Fsf-friends May 2007

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Internet, tech skills growing quietly in Goa...
by Frederick Noronha (FN) 02 Sep '24

02 Sep '24

INTERNET, TECH SKILLS GROWING QUIETLY IN GOA PANJIM, April 30: Goa's BSNL internet service provider is already providing some 3000 broadband connections in the state, and roughly another 24,000 people dial-up to get access the Net using this central government-run service. These figures emerged during an informal discussion at the monthly meeting of the India Linux Users Group (Goa), a network promoting Free Software and Open Source in the state. ILUG-Goa, which holds its meetings usually on the fourth Saturday of each month at the Goa Science Centre at Miramar, sees a range of tech issues -- usually directly related to Free Software and Open Source in Goa. During it's meet on April 29, a range of issues came up for discussion, from how to partition your hard-disk (to install GNU/Linux side-by-side with Windows), to software tools to ehance productivity, and various internet and broadband options available to users in diverse parts of Goa. For instance, there are some useful Free Software tools to monitor your bandwidth usage on BSNL's broadband. One such tool is available for free download at http://tinyurl.com/qgu9p Called the Data One Broadband Statistics, this is a screen-scraper written using Perl to download usage statistics of BSNL's Data One (www.bsnl.co.in/service/dataone.htm) broadband service and total it. Generally, BSNL (www.bsnl.co.in) allows only the Microsoft-based IE and has no monthly total. But trust Indian software talent to find a work-around. This solution comes from the Free Software/Open Source network in Chennai. Meanwhile, the Goa free software network stays connected and announces its event via http://iluggoaannounce.notlong.com There are no fees for joining, all are welcome, and encouraged to form parallel user-groups in diverse parts of the state. Meanwhile, the Fedora Core 5 Free Software distribution has just become available on DVD in Goa. Number of foreign magazines are also available. Members of ILUG-Goa such as engineer Bijon Shaha and software pro Arvind Yadav gave diverse views on techies-only distros like 'Gentoo'. Debopriyo 'DP' Sarkar pointed to a 'mindmap' of various Free Software distributions or 'distros' available, which was illustrated at linuxhelp.blogspot.com Earlier, there was a brief presentation on FreeMind. FreeMind is a premier free mind-mapping software written in Java. It has the potential of playing the role of a high productivity tool. Operation and navigation of FreeMind is faster because of one-click "fold/unfold" and "follow link" operations. Other members raised a range of issues -- from how to get started in GNU/Linux, to playing around with tools like StumbleUpon, and how to encourage Free Software usage in schools and educational institutions. Remy Furtado of Rosary College, Navelim expressed an interest in working on the Free Software tool Moodle, ideal for distance education, as the Goa University moves to a pattern of semisterisation. Goa Engineering College's Prof George Easaw has done work on this platform, as have others. Reacting unofficially, BSNL officials said Goa now had six STMS 155 MBps connectivity, which was resulting in a speedy expansion of broadband to many parts of the state. But for broadband facilities to become available in village areas, at least 60 subscribers were needed to make operations viable. So far, broadband from BSNL is available in a growing number of areas in Goa: Panjim, Vasco (except Cortalim, but including Sada, Mangor, Bogmalo, Sancoale and other areas), Ponda, Bambolim, Merces, Dona Paula, Porvorim, Mapusa town, Calangute-Candolim, and Saligao, among others. Equipment has already been installed in Aldona exchange, and broadband facilities are expected to go functional -- ------------------------------------------------------------- | India Linux Users' Group, Goa | | Join the friendly user group | | Mail list http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ilug-goa/join | ---------------------------------------------------------- | | http://groups.yahoo.com/group/teach-yourself-linux | | http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ilug-goa-announce | | http://www.iosn.net/country/india/organizations/ilug-goa/ | ------------------------------------------------------------- , , / \ .-. * SOFTWARE ((__-^^-,-^^-__)) (. .) * FREEDOM `-_---' `---_-' / V \ * SHARING `--|o` 'o|--' // \\ \ ` / /( )\ KNOWLEDGE IS POWER ): :( '.^^_^^.' SHARE IT EQUITABLY :o_o: \_/ \_/ "-"

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Careers in FLOSS... (Dec 2003 issue of LFY)
by Frederick Noronha (FN) 06 Jun '24

06 Jun '24

=========================================== LINUXForYou * Dec 2003 (Vol 1 No 10) In India Rs 50 (with CD) http://www.linuxforu.com Pages 102 * US$7.95 0 74470584957 =========================================== THIS ISSUE has probably reached your city. Saw it in Bangalore, and also got a complimentary copy from the LFY team at LinuxBangalore2003. But when I reached back to Goa on Dec 4, it wasn't in as yet. So it might take time to reach 'small town' India... FN REVIEWED: Mandrake 9.2 * PhProjekt * StarOffice 7.0 COMPUTERS AT TIS HAZARI, the session courts for the city of New Delhi, are being shifted over to Linux, courtesy the National Informatics Centre. - Rahul Chopra in this month's editorial. LINUX LEARNING CENTRE at Bangalore is offering courses in administration, security, development (internals and programming essentials, programming with Qt, device driver programming, MySQL & PHP), RHCE and Red Hat rapid track certification. www.linuxlearningcentre.com DotGNU RELEASES CD: It can now be used to implement application programs and Web services in C# and C applications under multiple operating systems, including GNU/Linux, FreeBSC, MacOS, MS Windows. The 219 MB release 0.1 CD is available as a free download at http://download.freedom.biz/dotgnu/dotgnu-0.1-cdrom.iso.gz.torrent e-Bridge calls itself "the new state-of-art training facility from eSpark Infotech is now open in the heart of Bangalore". It's offering embedded Linux courses (Linux fundamentals, programming Linux, embedded C & Linux, realtime C & Linux, Linux internals, device drivers, networking) and DSP courses (DSP fundamentals, TI/analog dev programming, audio/video, image processing, bio-medical systems). www.ebridgesolutions.net Linux.net provides a free e-mail service to those who want an e-mail address that ends in '@linux.net' MAJOR UPDATES and releases: OpenNA Linux 1.0, Gibraltar Firewall 1.0, Xandros Desktop 2.0, Onebase Linux 2.0, CUPS 1.120rc6. CAN YOU MAKE money with open source? Registration entails a "nominal fee" of Rs 5000 for a three-day conference. http://www.linuxasia2004.com/attendees/ February 11-13, 2004, New Delhi. SEND IN YOUR favourite slogans for a tee-shirt, and win five free copies of the shirt... LFYedit at efyindia.com MONEY CAN't buy respect, says Robert Adkins. Some of us might have met this guy at LB2003 in Bangalore. He's the CTO of Technetra Corp, and an advocate and implementer of FLOSS solutions for government. He can be contacted at radkins at technetra.com CAREERS WITH FLOSS: The number of students opting for courses in Open Source is growing steadily, even as industry experts predict a growing need for trained professionals in this expanding field. EXIT RED HAT, ENTER FEDORA: It's official now; the free (of cost) version of Red Hat Linux will not be available anymore. This has created a lot of FUD in an already unstable environment, thanks to the SCO episode. But is Red Hat closed for good? WEB-BASED COLLABORATION SOFTWARE: PHProjekt is an easy-to-install collaboration suite, which runs on the open source platform and databases. As the design of the system is developer-friendly, adding new features and components is a piece of cake. STAROFFICE: The latest version of Sun's office suite, StarOffice 7, may just be the right solution for the cost-conscious user. It loads faster than the earlier version, and sports some noticeable improvements. IN THE LFY CD THIS MONTH: Slackware (the "oldest Linux distro") and a range of GNU software for Windows users. FALLING BACK on backup systems. MAKING ADOPTION OF Linux in the enterprise easy. www.linux4e.com Business partners required: http://wwww.linux4e.com/partners ooWRITER HELPS YOU create your own templates and styles so that you can work with documents easily. Open Source is key to IBM's vision of computing. User empowerment is key to Microsoft's, writes Alolita Sharma USING DATABASE functions in Calc, a tutorial. (Wish there were more how-tos for the user in this mag! --FN) HALDIA DOCKS: it has a uniquely designed Linux installation with an active-active cluster set up, which is considered the best of its kind. This has ensured efficiency and cost-effectiveness. BASIC UNIX commands and concepts: an extract from *Running Linux* (Shroff Publishers, Pp 674 only Rs 425 in India). VxWorks and LynxOS are definitely the biggest embedded operating systems in use today. But slowly they are acknowledging the power of GNU/Linux and how it can help them maximise deployments. HELP LINUX GO INDIAN: By using various translation tools, you can join Language translation groups working across India to help translate GNU/Linux into your language. EXPERT INTRODUCTION: Multi-threaded programming under Linux. KICKSTART YOUR Linux installation (Part I): Installing Red Hat Linux on multiple machines one after another can be quite tedious. To avoid answering the same question over and over again, try the KickStart method, as it does not need any user intervention. WRITE CHEQUES. NOT JUST BOOKS: Niyam Bhushan on how anybody can turn thoughts into words, and words into wealth. NFS CLIENTS for Windows. OpenSSL PACKAGE offers a vast crypto library of algorithms WAIT QUEUES in Linux device drivers UNDERSTANDING recursive sub-routines INDIA-RELATED NEWS: HP launches GNU/Linux laptop Mandrake's latest distribution Oracle announces 10g for GNU/Linux Delixus offers India Linux CxProtect anti-virus mailing solution for mail-servers Trade management system from Network Programs Netweb Technologies unveils Tyrone MRO-Tek rolls out Network Management Systems Review of FLOSS at BangaloreIT.com =========================================== DISCLOSURE: This journalist (FN) writes a monthly column for LFY and gets paid for it. Promoting awareness about the content of LFY however is not part of the job, and is carried on with the intention spreading awareness about FLOSS among different GNU/Linux user groups in India. -- Frederick Noronha : http://www.fredericknoronha.net : When we speak of free Freelance Journalist : http://www.bytesforall.org : software we refer to Ph 0091.832.2409490 : Cell 0 9822 122436 : freedom, not price.

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RGF-Sarai CSDS programme for short-term FLOSS fellowships
by Frederick Noronha 31 May '07

31 May '07

Gora Mohanty gora at sarai.net Fri May 25 13:34:49 CEST 2007 Hello all, Below is an invitation for proposals for the RGF-Sarai CSDS programme for short-term FLOSS fellowships. Please feel to circulate this far and wide. The deadline for submission of proposals is the 25th of June. Please feel free to address any queries with regards to this to floss at sarai.net. Regards, Gora -------------------------------------------------------------- Call for proposals: RGF-Sarai, CSDS, short-term FLOSS fellowships 1 Introduction The Sarai programme of the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi (http://www.sarai. net) is pleased to announce fellowships for projects related to Free/Libre and Open Source Software (FLOSS) activities. This year, we have partnered with the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation (RGF) who are providing support for work in the specific area of computing, and localisation in five Indian languages, namely, Assamese, Hindi, Kashmiri, Oriya, and Urdu. We also invite proposals from projects in other FLOSS areas, especially ones that are relevant to educational, social, and community needs. Any project that meets the criteria given below is eligible for the fellowships, but we are particularly interested in: o Indian language computing, including work on fonts, rendering, locales, input methods, spell-checking, etc., as well as in advanced technologies like OCR, handwriting recognition, and speech-to-text. o Localisation into Indian languages of user interfaces, and translation of help documents for FLOSS applications. o In the interest of sustained development, we would like to see the enhancement of, and extensions for projects funded as part of past Sarai FLOSS fellowships. In particular, we draw attention to NewsRack (http://newsrack.in), Hindawi (http://www.indicybers.com), and ApnaOpus (http://apnaopus.var.cc). o Documentation for users of FLOSS tools, particularly in the area of Indian language computing. The production of video tutorials would be welcome. o Development of graphics, multimedia, and publishing tools. This would include applications for audio/video editing, animation, and desktop publishing. Enhancement of existing FLOSS tools is especially encouraged. o Putting together, distributing, and supporting a complete Indian language distribution, using FLOSS operating systems, and tools. o Collaboration software, and groupware solutions. o Writing Linux device drivers, and front-ends for common hardware, such as wireless cards, graphics cards, scanners, and printers. The other significant difference from past practice is that we will be asking for more of a collaborative approach from the fellows, both among one another, and with people at Sarai. The collaboration need not be in the actual development, but can consist of an ongoing conversation about one's work, its direction, and current status. While this has been an implicit expectation in the past, this time we are making the requirement explicit. The exact details of these will be worked out with the selected fellows, but will include things like discussions over IRC, email, and postings on the Sarai Project Resource Centre (PRC) mailing list. Fellows will also be asked to prepare a timeline for the projects, with intermediate milestones, and will be expected to adhere to them. 2 Applying for the fellowships We invite students, developers, researchers, and practitioners interested in the FLOSS arena to apply for the fellowships. While there is no prescribed format for the applications, we expect them to be in sufficient detail for a reviewer to sensibly evaluate them. Attention to details, such as a plan of work that addresses what is possible to accomplish within the limited project period, a projection of how the work might be continued after that, and a discussion of the possible impact of the project, is strongly recommended. In particular, we will look favourably on projects aimed at eventual deployment, rather than development per se. Please mail your application, along with a resume, to floss at sarai.net , with the subject line of "RGF-Sarai FLOSS fellowships". As this information is intended to be public, also subscribe to the PRC mailing list at https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/prc, and post a copy there, failing which your final proposal will be forwarded there by one of us. Enquiries are invited at floss at sarai.net , and on the PRC list, including questions on how to frame proposals. The last date of submission is midnight IST on Sun., June 25th, 2007. The projects will run for a total of about six months, with a final workshop to be held at Sarai, CSDS, Delhi, where the fellows will be expected to present a summary of their work. Besides this, as part of our engagement with the RGF, we will be holding workshops in regional locations, and the FLOSS fellows will be asked to be present at events local to them. The total amount of the fellowship will be Rs. 70, 000. 3 Conditions Applicants should have a valid bank account in any bank operating in India. These are support grants, and the fellows are free to pursue their primary occupations in parallel, as long as they keep working on proposed projects. The fellows must be willing to make a release of their final work under any open-source licence approved by the Open Source Initiative (OSI). Please see under http://www.opensource.org/licenses for a complete list. Proposals from teams, partnerships, collectives, and faculty on the behalf of a group of students are welcome, so long as the grant amount is administered by a single individual, and the funds are deposited in a single bank account in the name of an individual. -- FN M: 0091 9822122436 P: +91-832-240-9490 (after 1300IST) Skype: fredericknoronha Yahoochat: fredericknoronha http://fn.goa-india.org http://fredericknoronha.wordpress.com Email fred at bytesforall.org Res: 784 Saligao 403511 Goa India

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Re: Fsf-friends Digest, Vol 49, Issue 20
by Mishi Choudhary 31 May '07

31 May '07

Dear Friends, Eben Moglen, Professor of Law in Columbia Law School and Founding Director, Software Freedom Law Center will be speaking on Software Patents at the IIC Annexe Conference Room 3 on 9th June 2007 at 10:30 am. Eben is a brilliant speaker and was recently chosen as one of the 100 most influential personalities in the world by eWeek magazine. This meeting is open to all so feel free to forward this invite to your friends who may be interested in this subject. Eben's talk is organised by the Delhi Science Forum, Software Freedom Law Center, India, Free Software Foundation India, Sarai (CSDS), Indian Linux Users Group, Delhi, and others. More info about Eben is at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eben_Moglen Regards, Venky Warm Regards Mishi Choudhary

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Eben Moglen in Bangalore
by Vikram Vincent 31 May '07

31 May '07

Dear All, Eben Moglen, the architect of the GPLv3 is in Bangalore on the 3rd and he will be speaking at St. Joseph's college at 4pm. For details on the speaker please check out the links. Please forward this to all and definitely do attend. Mr. EBEN MOGLEN emoglen.law.columbia.edu/ en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eben_Moglen TOPIC: * "Freeing the Mind:* *Free Software and the end of proprietary culture"* Venue: Xavier's Auditorium, St. Joseph College, Lalbagh Road, Near Richmond Circle, Bangalore – 1. Time : 4.00 P.M on 03.06.2007, Sunday. Contact: Mr. Viju Krishnan, M: 94496 12237, Mr. Jaykumar.H.S M: 94481 63453 -- Regards Vikram Vincent +919448810822 http://groups.google.com/group/bangalore_alive/ http://fci.wikia.com/wiki/Campaign_to_promote_free_software_in_karnataka

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Fwd: [eGovINDIA] One year of OSS implementation in ELCOT - the score card
by Ramanraj K 28 May '07

28 May '07

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Umashankar C <umashankarc(a)yahoo.com> Date: May 27, 2007 11:17 PM Subject: [eGovINDIA] One year of OSS implementation in ELCOT - the score card To: eGovINDIA(a)yahoogroups.com Dear friends, On the 26th May 2007, ELCOT completed one year of OSS implementation in its day to day activities. Currently the migration to OSS is close to 126 out of 130 desktop machines (97%) and 25 out of 26 rack servers (96%). Barring four desktops which use a popular windows based accounting software, the entire ELCOT's head office moved into Suse linux. A lone user has been using Fedora core. We have asked for the linux version of the accounting software from the vendor. He had agreed. ELCOT is also in the process of migrating to an open source based ERP shortly and so the four desktops also would be migrated to Suse linux shortly. ELCOT had also rolled out a powerful application software for administering family cards. Currently the contractors who do the data entry for the family cards have been using it. Government have given approval for decentralising the family card printing operations at the district level, thanks to the web based software developed by ELCOT using OSS. The family card software has a powerful local language interface which is built on Java script technology. It is absolutely platform independent and the user need not install any fonts. So far so good. ELCOT has been show casing its success in the migration to OSS to all Government departments. A few of them were thoroughly impressed and have decided to fully migrate to OSS. It is still too early. Yet, the way in which the people accept OSS after a hands on experience in ELCOT gives room for optimism. ELCOT's staff generously share their experience when Government users visit ELCOT's office. They also get to see the linux ATM and also ELCOT's 28 seater software development centre which uses only OSS. ELCOT has an 80 licence anti virus software which had become redundant. The officer in charge of the licence had asked my permission to sell it outside! Concurrence given. Anti virus software has no role in ELCOT. The latest success is the use of crossover and wine software to run application software that had already been developed in Microsoft client - server environment. ELCOT's team is shortly descending on Salem to provide on site support to a large co-operative bank (150 desktops) to migrate to Suse linux without any migration of the existing Ms application software (using Wine/Cross over) Regards. Umashankar C.Umashankar IAS., (TamilNadu Cadre) e-governance expert. & Managing Director, Electronics Corporation of TamilNadu Limited(ELCOT) (A Government of TamilNadu Undertaking) Co-Moderator: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/eGovINDIA Mankind deserves open standards and open source software. Only the chosen ones get its taste. Others just hear the taste. Chennai: Ph: 91-44-42054443 ------------------------------

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Free Advice for the Litigious...
by Praveen A 25 May '07

25 May '07

Free Advice for the Litigious... "All of which is to say - no amount of fear can stop the rise of free media, or free software (they are the same, after all). The community is vastly more innovative and powerful than a single company. And you will never turn back the clock on elementary school students and developing economies and aid agencies and fledgling universities - or the Fortune 500 - that have found value in the wisdom of the open source community. Open standards and open source software are literally changing the face of the planet - creating opportunity wherever the network can reach." Jonathan Schwartz, CEO, Sun Microsystems http://blogs.sun.com/jonathan/entry/what_we_did Cheers Praveen -- പ്രവീണ് അരിമ്പ്രത്തൊടിയില് Join The DRM Elimination Crew Now! http://fci.wikia.com/wiki/Anti-DRM-Campaign

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Re: [Fsf-friends] Study: Developers Do Not Want GPL 3 to Police Patents
by Ajay Pal Singh Atwal 23 May '07

23 May '07

----- Mahesh M <maheshmukundan(a)gmail.com> wrote: > *News: Study: Developers Do Not Want GPL 3 to Police > Patents*<http://ct.enews.eweek.com/rd/cts?d=186-6473-8-85-153172-711179-0-0-0-1> > A new Microsoft-funded study has found that open-source developers do > not > believe licenses like the upcoming GNU GPL 3 should enforce software > patents > or prevent deals like the Microsoft-Novell patent agreement. > > Read More on > this....<http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2134788,00.asp?kc=EWKNLLIN052207FEA1> > -- > Mahesh > Did you say a Microsoft funded study :-D -- Sincerely Ajay Pal Singh Atwal Dept of CSE & IT BBSBEC, Fatehgarh Sahib Punjab, INDIA -------------------------------- http://www.bbsbec.ac.in http://www.ajaypal.com -------------------------------- ajaypal[at]bbsbec.org, ajaypal[at]acm.org

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Study: Developers Do Not Want GPL 3 to Police Patents
by Mahesh M 23 May '07

23 May '07

*News: Study: Developers Do Not Want GPL 3 to Police Patents*<http://ct.enews.eweek.com/rd/cts?d=186-6473-8-85-153172-711179-0-0-0-1> A new Microsoft-funded study has found that open-source developers do not believe licenses like the upcoming GNU GPL 3 should enforce software patents or prevent deals like the Microsoft-Novell patent agreement. Read More on this....<http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2134788,00.asp?kc=EWKNLLIN052207FEA1> -- Mahesh It takes 43 muscles to frown and 17 to smile, But it doesnt take any to sit there with a dumb look on your face... http://maheshmukundan.blogspot.com/

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The Market Function of Piracy
by Praveen A 22 May '07

22 May '07

The Market Function of Piracy By Jerry Kirkpatrick "One study found that users of pirated software sufficiently influenced — by word-of-mouth communication — eighty percent of the software's prospects to buy the legal product and another described several scenarios in which piracy can help increase the sales of legal products. The pirated product functions as a free sample that the innovator does not have to fund." Full story http://mises.org/story/2590 -- പ്രവീണ് അരിമ്പ്രത്തൊടിയില് Join The DRM Elimination Crew Now! http://fci.wikia.com/wiki/Anti-DRM-Campaign

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Fsf-friends May 2007