Fsf-friends October 2008

fsf-friends@gnu.org.in

17 participants
25 discussions

(R)e-Governance in Kochi Corporation !!
by CK Raju 06 Oct '08

06 Oct '08

"...The capital and initial costs, including those for hardware with software system cost, application software, creation of web portal, data digitisation and training and capacity building of personnel for the first two years of the commission, will be available from the Central government. The cost of the land and building, site preparation, civil infrastructure, employee cost, power and communication cost shall be borne by the State government or the urban local body. Wipro, one of the IT majors, is in the process of preparation of the detailed project report for the e-governance programme for Kochi. The agency is expected to complete the work within two months, Ms. Antony said. The Kochi Corporation had earlier made some attempts to computerise the office with the support of the Information Kerala Mission. A portion of the data in the possession of the Corporation was converted into electronic format earlier. .." Full story at http://www.thehindu.com/pp/2008/10/04/stories/2008100450510100.htm --------------- Are our activists in government aware of this new development ? Why aren't the platforms, mode of storage of public information, types of standards being deployed not mentioned here ? Is it another Microsoft back-door ? CK Raju

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Software Patenting
by Praveen A 06 Oct '08

06 Oct '08

"If formulaic Hindi films were protected by patent laws, we would be able to make only one film," joked Abraham. The system of software patenting wipes out smaller businesses and innovation, he said. "Software, like poetry and literary works, is already protected by copyright. After all, Bill Gates made his fortunes from copyright and not patents. But many software companies are trying to get additional protection." Copyright and patents are both part of intellectual property rights, but copyright restricts the expression of an idea while patents restrict the idea itself, according to Abraham. Under a patenting regime, even before a kid writes one line of code he has to read many patents." Full Coverage http://www.timeoutbengaluru.com/aroundtown/aroundtown_feature_details.asp?c… Another story by Hindu http://www.hindu.com/2008/10/05/stories/2008100559810400.htm Vote for it at FS Daily http://www.fsdaily.com/Legal/Software_patenting_will_harm_industry_consumer -- പ്രവീണ്‍ അരിമ്പ്രത്തൊടിയില്‍ <GPLv2> I know my rights; I want my phone call! <DRM> What use is a phone call, if you are unable to speak? (as seen on /.) Join The DRM Elimination Crew Now! http://fci.wikia.com/wiki/Anti-DRM-Campaign

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Software freedom? Why? (Derek Cordeiro's blog)
by Frederick Noronha [फ़र ेदरिक नोर ोनया] 04 Oct '08

04 Oct '08

01 October 2008 Software Freedom<http://www.derekcordeiro.com/2008/10/software-freedom.html> Software Freedom day is celebrated worldwide on the 3rd Saturday of September 1 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software%20Freedom%20Day>. But in Goa, it was celebrated at BITS Pilani, Goa Campus<http://www.bits-goa.ac.in/>on the 27th(or was it a 2 day event?). I have heard people define Free/Open Source Software time and again. There are endless discussions about which Open Source license is the best. One thing that should be known to all: Open Source Software is here to stay. Open Source even mentioned in textbooks e.g. Software Engineering books like Object-Oriented and Classical Software Engineering by Steven Schach. But what is the easiest way to adopt Free Software on your Desktop PC? If you already use GNU/Linux or *BSD or Solaris, you already have a whole lot of free software already installed. You probably have very little non-free software. The only thing you can do to contribute is to help others(could be help new users, or help developers, etc). If you use Microsoft Windows or Mac, follow some easy steps. Use Free Software as much as possible. 1. Firefox <http://getfirefox.com/> /Chrome/Flock <http://flock.com/> for browsing. 2. OpenOffice <http://openoffice.org/> for good quality formatted text documents/spreadsheets/presentations.(at the time of writing, OpenOffice 3.0 RC3 is available) extra: Check out the openoffice extensions like the template packs I and II 3. Pidgin <http://pidgin.im/> for Instant Messaging. 4. Thunderbird <http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/thunderbird/> for email. 5. Free Developer tools like Eclipse <http://eclipse.org/> , Netbeans<http://netbeans.org/>together with MinGW <http://www.mingw.org/> /MSYS <http://www.mingw.org/wiki/msys> and free libraries like wxWidgets <http://wxwidgets.org/> (If you know MFC, it is an excellent choice). 6. Java <http://java.sun.com/> is mostly Free software, use it. The most important thing though is not to discourage others from using it.(This goes out especially to fanboys who are pretty narrow minded). Sometimes I've heard people say that Linux sucks. I cannot disagree or agree -- Linux is far from perfect, but nothing really is perfect.(The same people say that Vista is awesome--I think Microsoft will not completely agree with that). Buzz up!<http://buzz.yahoo.com/article/pub/http%253A%252F%252Fwww.derekcordeiro.com%…> ShareThis <http://www.derekcordeiro.com/#> Posted by Derek J C at 3:15:00 PM<http://www.derekcordeiro.com/2008/10/software-freedom.html> in freedom <http://www.derekcordeiro.com/search/label/freedom> 2 comments<http://www.derekcordeiro.com/2008/10/software-freedom.html#comment-form> <http://www.blogger.com/email-post.g?blogID=2174257787047055345&postID=25716…> http://www.derekcordeiro.com -- FN * Independent Journalist http://fn.goa-india.org Blog: http://fredericknoronha.wordpress.com Tech links from South Asia: http://twitter.com/fn M: +91-9822122436 P: +91-832-2409490

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Freedom Walk started - Walking the Walk
by Praveen A 04 Oct '08

04 Oct '08

Hi, Freedom Walk organised by Zyxware and many Free Software communities have started on October 2nd as planned. I request everyone to try find some time to join this or at least talk about it with your friends and write about it if you maintain a blog. You can keep yourself updated with the latest happenings at http://www.freedomwalk.in/ Some photos of the walk started appearing on the website http://www.freedomwalk.in/content/17/freedom-walk-day-0-photos-departure-at… http://www.freedomwalk.in/content/15/freedom-walk-day-1-photos http://www.freedomwalk.in/content/16/freedom-walk-day-2-photos Cheers Praveen -- പ്രവീണ്‍ അരിമ്പ്രത്തൊടിയില്‍ <GPLv2> I know my rights; I want my phone call! <DRM> What use is a phone call, if you are unable to speak? (as seen on /.) Join The DRM Elimination Crew Now! http://fci.wikia.com/wiki/Anti-DRM-Campaign

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Part 2 of the GNU/Linux primer
by shirish 02 Oct '08

02 Oct '08

Hi all, One of the comments fuelled a part 2 of the GNU/Linux primer. http://flossexperiences.wordpress.com/2008/10/02/gnulinux-primer-2/ Some caution though, I had played with few themes before settling on this one, what do you think? Some more changes in the coming week or two are expected. Feedback, suggestions and flames all invited and encouraged. :) -- Regards, Shirish Agarwal This email is licensed under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/ 065C 6D79 A68C E7EA 52B3 8D70 950D 53FB 729A 8B17

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Fsf-friends October 2008