On October 16, 2023, the Uptane community officially released a new and improved version of its website. This somewhat radical reinvention was introduced because, while users affirmed that the existing website contained a lot of useful information, they felt it was not particularly easy to navigate.
Uptane, an open source secure software update system for the automotive industry capable of resisting even attacks by nation-state level actors, has made quite an impact in less than a decade since its inception. Adoption of the project, for which Dr. Justin Cappos, associate professor of computer science and engineering at NYU Tandon serves as a Steering Committee member, has grown not only in the automotive world for which it was conceived. Increasingly, it is being utilized in other industrial sectors where updates are routinely received over the air, such as robotics, Thus, the community felt it was imperative to address the site’s limitations to ensure potential users could find exactly the information they needed.
The timing was fortuitous as Uptane had agreed to participate in the Google Summer of Code program, where each year students and professionals learn more about open source initiatives by taking a lead role on a proposed project. Through GSoC, the Uptane team was able to tap the ideas, expertise, and efforts of Abhijay Jain, a student at Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University in Delhi, India. Among the innovations Jain brought to the project was utilizing Docusaurus to construct the site, as opposed to using the original Jekyll framework. Also, based on a suggestion from Jain, Uptane participated in Hacktoberfest last month, allowing developers from around the globe to contribute to Uptane’s repository and, by extension, help enhance the security framework and make vehicles more secure.
Version 2.0 of the Uptane website features a cleaner and more contemporary design, and a more user-friendly architecture. Among the improvements to the site is a much more visible placement of links to important documents. Now, the most recent incarnation of the Uptane Standard for Design and Implementation, and it’s companion document Deployment Best Practices, can be accessed directly from the home page, as can a one-page list of initial steps for implementing the framework. The new website also provides a blogging spot, creating a new public forum for issues critical to the advancement of the technology.
To ensure the community had sufficient input into the revision project, a number of its members worked with Jain over the summer. In addition to the “mentors of record,” Lois Anne DeLong of New York University and Philip Lapczynski of Renesas, Jain worked with Jon Oster of Toradex, and Uptane Steering Committee members Ira McDonald of High North and Cappos. And, as a side benefit to the website re-development efforts, Uptane now has a LinkedIn page (https://www.linkedin.com/company/97445010/admin/feed/posts/) and a Discord channel, making it easier for interested parties to submit concerns and recommendations that could enrich and advance the technology.