IN THIS ISSUE

Spotlight

Dzongkha Linux Launch Event in Thimphu, Bhutan

Asia-Pacific Reports

Open Office, Please Do Not Disappoint Fiji
Cyberspace and the Pacific
Taipei

IOSN News

GNU/Linux Training of Trainers, August 28 to September 9, Bangkok, Thailand
IOSN and UNDP-APDIP Releases New Publication on FOSS and Licensing
Publication on FOSS and Open Standards

Tidbits ... from here and there

Mongolian Open Source Network
The Asian CJK Native-Language Group
PERL and India
GNU/Linux Training in Urdu
Philippine Open Source Conference 2006
Uzbekistan is Becoming Acquainted with FOSS Experience of Asia-Pacific Countries
Call for Asia to Adopt OpenDocument Format
Malaysia OKs Move Toward OpenDocument Format
The Opensourcedeal
Free Shipment of GNU/Linux CDs
From the Middle East
Ethiopian Activitists Promote FOSS
Moroccan Fisheries Escapes Proprietary Net

Links from Asia-Pacific

Nepal Discusses FOSS
Open Source Symposium
FOSS and Gender
FOSS Foundation in Pakistan

Quote ... Unquote

From Sarawak, Malaysia

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Spotlight

Dzongkha Linux Launch Event, in Thimphu, Bhutan <http://tinyurl.com/hg39k>

[By Christian Perrier] From June 1st to 5th, I have been invited to attend the Dzongkha Linux launch event, in Thimphu, Bhutan. For those not aware of this, Bhutan is a 700,000 inhabitants country located between India and China, in the eastern part of the Himalaya range. The size of the country is somewhat similar to that of Switzerland.

Bhutan's national language is Dzongkha, a language from the Sino-Tibetan family. Recent laws in the country have enforced the use of the national language in all official events and all official communication. Therefore, even though all the (free for everybody) education system is bilingual in English/Dzongkha, it is very important for the country to be able to use the Dzongkha language on computers.

After a quite deceptive attempt with Microsoft to include support for Dzongkha in Microsoft operating systems (US$523,000 have been thrown in this attempt), the Ministry of Information and Communication launched the DzongkhaLinux project 2.5 years ago.

During that time period, the Department of Information Technology (DIT) has been able to build a complete system with complete support for the Dzongkha language. The system is based on Linux and more specifically on Debian. It consists of one CD which can be either installed or used as a live CD (the installation system is using Morphix, not D-I which was not ready at that moment).

The CD embarks a complete set of Dzongkha-localized applications, namely the Gnome environment, the OpenOffice suite, the Mozilla web browser, the Evolution mail reader and GAIM as instant messaging application.

On June 2nd (national holiday in Bhutan as anniversary of the coronation of the King), the DIT was officially launching the DzongkhaLinux system ("Our language....our software").

Because of the recently very productive collaboration with the technical project head, Pema Geyleg, for inclusion of Dzongkha support in Debian Installer, I was invited to attend the event and give there a keynote lecture about "Free Software and the Global community".

The event was very widely advertised in Bhutan: it was covered in all newspapers and got a strong importance in the national television.

Two ministers of the Bhutanese government were attending the event: the minister of Information and Communication (Chief
Guest) and the minister of Education. Nearly all other ministries were represented by Secretaries. The country's Prime Minister, originally scheduled to attend, had to cancel because of other commitments abroad.

As the project is part of the PANLocalization project <http://www.panl10n.net>, aimed at bringing localized computer use in several Asian countries, and funded by IDRC (a Canadian governmental organization), several representative of these organization, or other governmental or non-governmental organizations, were represented.

More specifically, Panl10n was represented by Dr. Sarmad Hussain, from Pakistan, head of the Center for Research on Urdu Language Processingin Lahore, Pakistan.

Also invited were the Nepali localization team, who launched a very similar distribution for Nepali language, as well as Guntupalli Karunakar, recognized expert in Indic languages handling in Free Software, and one of the leaders of the Indlinux project <http://www.indlinux.org>.

The event itself featured:
-Introduction by the head of DIT
-My own keynote lecture about FLOSS and the Global Community -Dr. Sarmad Hussein, lecture about the PAN localization project -A pre-recorded demo of the DzongkhaLinux dostribution -A conclusion by the ministry of Information and Communication

I have been incredibly impressed by the very wide coverage of this event (the next days, barely anyone I was meeting could talk about it) and the strong commitment showed by local officials to support the project.

My own keynote lecture focused on the main key aspects of Free Software, especially in developing countries (Openess, independence, ability to preserve the local culture and knowledge, ability to develop a local software and services industry). I, of course, also introduced the Debian Project, targeting the point on the commitment of the project to Free Software and enlightening its ability to be "derived" for specific needs.

Post-event discussions (including private discussions with the involved officials and ministers) have shown me that this concern has been very well received. The ability of Free Software to allow customization and appropriation of the technology by local people is very well understood.

We can safely assume that, in a near future, teachers in all Bhutan schools who, up to now, needed to prepare their courses hold in Dzongkha by hand, because of the lack of tools able to process the language on computers will be able to use DzongkhaLinux for their needs.

Similarly all monks in Bhutan monastery will soon be able to work with their sacred texts with computers instead of copying them by hand (the buddhist religion plays a great role in Bhutan's day to day life).

In general, all needs for the Dzongkha language processing will be able to be fulfilled, which should improve the coverage in Dzongkha in many areas in the country.

In short, DzongkhaLinux is promised to a very wide success and can also be considered as a big success for Debian. When the most important guest at the event mentions in his lecture that "we had a collective dream of having our own computer software for our own needs", I feel like the dream that the Free Software Community is having since more than 20 years has become a reality in that small part of the world.

I hereby want to deeply thank DIT, the Ministry of Information and Communication, as well as all individuals who have made this trip to Bhutan a complete success and a personal deep achievement. Aside from this, it has allowed me to discover a unique culture and a wonderful country, with a strong commitment to preserve that local culture and the natural environment.

The legendary friendliness and openness of the Bhutanese people is definitely not unsurpated.

I am deeply confident that the future collaboration between Debian and similar projects all around the world will became very common and will justify all the energy that all individuals involved in Debian in Free Software invest daily in this dream.

Official announcement of Dzongkha Linux: http://www.dit.gov.bt/newsdetail.php?newsId=44

Bhutan's Department of Information Technology: http://www.dit.gov.bt/

The Dzongkha Linux project home (needs update): http://dzongkha.sourceforge.net/

PAN Localization: http://www.panl10n.net

IDRC, International Development Research Centre: http://www.idrc.ca/

[ADDITIONAL LINK: IOSN - Bhutan Free/Open Source Software Resources: http://www.iosn.net/south-asia/countries/bhutan/]

 

Asia-Pacific Reports

Open Office, Please Do Not Disappoint Fiji

A REPORT, FROM THE PACIFIC: Rajneel Totaram <rjnlfj@yahoo.com> sent in this update of the Fijian Spellchecker for OpenOffice project.

The project was the brainchild of Dr. William Blanke, then a Computing Science lecturer at the University of the South Pacific (USP), and was carried out together with Dr. Paul Geraghty, an Associate Professor at the School of Language, Arts & Media (USP).

A team of Computing Science and Fijian Languages students worked under Dr. Blanke and Dr. Geraghty to complete the project.

The project proved to be quite a challenge for the team for a number of reasons. Firstly, the computing science side of the group (Dr. Blanke and myself) did not speak the Fijian language and the languages side of the group did not clearly understand the 'programming' aspect of MySpell, the spellchecking engine used in OpenOffice.

However, the biggest hurdle was the Fijian language itself. Unlike English, the Fijian language 'lacked proper structure'. How do you create rules for the affix file to be used with MySpell from the language that did not have many rules? In fact, there were only a few rules that were always followed. Other rules may or may not be followed. The prefixes/suffixes used with the root word could vary depending on the words used before and after the root word. I do not think that MySpell has support for such a situation.

Nevertheless, the project was completed and produced a decent result. Computer scripts were written that analysed the word formations of the Fijian language and generated patterns from these. From these patterns MySpell compatible rules were devised that were used in the affix file.

The Fijian spellchecker does a pretty decent job, although there is always room for improvement. We have now set the platform on which others can add to make the Fijian spellchecker more accurate and efficient. The project was completed on August 11, 2005. However, it cannot be used with the OpenOffice suite as yet. Due to a tiny bug, OpenOffice cannot recognize the Fijian locale. We are told that this will be fixed when version 2.04 of the OpenOffice suite is released. The current version of the Suite is 2.03. From the next version, OpenOffice will officially have support for Fijian spellchecking, something that we are eagerly awaiting.

This project is supported by the USP-IOSN Microgrants Programme <http://www.iosn.net/pacific-islands/usp-microgrants/>

Cyberspace and the Pacific

Franck Martin <franck@sopac.org> posted this note recently to the IGOVAP mailing list: The situation in the Pacific Islands is the following (or at least what I have gathered).

All Pacific Islands except Fiji and PNG, connect for Internet and Telephony via Satellite. There are very few satellites available mainly the 2 Inteslsat and PAS2 PAS8 and skynet(?). Most of the satellites over the Pacific Islands have footprint over Asia and North America but not in the middle.

Via Intelsat, or PAS it does not matter where you land the signal. You can land it at various teleports: California, West Canada, Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand.

The PITAnet is in fact an agreement between the PI Telcos to land the signal at the same location, West Canada with Teleglobe (I think). Some telcos did that some others did not. When I came in Samoa, long time ago, the signal was landed in Australia, if I recall. The ARNET has something peculiar of pricing which is a mix of fixed prices with volume charges.

The Southern Cross Cable (SCC) is between, NZ, AU, Fiji, Hawaii and California. Fiji is a simple node. In short the difference between cable is the following. Cable has huge capacity. The initial capacity of the SCC was 12GB/s on 3 pairs of fiber, yes 3 pairs. I have heard the capacity has been upgraded further. This capacity means you can transfer a full length DVD movie every second. The latency is very short, the signal stay on the ground so to speak and does not have to go via a geostationary satellite (500ms roundtrip in general or half a second). Cable is a huge investment but is somehow cheaper than satellite (cost/Mb/s). It also means the company having access to a cable can undercut any company using a Satellite. Satellite are more versatile but low capacity, a few hundred of Mb/s. I think the landing station for Fiji only costed USD60millions. It is not rare to have a undersea cable passing a few km away of land in the Pacific Islands. I think it is the case in Solomon Islands.

For you to run Border Gateway Protocol, means you must have a need for it. You must have at least more than one Internet connection out of the country (any type of connection), so you can act as a node or Internet Exchange (IX): you may forward Internet packets to others (between sites which are not necessarily your customers). An IX is usually a node supported by many ISPs to avoid that the local traffic goes round the world to end up next door, because next door use another ISP. Most Pacific Islands use only one Internet Connection via satellite and that can be dealt with static routing. BGP needs relatively high end Cisco gear. Static routing is done with very cheap hardware. The BGP network (or Internet Backbone) knows where all the devices on the Internet are (in term of connectivity).

Root servers via Anycast requires BGP to work (so I understand). Basically you intercept the IP packets at destination of one of the 13 root servers IPs and redirect it to your anycast root server. Why having a root server? If your Internet link outside the country dies, you are still able to have in the country a root server that can tell you where are the .ws servers to answer queries for your local internet services. Also a local root server will save some traffic and will reduce significantly the time it takes to get a DNS answer (see latency over satellite).

Fiji has the SCC and still a big satellite dish connected to Intelsat. They tried to become a node for the Pacific, but I believe they are not yet geared for this kind of commercial adventure. You need 24/7 staffed operations, with marketing managers who can compete on the International market, especially against US, AU and NZ.

The other big challenge in the Pacific Islands is that most islands in the same country are out of line of sight. So even national communications go satellite. There are huge technical challenges to provide a better Internet (connectivity side) to the Islands. Most Satellite communications between two islands go via the National node. Using twice the capacity of the same satellite: Island1-SatelliteA-National Node-SatelliteA-Island2.

I think these technical challenges are still far from being addressed. Having a cable is ideal, technically but may not be affordable and may lock other providers to come in. A pity that PI could not afford the SCC when it was designed. Even New Caledonia and French Polynesia refused it, because they did not see the need for such capacity (I think). Now they are looking at their option to set an undersea cable.

Also with the land ownership system in many Pacific Islands, an undersea cable to connect islands or coastal points on the same island may be less legally troublesome and faster to implement.

TAIPEI [Based on a presentation by Ping Yeh]

National Taiwan University's adjunct assistant professor Ping Yeh -- who is also a co-founder of the Taipei Open Source Software User Group -- recently put together (for the Asia Open Source Software Symposium) a fascinating presentation on what's happening on the FOSS front at Taiwan, the island in East Asia with a population of 23 million.

Taiwan is located off the coast of mainland China, south of Japan and north of the Philippines. Also known as Formosa (Portuguese sailors called it Ilha Formosa, which means "beautiful island"). The island comprises of steep mountains covered by tropical and subtropical vegetation.

Taiwan has had a "traditional" and "closed source" trend since the 1980s. But the government's five-year programme
2002-7 has a theme of "establishing the Free Software industry". It has been investing over 100 million NT a year, and the emphasis is on training ("nothing can be done without highly-skilled people") , standards and compatibility ("make sure things work together"), and legal issues ("reduction or removal of Free Software-unfriendly regulations and laws").

Interestingly, this programme has some clear goals. These include, building a friendly environment for Free Software development, having an internationally-active Free Software development community, high-value Free Software products, and encouraging a large-scale Free Software industrial chain.

One interesting goal the Taiwanese are talking about is having OpenOffice.org as the format for all government documents. "It requires mature localisation and massive training through all levels of government organisations," says Ping Yeh in the presentation.

There are some useful government-funded programmes too: a Linux Compatibility Test & Certification Center; an Open Source Software Application Consulting Center; the recursively-named OSSF Supports Software Freedom; standard operations procedure for open source softwares; Free Software Research & Development; and embedded Linux R&D.

Linux Compatibility Test & Certification Center, or the LCTCC, aims to test the compatibility between hardware and various flavors/versions of GNU/Linux distributions. A useful idea in a country that is into the deep end of excellence in the hardware world. It is run by the Taiwan Linux Consortium, and in 2004 had 279 database entries, six promotion events, and contacts with the Free Standards Group for setting up the LSB/OpenI18N certification. See <http://linux.tca.org.tw/linux-test/>

SOP for OSS is a Standard operating procedures for open source softwares. It is run by the Chinese Open Systems Association. By late 2005 it had completed SOP documents for installing and configuring Fedora core 2, webmin, apache, sendmail, mysql, samba, phpnuke, tomcat, openwebmail, firewall and OpenOffice.org. Each SOP has a detailed report (in PDF) and an associated flash live demo.

OSSACC (Open Source Software Application Consulting Center) is an attempt by Taiwan's Ministry of Education's push to diversity in IT education in elementary schools. It is funded by the MOE, and executed by Software Liberty Association of Taiwan. It's mission? To train elementary school teachers to use free softwares and provide support to them. It has offered more than 1500 trainees courses on Linux, OpenOffice, PHP, zope, etc. Besides, it has made and distributed the EZGo CD, a collection of free softwares on Windows and training materials <http://www.ossacc.org/>

OSSF stands for "OSSF Supports Software Freedom", and is led by the Institute of Information Science, Academia Sinica.
(The Academia Sinica, headquartered in the Nangang district of Taipei, is the national academy for Taiwan. It is deemed a primary research centre for the nation. It supports research activities in a wide variety of disciplines, ranging from mathematical and physical sciences, to life sciences, and to humanities and social sciences.) This project focuses on infrastructure building for free software development. It offers a foundry, similar to sourceforge.net, for local FOSS developers to interact in local languages.

There's also technical, operational and legal assistance. Legal analysis of OSS licenses is provided to assist developers to choose the most suitable license <http://www.openfoundry.org/>

OpenFoundry.org is the repository of OSSF. It has some 321 projects, 1753 registered users as of Sept 3, 2005. Some well-known projects emerging out of this Taiwanese experiment include OpenWebMail, OpenVanilla, Kwiki, Pugs. See <http://openfoundry.org/>

License Wizard of OSSF helps maintainers and authors of Free Software projects to choose a license they like best. You need to answer a few questions such as, and then you're prompted to the suitable license. This process is available only in Traditional Chinese so far.

Meanwhile, the F.S. R&D programme is funded by Taiwan's National Science Council, and encourages two kinds of Free Software R&D -- that needed by industry, and that which can be used as software components. It is conducted by universities and research institutes via a "call for proposal" mechanism. Some 133 proposals approved for 2003 and 2004 combined.

Embedded Linux R&D Programme is a strategy to combine GNU/Linux technology with Taiwan's local strength in IT hardware. Its target market is embedded products, it emphasises on GNU/Linux wide-scale security systems, and its major participants are the Taiwan Linux Consortium and its member companies, the Industrial Technology Research Institute and Institute for Information Industry.

Apart from all this, there's spontaneous initiatives and volunteer-driven projects -- from the research, educational, industrial sectors and the GNU/Linux community. "This is not an exhaustive report," says Ping Yeh modestly.

Taiwan Linux Consortium has been promoting GNU/Linux since 2000. Linux Expo is held every summer together with Computex, the second largest computer exhibition in the world.

Taiwan Linux Forum is active too. There's the Golden Penguin Award (annual since 2003) -- a distinguished contribution award that goes out to the best application of the year, and the best innovation of the year. This was scheduled to be extended to greater China recently.

Not to say that the educational sector is lagging behind in initiatives. School Free Software (SFS) has been run since 2003. It's a Web-based school administration portal, PHP+MySQL (LAMP).  It's modular, with more than 100 modules. Developers are teachers in elementary schools.  More then 500 schools in three counties are using it <http://sfs.wpes.tcc.edu.tw/>

Dr. Geo, on the other hand, is an interactive software for teaching geometry. It's now part of the global Freeduc project, which takes Free Software to school. There's also the Freeductw project, aimed at promoting Freeduc softwares in Taiwanese primary schools.

In the research sector, informs Ping Yeh, there are many projects, some funded by the NSC and some spontaneously growing. These include the DRBL (Diskless Remote Boot in Linux) which has one boot server, multiple diskless clients, and is seen as being particularly well suited for computer classrooms. More than 200 installed sites (6000 PCs) are in schools, hospitals, NPOs, government organizations, and small- and medium-sized businesses.

There's a Sourceforge mirror run out of the NCHC Tainan, which has been online since March 2005.

On the community front, other initiatives have come up. There's the Software Liberty Association of Taiwan. It's a not-for-profit organization dedicated to the promotion of Free Software. Donations are tax-deductible. This network holds an international FOSS conference annually since 2001. It offers community awards every other year, and interleaves with a technology competition which is also held in alternative years. It runs OSSACC for the Ministry of Education <http://www.slat.org/>

User group activities include: Taiwan linux user group (forum), Tainan linux user group (talks), Tainan county network center, Taiwan Debian user group (wiki, irc), PCManX, OV-IME, and others Fedora Taiwan (forum), Fedora LiveCD, OS X chat (irc, blog), OpenVanilla, Taipei open source software user group (talks, mailing list), Mozilla Taiwan (forum), Localisation Sayya.org (bbs), and other volunteering individuals work on Gentoo, Ubuntu, *BSD, etc.

Some names you ought to be linking to Taiwan, when you hear of them in the future: Pugs, implementation of Perl 6 in Haskell, led by Autrijus Tang <http://www.pugscode.org/>

svk: decentralized version control system that works with all major code repository systems, led by C.L.Kao <http://svk.elixus.org/>

PCMan: cross-platform BBS client with graphical user interface, led by "pcman"

OpenVanilla: cross-platform input method framework, led by Dane Liu <http://www.openvanilla.org/>

OV-IME: input method editor for OpenVanilla on Windows, led by Kanru Chen

SDL-im: enabling input method in SDL (Simple Directmedia Layer, a game development library), led by L.Y.C.

Some names that helped in collating the content of this presentation, and could be helpful contacts to finding out more: Ping Yeh (National Taiwan University & Tossug +886.913.165.100 ping@pingyeh.net) and Tinli Lin (OSSF), K.C. Chen (OSSACC), Mike Lin (TLC), Tzu-Chiang Liu (OSSF), Fred Cheng (NICI), Hong-Sheu Wu (COSA), James Chen (ITRI), Steven Hsiau (NCHC), T. H. Chang (NSC), Ying-Kuang Chen (SFS), Chao-Kwei Hung (Freeduc), Jing-Chun "jserv" Huang (Debian Taiwan), Chuan-Te Ho (RDEC).

Links to Taiwanese organizations:

Chinese Open System Association: http://www.cosa.org.tw/
Taiwan Linux Consortium: http://taiwan-linux.tca.org.tw/
Software Liberty Association of Taiwan: http://www.slat.org/

Links to Taiwanese projects:

Chinese Linux Extension: http://cle.linux.org.tw/
OSSF Supports Software Freedom: http://openfoundry.org/

Links to Taiwanese communities:

Taiwan Linux User Group: http://www.linux.org.tw/
Tainan Linux User Group: http://tnlug.linux.org.tw/
Tainan County Network Center: http://freesf.tnc.edu.tw/
Taipei Open Source Software User Group: http://tossug.org/
Debian: http://debian.org.tw/
Fedora Taiwan: http://www.fect.com.tw/
Mozilla Taiwan: http://moztw.org/
OS X Chat: http://osxchat.blogspot.com/
Dream Software List: http://wiki.debian.org.tw/index.php/WishList2005
Sayya BBS: telnet://bbs.sayya.org/

Acronyms of government agencies:

NSC: National Science Council
MOE: Ministry of Education
IDB: Industry Development Bureau of the Ministry of Economy Affairs
NICI: National Information and Communications Initiative
RDEC: Research, Development and Evaluation Commission

http://www.openmalaysiablog.com/2006/07/odf_alliance_ne.html
http://www.openmalaysiablog.com/2006/07/ps3_pikoms_conf.html
http://kushaldas.blogspot.com/2006/07/one-year.html
http://ipvsadm.blogspot.com/2006/07/idcs-asiapacific-managed-services.html
http://www.openmalaysiablog.com/2006/07/moving.html
http://www.openmalaysiablog.com/2006/07/digital_rights_.html
http://www.openmalaysiablog.com/2006/07/software_patent_1.html
http://kartikm.blogspot.com/2006/07/tuxpaint.html

IOSN News

GNU/Linux Training of Trainers, August 28 to September 9, Bangkok, Thailand

This two-week intensive course introduces GNU/Linux trainers to training with open content GNU/Linux system administration training materials and low cost LPI certification examinations. For participants from Thailand, Lao PDR, Cambodia and Malaysia over 10 days, after which they will sit for examination to be certified as LPIC Level 1 Linux professionals. In conjunction with this training, on the day of examination local proctors will be trained and certified. These independent proctors will then be able to administer low-cost paper-based LPI examinations for local organizations in their respective countries. Trainees for system administration will be able to maintain workstations and basic LAN and Internet server services. Detailed objectives for LPIC Level 1 certification are available from the links provided below:

LPI 101: http://www.lpi.org/en/obj_101.html
LPI 102: http://www.lpi.org/en/obj_102.html

More information about this event:
http://www.iosn.net/asean-3/countries/thailand/tot

Or contact:

Khairil Yusof - khairil@apdip.net

IOSN and UNDP-APDIP Releases New Publication on FOSS and Licensing < http://www.iosn.net/licensing/foss-licensing-primer/foss-licensing-primer-release>

As the FOSS Movement has been growing rapidly in recent years, more and more stakeholders are brought in to participate in different roles. Some of them are end-users, developers, business entities, or government agencies that provide funding for FOSS projects. This e-primer is designed to provide these stakeholders with some basic knowledge about copyright, software copyright and FOSS licenses. Legal issues may vary in different situations and this e-primer may not be able to provide answers to all situations. But, hopefully, it will serve as a bridge between lawyers and non-lawyers in this joint venture of FOSS development.

This e-primer examines different proprietary and FOSS licenses that use copyright law to regulate the use of software, and discusses how the FOSS movement uses licenses as a way to create a different model of software development. It provides scenarios to highlight possible copyright issues regarding the use of FOSS by end-users, developers and vendors, and addresses common questions and misconceptions regarding copyright and licensing issues. The e-primer also includes two cases regarding government-sponsored FOSS projects.

This e-primer is part of the Free/Open Source Software e-Primer Series. For other publications in this series, please visit <http://www.iosn.net/publications/foss-primers>

Publication on FOSS and Open Standards <http://www.iosn.net/open-standards/news-items/open-standards-primer>

In this age of information and communications technology, many governments are moving towards open standards frameworks.

Open standards ensure that products and services can inter-operate and work together, even though they may be from different parties or entities. Open standards ensure that the next purchase is not dictated by the last purchase, thus, increasing users’ choices, access to products, information and services, and opportunities for sharing and collaboration.

In addition to the advantage of increased competition for acquisition and the ongoing operational expense, governments, businesses and other entities can benefit from each others' efforts and share applications that each have built.

This e-primer, with a foreword by Peter J. Quinn, introduces readers to what open standards are and why they are important. It explains the standard-setting processes and provides examples of open standards policies, initiatives and formats. It also addresses the challenges faced in implementing open standards.

This e-primer is part of the Free/Open Source Software e-Primer Series. For other publications in this series, please visit <http://www.iosn.net/publications/foss-primers>

 

Tidbits from Here and There

Mongolian Open Source Network

Software Freedom Day <http://www.softwarefreedomday.org> comes up worldwide on September 16. Many teams from Asia are involved too. This network offered a link to the Mongolian Open Source Dulmandakh of Sukhbaatar, who's interested, among other things in l10n, marketing, GNOME-MN (planning), testing. A Gnome link sees Dulmandakh saying he contributes bugs and patches to GNOME's Bugzilla, contributed translations to GNOME projects, and actively promoted Gnome. Contact: DULMANDAKH Sukhbaatar <dulmandakh@gmail.com>

The Asian CJK Native-Language Group < http://ooonewsletter.blogspot.com/2006_07_01_ooonewsletter_archive.html>
On July 17, 2006, the Chinese, Japanese and Korean native-language projects of OpenOffice.org have decided to join forces to form the Asian CJK Native-Language Group of OpenOffice.org. Kazunari Hirano will act as the communications and technical coordinator of the group.

PERL and India <http://www.swaroopch.info/archives/2006/07/16/map-perl-india/>

Swaroop CH brings to everybody's attention a comment in the Perl.com newsletter. It says: "Did you know that the country with the second-largest number of Perl.com readers is India? That's right! Greetings to everyone on the subcontinent; tell your friends about us.

GNU/LINUX Training in Urdu <http://www.wbitt.com/urducbts>

Kamran Azeem (RHCE) has contributed Computer Based Training Programs for learning Linux in Urdu. You may access the CDs from <http://www.wbitt.com/urducbts> If you need the DVD version of the CBTs, they are available at Rs.500 per DVD. Kindly contact Kamran directly at: kamran@wbitt.com

Philippine Open Source Conference 2006, September 26 to 28, EDSA Shangri-la Manila <http://www.philosc.com/about_the_conference.html>

The Philippine Open Source Conference 2006 this year is merged with the first Philippine Voice and Telephony Technology Conference. The event is targeted to companies and enterprises currently using or are considering using open source voice and telephony technologies. Organizers say: "This is an excellent venue for discovering, experiencing, and learning about open source technology, systems, and services, and especially as they relate to VOIP and telephony."

Uzbekistan is Becoming Acquainted with FOSS Experience of Asia-Pacific Countries <http://www.iosn.net/Members/damiramirov/uzbfoss>

Call for Asia to Adopt OpenDocument Format
<http://www.iosn.net/open-standards/news-items/call-for-asia-to-adopt-odf>

Malaysia OKs Move Toward OpenDocument Format < http://www.iosn.net/asean-3/countries/malaysia/news/malaysia-oks-move-toward-opendocument-format>

The Opensourcedeal

Writes Raseel: "I am a Linux (and OSS) enthusiast and a moderately active member in the Bangalore and Bombay LUG mailing lists. I have just started out with a venture called The OpenSourceDeal. I plan to cater to the insatiable appetite of Indian OSS enthusiasts, newbies, converts and anyone else who may care to join in with an onslaught of OpenSource Software. Check out out site at <http://osd.byethost8.com/>

Free Shipment of GNU/Linux CDs

<http://free.thelinuxstore.ca> is offering free shipment of some GNU/Linux CDs.

From the Middle East <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Linux-middleeast/>
Linux news and views from the Middle East is a free mailing list.  Maintained by GSC Prabhakar James and Co-Moderators of Linux User Group - in the Middle East. This Linux User Group Middle East was officially founded in 1999 as the first Linux User Group in the Middle East. But the list is open to all and not confined to a particular geographical area. Anyone interested in becoming co-moderators please drop a line to <prabhags@goldensun.com>

Ethiopian Activists Promote FOSS <http://www.tectonic.co.za/view.php?id=1054&s=news>

NGOs, APC and Catia have joined forces with the Ethiopian Free and Open Source Network to host a series of workshops over the next 10 days to promote the use of free and open source software in that country. The series of three workshops will range from FOSS policy discussions to advanced systems administrator training.

Moroccan Fisheries Escapes Proprietary Net <http://www.tectonic.co.za/view.php?id=1055&s=news>

One of Morocco's first government departments to start the move to free software has chosen to switch its servers to Mandriva Linux and is looking at switching desktops to Linux in the near future in a move that could save them as much as 80% of their acquisition and support costs.


 

Links from Asia-Pacific

Nepal Discusses FOSS <http://www.madanpuraskar.org>

In Nepal, Madan Puraskar Pustakalaya has been organizing a bi-weekly, open-discussion program, where participants can discuss about FOSS, FOSS applications, Open Source, GNU/Linux etc, says MPP outreach officer Ekta Silwal. Contact <ektasilwal@gmail.com> Related groups: linuxkakura@googlegroups.com, foss-nepal@googlegroups.com

Topic: Design and Use of Ext2read Speaker: Manish Regmi
Date and Time: August 20, 2006, Sunday, 5-6 p.m. Venue: Yala Maya Kendra, Patan Dhoka, Lalitpur linuxkakura@googlegroups.com; http://nepalinux.org/content/view/21/41/ Link to MPP: http://www.madanpuraskar.org

Discussion Topics: Open Source and Linux (May 14, 2006) Localization and Nepali Aplications (May 28, 2006) How to make a boot loader and OS from Scratch (June 11, 2006) Samba and PDC (Primary Domain Controller) (June 25, 2006) Open Discussion on FOSS and Software Freedom Day (July 9, 2006) Embedded Linux (July 23, 2006) Implementing Firewall in Linux (August 6, 2006)

Proposed Topics: Open Office.org and Hunspell * Basic Commands in Linux * Trouble Shooting and FAQ discusssion * NIS, NFS and FTP * Apache * Php * MySQL * Php and MySQL * Programming in Linux (C, C++, Java) * High Performance Computing with Linux

Open Source Symposium <http://www.opensourcesymposium.org>
Eugene Teo <eteo@redhat.com> informs about planned Open Source Symposia in 14 cities across Asia-Pacific. Of the 14 cities, five will have Red Hat Developer Day as well. Writes Teo: "We cover Mumbai and Bangalore too!" Cities being covered are Beijing, Soeul, Shanghai, Taipei, Guangzhou, Manila, Singapore, Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur, besides the two in India. Outside Asia, there's Sydney, Melbourne and Auckland.

FOSS and Gender

Check out this debate at <http://www.svaksha.com/?p=55> Also see < http://g33k.wordpress.com/2006/07/17/of-women-and-free-software/>

FOSS Foundation in Pakistan

Fouad Riaz Bajwa is general secretary and FOSS Advocate at FOSSFP (Free & Open Source Software Foundation of Pakistan). Their Secretariat is at <http://www.fossfp.org> or <http://www.ubuntu-pk.org>

Quote... Unquote

From Sarawak, Malaysia

I am Nicholas Ng from Kuching, Sarawak, Malaysia. I am a member of Kuching Open Source Community < http://www.kuchingosc.org>, a community-driven efforts in promoting the open source in Kuching, Malaysia.

I was reading through the iosn-general mailing list and found out that you just presented a talk / presentation on FLOSS and the Global Community during the launching of Dzongkha Linux. The purpose why I write to you is to ask for your permission to re-use or use parts of your presentation and to have a copy of the presentation.

Our open source community is also invited to give presentation on open source and Linux for the coming ICT Fair in our city (30 June until 2 July 2006) and I would like to gather presentations from the open source community to be included in our presentations.

I hope that we can have your permission and files for your presentations.

Nicholas Ng Boon Liang, Kuching Open Source Community, Kuching, Sarawak, Malaysia
Homepage: http://www.kuchingosc.org <nbliang@gmail.com>

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IOSN NEWSLETTER: FOSS in Asia-Pacific is edited by Frederick Noronha - http://fn.goa-india.org or http://fredericknoronha.wordpress.com - and supported by the International Open Source Network <http://www.iosn.net>

IOSN promotes the adoption of free/open source software, open standards and open content for sustainable human development in the Asia-Pacific region. IOSN is a network with a small secretariat based at the UNDP Regional Centre in Bangkok and three centre of excellence -- IOSN ASEAN+3, IOSN PIC (Pacific Island Countries) and IOSN South Asia, based in Manila, Suva and Chennai respectively. To find out more, contact the centres of excellence.

IOSN ASEAN+3: asean3@iosn.net
IOSN PIC: pic@iosn.net
IOSN South Asia: southasia@iosn.net

IOSN is an initiative of UNDP Asia-Pacific Development Information, and supported by the International Development Research Centre of Canada.

To include Asia-Pacific related news about FOSS in this newsletter, please email <frededericknoronha@gmail.com> with a cc to <fred@bytesforall.org>

This newsletter is released under the Creative Commons Attribute 2.5 license. Reproduction of the contents of this newsletter is encouraged, provided acknowledgement of the source(s) is made.