Ubuntu Cloud-Init: From Development to Production with Multipass

• Duncan Njoroge (Infrastructure Engineer, Ericsson.)

Modern infrastructure demands consistent, repeatable deployments across development, testing, and production environments. This talk will demonstrate how Ubuntu's cloud-init and Multipass create a unified workflow from laptop to data center. Attendees will learn how to leverage Ubuntu's native cloud-init project to automate server provisioning across multiple environments: local development with Multipass, homelab virtualization, and public cloud deployments. Through practical examples and live demonstrations, they'll discover how the same cloud-init configuration files work seamlessly across all deployment targets. I'll explore real-world automation workflows, version management strategies across Ubuntu LTS and latest releases, and demonstrate how small teams can achieve enterprise-grade infrastructure consistency using Ubuntu's ecosystem tools.

Building Verifiable Knowledge Systems with Agentic RAG and Knowledge Graphs

• Western Onzere

Large Language Models are increasingly being embedded into production systems, yet many current Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) approaches struggle with trust, traceability, and operational robustness. This talk explores how Agentic RAG combined with Knowledge Graphs can be used to build verifiable, auditable knowledge systems rather than opaque AI applications. Using Telos, a recently released legal reasoning engine, as a concrete case study, the session examines how complex domain knowledge can be structured, retrieved, reasoned over, and iteratively refined. Topics covered include: - Limitations of naïve RAG architectures in real systems - Agent-based retrieval and reasoning workflows - Knowledge graphs as structural infrastructure for grounding and provenance - Design patterns for inspection, traceability, and controlled generation - Infrastructure considerations for deploying and operating such systems Although the case study is drawn from the legal domain, the architectural principles apply broadly to compliance, finance, internal knowledge platforms, and other knowledge-intensive systems.

PostgreSQL on RISC-V Ubuntu: deb/snap/rock/charm

• Alex Lutay (Canonical)

This session will demonstrate PostgreSQL Deb, Snap, Rock, Charm, and Juju on RISC-V using Canonical Ubuntu. We will also showcase the UI/UX similarity across different architectures, including AMD, ARM, and RISC-V, as well as the simplicity of managing applications using the Juju application lifecycle management system.

LXD in Production: Building a Cost-Effective Private Cloud on Bare Metal for African Deployments

• Mucheru Maina

Managing cloud infrastructure in Africa comes with unique constraints — high AWS/Azure costs, unreliable connectivity, and the need to serve multiple markets efficiently. This talk explores how LXD can be used to build a robust, production-grade private cloud on bare metal servers, dramatically reducing infrastructure costs without sacrificing reliability or flexibility. Drawing from real-world experience managing hybrid infrastructure across 8 African markets, this session covers: setting up and managing LXD clusters on bare metal, designing container profiles and storage pools for multi-tenant workloads, networking strategies including bridged and OVN networking, practical operational lessons — backups, monitoring, and day-2 operations. Attendees will leave with a clear understanding of when LXD makes sense over VMs or Kubernetes, and a practical blueprint for deploying it in production.

An Open Blueprint for Climate-Resilient Microrobots Swarm Using Ubuntu

• STACEY INGOLO (KABARAK UNIVERSITY)

Water scarcity remains one of the most urgent challenges in arid and semi-arid regions across Kenya and Africa. Instead of proposing large centralized infrastructure, this talk presents an open blueprint and technical framework for building decentralized, solar-powered microrobot swarms using Ubuntu and open-source technologies. The session focuses on the architecture required to build such a system (not a finished product),making it realistic, research-driven, and collaborative. The proposed framework includes: - Ubuntu Core for embedded device management - Open-source firmware for modular microrobot units - MQTT-based communication for swarm coordination - Python-based control and optimization logic - Ubuntu Server edge nodes for local orchestration - MicroK8s for distributed simulation and testing - Open hardware standards for community-driven iteration The talk demonstrates how Ubuntu can extend beyond traditional computing environments into decentralized environmental infrastructure. By framing the project as an open, extensible platform, the session invites developers, students, researchers, and makers to experiment, simulate and contribute improvements. Attendees will gain a clear understanding of how open-source tools can be used to design scalable, resilient systems that address real-world African climate challenges.

Open source datasets: Powering inclusive communication for the deaf community

• Winnie Ongiri (Signvrse)
• Elly Savatia (Signvrse)

Communication is a fundamental human right, yet millions of deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals across Kenya and Africa face significant barriers in accessing digital content and services. Signvrse is an open-source digital sign language interpreter that converts text and spoken language into expressive sign language animations rendered on avatars in real time — built on open-source foundations to demonstrate how community-driven technology can unlock inclusion at scale. An estimated 600,000 deaf and hard-of-hearing Kenyans rely on Kenyan Sign Language as their primary mode of communication, yet the vast majority of digital platforms remain inaccessible to them. Human interpreters are scarce and expensive, and existing commercial solutions are proprietary, costly, and largely untailored to African contexts. Our flagship product,TERP360 accepts text or speech input in any language and produces accurate, natural sign language output through animated 3D avatars. By leveraging open-source dataset models and sign language datasets, the platform supports multiple language inputs and is designed to be community-auditable and extensible. Source code, datasets, and models are released under permissive open-source licences to encourage contribution and adaptation for other African sign languages. Signvrse has the potential to transform how deaf communities interact with public services, healthcare, education, and media in Kenya. Our vision is a Pan-African accessibility layer that any application can integrate — making the digital world truly inclusive. UbuCon Kenya 2026 is the ideal platform to share this work and rally developers to explore how they can contribute.

Building a secure home lab with Raspberry Pi and Tailscale

• Felix Jumason (Cursor AI)

Launchpad: Open source collaboration and Linux-focused development

• Charles Odada

Bridging Native C++ Infrastructure with Distributed Data Platforms

• Irfan Ghat

What happens when high-performance native systems require **secure**, **distributed** access to modern large-scale **data processing infrastructure**? This talk covers **an open-source C++ client** implementation built on the **Spark Connect protocol**, enabling Native Systems to communicate with remote Spark clusters using **gRPC** and **Protobuf**. **The talk explores:** - The architecture of Spark Connect and its decoupled client-server model - Designing a secure, distributed query interface from native C++ - Authentication and production deployment considerations - Leveraging gRPC for structured remote execution - Packaging and building the client for Ubuntu & other Linux environments (**Linux Package distribution**) - The role of open standards in expanding big data ecosystems All these aspects demonstrate how **systems-level engineering** can integrate directly with cloud-native data platforms while preserving **performance**, **portability**, and **security**. By **extending Spark access beyond JVM and Python**, this project **enables integration with embedded systems**, **financial engines**, **scientific computing workloads**, and other performance-sensitive environments. The goal is not to replace existing Spark APIs but to expand the ecosystem through **open-source**, cross-language interoperability.

Are we making it easy for new contributors to grow?

• Cornelius Emase

Open source communities are very good at helping people make their first contribution, but many struggle with what happens after onboarding. New contributors often join with excitement, complete an initial task, and then lose direction because the next steps are unclear. This talk explores how communities can design clearer contributor pathways—from first contribution to long-term growth. Using practical experience from community work in the Fedora Project and mentorship programs like Outreachy, I will discuss real onboarding gaps and how communities can fix them with simple structural improvements. We will cover: - How contributors typically discover open source projects - Common drop-off points after onboarding - How mentorship and documentation influence retention - Practical models for helping contributors grow into maintainers and community leaders This session focuses especially on emerging open-source ecosystems in Kenya and similar regions, where interest in open source is rapidly growing but contributor pathways are still evolving. Attendees will leave with actionable ideas for: - Structuring beginner-friendly contribution workflows - Building contributor growth ladders - Creating sustainable community support systems The goal is simple: Communities should not only make it easy to join—but also easy to stay and grow.

RTOS in Linux without PREEMPT_RT: Having your Cake and Eating it too

• Machar Kook

Any builder and developer who enjoys going down the rabbit hole at the intersection of software and hardware in embedded systems, will eventually find themselves judging if their current task/project should be implemented using an RTOS or a custom linux kernel with the PREEMPT_RT patch set. The decision they make almost always is not guided by the nature of the project/ problem they are currently solving, but on what they find to be the easy path. If they have previously built a custom kernel with the PREEMPT_RT patch set for their hardware and have no RTOS experience, they will do the same. The opposite is also true. The exception comes if they have done both, and from personal experience, their decision will be guided by the merits each approach brings to the table with regards to the particular problem they are solving. Two-three years ago I was building a custom drone firmware, but from a model predictive control point of view instead of the classic PID tuning approach. I came at the problem from an RTOS point of view, and needless to say, while a microcontroller works perfectly with an RTOS, it is at the end of the day an extremely resource constrained device. As a result, I put the project on a brief hiatus. Last year, after discovering that I could compile a custom kernel for the Raspberry Pi with the PREEMPT_RT patch set, I realized that I now had the right primitives to revisit the problem, however, I ran into an immediate problem. A real-time linux kernel is very powerful, but the challenge of managing kernel configuration, maintaining compatibility across hardware types and revisions quickly shift the focus away from building my project and towards maintaining infrastructure. But what if real-time performance didn’t require turning Linux itself into an RTOS? This talk proposes an alternative architectural pattern: distribute time-critical responsibilities to dedicated microcontroller-based nodes, and leave Linux to do the high-level orchestration, networking, UI, and asynchronous processing. Building on this kernel of the idea, this project and talk are inspired by the klipper firmware that runs on most 3d printers, where real-time workloads (those that have hard timing guarantees) run on microcontrollers like the Raspberry Pi Pico or ESP32, each running a lightweight RTOS, while a Linux SBC coordinates the system, aggregates data, handles networking, and runs all high level logic without requiring PREEMPT_RT. This way, you can have real-time guarantees and still keep/eat your cake

Micro-transactions at Scale: Solving the "Penny-Switching" Problem in Open Source Finance

• Brooke Stanley Agina (USIU - Africa)

The future of AI and robotics in African Markets

• Yvonne Gachara (USIU - Africa)

Digibiashara

• Ilyas Bourzat (USIU - Africa)

Building an Open-Source Community from Scratch in Kenya: Lessons from Salamander Tech Hub Starting a tech community is easy. Sustaining one is difficult. In 2025, Salamander Tech Hub began as a small grassroots initiative focused on Git, GitHub, and open source fundamentals. With no funding, limited infrastructure, and a volunteer driven team, we set out to create a space where young developers could move from learning tools to contributing to real projects. Within a year, we hosted recurring technical sessions, partnered with external speakers, and organized our first physical event, Wajenzi Hack 1.0. Along the way, we faced familiar challenges in emerging ecosystems: inconsistent participation, contribution gaps, volunteer fatigue, and sustainability concerns. This talk presents a practical, experience driven framework for building early stage open source communities in resource constrained environments. It covers attracting the first members, designing contribution pathways beyond workshops, building partnerships, measuring meaningful engagement, and maintaining momentum after the excitement of initial events fades. Attendees will leave with actionable strategies, cautionary lessons, and a replicable model for starting and growing community driven open source initiatives.

Automating Drone Simulation with Nix, Containers, and ROS

• Mark Ngugi

In this talk, I’ll demonstrate how to set up a reproducible drone simulation environment using MAVLink, and ROS, with two powerful options for automation: Nix and Docker containers. We’ll cover how to set up the simulation stack, visualize missions in Gazebo, and run automated tests—using either Nix for a fully declarative setup or containers for an isolated environment. You’ll see how to create a consistent, reproducible setup that works across different machines, whether you prefer the precision of Nix or the flexibility of containers. I’ll show how to run simulated drone missions, visualize in Gazebo, and run tests within these environments to validate autonomous behavior.