (This is only available to Mozillians who use Nightly and are willing to help report bugs and test the patch when it lands)

Thanks again to the folks at Yubico for supporting U2F in Firefox!

Update: This offer is now closed check your email for a code or a request to verify you are a vouched Mozillian! We got more requests also then we had available so only the first two hundred will be fulfilled!

Call for Help: Mentors Wanted!

January 14, 2015 By Benjamin Kerensa

This is very last minute as I have not been able to find enough people interested by directly approaching folks, but I have a great mentoring opportunity for Mozillians. One of my friends is a professor at Western Oregon University and tries to expose her students to a different Open Source project each term and up to bat this term is the Mozilla Project.

So I am looking for mentors from across the project who would be willing to correspond a couple times a week and answer questions from students who are learning about Firefox for Android or Firefox for Desktop.

It is ok not to be an expert on all the questions coming your way but if you do not know then you would help find the right person and get them the answers they need so they do not hit a roadblock.

This opportunity is open to both staff and contributors and the time commitment should not exceed an hour or two a week but realistically could be as little as twenty minutes or so a week to exchange emails.

Not only does this opportunity help expose these students to Open Source but also to contributing to our project. In the past, I have mentored students from WOU and the end result was many from the class continued on as contributors.

Interested? Get in touch!