The GNOME Foundation, a non-profit organization, has received a grant of 1 million euros from Sovereign Tech Fund. The funds are planned to be spent on the following:
- creating a new accessibility technology stack for the disabled;
- encrypting users' home directories;
- updating the GNOME Keyring;
- improving hardware support;
- investments in QA and Developer Experience;
- expanding various freedesktop APIs;
- consolidating and enhancing components of the GNOME platform.
The fund invites interested developers—both individuals and organizations—to participate in work on these topics.
There is currently limited detailed information, but the plans for the new accessibility technology stack for the visually impaired can be read about in Matt Campbell's blog, who is expected to take on this part of the work. Matt is blind himself and has been developing software for others like him for over 20 years, including users of Linux. Matt is the creator of System Access (from 2004 to present), a contributor to the Narrator and UI Automation API development at Microsoft (2017-2020), and the lead developer of AccessKit (from 2021 to present).
The Sovereign Tech Fund was established in October 2022 and is funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Protection. During this time, the fund has supported projects such as curl, Fortran, OpenMLS, OpenSSH, Pendulum, RubyGems & Bundler, OpenBLAS, and WireGuard.
Source: linux.org.ru
