Biohackathon: GNU/Linux Debian Join Hands To Fight COVID-19
According to Telegraph, one-fifth of the world’s population is under lockdown in the fight against the COVID-19. Consequently, almost all domains of technology have come forward to help. Open-source giants like OpenSUSE have also started various initiatives to offer support for medical devices and tools.
Along the same lines, yesterday, the open-source Debian Med team announced the launch of the online Biohackathon for students. The Med team also requested Debian developers to participate and contribute to improving biomedical free and open-source software.
Virtual Biological Hackathon
Since medical experts are advising people to follow social distancing, the Biohackathon will be held through an online platform. The hackathon will start on April 5 and end on April 11.
The Debian Med team will maintain the whole event. Debian Med is a project that develops free and open-source software for medical practices and biomedical research.
Also, developers don’t require any knowledge of biology or medicine to participate in Biohackathon. They can contribute to their field related tasks such as bug tracking, testing, documentation, or packaging.
Most Debian developers are already involved in tracking the COVID-19 tagged bugs of listed biomedical software packages.
How Can I Participate In Biohackathon?
The hackathon is open to all. Students with knowledge of any of the topics given here can sign up and contribute to the event.
To register, you first need to become a member of the mailing list. Then, you can join any topic/group listed on the Biohackathon wiki. To add yourself to a particular group, you also need to edit the page and send a pull request.
For complete information, you can visit the main online event organized at GitHub here. However, there is also a separate participation event for Debian developers.
