Fsf-friends August 2010

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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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[X-Post][Jobs] Project positions open at IIT Bombay
by Puneeth Chaganti 31 Aug '10

31 Aug '10

1 Announcement ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Project positions are open at IIT Bombay for an MHRD funded project, Free and Open source Software for Science and Engineering Education (FOSSEE). You may obtain further info about the project from the project site: [http://fossee.in] 2 Keywords ~~~~~~~~~~~ Python, Science, Engineering, Education, Scientific computing, IIT-B, FOSS Awareness, Instruction Design, Documentation, Teaching, Graphic Design, Editing, Copy writing, SciPy, NumPy, Sage. 3 Project Description ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The current major activities of the team are - - Course design and content generation for courses on Python (specifically Python for Scientific Computing), LaTeX, Version Control Systems and other FOSS tools. This involves applying the concepts of Instruction Design to design courses and generation of a significant amount of documentation in the form of written material, presentations, spoken tutorials and video lectures. - Generation of supplementary material in the form of code and documentation for Engineering and Science courses being taught at IIT-Bombay. - Delivery of workshops and courses at various levels and locations across the country on the topics mentioned in content generation. - Co-ordination and Organization of conferences like SciPy.in and Sage Days. - Creating a customized distribution that has all the relevant packages to use Python for scientific computing. - We also intend to work and improve upon a tiny implementation of Python to make it suitable to be used on a Low Cost Access Device, being developed by another team from IIT-Bombay. 4 Open Positions & Description ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + Content Generators + Writers/Editors + Event Manager + Project Manager + Instructional Designer + Graphic Designer + tiny Python champion 4.1 Content Generators ======================= + Qualifications Educational Qualifications: - Preferably a Bachelors degree in Engineering OR - Post Graduate degree in Science Applicants are expected to possess the following qualities/skills: - Willingness to learn - Good programming skills - Knowledge of Python programming language - Passion for FOSS - Experience with using FOSS - Good math and science skills One or more of the following skills would be a plus: - Knowledge of or experience in Instructional Design and/or content generation. - Experience of working on a FOSS project. - Experience with customizing Linux distributions. + Remuneration The pay will be in the range Rs. 10000 to 30000 depending on the qualifications and experience. For extra-ordinary people the upper limit is flexible. 4.2 Writers/Editors ==================== + Qualifications Educational Qualifications: - A Bachelors degree, preferably in English Applicants are expected to possess the following qualities/skills: - Demonstrated skill and Experience of writing technical documents. - Should be able to write/produce an error free, high quality document (with instruction design principles applied) of about 1200-1500 words in a day. - Good communication skills One or more of the following skills would be a plus: - Knowledge of LaTeX or ReST. - Use of version control systems. - Knowledge of Instruction Design - Experience with using FOSS and a passion for FOSS. + Remuneration The pay will be in the range Rs. 10000 to 30000 depending on the qualifications and experience. For extra-ordinary people the upper limit is flexible. 4.3 Event Manager ================== + Qualifications Educational Qualifications: - At least a 3 year diploma or a Bachelors degree Applicants are expected to possess the following qualities/skills: - Experience in organizing, co-ordinating and conducting events involving anything between 50 to 300 participants. - Good communication skills One or more of the following skills would be a plus: - Experience of organizing a FOSS event. - Experience with using FOSS. - Passion for FOSS. + Remuneration The pay will be in the range Rs. 10000 to 30000 depending on the qualifications and experience. For extra-ordinary people the upper limit is flexible. 4.4 Project Manager ==================== + Qualifications Educational Qualifications: - At least a Bachelors/Masters degree and relevant experience. Applicants are expected to possess the following qualities/skills: - Experience in managing a team of 10-12 people - Good programming skills - Good communication skills - Passion for FOSS - Familiarity with FOSS culture and development One or more of the following skills would be a plus: - Knowledge of Python programming language - Experience in managing a team contributing to FOSS + Remuneration The pay will be in the range Rs. 30000 to 60000 depending on the qualifications and experience. For extra-ordinary people the upper limit is flexible. 4.5 Instructional Designer =========================== + Qualifications Educational Qualifications: - A bachelors/masters degree Applicants are expected to possess the following qualities/skills: - A good amount of experience in Instruction Design - Good communication skills One or more of the following skills would be a plus: - Knowledge of and Passion for FOSS. - Experience with designing content for FOSS courses. + Remuneration The pay will be in the range Rs. 10000 to 30000 depending on the qualifications and experience. For extra-ordinary people the upper limit is flexible. 4.6 Graphic Designer ===================== + Qualifications Educational Qualifications: - At least a 3 year diploma or a bachelors degree in any field Applicants are expected to possess the following qualities/skills: - Good sense of aesthetics, color and design - Excellent design skills - Good communication skills - Experience in designing web-sites, posters, logos, t-shirts, and other promotional material. One or more of the following skills would be a plus: - Experience with using FOSS. - Passion for FOSS. + Remuneration The pay will be in the range Rs. 10000 to 30000 depending on the qualifications and experience. For extra-ordinary people the upper limit is flexible. 4.7 tiny Python champion ========================= + Qualifications Educational Qualifications: - Preferably a Bachelors degree or higher Applicants are expected to possess the following qualities/skills: - Good programming skills - Willingness to learn - Knowledge of Python programming language - Experience with micro-controller/processor programming - Passion for FOSS - Experience with using FOSS One or more of the following skills would be a plus: - Knowledge of Python internals - Experience of working on a FOSS project. + Remuneration The pay will be in the range Rs. 10000 to 30000 depending on the qualifications and experience. For extra-ordinary people the upper limit is flexible. 5 Why you should apply ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ - You get paid to improve and write FOSS. - You get to do really meaningful work -- your work will influence generations of future students all over India and potentially elsewhere. - You get to work on some of the most important projects that will influence the future of science and engineering. - You get to meet and work with the authors of various important packages like Numpy, Scipy, matplotlib, Mayavi and Sage. - You will be at IIT Bombay and will have best of both worlds -- good pay and an academic environment. 6 How to Apply ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The positions are for a maximum duration of 2 years. The initial appointment will be for a period of 3 months which will be extended based on performance. Applicants may email their resumes along with a one page writeup on why they think they are well suited for the project to: jobs[at]fossee.in -- Puneeth Chaganti FOSSEE, IIT-Bombay

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Invitation for Richard M Stallman's talk
by Swathanthra Public Relations 31 Aug '10

31 Aug '10

Dear Sir/Madam, Swathanthra, the free software users group of St. Joseph's College of Engineering & Technology is organizing a one day Free Software Fest named ‘Swathanthra 1.0’. I am privileged to inform you that Mr. Richard M. Stallman, will give a talk on “Free Software and Your Freedom”, answer questions, and inaugurate the Free Software Users’ Group of the College at 10:30 am on September 09, 2010. I invite you to kindly visit us and participate in the function which, I am sure, shall benefit all those present. More details about the event are available in our official website www.swathanthra.in and those who are interested need to register at the website. The registration for the event would be closed on 7th September. The entry for the event would be free. With warm regards, Yours sincerely, Krishnalal G +91 9497171117

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[Fsf-friends] virtual-global-conference-on-blended-and-distributed-education
by Vikram Vincent 22 Aug '10

22 Aug '10

Live streaming http://www.ustream.tv/channel/virtual-global-conference-on-blended-and-dist… In a world where students have access to technology, there is increasing need to incorporate systems wherein the focus is on the learner than the teacher. Technology has a huge role to play in this paradigm shift. In order that the teachers as facilitators grasp the huge untapped potential of technology, TQMS is organizing a virtual global conference in educational technology titled “Technology for Blended and Distributed Education” from August 18-20, 2010 wherein the speakers address the participants over virtual mode through video conferencing and webinars. The objective is manifold to tap the potential of technology, to bring world renowned and distinguished speakers in specialized domains in ICT advancements in education and address emerging concepts, technology based administrative deployment practices, strategies and possibilities to share their experiences with a select audience from their home location from any part of the world. The sessions would be scheduled to take into consideration the various location of speakers from different time zones. While participants of the conference will assemble at Christ University, the venue for conference proceedings, the robustness of the conference will also be built around high quality peer reviewed papers for a few face to face presentation as ‘interlude conference plug-in sessions’ at the physical location of the conference on all the days of the conference. It is intended that the conference will also reinforce the supplementary and complementary nature of technology wherein the facilitator plays a very important role. -- Vikram Vincent +919448810822 080 4012 9072 It's 'Free' as in Swatantra.

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National Conference on Free Software and Education
by V. Sasi Kumar 18 Aug '10

18 Aug '10

FSF India, SPACE and the National Institute of Technology, Calicut, Kerala, is organising a National Conference on Free Software and Education at Kozhikode (formerly Calicut) during September 10-12. Faculty members from some of the eminent institutes in India and abroad will speak on the need for using Free Software in education and demonstrate Free Software useful for science and engineering education. The inaugural session would be on 10th evening at the Tagore Centenary Hall, Kozhikode, and the main conference at the NIT campus. Further details are available at http://c11.space-kerala.org/fsinedu Depending on availability of funds we will try to provide travel support and accommodation to a few participants. Best Sasi -- V. Sasi Kumar Free Software Foundation of India http://swatantryam.blogspot.com

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Debian Workout day on 21st Saturday as a follow up to Mini DebConf
by Praveen A 18 Aug '10

18 Aug '10

Hi, I hope you already went through http://wiki.debian.org/DebianIndia/MiniDebConf2010#After-event More details about the Workout is at http://wiki.debian.org/DebianIndia/DebianWorkout2010Aug21 It will be an informal session where we will work together on specific packages and bugs. See if you find an interesting package on wnpp.debian.net before you come. Also for those who could not get their gpg keys signed, come prepared with print outs and photo ids. For those of you who cannot make it in person, we will keep our irc channel open ie, #debian-in on irc://irc.oftc.net You can use mibbit.com if you have problems connecting using an irc client. Thanks Praveen -- പ്രവീണ്‍ അരിമ്പ്രത്തൊടിയില്‍ You have to keep reminding your government that you don't get your rights from them; you give them permission to rule, only so long as they follow the rules: laws and constitution.

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Fsf-friends August 2010