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Fwd: [fosscomm] Petition: Request to drop proprietary software from the free laptops to be distributed by the government to students of Tamil Nadu
by Nagarjuna G 22 Jun '11

22 Jun '11

Please sign this petition. some observations: the '/' in GNU/Linux is printed as '\' in the text. which may be corrected. another unfortunate part of the draft is the cost aspect of the initiative is given greater importance in the arguments, and the functional importance of the operating system while comparing GNU/linux with windows. We should take opportunities like this to tell the policy makers that freedom of the user is more important than the cost, while also telling that using free software is incidentally economical as well. I have signed the petition. -- GN ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Narendra Sisodiya <narendra(a)narendrasisodiya.com> Date: Wed, Jun 22, 2011 at 10:37 AM Subject: [fosscomm] Petition: Request to drop proprietary software from the free laptops to be distributed by the government to students of Tamil Nadu To: Indian FOSS Community Network list <network(a)lists.fosscom.in> FYI ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Alagunambi Welkin <alagunambiwelkin(a)fsftn.org> Date: Tue, Jun 21, 2011 at 9:50 AM Subject: [FSFTN] Petition: Request to drop proprietary software from the free laptops to be distributed by the government to students of Tamil Nadu To: mailinglist(a)fsftn.org Dear Friends, The Government of Tamil Nadu have decided to implement the scheme of free distribution of laptops to students studying Government and Government aided Schools and Colleges, and released a tender to procure 9,12,000 of laptops for the same. By the tender reference: ELCOT/PID/ICB/LTC/PI/2011-12, government wants Proprietary Software to be installed. The decision to include Proprietary OS in the laptops will have a huge impact both on cost and effectiveness of its use in education. There are 9,12,000 laptops being ordered for distribution. Assuming a basic cost of Rs1,000/- per system for the OS license, we find that it will cost the exchequer a whopping 91.2 crore. Incidentally the anti-virus software (the 'twin brother' of MS Windows) is offered as part of the package for just 1 year. This implies that the student will have to either pay to renew the license every year or use a pirated version. Given the weak financial situation of a vast majority of students, especially in rural parts of the State, it is most likely that they would would opt for latter, a highly unethical and unsafe practice. There is also a question mark as to how and where students are expected to renew licenses or anti-virus software. Besides, Microsoft provides support for its products only for a stipulated period; there is no comment on how students would get the assistance once the product is officially withdrawn from market. It is well known now that GNU\Linux can perform all the functions any proprietary OS can do and much more. Most of these laptops will be used mainly to read/edit word documents, browse the internet, multimedia purposes, etc.. All these functions can be accomplished with ease by the available GNU\Linux distributions. Many more educational software are produced by the FOSS community in GNU\Linux platform than any proprietary companies. It is worth mentioning that there are even GNU\Linux distributions available for educational purposes which are packed with lot of software packages required for eduction. So, please sign the petition to give free open source software for the younger generation of Tamil Nadu. http://www.fsftn.org/tn-students-laptop-petition -- Alagunambi Welkin Executive Committee Member Free Software Foundation, Tamil Nadu. Part of - Free Software Movement of India. _______________________________________________ Mailinglist mailing list Mailinglist(a)fsftn.org http://fsftn.org/mailman/listinfo/mailinglist_fsftn.org -- ┌─────────────────────────┐ │ Narendra Sisodiya │ http://narendrasisodiya.com └─────────────────────────┘ _______________________________________________ network mailing list network(a)lists.fosscom.in http://lists.fosscom.in/listinfo.cgi/network-fosscom.in

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Free laptops from TN Govt - Choice of OS
by Anivar Aravind 20 Jun '11

20 Jun '11

Copy pasting a mail from Ilug Chennai List http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/pipermail/ilugc/2011-June/066307.html Friends. On Jun 18, 2011 TamilNadu Govt announced a Tender for "9 lakh" free laptops for the students. Here is the Tender Notice : http://www.tenders.tn.gov.in/pubnowtend/uploaded/TD_elc58921_tn_laptop_sche… http://epaper.dinamalar.com/PUBLICATIONS/DM/MADHURAI/2011/06/18/Article/009… Page 57 in the pdf says that Operating System : Preloaded Dual booting - Windows starter edition with Anti Virus for 1 year license and Linux. These laptop should be loaded with only free open source software and proprietary software should not be used. How can we suggest the TN Govt to avoid the proprietary software ? Please share your thoughts. -- Regards, T.Shrinivasan -- Anivar Aravind

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Welcome to the FOSS India IRC Network
by Vivek Varghese Cherian 17 Jun '11

17 Jun '11

Hi, The FOSS India Internet Relay Chat Network (irc.foss-india.org) is a communications network for friends,well wishers and community members of the Free Culture and Free/Open Source Movement in India. Come join us and have a wonderful and intellectually rewarding chat experience. Regards, -- Vivek Varghese Cherian (विवेक वर्गीस चेरियान) Senior System Administrator RHCSA #100-173-327 Member of USENIX,SAGE,LOPSA,EFF, FSF Associate. Website : http://www.vivekcherian.com Blog: http://www.vivekcherian.net Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/vivekvc Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/vivek.v.cherian IRC: Vivek and ViveKVC on both Freenode and OFTC GPG Key fingerprint = 1EB1 0647 9574 18A3 40B5 8D74 F842 576B 3C2B 8538

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Mini DebConf Kerala 2011 on 22nd, 23rd and 24th April in MES Kuttippuram
by Praveen A 19 Apr '11

19 Apr '11

Hi, A Debian Mini Conference is a gathering of debian folks in an area. We have been having debian meetups for a few years and this time we are planning conferences in 4 cities across India. More about it at http://wiki.debian.org/DebianIndia/MiniDebConf2011 We are starting with Min DebConf Kerala in MES Kuttippuram. This year focus has been to get more people contributing in debian with a special focus on hands on training in creating and maintaining debian packages. We will start with introduction of debian - why it is unique, why debian etc and introduce various tools used in debian. We will have a gpg key signing party - a key component of trust in a distributed community like debian. Then move to packaging a sample application explaining various steps in detail - giving a chance to try it hands on while we explain it. Once packaging session is over, we encourage every one to take up one package and start working on it. We will have people who know packaging to provide help as required. If you are interested register at http://wiki.debian.org/DebianIndia/MiniDebConf2011/Participants Regards 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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freedombox needs your support
by Praveen A 19 Feb '11

19 Feb '11

FreedomBox foundation is raising funds using kickstarter and they are targetting 60000 USD in 30 days. Withing 3 days they got more than 26000 USD and I pledged 100 USD. Minimum is 1 USD (about 45 rupees). So show you care about Freedom and pledge your support. You just need a credit card. If you don't have one yet, find any of your friends who have a credit card and use it. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/721744279/push-the-freedombox-foundati… -- 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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NCAR2010 Valedictory live
by praveen chandrahas 18 Dec '10

18 Dec '10

Hi All, Valedictory session of NCAR2010 live at http://ncar2010.fsmi.in/live -- Regards Praveen Chandrahas Free Software is a matter of freedom, not cost. It is a matter of liberty, not price.

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Live Plenary NCAR2010
by Nidhin Sasi 17 Dec '10

17 Dec '10

Plenary session of NCAR2010 live at : http://ncar2010.fsmi.in/live from 5:30PM onwards

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Новое сообщение
by Vovan 13 Dec '10

13 Dec '10

http://samec.org.ua/

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Language Technology Meetup with Wikimedia team
by Praveen A 10 Dec '10

10 Dec '10

Hi, Danese Cooper who is currently the CTO for Wikimedia, Erik Möller, Deputy Director of Wikimedia Foundation and Alolita Sharma, Engineering Programs Manager, Wikimedia Foundation is visiting Pune from Dec 12-14. They are keenly interested in exploring tools, techniques and approaches they might collaborate on in localizing large-scale content repositories. They can do some brief presentations about what Wikimedia is up to. Wikimedia is looking for contributors in Indian content, open source technologies and growing its community in India. They would like to meet local Indic localization community to talk about the amazing work that they’ve accomplished in Linux and open source localization. Wikipedia needs that kind of help since its community in India has some localization contributors but not enough. Date: : Tuesday, 14-December-2010 10:00 AM IST Venue:: Red Hat Office, Tower 10, Cyber City, Magarpatta City, Hadapsar For registration see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Meetup/Pune/Pune4 Share this with others who might be interested. 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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Workshop for women researchers - run up to NCAR 2010
by sarath ms 27 Nov '10

27 Nov '10

Hi friends, Swecha organized a workshop for women researchers and academicians on the theme 'Women in Research - the FOSS paradigm' on Friday 26th November. The workshop was attended by around 165 women working as lecturers, professors and researchers in various engineering and MCA colleges. It was inaugurated by the Vice-Chancellor of JNTU Hyderabad Dr. D. N. Reddy who encouraged women to participate in research and also appreciated the efforts by Swecha in propagating the use of FOSS and wished it success in further endeavors like NCAR 2010. The keynote address was given by Prof. Jayanthi Sivaswamy from IIIT Hyderabad, who is the All India coordinator of the Virtual Labs project of MHRD and heads the Center for IT in Education. She put forward two reasons to consider use of FOSS. One, from the social justice point of view as proprietary software cuts access to lakhs of people who cannot afford the high cost of that software. Two, use of FOSS also makes economic sense as it encourages and involves many more people in the process and thus would be good for the economy of the country. As for concrete application of FOSS in research, she gave the example of how FOSS was much superior in usage for her while developing virtual labs for science. The idea of virtual labs for science was prompted by the lack of proper labs and infrastructure in most of the schools and colleges in Hyderabad. The IIIT is involved in developing these labs and now the union ministry of HRD is asking for similar virtual labs to be developed for engineering colleges also. She pointed out that the use of FOSS in such research projects is growing not only in India but across the world. Prof. K S Rajan of IIIT said that knowledge can grow only when it is shared with others and free software provides the platform for such sharing and enriching of knowledge. In this context he emphasised the importance of peer learning and how it is important to do so at every level of education. He felt that FOSS platform enables the academics and researchers to be updated in their knowledge about their spheres. The workshop had presentations on 'Computing freedom with free software – the Experience of Swecha' by Dr L Pratap Reddy of JNTU Hyd who is also the working chairman of Swecha; a presentation on 'How to use FOSS for research and development' by Ms. Sirisha of Wipro Technologies. There were also testimonials by women from various institutes who used FOSS in their research work and how it helped them to accomplish their goals. The participants set forward an action plan which included setting up FOSS labs in their colleges, creation of Lab Manuals for FOSS tools, conducting workshops for other faculty and students, participating in localization of free software etc. More info & photos at http://ncar2010.fsmi.in/women-researchers-workshop Regards, Sarath M S www.swecha.org

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