All India Radio interviewed Jay Jacob of ILUG Cochin in a one hour programme involving other ILUG Cochin Members as well. Here are the details.
Organized by All India Radio
Programme : Surabhi,
Subject : Swathanthra Software: Digital logathe Jandhipathya Prakhyapanam
Date : 10/06/2009
Time : 3pm – 4pm.
Files: Low Quality Ogg Audio( 5.3 MB]
Pour in your comments on the programme.
Indian Libre User Group, Cochin Chapter is proud to present the second edition of the Swathanthra Software Sangamam from 25th to 29th of May 2009 at Vocational Higher Secondary School, Irimpanam, Thrippunithura. This event brings together the Free Software community, teachers and students for 5 days of knowledge sharing programmes.
Objectives of the Program
● To teach the basics of Computing and Programming through Command Line
Interface and Python Programming.
● To spread awareness on the importance of Free Software in Schools.
● To create a free thinking group among the students, teachers and the community to
study, share and collaborate thereby developing skills for generating ideas and
technologies for the country.
● To unravel the internals of computer hardware.
● Engage them in fun filled activities for learning.
May 25 -28:
Workshop on Programming using the Python Language
May 29:
Inauguration of Swathanthra Software Kuttayma, VHSS Irimpinam
Free Software Quiz Contest
Computer Hardware Internals Demonstration
Swathanthra Software Seminars
- Free Software, Free Society by Jay Jacob
- Future of Student Community through Swathanthra Software by Vimal Joseph
The complete details are given in the following files.
Venue: Sacred Hearts Girls Higher Secondary School, Muthalakkodam, Thodupuzha
Date: 21st to 25th April
Number of students: 62
ILUG Cochin has successfully conducted a five day training program for the students of Thodupuzha Educational District. The training started on 21st. There were 65 students in total. They were from 8th and 9th class. The camp was organized by District Educational Office (DEO), Thodupuzha at Sacred Heart Girl’s High School, Muthalakkodam, Thodupuzha.
The aim of the training camp was to help students in creating and maintaining a website/blog using WordPress and how to use GIMP for editing pictures before uploading it to a website. WordPress, one of the most popular blogging software, help people to create blogs/website without having any knowledge in HTML or programming.
The students were not aware of sending and receving email. So we decided to help students in creating email accounts and taught them how to send and receive email. We have given appropriate informations on how to use emails securely. The need for signing out and keeping passwords hidden from others were also explained.
We could also help teachers in using WordPress and GIMP. At the end of the camp some of the students and teachers were able to create there own blogs. The camp ended on 25th.
Team members:
Binny
Venkat
Harikrishnan
Manu
Sreenadh
Some outputs from the camp
http://tribalpoomala.wordpress.com/
http://vishakhnarayanan.wordpress.com/
The above blogs are not complete. Since majority of the students have no pc at home they won’t be able to post immediately.
Let us hope they will add more contents after the school reopening.
Press Club, Ernakulam had organized a workshop on Free Software for the people working in Newspapers and other Media ILUG Cochin was invited to handle the workshop by the Press Club, Ernakulam. This in fact was due to the good relationship maintained by the group with the people in the Media.
The session started by talking about the Freedoms that form the foundation for principles of Free Software. The speaker explained with examples the concept of Free Software and how the community worked together to create technology for the benefit of mankind.
The talk turned towards the history of the Free Software movement and about Richard Mathew Stallman, the founder of the GNU Movement. The speaker then explained the series of events that lead to the birth of GNU/Linux.
The importance of Freedom was explained by comparing the situation to “India’s Struggle for Freedom. The audience were subscribing well to the important aspect of the speech.
The talk then explained the basic copyright concept and how the copyleft concept created by the Free Software movement helped protect the Freedom of users.
As the talk was winding up, lot of questions we raised, especially on Licenses, copyright, sharing and distributing free software for money. The ambiguity in the term Free as in Freedom was also clarified.
The demonstration started with the basic login screen of the OS. The speaker touched upon the basic aspects of a Free Software Desktop Environment . He explained the fundamental concepts behind a Desktop Environment He then proceeded to explain a few basic applications for daily use belonging to the following categories:
There were lot of questions on using Malayalam with OpenOffice. The speaker explained the answers in a very efficient manner, thereby satisfying the audience queries.
Sanal Kumar sir touched upon the importance and relevance of teaching Free Software in Schools. He talked extensively about the present level of implementation and the problems faced. He delved deep into how the community can find solutions for the issues faced and how they can effectively work with the teachers to improve the present curriculum so that it can bring out the true power of Free Software.
The speaker next explained the importance of the Malayalam language and how free software and projects like “Swathanthra malayalam computing” have enabled the language to reach leaps and bounds. The talk also touched upon the possibilities of Malayalam blogging and how the Internet was a new arena that was allowing the language to expand its horizon.
The concluding session saw Sameer finally explaining the name change of the group and the vision and future of the group. The press club secretary thanked the ILUG Cochin Members for their cooperation with the Media and concluded the session.
ILUG Cochin thanks Anand Haridas of “The Hindu” for having taken the initiative to bring the Free Software Community closer to the Media by conducting this event, and hope that more events of this nature happen in the future.
ILUG Cochin has started a campaign to bring teachers closer to the Free Software Community. This campaign has 3 primary objectives:
- Enlighten teachers about the true concept of Free Software and how it can create a new generation of students with core social values and technical abilities.
- Provide Support to teachers for the Free Software Implementation in Schools, the aim is make teachers self reliant.
- Help Students to explore the possibilities of Free Software outside the academics.
As a part of the campaign, ILUG Cochin had organized an event in assosciation with the Vocational Higher Secondary School Irimpanam (http://vhssirimpanam.org/) on 10/02/2009
“Swathanthra Software Sangamam”
- One Day Programme for students and teachers
- Session on ” The significance of the Free Software Movement ” by Jay Jacob.
- Blender Workshop by Zadeek
- Inkscape Workshop by Sreenadh
- Interaction between Teachers and ILUG Cochin Community.