Processing .....please wait.. 
The article has been forwarded.... 
Gates gone, New Delhi sponsors free software meet
Monday, 02 December 2002, 20:30 IST
BANGALORE: The Indian government, along with global computing giants Hewlett-Packard and IBM, is sponsoring one of the country's largest open source events beginning here Tuesday.
India's ministry of communications and information technology is a major sponsor of the LinuxBangalore2002, a two-day open source software talk fest being held at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) here from December 3-5.
The move comes soon after rolling out the red carpet to Microsoft chief Bill Gates who visited India in November.
"Given recent events, this endorsement was unexpected, but warmly welcomed. It warms our hearts to know that we have our government on our side. We sincerely thank the government for its support," commented Atul Chitnis, a prominent open source advocate and an adviser to the event.
The reference was obviously to the Gates visit.
Unlike proprietorial software, open source or free software offers the freedom to copy, use, adapt and distribute software, which may also be sold for a price provided other users' "freedoms" are not blocked.
This represents a radically new way of running a software business.
Proprietorial software firms like Microsoft have sought to play down threats to their business model from such approaches, but global computing firms -- specially those in the hardware sector that would like to see the market expand -- have been more than enthusiastic about exploring the potential of FLOSS, or free/libre and open source software.
LinuxBangalore2002 is being held for the second successive year, with around 75 talks being presented. Last year, some 2,000 people registered for the event.
Literally dozens of talks have been volunteered for the event. These range from corporates like Hewlett Packard and IBM explaining why GNU/Linux is "open for business" and "ready for the enterprise", to GNU/Linux's role in e-governance and education.
Linux in robotics, network security in embedded devices, geographical information system (GIS) GRASS on Linux and open source corporate desktop are some of the other subjects to be focussed on in parallel one-hour talks.
Special focus is being given to Indianisation efforts for GNU/Linux, a field that has been lacking progress in other non-English, particularly non-Latin, script languages.
Some foreign visitors are also expected. One from Japan mentioned plans to visit to build possible alliances with Indian skills for embedded Linux solutions.
Sandor Markon of Osaka, Japan told IANS: "I am the manager of a Japanese manufacturer involved in introducing Linux to my company at least five years ago. My company is considering starting to out-source software projects in India.
"I am going to attend the Linux-Bangalore conference with the goal of finding possible partners in embedded systems development capacities."
Open source in education is a growing concern in India which suffers from a resource crunch and where computer education for school students is seen as a growing priority.
Some 81 percent of those coming for the meet are interested in development, while interest in administrative tasks is 65 percent. Nearly 61 percent are interested in user issues.
Emerging technologies have the attention of 74 percent, while the government and education issues are a priority for 31 percent. Community topics interest another 30 percent.
For those techies who make it, this could be about the most important event of the year on their technology calendar.
Source: IANS
Source: IANS
