Fsf-friends October 2003

fsf-friends@gnu.org.in

15 participants
21 discussions

INTRODUCING: Hong Feng... of China
by Frederick Noronha (FN) 20 Oct '03

20 Oct '03

SELF-INTRO OF Hong Feng... interesting to see what others in Asia are upto. FN ----- My name is Hong Feng. I was born in 1968 in HuNan Province, China. After graduated from my university, I'd studied mathematics and Pansystems Methodology after the theory founder, Prof. Wu XueMou, in Wuhan during 1988-1991. In 1992-1995, I visited Russia and stayed in Moscow. I was greatly impressed by the Russian social reforms. I founded RON's Datacom Co., Ltd. with other 2 people in May 1995 when I returned from Russia. Since then, I have been exploring how to build a successful business model on the basis of free software (which has wrongly been called as "open sources software" since 1998 in the public media and by part of the community). Free software is so interesting, I have been enthusiastically promoting it in China for years. During 1997-1999, I had worked as the chief editor at O'Reilly & Associates in Beijing. It is an American publisher of computer books. During that time, I translated several books from English into Chinese. But I no longer effort any proprietary publications in the 21st Century. In my spare time, I like reading books on various topics, especially philosophy and history (I should admit I am too bookish); travelling to some places with beautiful nature scenes (one of the places I dream to visit someday is the Kamchatka in Russia); collecting some Chinese traditional style paintings and Russian paintings; swimming in natural rivers and lakes (especially the Han River near my Wuhan home in the summer); and watching the soccer matches. I am a true music fan! I like to play harmonica (mouthorgan) and Spanish guitar. Now I make some excises with a common saw and a bow (that's a quite new invented music instrument. The voice is a little bit like that of a Hawaiian guitar). I admire and respect a few famous scholars, including: * H. Poincare * G. Cantor * A. Einstein * B. Russell * E. Brouwer * D. Hilbert * K. Goedel * A. Robinson I like some poems too, two poets I like the most are Mao ZeDong, and Heinrich Heine because the poems of both in their youth, are quite romantic, but became more revolutionary and less romantic later. My most favorite author is Isaac Asimov, for his unmatchable imagination and high productivity in such high quality. I do not like to follow any sort of so-called "authorities", which forbid my freedom and the independency. I believe the intrinsics of the nature is a "regret" caused by uncompleteness. I have a baby named "MNM Project" (MNM's Not a Million), who is 2 years old now. I am taking care of him to protect my freedom! A large part of the project is Hackerdom Training Program (HTP) going on now. I am a freelance writer, the author of 4 books, including "Free Software: New Game Rules". I am also the publisher of FREE SOFTWARE Magazine (FSM). Till now, it is the only free (the ``free'' in freedom) monthly periodical devoted to the global free software community. It has both a web version and a paper version; both are free to copy and redistribute. I am still writing a biography for my friend, Richard Stallman (the Chinese title of the book is "RMS BenJi") who is the Chairman and one of the founders of Free Software Foundation. It is a hard project, as I try to unleash the technical details of his software in Part II of the book. I would like to write more biographies into the BenJi series for free books (as a part of MNM Project). To publish the free books in Chinese, I need to have a set of nice free fonts. I am designing high quality, free PostScript fonts in METAPOST. Since Chinese has thousands of characters to design, this project is still undergoing. PostScript specification is open, and widely supported by the publishing industry. GNU has a tool, "Ghostscript", which can interpret PostScript files; it is also a stack-based programming language. Because the typesetting is so fun, I founded the Chinese TeX User Group (CTUG) in 2000, which aims to promote Prof. Donald Knuth's TeX system for the community. As a programmer, I like some programming languages, including Lisp, (Objective) C and assembly. Now I heavily work with Scheme for hacking and training. Scheme is a modern dialect of Lisp, quite small yet very powerful indeed (I shall say it is RMS who showed me the power and elegance of Lisp). Maybe you like it too and are interested in joining my MNM Project? You can reach me by snail address: Suite 3-3, WuZhong Street 200, DongXiHu District, Wuhan, HuBei Province, 430040 China P.R. Or, electronically by email: info(a)mail.rons.net.cn to feedback your comment to the web page.

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[Fsf-friends] Indianisation ahoy... talks in Goa on Indian language computing
by Frederick Noronha (FN) 20 Oct '03

20 Oct '03

--------------------------- * Indian Linux project * * http://www.indlinux.org * --------------------------- INDIANISATION AHOY: That untiring campaigner on Indianisation issues, G Karunakar <karunakar(a)indlinux.org> -- to visit the 'Paradise LUG' chapter in Goa later this week -- informs us that IndLinux Milan CD 0.7-2 alpha has been released. Some time back the final release notes were yet to be up. But, says he, you can track the release notes at http://www.indlinux.org/wiki/index.php?IndLinuxMilanReleaseNotes Good news! G Karunakar confirms that he will be in Goa this weekend. He has agreed to allow us to take (fair) advantage of his presence here. He will be speaking about current initiatives at Indian language computing attempts on the GNU/Linux platform. Venue: PCC College of Engineering Location: Along Panjim-Margao highway, 3 kms before Margao Date: October 23, 2003 (Thursday) Time: 4 pm Subject: The Indian Language Desktop Venue: CSI, Computer Society of India Office Location: Naguesh Apts, 3rd Floor, Opp Navtara Hotel, Panjim Market Area, Panjim. Date: October 25, 2003 (Saturday) Time: 4 pm to 6 pm Subject: Indianisation of Computing: The Tech Stuff For those interested in Konkani (or work in any other small language) karunakar(a)freedomink.org recently mentioned: The starting point for translation is to start with the gnome glossary, its a collection of most commonly occuring tech terms, which are used a lot in translations. Work becomes easy if you have this done first, then po files can be taken up. You can get the glossary files at http://www.indlinux.org/downloads/gnomegloss/ Also announce on the gnome-i18n list (see http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gtp/) Also read a rough howto on doing translations at http://www.indlinux.org/hindi/gnome/howto.txt One of Karunakar's preferred quotes: --------------------------------------------------------------------------- A reasonable man adapts himself to the world An unreasonable man tries to adapt the world to himself So all progress in the world depends on the unreasonable man - GB Shaw

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Letter to the Hindu from RMS
by Arun M 19 Oct '03

19 Oct '03

Dear Editors Your Sep 27 article, When "Piracy" Funds Terrorism, violated a basic principle of journalism: not to make an accusation without positive grounds. It accused unauthorized CD producers of funding terrorism, but cited no grounds for this except that some of them are in Pakistan. I have no great sympathy for those who commercially copy music without paying the musicians. (That includes the major record labels, since most of their musicians do not actually receive royalties for their records.) But we must reject the attempts to demonize those who copy, whether it means saying they support terrorists or simply calling them "pirates", because this propaganda campaign doesn't stop with commercial copiers. Its real target is you and me--anyone who sometimes copies a record. The real terror campaign is being mounted by the record companies, which are suing hundreds and perhaps soon thousands of ordinary people in the US. It aims to make people so frightened that they do not dare share with their friends. Helping one's friends is part of human nature, so it takes a lot of fear to make people stop. I hope that the citizens of India will insist on keeping India safe from record company terror. Richard Stallman 545 Tech Square Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA

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GNULinuxIndia * Oct 18, 2003
by Frederick Noronha (FN) 18 Oct '03

18 Oct '03

-------------------- --------------------------- * BytesForAll * * Indian Linux project * * bytesforall.org * * http://www.indlinux.org * --------------------- --------------------------- e88~~\ 888b | 888 | / 888 888 ,e, d888 |Y88b | 888 | L 888 888-~88e e88~\888 " /~~~8e 8888 __ | Y88b | 888 | I 888 888 888 d888 888 888 88b 8888 | | Y88b | 888 | N 888 888 888 8888 888 888 e88~-888 Y888 | | Y88b| Y88 | U 888 888 888 Y888 888 888 C888 888 "88__/ | Y888 "8__/ X 888 888 888 "88_/888 888 "88_-888 -------------------------------------------------------------------- Formerly LinuxInIndia * Compiled by: Frederick Noronha * Oct 18,2003 -------------------------------------------------------------------- SOME GNU/Linux mailing lists: Linux-India-General, Linux-India-Help and Linux-India-Programming. * Send Linux-india-general mailing list submissions to linux-india-general(a)lists.sourceforge.net * To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/linux-india-general * or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to linux-india-general-request(a)lists.sourceforge.net * You can reach the person managing the list at linux-india-general-admin(a)lists.sourceforge.net * (The LIH and LIP lists can also be reached by replacing the word *general* above by the words *help* and *programming*, respectively.) TRIVANDRUM USERS' GROUP: Rajkumar S <s_raj(a)flashmail.com> announced the new url of Trivandrum Linux users group: http://triglug.sarovar.org/ GNU/LINUX DEMO DAY: ILUGC conducted a Linux Demo Day @ MIT Chennai on last month 27th and 28th. Nearly 1000 people are visited the event, according to Bharati S of the IndLinux team, DON Lab, TeNeT Group, IIT-Madras, Chennai. Read the report at http://www.chennailug.org/ldd.html PROGRAMMERS WITHOUT FRONTIERS? This is from my friends Geert Lovink <geert(a)xs4all.nl> of the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia and Seppo Koskela of the Applied Linux Institute in Helsinki, Finland and FN of BytesForAll from Goa, India who say: "We would to ask your opinion -- and possible involvement -- in the following idea. A few weeks ago, in Geneva, during difficult negotations about the Plan of Action for the upcoming World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), an idea was launched--and then dropped -- to create 'Programmers without Frontiers'. Would you be interested to give this idea more shape and actually create such a network? The form of such a networked organization is open and it's aim lies in supporting the spreading of FL/OSS and consolidating the collaboration between users and programmers, especially in the South. If the UN is not able to create and launch it, should we do it? Looking forward to your response." A LIVE-CD IN THE BANGLA LANGUAGE: Sayamindu Dasgupta <sayamindu(a)clai.net>, the young achiever of the Free Software network from Kolkata in eastern India, recently announced the Ankur Bangla LiveCD version 1.0-beta2 (codenamed DaanpiTe Chhele). He wrote: "Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, The Ankur Bangla Project is proud announce version 1.0-beta2 (DaanpiTe Chhele) of its Morphix based LiveCD (or if you prefer it in that way -- demo CD)." What is it? The Ankur Bangla LiveCD is a 'khichuri' created out of some of the finest GNU/Linux distributions out there. The bootup, hardware detection and shutdown is done by a combination of Debian GNU/Linux, Knoppix and Morphix. The non GUI system is based on Slackware Linux 9.0 while the GUI runs a version of GNOME 2.4, specifically patched and compiled for the Ankur Bangla group to show off its works. (Yep right! - "patched" means that there is extra functionality and eyecandy) Requirements? The Ankur LiveCD requires 16 MB of RAM and a i486 compatible CPU to run in command line mode. However, to see anything in Bangla, you will have to run the CD in GUI mode, which requires a minimum of 128 MB RAM and a 400 Mhz or better processor to run. You can use it with lesser RAM and lots of swap space, but there's no guarantee this would work! What does it do? With this LiveCD, we aim to provide everything that a stock Windows(TM) install provides. This means, you get a fully functional desktop, a plain-text editor (with beta level support for Bengali spellchecking), a web browser (to render UTF-8 encoded Bangla web-pages perfectly), an instant messaging client, a standalone FTP client, a VCD/DVD/videofile/audiofile/audio CD player, a CD burning software with basic functionality, an image viewer, numerous games, a PDF and PS file viewer, a terminal emulator, a program similar to Microsoft(TM) Netmeeting (TM), a sound recorder, a webcam management utility (being tested), a fancy calculator, a dictionary, an archiver and a "really fancy" character map utility, a system log watching tool, a nice little wizard-based network setup tool. Just pop the CD into the drive, reboot, sit back and relax. In most cases all your hardware will be autodetected, and you will be inside the Desktop in no time. To see screenshots see www.bengalinux.org/screenshots/gnome/ Interested? Contact sayamindu(a)clai.net WORLD SOCIAL FORUM IN MUMBAI (BOMBAY) AND FREE SOFTWARE: Warren Norrix is working with the World Social Forum (India) in Bombay. On behalf of the Free Software Foundation India, he will be coordinating activities of Free Software Movement in WSF which meets in this Indian city in early 2004. Says Arun <arun(a)gnu.org>: Warren should be able to update us soon on what he is doing and what are to be done etc. Can we have a list of organisation relating to free software who would be coming for the event? List of programs to be organised?... MORE DETAILS on the above from : www.hipatia.info - info(a)hipatia.info - www.fsm.hipatia.info wiki.hipatia.info/wiki/1.3.4/index.php?pagename=Foro%20Social%20Mundial%202004 -------------------- Fsm2004 mailing list Fsm2004(a)hipatia.info http://listas.hipatia.info/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fsm2004 SITEWATCH: http://sarovar.org ... check this site that's trying to build itself up as an Indian sourceforge. Can it work? Your help is vital! MOZILLA THAT SUPPORTS INDIC LANGUAGES: raj(a)linuxense.com informs that he has uploaded a mozilla with experimental patches to support indic languages at http://www.linuxense.com/oss/render/mozilla/index.html Even though the seb pages indicate the Malayalam language, there is nothing Malayalam-sepcific in that and all Indian languages should be able to use that, he says. Please pass this note along and bugs and test cases should be reported at http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=215219 FINNISH CAMPAIGNER IN INDIA: Timo Mielonen <timo.mielonen(a)maailma.net> from Finland writes in to say that Marko Ulvila will be shortly visiting India. He was one of key persons when the Finnish Ministry for Foreign Affairs decided to study the role of Free/Libre and Open Source Software in the Third World. Ulvila is a senior activist engaged with a number of movement groups and NGOs. One of his interest is the struggle for freedom of knowledge and information. For this reason, he is an active proponent of free software. In 2000-2002 he was a special advisor to minister for development cooperation, Ms. Satu Hassi (of the Greens Party) who initiated the study on FLOSS in the 'developing' countries. Now he is engaged with a Finnish NGO Coalition for Environment and Development, which is co-organising a number of worksops for Mumbai World Social Forum. Although free software is not on the agenda of CED, Marko is keen to get in touch with the Indian activists in this field. As a GNU/Linux user since 1998 he is keen to deepen his knowledge of and expand his contacts with the members of the community. He will be in India from beginning October to end of January. marko.ulvila(a)kaapeli.fi says himself that he's in Delhi from October 2, in Goa from around Dec 22 to Jan 2, and in Mumbai after that. AT THE GOA ENGINEERING COLLEGE: http://ele.gec.ac.in/resources.html is the site of the Goa Engineering College, which allows students to download a number of distros, tutorials, documentation and other GNU/Linux related material for free and share it with freedom. Incidentally, GEC-Farmagudi was on the itinerary of Free Software Foundation founder Dr Richard M Stallman, when he visited Goa in November 2002. FLOSS champions there include the highly-skilled Prof MSR (Rayadu) and the untiring Prof (Dr) George Easay. ########################################################################## # Send submissions for comp.os.linux.announce to: cola(a)stump.algebra.com # # PLEASE remember a short description of the software and the LOCATION. # # This group is archived at http://stump.algebra.com/~cola/ # ########################################################################## LISTING PACKAGES WRITTEN BY INDIANS: Radhakrishnan CV <cvr(a)tug.org> says on behalf of TUGIndia -- the active and helpful TeX user group -- that TUGIndia contemplate to create a comprehensive page, listing all the packages written by Indians with links and pointers for download. Says he: "I would therefore, earnestly request authors of TeX packages, fonts, utilities and documentation that are released under anyone of the free/open source licences with download links to me privately. A brief writeup about the package would also be helpful. Your cooperation in this matter would be highly appreciated. We would also mirror all the stuff at sarovar.org " Indian TeX Users Group ---------------------- Home: http://www.tug.org.in/ Subscribe: http://tug.org/mailman/listinfo/tugindia FLOSS TODAY? Keep abrest with what's happening on the FLOSS (Free/Libre and Open Source Software) front in India on a daily basis. Flosstoday mailing list Flosstoday(a)mail.sarai.net http://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/flosstoday FINDING FLOSS IN SOUTH ASIA: Partha Sarkar <partha(a)bytesforall.org> from Bangladesh offers some links to people working in the field of FLOSS, from his part of South Asia, when we recently asked him. Says he: "Anir Chowdhury" <anir(a)evastra.com is involved with developing Bangla Linux in Bangladesh. "Sayeedur Rahman" <bangla_ict(a)yahoo.com who runs a list on Bangladesh ICT development and is a UNIX specialist. Muhammad Muquit (http://www.muquit.com/muquit/whoami.html) Email: muquit(a)muquit.com. I think these would help. They would also be able to give you more contacts if you need that." If anyone could offer more links to GNU/Linux enthusiasts in Bangladesh, Pakistan, Nepal and Sri Lanka, it would be very helpful. FROM KOCHI, SOUTH INDIA: Vimal <vimalekm(a)vsnl.net> tell sus that there is a Free Software User Group in Kochi. Check http://puggy.symonds.net/~fsug-kochi Says Vimal: "There is also a very active mailing list." See http://www.symonds.net/mailman/listinfo/fsug-kochi-discuss -------------------------------------------------------------------------- YOUR INPUTS and criticism to this newsletter are welcome. Contact us at fred at bytesforall dot org COPYLEFT 2003. May be freely circulated provided entire text and credits are left intact. You can subscribe to receive this FREE newsletter (free of cost, and free in other ways too!) by sending an email to linuxinindia-request(a)freelists.org with 'subscribe' in the subject field OR by logging in on to www.freelists.org (a great place to set up free-of-cost technology-related lists!). You can go there directly by clicking on the URL below http://www.freelists.org/cgi-bin/list?list_id=linuxinindia --------------------------------------------------------------------------

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Some confusions on Indiaoptions.com
by CK Raju 17 Oct '03

17 Oct '03

There are reports that Indiaoptions.com that has been quite regular in advertising on RHCE courses, are giving confusing remarks on GNU and other related technologies. The first case was reported from the presentation held by the Thrissur centre and now the Kozhikode centre also appears to have made similar remarks. In a fair game, as a defender of proprietary software, attacking the Free Software could be OK, but when it happens under the pretext of offering courses and conducting seminars on Free Software, perhaps the strategy should be aptly called unethical. Does anyone here know more on this company, its dealings and its intentions ? Or is it a new found strategy of M$ ? CK Raju Thrissur

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GNULinuxInIndia Oct 15, 2003
by Frederick Noronha (FN) 15 Oct '03

15 Oct '03

e88~~\ 888b | 888 | / 888 888 ,e, d888 |Y88b | 888 | L 888 888-~88e e88~\888 " /~~~8e 8888 __ | Y88b | 888 | I 888 888 888 d888 888 888 88b 8888 | | Y88b | 888 | N 888 888 888 8888 888 888 e88~-888 Y888 | | Y88b| Y88 | U 888 888 888 Y888 888 888 C888 888 "88__/ | Y888 "8__/ X 888 888 888 "88_/888 888 "88_-888 -------------------------------------------------------------------- Formerly LinuxInIndia * Compiled by: Frederick Noronha * Oct 15,2003 -------------------------------------------------------------------- INDIA... AT THE LINUX COUNTER: Linux Counter has a total of 138722 people registered. 1407 users have been registered by friends. There are 124367 machines registered. This network guesstimates that between 0.2% and 5% of all Linux users have registered with the Linux Counter. So the total number of Linux users is probably between 2,774,440 and 69,361,000 people. Among the country-wide ratings, India is ranked only 137th overall, when judged by GNU/Linux uers per million population. But in terms of overall number of GNU/Linux users registered, India with 2843 registered users is only behind the US (28514 registered users), Germany (11307), Brazil (9785), France (6479), Spain (5558), Great Britain (5307), Canada (4600), Italy (4517), the Netherlands (3595), Sweden (3300), Finland (3137 users). India is ahead of Russia, Mexico and China. Probably improved connectivity to the Net here would make more people aware of the Linux Counter, and give users a better chance to register. Linux Counter recently completed 10 years of its existance. This compiler (FN) is proud to be associated with this initiative, as a volunteer covering Goa-India. More volunteers welcome for regional Indian states. If you use GNU/Linux, acknowledge your debt to the volunteers who (and the philosophy that) made it happen! Not just Linux the kernel, but also GNU! Register at http://counter.li.org 'INDIA'S BIGGEST OPEN SOURCE EVENT': Linux Bangalore/2003, what is called "India's biggest Open Source event", is being held from December 2-4 at Bangalore, India. For details visit http://linux-bangalore.org/2003 Organisers have just announced that speaker registration for Linux Bangalore/2003 is now open. If you wish to be considered to give a talk at Linux Bangalore/2003, check http://linux-bangalore.org/2003/register/ Speaker guidelines at: http://linux-bangalore.org/2003/guides/speakers.php Speaker registration will be provisionally open till November 8th. Some 70+ talk slots will be available. Talks will be selected after that. Those wanting to keep abrest with plans for the event, join the list by sending a blank email to linux-bangalore-2003-subscribe(a)yahoogroups.com LFY ANNOUNCES Linux Asia 2004 IN DELHI, FEB 2004: Linux For You, Asia's first Linux magazine, today announced holding of Linux Asia 2004. The event is aimed at shifting Linux from labs to offices. Linux Asia 2004 will be held from February 11th - 13th, 2004 (Wednesday, Thursday and Friday) at The India Habitat Centre, New Delhi. It says it will be "the largest ever event on Linux in India". http://newsvac.newsforge.com/newsvac/03/09/29/1618251.shtml?tid=52 --------------------------------------------------------------------------- ########################################################################### --------------------------------------------------------------------------- BUY GNU/LINUX CDs at Rs 30 per CD (plus postage). This network, run by Aniket Navelkar <aniket(a)gmx.net> is supported by the GNU/Linux Users Group of Margao, Goa. To place an order for your personal copy and for further info, pls contact aniket(a)gmx.net. Payment via cash, DD, money order or SBI electronic transfer. Distros currently available include Debian 3.0, Redhat 9.0, Mandrake 9.1, Knoppix 3.3 and 3.2, GNUWin 2.1 (GNU utilities for Windows!), FreeBSD 5.0, Server Optimised Linux (SOL), Dynebolic 1.03a3, The Open CD (for Windows platform), FreEDUC (educational software that boots from a CDrom), SUSE LiveEval, Gnoppix (no, this is not a spelling mistake!), Slackware 9.0, RockLinux 2.0 (lots of Windows Managers Qvwm, Fwvm2, icewm), Conectiva 9.0 (four-CD set), ArchLinux 0.5, ArkLinux, and GSCP Distro (the easy-to-set up version of the Goa Schools Computers Project). http://www.ilug-margao.org/html/cd_library.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------------- ########################################################################### --------------------------------------------------------------------------- TeXLIVE 2003 CD NOW ON SALE: Radhakrishnan CV <cvr(a)river-valley.org> tells us that the TeXLive 2003 CD has been released (stable final release) and the have the iso images of demo, install and live versions of the CD/DVD. Says he: "Install version is what a normal user would need. Live version is ready-to-run TeX system for 12 operating systems in a DVD without installing unto your harddisk and demo is a scaled down live version for Linux, Win32 and Mac OSX alone." All the bzipped ISO images are at: http://sarovar.org/projects/texlive PDF and JPG files of all the CD/DVD labels and covers are also available at the same site. You might find details about TeXLive at: http://texlive.sarovar.org "Be warned that bzipped images of install and demo CD's are roughly 270 MB and 571 MB respectively. Compressed DVD image is 516 MB. The page might show you the filesize as single digit bytes, that's because it is a symlink from the mirror folder. TeXLive is an ongoing project at TUG, so we would sync the newest stable releases always," says he. TUGIndia is making available the TeXLive 2003 collection (3 CD set released by TUG), beautifully packaged in a nicely printed CD cover. It looks like a collectors item. They have fixed the price at Rs. 1,000 per set including forwarding and shipping costs. Says CVR: "We would dispatch CDs to the individual/institutions who have already paid the cost (of Rs. 500 which was the cost of previous release of TeXLive) and waiting for TeXLive's release without any burden of extra cost. This is in recognition of their patience and interest in TeXLive." People who are fortunate to have a fat bandwidth can grab the images from sarovar.org. They are free to make copies and distribute, but respect the licences of the packages. Says CVR: "Recently, Springer-Verlag copied TeXLive 7 CD and distributed along with one of their LaTeX books with explicit instruction on the CD that 'contents of the CD should not be copied or distributed' which is a clear violation of the licences of thousands of packages in the CD. By doing such a thing, one invites the wrath of TUG, FSF and obviously runs the risk of litigation." Compilation of the TeXLive CD is the result of the hard work of hundreds of developers' for several months apart from the terrific work of several thousand contributors who wrote all the software solely for the benefit of the user community. By purchasing the TeXLive, the cost of which is only that of the media and shipping, you promote a great movement that stands for software freedom, adds the Indian TeX Users Group. INDIANISATION AHOY: That untiring campaigner on Indianisation issues, G Karunkar <karunakar(a)indlinux.org> -- incidentally, we're awaiting this guy at the 'Paradise LUG' chapter in Goa later this month -- informs us that IndLinux Milan CD 0.7-2 alpha has been released. Some time back the final release notes were yet to be up. But, says he, you can track the release notes at http://www.indlinux.org/wiki/index.php?IndLinuxMilanReleaseNotes Download the ISO from (total size 531MB). http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=11495 Features: * Based on Morphix 0.4-1 * Gnome 2.4 desktop, OpenOffice 1.1rc3 , evolution 1.4 * Extra apps added: Yudit, gtranslator, pfaedit, kbabel, gettext, balsa * Boot options for all major Indian languages added. Hindi (hi) -default, Bengali (bn), Gujarati (gu), Kannada (kn), Malayalam (ml), Marathi (mr), Oriya (or), Punjabi (pa), Tamil (ta), Telugu (te) * Language can be selected boot time by passing lang=code parameter eg. for Bengali, give morphix lang=bn; for Marati give, morphix lang=mr * Install to harddisk (morphix installer) work successfully, but use if carefully. Indic specific additions * two new fonts Gargi (devanagari), Padmaa (gujarati) - from http://www.indictrans.org * Locales for Bengali, Gujarati, Malayalam, and Punjabi * Misc changes: switching between layouts in gkb appled done by \"Shift L + Shift R\" combination. Default keyboard layout - Hindi , additional Bengali, Gujarati, Kannda, Malayalam, Tamil. OpenOffice configured to work with Hindi. Yudit also configured with Indic fonts & keyboard layouts Track IndLinux Demo CD development at http://www.indlinux.org/wiki/index.php?IndLinuxDemoCd Check this mailing list, on Indianisation of GNU/Linux, at https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/indlinux-news BILINGUAL WEB-PAGES: Harveer wanted to know how to make bi-lingual webpages with GNU/Linux. There are two ways to it you could use font based method, where you select the font and type, so font tags are used for it, and that particular font has to be installed on client side. Dynamic fonts can be used, but they won't work on GNU/Linux. Another way is to make webpages in unicode. On GNU/Linux you can use Redhat 9/MDK 9/ Morphix, all of which have Gnome 2.0. Here you will have to do all html coding urself. Mozilla composer can also be used, but its not yet supporting rendering (the stable releases). Check out http://www.geocities.com/alkuma/seehindi.html, that should help you get started. On using yudit read http://www.indlinux.org/doc/yuditguide.html Karunakaran says that they are customising Morphix to make it indian-language enabled, with commonly needed apps. Quite some people have show interest in that. Says he: "You can chekout what we are doing at http://www.indlinux.org/wiki/index.php?IndLinuxDemoCd Also check with http://smc.sarovar.org (the Malayalam localisation group). They made a malayalam knoppix CD and it was probably used in some projects." FROM MALAYSIA: The Malaysian National Computer Confederation (MNCC) and Advanced Technology Studies Centre (atSC) have embarked on a plan to promote open source technology to schools in the country. As a start, they have initiated a pilot project, with sponsorship from local businessman Datuk Siew Nim Chee, to train teachers in open source software (OSS), says a report forwarded by Doug Loss dloss(a)bloomu.edu http://www.technewsworld.com/perl/story/31762.html GARGI RENDERS FINE WITH MOST TEXTS: Prof Nagarjuna G. <nagarjun(a)hbcse.tifr.res.in> reports from Mumbai that the release of Gargi 1.1 seems to be rendering fine with most texts. Mozilla build 1.5b with CTL enabled is also available for download (15mb) from the link: http://www.gnowledge.org/Data/ObjectType/lcalznproject/ http://www.gnowledge.org/Data/Objects/mozilla/ http://www.gnowledge.org/Data/Objects/howtoFont/ Says this doughty campaigner: "Please give feed back on both mozilla and the fonts. We are soon starting xmodmaps for indian languages other than inscript and the printing problem. I will also write soon about the notes on the meeting that we had regarding printing problem where developers from NCST and RedHat participated along with Karunakar and myself." INTL OPEN SOURCE NETWORK: Irfan Khan <khania2(a)super.net.pk> draws our attention to a report on the International Open Source Network at http://www.developmentgateway.org//ict/dg-contribute/item- detail?item_id=350274&version_id=210589&from=alert The International Open Source Network (IOSN) is a Center of Excellence for free and open source software (FOSS) in the Asia- Pacific Region. Via a small secretariat, the IOSN is tasked specifically to facilitate and network FOSS advocates and human resources in ... INVITE TO JOIN THE 'LITTLE LEAGUE': Kunal <kunalbharati(a)yahoo.com> from Navi Mumbai would like to draw the attention of smaller LUGs around India to join the 'Little League', a network meant to promote GNU/Linux in the smaller regions of the country. He suggests that it might be "a good idea to mail the invitation to owners of there respective glugs (GNU/LUGS) i.e. glug listed on (the indian FLOSS magazine LinuxForYou) LFY ... and mention there that this list is not for posting and technical problems ... but for discussion about activities that each and every glug is doing". Sukrit from Pondicherry is the founder of the Little-League concept. Active campaigners from the smaller LUGs are specially invited. To join, send a blank email to little_league-subscribe(a)yahoogroups.com -------------------------------------------------------------------------- YOUR INPUTS and criticism to this newsletter are welcome. Contact us at fred at bytesforall dot org COPYLEFT 2003. May be freely circulated provided entire text and credits are left intact. FN --------------------------------------------------------------------------

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[Fsf-friends] Re: [fsug-kochi-discuss]Automatic Character Encoding switching in Mozilla/Firebird
by Biju G C 14 Oct '03

14 Oct '03

I dont know whether users are facing similar problem mentioned in following mail when visiting other Indian language sites. If so please let me know the websites and required character encoding, I will update my extension for that sites also. --- Biju G C <bijumaillist(a)yahoo.com> wrote: Hi, One of the major issue with Mozilla as well as Firebird Browsers is the need for switching the Character Encoding while visiting Malayalam newspaper sites. In GNU/Linux we can use Galeon, But when I ask many MS-Windows users (mainly NRI's) to try an open source alternative to IE, that is "Firebird" ( http://www.mozilla.org/products/firebird/ ) this becomes a major issue for them. No NRI want to use one browser for Malayalam sites and other for English sites. So they will finally end up in IE. So I created in an extension to just do the Character Encoding switching automatically. Here is the install link http://downloads.mozdev.org/quicktools/AutoCharacterCoding.xpi (source included, works for Mozilla and Firebird, on both GNU/Linux and MS-Windows) sites handled now are http://www.malayalamanorama.com/ http://www.deepika.com/ http://www.deshabhimani.com/ for http://www.mathrubhumi.com/ from menu do "View/Force Auto Font" once. Or open the links in the new tab http://www.keralakaumudi.com/ (no need for my extension) If there are other sites which give problem please let me know. I can also do same thing for other indian languages Warning: This is not a replacement for fonts, and extension wont download fonts by itself. You should download/install font by yourself. PS: After installing only GUI difference you see is menu item "View/Force Auto Font". And a Malayalam "A Ka" toolbar button in Firebird toolbar customization screen. My other extensions http://quickmanager.mozdev.org/ - a popular one at forum http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?p=215162 http://macroeditor.mozdev.org/ - a tool for newbies to create macros, or try scripts before making new extensions http://links.mozdev.org/ - A way to share links (bookmarks) with friends http://quicktools.mozdev.org/ - a collection of many small extensions ________________________________________________________________________ Want to chat instantly with your online friends? Get the FREE Yahoo! Messenger http://mail.messenger.yahoo.co.uk

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PLOS
by Arun M 13 Oct '03

13 Oct '03

First issue of journal biology from Public Library of Science available now. http://biology.plosjournals.org/ Arun

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[Fsf-friends] Fwd:extention of deadlines for event registration to 30 October 2003
by Suresh Titus John 06 Oct '03

06 Oct '03

7 6

URGENT ASSISTANCE
by frazeraloma＠netscape.net 04 Oct '03

04 Oct '03

Good Day, with warm hearts I offer my friendship, and my greetings, and I hope this letter meets you in good time. It will be surprising to you toreceive this proposal from me since you do not know me personally. However, I am sincerely seeking your confidence in this transaction, which I propose with my free mind and as a person of integrity. My name is FRAZER OTTO, the son of TIMOTHY WEWE OTTO, a farmer from Zimbabwe, murdered in the land dispute in my country. As led by my instinct, I decided to contact you through email, after searching for contacts via the internet, as it is the only means I can contact anybody since I am cutting off ties with Zimbabwe for now. Iapologize if this is not acceptable to you. The purpose of this letter is to seek your most needed assistance in a business venture. Due to the land and political problems in Zimbabwe, as a result of President Robert Mugabe's introduction of new Land Act Reform wholly affecting the rich white farmers and the few rich black farmers, all white farmers were asked to surrender their farms to the government for re-distribution and infact to his political party members and my father though black was the treasury of the farmers association and a strong member of an opposition party that did not support the president's idea. He then ordered his party members and the police under his pay row to invade my father's farm and burn down everything in the farm. They killed my father and took away a lot of items from his farm. After the death of my father, our local pastor and a close friend of my father handed us over will documents with instructions from my father that we should leave Zimbabwe incase anything happen to him. The will documents has a certificate of deposit, confirming a cash deposit totaling Fourteen million five hundred thousand united state dollars. [$14.5MUSD] Kept in custody for us in a security company ,but unknown to the company that the content is money hence it was deposited as personal belongings. This money was deposited with this Private Security Company for safety and security reasons, and was to be used for the purchase of land, new machines and chemicals establishment of new farms in Botswana. This violent and barbaric act by Mugabe has since led to the death ofmy beloved mother and kid sister and other innocent lives.I was continually threatened to abandon my inheritance from my fatherafter he was murdered. I resisted for a while, but when the danger became unbearable, and I survived two murder attempts, I fled Zimbabwe with the help of my father's close friend Mr. John Casahans from Australia also a farmer who was leaving in Zimbabwe with us but left with his family following this ugly development I have tried to reach him but all to no avail. I am currently staying in the Netherlands where I am seeking political asylum. In fact my decision to come here to seek asylum, is because the security company from South Africa, has a branch here, I have contacted them to move the safe deposit from their office in Johannesburg here, which they have since done. I need to transfer this money to an account and invest part of the money. Since the law of Netherlands prohibits a refugee (asylum seeker) to open any bank account or to be involved in any financial transaction,especially of this grate magnitude this is why I am seeking a genuine and reliable partner, whose account this money can be transferred, hence this proposal to you. You have to understand that this decision taken by me is a very big and brave one, and it entrusts my future in your hands, as a result ofthe safe keeping of this money. If you accept to assist me, all I want you to do for me, is to assist with arrangements to claim the deposit from the security company from their office here in The Netherlands, as it has now been transferred from Johannesburg, South Africa to their branch here. The company will be legally informed of you representing me. For your assistance, I have two options for you. Firstly you can choose to have 20% of the money for your assistance, and helping me open an account for the money to be deposited here, or you can go into partnership with me for the proper profitable investment of the money in your country. Whichever the option you want, please to notify me in your reply. I have also set aside 1 % of this money for all kinds of expenses that come our way in the process of this transaction, and 4%for Charity donation. If you prefer to accept the 20% for your moral and financial assistance then the balance will be leftin the account here for me. Please, I want you to maintain absolute secrecy for the purpose of this transaction. You can reach me on frazeraloma(a)netscape.net I look forward to your reply and co-operation, and I thank you in advance as I anticipate your co-operation. Sincerely, Frazer Aloma

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Fsf-friends October 2003