Recapping day two of Red Hat Summit Virtual Experience 2021

It seems like just yesterday we were planning for Red Hat Summit 2021, and now the two days of our April Summit programming have just flown by. Let's take a quick look back at what happened. And, if you missed something, don't worry! Much of the Summit programming is still available on demand for you to watch at your convenience. 

Major Summit announcements

Let's take a look back at some of the major news from Red Hat Summit. There was a lot going on, and you might have missed an announcement or two.

• Red Hat OpenShift Platform Plus: Red Hat introduced a new edition that builds on the capabilities of OpenShift Container Platform, taking it a step further by providing a solution that includes advanced security features, Day 2 management capabilities and a global container registry. 

• Red Hat and Boston University (BU) announce an expanded collaboration: Red Hat is donating software subscriptions, valued at $551.9 million, to BU while also announcing a renewed and expanded commitment of $20 million to support research and deepen collaboration under the Red Hat Collaboratory at BU. 

• Red Hat announces new managed cloud services: Red Hat announced the expansion of its open hybrid cloud technology portfolio with new managed cloud services: Red Hat OpenShift API Management, Red Hat OpenShift Streams for Apache Kafka and Red Hat OpenShift Data Science.

• Red Hat announces automotive plans: Red Hat announced its intent to deliver a functional-safety certified, evolving Linux operating system for the automotive industry. Built from the trusted components of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL), and in collaboration with exida, this operating system will be designed for continuous updates throughout its lifecycle while still retaining crucial functional safety certifications.

• Red Hat Insights expands beyond RHEL: Red Hat is launching Red Hat Insights for Red Hat OpenShift and Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform and with expanded capabilities for Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). 

• Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.4: This release will be available in the coming weeks and refines the platform’s role as a lightweight, production grade operating system for edge deployments, adding new Linux container, deployment and management capabilities scaled for the needs of edge computing.

Those are just some of the biggest announcements. Be sure to head over to the Summit 2021 Newsroom to scope out all the announcements.

2021 Red Hat Innovator of the Year

Since 2007, Red Hat customers and partners have been recognized for their outstanding and innovative use of Red Hat solutions with the Red Hat Innovation Awards.

On day two of Summit we unveiled the winner of the 2021 Red Hat Innovator of the Year, Medifé Asociación Civil. Medifé is a leading non-profit healthcare insurance organization in Argentina, and it worked with Red Hat to implement a new digital application architecture to support the changing needs of its members and better respond to the unique market dynamics that have emerged as a result of COVID-19.

You can see all the 2021 Red Hat Innovation Award Winners and 2021 Honorable Mentions on the Innovation Awards page and learn all about their use of open source technologies to solve complex problems. You'll also be able to look back on past winners. 

Vision and Fundamental sessions

We did something a little different this year and added two new types of sessions to Red Hat Summit: "vision" and "fundamental" sessions. 

With our vision sessions, we featured Red Hat leaders and experts giving deep insights about technology trends and Red Hat technologies. In the fundamental sessions, we got deeper into the technology and what makes it work with sessions like "Kubernetes 101" and "Quarkus Fundamentals." 

Missed them the first time around? Don't worry, they're waiting for you on-demand!

AI sunk my Battleship!

We know to expect live demo goodness from Burr Sutter, Red Hat's Director of Developer Experience, at Summit. That's a given. What attendees might not have expected was that Sutter and crew would create a demo that allowed an AI to sink their battleship.

Sutter and friends put together yet another fantastic demo for Summit, this time around they showed how to build an event-driven, cloud native application with tools like Red Hat OpenShift, Red Hat OpenShift Data Science, Jupyter Notebooks and Red Hat OpenShift Streams for Apache Kafka. 

Attendees got a chance to battle an AI powered by OpenShift playing a Battleship-like game, albeit on a smaller board than is strictly regulation. At one point, the team paused the demo and played back the last game to show the AI and human moves throughout — a great illustration of the streaming capabilities of Apache Kafka. 

If you missed out on the demo the first time (or want to watch again) be sure to check out the on-demand session.

Special guests: Mick Ebeling and Kumail Nanjiani

Red Hat's very own Angela Andrews hosted a special guest conversation with Mick Ebeling and Kumail Nanjiani.

Ebeling is the founder and CEO of the Not Impossible Foundation, and he’s formed teams to tackle seemingly impossible projects from helping an ALS patient draw for the first time in seven years to 3D-printing prosthetics for amputees in Africa. He challenged attendees to “see the world through what is absurd.” As he took on the challenge to make an ocular recognition device for the artist with ALS, he explained, “Sometimes you have to see something that’s absurd, commit, then figure out how you’re going to pull it off.”

He also imparted his driving principle of “Help one, help many.” Find one relatable story and person to help, which can inspire others to help countless more. To drive egoless innovation, It’s important to remember there’s a human story behind what you’re doing. 

Surrounding himself with different perspectives has helped critically acclaimed actor, comedian and writer Nanjiani throughout his career too. He shared that by working with people with different backgrounds, like Oscar-winning director Chloé Zhao on the upcoming Marvel Cinematic Universe film "Eternals," he’s been able to learn that every person looks at the world a little differently. 

Respect for other perspectives may help comedians like Nanjiani be more thoughtful about who’s on the receiving end of their jokes, or help us think about the social and ethical implications of technology. Nanjiani said, “I am a proponent of technology. I think technology is an essential tool that sort of allows us to become better than we’ve ever been in history. But, technology has a lot of power.” 

Hear more from Nanjiani, and learn more about what you can do to address world hunger with Ebeling, by watching the Q&A session.

Until next time

Thanks much to all of our friends around the world who joined the Red Hat Summit 2021 Virtual Experience. We appreciate all those who've turned up to hear about Red Hat's latest announcements, watch live demos and enjoy our special guest sessions. Be sure to go back and re-watch the sessions you enjoyed most or take in some of the on-demand sessions you might have missed the first time around. 

Join us again June 15 and June 16 for another Red Hat Summit Virtual Experience with breakout sessions, more "Ask the Experts," the virtual expo hall, and more!