Janabhaaratii

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Localisation of Free/Open Source Software

Development Deployment and Community Building

Mumbai - C-DAC Mumbai is working on the project janabhaaratii. This project is titled 'Localisation of Free/Open Source Software: Development, Deployment and Community Building'. These includes contributing to the community efforts in developing a software suite based on GNU/Linux and made available in Indian languages. The project is funded by the Technology Development in Indian Languages (TDIL) group in Department of Information Technology, Ministry of Communication and IT of Government of India.

Objective of the janabhaaratii:

• To enable wide use of Indian language computing through Free/Open Source systems and applications localised in Indian languages.

• Invite, build and support community initiatives to produce and disseminate free/open source software systems, applications and content to help proliterate wide-spread use of Information Technology in our society, breaking language barriers and through affordable means. This will thus help bridge the so called digital divide.

• Development of technology to suit Indian languages, dissemination of the same, deployment into diverse sections such as home use, mass applications, education, rural areas, infokiosks, cybercafes, e-governance, content creation etc.

C-DAC is a pioneer in development and deployment of Indian language technologies and products for over 15 years. janabhaaratii project is handled by C-DAC Air-India bldg office, Nariman Point, Mumbai. In particular C-DAC, Mumbai has also been in the forefront with the INDIX2 project which makes GNU/Linux operating system specifically intelligent about indic scripts and gives the world a more generic approach to deal with complex scripts. Some of the fonts developed under the INDIX2 project are now also available to public from TDIL website http://www.tdil.mit.gov.in/download/openfonts.htm

The project inherits and will enhance the access and usability of the above resources. Further, the project stands on the shoulders of several teams working on localization of GNU/Linux, most notably IITs, IIITs, Indlinux, ankurbangla, HBCSE(TIFR), FSF India , MarathiOpenSource group and Corporations like IBM. Several Resource Centres supported by TDIL have stacked up a lot of localization resources. The project envisages threading together these efforts and present to the community a suite of software components in readily usable form through Open Source under GPL/LGPL licences.

The project needs cooperation of language specialists, linguists, computer specialists, users, governments (Centre and States), academia (faculty and students) and many others. This is also an appeal to all to join this mission and bring the benefits of IT revolution to the majority of population.

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1st Orientation Programme for Marathi Translators and wordlist editors

Date and Time: 10th Nov 2006, 10:00 - 17:00


Venue: Centre for Development of Advanced Computing
(Formerly NCST)
8th Floor, Air India Building,
Nariman Point, Mumbai 400 021.
India.
Telephone: +91 22 2202 4641, +91 22 2283 6924
Fax: +91 22 2204 9573


Everybody has a role to play in terms of

• Translation
• Translation Review
• Wordlist Review and Edition
• Coordination
• Graphical Design (to improvise Appearance)
• Popularising
• Concepts and Ideas
• Content Creation
• Technical Support (Installation and Usage)
• Workshops and trainings
• Event Management
• Testing (identifying bugs)
• Development (plugins and extensions)
• Programming
• Lexical Resources Creation
• Defining Roadmap
• Just as an observer

Concept Introduction:

Almost all operating systems, softwares and applications have their Graphical User Interfaces (GUI) in English by default. People who don't know English (more than 95%) are not comfortable with it and just because of language barriers, they are kept away from the information useful to their day to day activities.

Transparency is the key issue !

Translating these user interfaces and relative documentation is a big challenge. Those who are keen in creating an excellent blend of Indian languages and computer can certainly play an important role in the mission. People, who would like to interact with computer in their own language they are proud of, would be potential users and also contributors who can give direction to the development process.

We can never deny the role of our "Mother Tongue" in boosting up any country's economy (viz. Japan, China, etc). After all "Knowledge" has no language barriers, why then should people feel ignorant about the information. That's why our Government is carrying out serious efforts in the direction to empower ALL, with the information/knowledge, breaking language barriers where computers are playing pivotal role.

We are working under Free/Libre Open Source Softwares (foss/floss) umbrella based on GNU/Linux platform.

We also welcome all language and computer enthusiasts who would like to be contributors as well.

Outcomes:

Almost 30 language and computer enthusiasts attended and enjoyed this event. Almost half of them were very keen in contributing to the mission then and there itself. Surprisingly almost thousand words have been corrected and few of them entered newly in a linguistic way (identified base words and their all possible forms) during just 3-4 hours hands-on session. That too only by 2-3 people who were not aware of Marathi input on GNU/Linux platform before half an hour of hands-on session.

It means our mission will be successful if we can increase number of such enthusiasts who would like to take technology to their community crossing all language barriers and also has expertise in the field of computers, softwares and language all together.

There is a serious need of one more orientation programme for Translators who would be translating computer terminologies and computer messages to marathi which can be easily understood by a common man having no technical knowledge about computers and wants to work with computer in their mother tongue.

There are plans for these kind of events as and when required.

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For Marathi related activities join us at MarathiOpenSource@yahoogroups.com

Media Link:  Loksatta dated 15th Nov 2006 or visit http://www.loksatta.com/daily/20061115/shik.htm

IRC channels

#janabhaaratii and #marathiopensource

at irc.freenode.net


Dr. Alka Irani (Chief Investigator)
Priti Patil
janabhaaratii
Language Computing Group
C-DAC, Mumbai

alka@cdacmumbai.in
prithisd@cdacmumbai.in, prithisd@gmail.com