BeakerX
BeakerX is an open-source project originally developed and released by Two Sigma, the New York-based quantitative hedge fund, as a collection of JVM kernels and interactive widgets for Jupyter Notebook and Jupyter Lab.
Profile
BeakerX is a dormant open-source project that provided JVM language kernels (Java, Scala, Groovy, SQL) and interactive widgets for Jupyter Notebook and Jupyter Lab.
BeakerX is an open-source project originally developed and released by Two Sigma, the New York-based quantitative hedge fund, as a collection of JVM kernels and interactive widgets for Jupyter Notebook and Jupyter Lab. First published in 2017, the project succeeded the earlier Beaker Notebook and was designed to bring Java, Scala, Groovy, and SQL kernels into the Jupyter ecosystem, along with autotranslation and interactive plotting and table widgets. The project's GitHub repository, hosted under the Two Sigma organization, shows 2,900 stars, 383 forks, and 1,689 commits, with the last commit made in January 2021.
Since that date, the repository has seen no active development: no new releases, no merged pull requests, and no responses to open issues. The project's README explicitly states it supports Jupyter Lab versions 1.2.x and 2.x, which are now multiple major versions behind the current Jupyter Lab 4.x series. BeakerX is not a company; it has no headquarters, no employees, no revenue, no funding rounds, and no customers.
It is a dormant open-source project that has not been updated in over five years. The project's documentation and installation instructions reference conda packages hosted on the beakerx channel, but those packages have not been updated since 2020. The project's license is Apache 2.0, and the code remains available for anyone to fork or use, but there is no active maintenance, community support, or roadmap.
The project's name has been confused with unrelated companies such as Bruker Corporation (ticker BRKR), Baker Hughes (ticker BKR), and Brinker International (ticker EAT), but those are entirely separate entities with no connection to BeakerX. The project's last meaningful activity was in 2020, and it has been effectively abandoned by Two Sigma since then.
Who buys this
- Data scientists and researchers using Jupyter who wanted to run Java, Scala, or Groovy code in notebooks
- Developers working with Apache Spark or other JVM-based data processing frameworks who needed interactive notebook support
- Organizations using Jupyter Lab 1.x or 2.x who needed advanced plotting and table widgets for JVM languages
Strengths and what to watch
Strengths
- The project's codebase is publicly available on GitHub under an Apache 2.0 license, allowing anyone to fork and modify it without restriction.
- The project demonstrated a novel approach to polyglot notebooks by providing autotranslation between Python, Java, Scala, Groovy, and SQL within the same notebook.
- The project's widget library for interactive plotting and tables was well-regarded and provided functionality not available in standard Jupyter at the time.
Watch for
- The project has received no commits since January 2021 and no releases since 2020, making it effectively abandoned with no active maintenance or security updates.
- The project only supports Jupyter Lab versions 1.2.x and 2.x, which are now multiple major versions behind the current Jupyter Lab 4.x, rendering the project incompatible with modern Jupyter environments.
- The project is not a company and has no funding, employees, or commercial support; users relying on it have no recourse for bugs, security issues, or compatibility problems.
Key Information
- Industry
- Collaboration
- Founded
- 2017
Frequently Asked Questions
What is BeakerX?
BeakerX is an open-source project from Two Sigma that provided JVM language kernels for Java, Scala, Groovy, and SQL, plus interactive widgets, for Jupyter Notebook and Jupyter Lab. It is now dormant with no updates since January 2021.
Is BeakerX still actively maintained?
No, BeakerX is not actively maintained. The last commit to its GitHub repository was in January 2021, and no new releases or merged pull requests have occurred since. The project is effectively abandoned by Two Sigma.
What Jupyter Lab versions does BeakerX support?
BeakerX supports Jupyter Lab versions 1.2.x and 2.x, which are multiple major versions behind the current Jupyter Lab 4.x. This makes BeakerX incompatible with modern Jupyter environments without significant modifications.
What features did BeakerX offer for Jupyter?
BeakerX offered JVM language kernels for Java, Scala, Groovy, and SQL, along with autotranslation between these languages and Python. It also included interactive plotting and table widgets that enhanced notebook functionality.
Is BeakerX a company?
No, BeakerX is not a company. It is a dormant open-source project originally developed by Two Sigma. It has no headquarters, employees, revenue, funding, or customers. The code is available under an Apache 2.0 license.
Can I still use BeakerX today?
You can fork the code from GitHub, but BeakerX is incompatible with current Jupyter Lab versions and has no active support. There are no security updates or bug fixes, so using it in production is not recommended.
Sources
- github.com — Project description, last commit date (January 2021), star count (2.9k), fork count (383), commit count (1,689), supported Jupyter Lab versions (1.2.x and 2.x), and project status as a Two Sigma open-source project.
- ir.bruker.com — Confirms that Bruker Corporation (ticker BRKR) is a separate company with no relation to BeakerX; provides Q1 2026 revenue of $823.4 million.
- s206.q4cdn.com — Confirms that Alphabet Inc. is a separate company with no relation to BeakerX; provides Q1 2026 revenue of $109.9 billion.
- investors.brinker.com — Confirms that Brinker International (ticker EAT) is a separate company with no relation to BeakerX; provides Q3 2026 revenue of $1.47 billion.
- investors.bakerhughes.com — Confirms that Baker Hughes (ticker BKR) is a separate company with no relation to BeakerX; provides Q1 2026 revenue of $6.6 billion.