Technical talks at universities by agamez

Description

This project aims to empower the next generation of tech professionals by offering hands-on workshops on containerization and Kubernetes, with a strong focus on open-source technologies. By providing practical experience with these cutting-edge tools and fostering a deep understanding of open-source principles, we aim to bridge the gap between academia and industry.

For now, the scope is limited to Spanish universities, since we already have the contacts and have started some conversations.

Goals

• Technical Skill Development: equip students with the fundamental knowledge and skills to build, deploy, and manage containerized applications using open-source tools like Kubernetes.
• Open-Source Mindset: foster a passion for open-source software, encouraging students to contribute to open-source projects and collaborate with the global developer community.
• Career Readiness: prepare students for industry-relevant roles by exposing them to real-world use cases, best practices, and open-source in companies.

Resources

• Instructors: experienced open-source professionals with deep knowledge of containerization and Kubernetes.
• SUSE Expertise: leverage SUSE's expertise in open-source technologies to provide insights into industry trends and best practices.

---

Help Create A Chat Control Resistant Turnkey Chatmail/Deltachat Relay Stack - Rootless Podman Compose, OpenSUSE BCI, Hardened, & SELinux by 3nd5h1771fy

Description

The Mission: Decentralized & Sovereign Messaging

FYI: If you have never heard of "Chatmail", you can visit their site here, but simply put it can be thought of as the underlying protocol/platform decentralized messengers like DeltaChat use for their communications. Do not confuse it with the honeypot looking non-opensource paid for prodect with better seo that directs you to chatmailsecure(dot)com

In an era of increasing centralized surveillance by unaccountable bad actors (aka BigTech), "Chat Control," and the erosion of digital privacy, the need for sovereign communication infrastructure is critical. Chatmail is a pioneering initiative that bridges the gap between classic email and modern instant messaging, offering metadata-minimized, end-to-end encrypted (E2EE) communication that is interoperable and open.

However, unless you are a seasoned sysadmin, the current recommended deployment method of a Chatmail relay is rigid, fragile, difficult to properly secure, and effectively takes over the entire host the "relay" is deployed on.

Why This Matters

A simple, host agnostic, reproducible deployment lowers the entry cost for anyone wanting to run a privacy‑preserving, decentralized messaging relay. In an era of perpetually resurrected chat‑control legislation threats, EU digital‑sovereignty drives, and many dangers of using big‑tech messaging platforms (Apple iMessage, WhatsApp, FB Messenger, Instagram, SMS, Google Messages, etc...) for any type of communication, providing an easy‑to‑use alternative empowers:

• Censorship resistance - No single entity controls the relay; operators can spin up new nodes quickly.
  
• Surveillance mitigation - End‑to‑end OpenPGP encryption ensures relay operators never see plaintext.
  
• Digital sovereignty - Communities can host their own infrastructure under local jurisdiction, aligning with national data‑policy goals.
  

By turning the Chatmail relay into a plug‑and‑play container stack, we enable broader adoption, foster a resilient messaging fabric, and give developers, activists, and hobbyists a concrete tool to defend privacy online.

Goals

As I indicated earlier, this project aims to drastically simplify the deployment of Chatmail relay. By converting this architecture into a portable, containerized stack using Podman and OpenSUSE base container images, we can allow anyone to deploy their own censorship-resistant, privacy-preserving communications node in minutes.

Our goal for Hack Week: package every component into containers built on openSUSE/MicroOS base images, initially orchestrated with a single container-compose.yml (podman-compose compatible). The stack will:

• Run on any host that supports Podman (including optimizations and enhancements for SELinux‑enabled systems).
  
• Allow network decoupling by refactoring configurations to move from file-system constrained Unix sockets to internal TCP networking, allowing containers achieve stricter isolation.
• Utilize Enhanced Security with SELinux by using purpose built utilities such as udica we can quickly generate custom SELinux policies for the container stack, ensuring strict confinement superior to standard/typical Docker deployments.
• Allow the use of bind or remote mounted volumes for shared data (/var/vmail, DKIM keys, TLS certs, etc.).
  
• Replace the local DNS server requirement with a remote DNS‑provider API for DKIM/TXT record publishing.
  

By delivering a turnkey, host agnostic, reproducible deployment, we lower the barrier for individuals and small communities to launch their own chatmail relays, fostering a decentralized, censorship‑resistant messaging ecosystem that can serve DeltaChat users and/or future services adopting this protocol

Resources

• The links included above
• https://chatmail.at/doc/relay/
• https://delta.chat/en/help
• Project repo -> https://codeberg.org/EndShittification/containerized-chatmail-relay

---

Port the classic browser game HackTheNet to PHP 8 by dgedon

Description

The classic browser game HackTheNet from 2004 still runs on PHP 4/5 and MySQL 5 and needs a port to PHP 8 and e.g. MariaDB.

Goals

• Port the game to PHP 8 and MariaDB 11
• Create a container where the game server can simply be started/stopped

Resources

• https://github.com/nodeg/hackthenet

---

Rewrite Distrobox in go (POC) by fabriziosestito

Description

Rewriting Distrobox in Go.

Main benefits:

• Easier to maintain and to test
• Adapter pattern for different container backends (LXC, systemd-nspawn, etc.)

Goals

• Build a minimal starting point with core commands
• Keep the CLI interface compatible: existing users shouldn't notice any difference
• Use a clean Go architecture with adapters for different container backends
• Keep dependencies minimal and binary size small
• Benchmark against the original shell script

Resources

• Upstream project: https://github.com/89luca89/distrobox/
• Distrobox site: https://distrobox.it/
• ArchWiki: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Distrobox

---

Is SUSE Trending? Popularity and Developer Sentiment Insight Using Native AI Capabilities by terezacerna

Description

This project aims to explore the popularity and developer sentiment around SUSE and its technologies compared to Red Hat and their technologies. Using publicly available data sources, I will analyze search trends, developer preferences, repository activity, and media presence. The final outcome will be an interactive Power BI dashboard that provides insights into how SUSE is perceived and discussed across the web and among developers.

Goals

1. Assess the popularity of SUSE products and brand compared to Red Hat using Google Trends.
2. Analyze developer satisfaction and usage trends from the Stack Overflow Developer Survey.
3. Use the GitHub API to compare SUSE and Red Hat repositories in terms of stars, forks, contributors, and issue activity.
4. Perform sentiment analysis on GitHub issue comments to measure community tone and engagement using built-in Copilot capabilities.
5. Perform sentiment analysis on Reddit comments related to SUSE technologies using built-in Copilot capabilities.
6. Use Gnews.io to track and compare the volume of news articles mentioning SUSE and Red Hat technologies.
7. Test the integration of Copilot (AI) within Power BI for enhanced data analysis and visualization.
8. Deliver a comprehensive Power BI report summarizing findings and insights.
9. Test the full potential of Power BI, including its AI features and native language Q&A.

Resources

1. Google Trends: Web scraping for search popularity data
2. Stack Overflow Developer Survey: For technology popularity and satisfaction comparison
3. GitHub API: For repository data (stars, forks, contributors, issues, comments).
4. Gnews.io API: For article volume and mentions analysis.
5. Reddit: SUSE related topics with comments.

---

Try AI training with ROCm and LoRA by bmwiedemann

Description

I want to setup a Radeon RX 9600 XT 16 GB at home with ROCm on Slowroll.

Goals

I want to test how fast AI inference can get with the GPU and if I can use LoRA to re-train an existing free model for some task.

Resources

• https://rocm.docs.amd.com/en/latest/compatibility/compatibility-matrix.html
• https://build.opensuse.org/project/show/science:GPU:ROCm
• https://src.opensuse.org/ROCm/
• https://www.suse.com/c/lora-fine-tuning-llms-for-text-classification/

Results

got inference working with llama.cpp:

export LLAMACPP_ROCM_ARCH=gfx1200
HIPCXX="$(hipconfig -l)/clang" HIP_PATH="$(hipconfig -R)" \
cmake -S . -B build -DGGML_HIP=ON -DAMDGPU_TARGETS=$LLAMACPP_ROCM_ARCH \
-DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release -DLLAMA_CURL=ON \
-Dhipblas_DIR=/usr/lib64/cmake/hipblaslt/ \
&& cmake --build build --config Release -j8
m=models/gpt-oss-20b-mxfp4.gguf
cd $P/llama.cpp && build/bin/llama-server --model $m --threads 8 --port 8005 --host 0.0.0.0 --device ROCm0 --n-gpu-layers 999

Without the --device option it faulted. Maybe because my APU also appears there?

I updated/fixed various related packages: https://src.opensuse.org/ROCm/rocm-examples/pulls/1 https://src.opensuse.org/ROCm/hipblaslt/pulls/1 SR 1320959

benchmark

I benchmarked inference with llama.cpp + gpt-oss-20b-mxfp4.gguf and ROCm offloading to a Radeon RX 9060 XT 16GB. I varied the number of layers that went to the GPU:

• 0 layers 14.49 tokens/s (8 CPU cores)
• 9 layers 17.79 tokens/s 34% VRAM
• 15 layers 22.39 tokens/s 51% VRAM
• 20 layers 27.49 tokens/s 64% VRAM
• 24 layers 41.18 tokens/s 74% VRAM
• 25+ layers 86.63 tokens/s 75% VRAM (only 200% CPU load)

So there is a significant performance-boost if the whole model fits into the GPU's VRAM.

---

"what is it" file and directory analysis via MCP and local LLM, for console and KDE by rsimai

Description

Users sometimes wonder what files or directories they find on their local PC are good for. If they can't determine from the filename or metadata, there should an easy way to quickly analyze the content and at least guess the meaning. An LLM could help with that, through the use of a filesystem MCP and to-text-converters for typical file types. Ideally this is integrated into the desktop environment but works as well from a console. All data is processed locally or "on premise", no artifacts remain or leave the system.

Goals

• The user can run a command from the console, to check on a file or directory
• The filemanager contains the "analyze" feature within the context menu
• The local LLM could serve for other use cases where privacy matters

TBD

• Find or write capable one-shot and interactive MCP client
• Find or write simple+secure file access MCP server
• Create local LLM service with appropriate footprint, containerized
• Shell command with options
• KDE integration (Dolphin)
• Package
• Document

Resources

---

Self-Scaling LLM Infrastructure Powered by Rancher by ademicev0

Self-Scaling LLM Infrastructure Powered by Rancher

---

Description

The Problem

Running LLMs can get expensive and complex pretty quickly.

Today there are typically two choices:

1. Use cloud APIs like OpenAI or Anthropic. Easy to start with, but costs add up at scale.
2. Self-host everything - set up Kubernetes, figure out GPU scheduling, handle scaling, manage model serving... it's a lot of work.

What if there was a middle ground?

What if infrastructure scaled itself instead of making you scale it?

Can we use existing Rancher capabilities like CAPI, autoscaling, and GitOps to make this simpler instead of building everything from scratch?

Project Repository: github.com/alexander-demicev/llmserverless

---

What This Project Does

A key feature is hybrid deployment: requests can be routed based on complexity or privacy needs. Simple or low-sensitivity queries can use public APIs (like OpenAI), while complex or private requests are handled in-house on local infrastructure. This flexibility allows balancing cost, privacy, and performance - using cloud for routine tasks and on-premises resources for sensitive or demanding workloads.

A complete, self-scaling LLM infrastructure that:

• Scales to zero when idle (no idle costs)
• Scales up automatically when requests come in
• Adds more nodes when needed, removes them when demand drops
• Runs on any infrastructure - laptop, bare metal, or cloud

Think of it as "serverless for LLMs" - focus on building, the infrastructure handles itself.

How It Works

A combination of open source tools working together:

Flow:

• Users interact with OpenWebUI (chat interface)
• Requests go to LiteLLM Gateway
• LiteLLM routes requests to:
  • Ollama (Knative) for local model inference (auto-scales pods)
  • Or cloud APIs for fallback

---

Backporting patches using LLM by jankara

Description

Backporting Linux kernel fixes (either for CVE issues or as part of general git-fixes workflow) is boring and mostly mechanical work (dealing with changes in context, renamed variables, new helper functions etc.). The idea of this project is to explore usage of LLM for backporting Linux kernel commits to SUSE kernels using LLM.

Goals

• Create safe environment allowing LLM to run and backport patches without exposing the whole filesystem to it (for privacy and security reasons).
• Write prompt that will guide LLM through the backporting process. Fine tune it based on experimental results.
• Explore success rate of LLMs when backporting various patches.

Resources

• Docker
• Gemini CLI

Repository

Current version of the container with some instructions for use are at: https://gitlab.suse.de/jankara/gemini-cli-backporter

---