Linux Professional Institute Launches the Open Source Essentials Education Program

Toronto, 04-04-2024 – Linux Professional Institute (LPI) announces the launch of Open Source Essentials, a certificate and education program targeting the common set of knowledge everyone with a role in open source should have.

“Open source is nowadays used in professional settings more than ever. This implies that professionals with very different backgrounds, from developers and technicians to project managers, lawyers, and account managers, do work related to open source. With Open Source Essentials we establish a common set of knowledge and a common vocabulary to enable professionals of all sorts to collaborate with each other and consider the most important aspects of Open Source,” says Fabian Thorns, Director of Product Development at LPI.

“The learning objectives are designed to cover all major domains that affect Open Source. They include software fundamentals, open source software licenses, open content licenses, open source business models, and project management as well as collaboration and communication. The combination of knowledge from these realms will, for example, allow a lawyer to understand what a ‘merge request’ is and a technician to understand what exactly constitutes a ‘derivative work’ in the sense of copyright,” explains Thorns.

The exam is part of LPI’s Essentials certificate track. The exam consists of 40 multiple choice questions that have to be answered within 60 minutes. The Open Source Essentials certificate is designed to complement other professional qualifications that benefit from or require knowledge of open source software, open content, and other kinds of open technologies.

“Open Source Essentials is a tool for both professionals and organizations who want to use, create, and contribute to free technologies in a well informed, responsible, and sustainable way. We welcome organizations to use this certificate to prove their ability to behave as good open source community members. We also encourage everyone to leverage our objectives and learning materials when educating their staff. We also recommend that, within the course of adopting open source technology into their organization, they institutionalize their open source efforts, for example, by setting up an Open Source Program Office,“ says G. Matthew Rice, Executive Director of LPI.

Along with the exam, LPI provides comprehensive learning materials to allow candidates to prepare for the exam. The materials are designed to support self-studies as well as training and teaching. The materials are free for personal use by anyone and available to LPI partners.

The initial set of lessons is available at learning.lpi.org/en/learning-materials/050-100/. Additional lessons as well as first translations will be added to the learning materials within the next few weeks. The Open Source Essentials exam is available on the Pearson Vue testing centers and the Person OnVue testing platform. More information is available on the LPI website at lpi.org/ose.

About Linux Professional Institute (LPI)

Linux Professional Institute (LPI) is the global certification standard and career support organization for open source professionals. With more than 200,000 certification holders, it’s the world’s first and largest vendor-neutral Linux and open source certification body. LPI has certified professionals in over 180 countries, delivers exams in multiple languages, and has hundreds of training partners. Learn more at lpi.org.

Media Contact:
Björn Schönewald
Communications
Linux Professional Institute
bschonewald@lpi.org