[Indic-computing-users] Incorporating Indian Linux

[jitendra <jit...@vs...>]

The trigger by Venky is very timely.The posting by Hema is really
importanat.
I do humbly feel that in the near term, unicode will be the determining
standard. However for the rest I agree with a lot of what she says.
Our project to make free software available in indian languages with the
same facilty as in English cannot be emphasised more.
Motivations for this have several components , each being present in all
activists , some with more some with less intensity. These are techie
ego , altruism, pragmatism, self-interest,professional commitment etc.
While individuals in research or commercial setups are driven by
different major drives, all of us have a greater common good in mind.
The need is to coalesce all these strands, spread thin in the absence of
coordinating body.
The very fact that there is no single web-site that showcases all that
is happening and act as a  repository on this front and that can act as
a clearing house for ideas and resources is an indicator that there is a
need for a pooling of resources.
 What is needed is a comprehensive view of things. Natinoal economic
priorities, commercial viability of business ventures, ethical
imperatives, technical advances and limitations, appropriateness to our
audience to day( as also  future compatibilty ), circulation of reserach
results from many centres and very nimportantly an ARMY (with a gentle
hierarchy of  foot-soldiers,majors and generals ) to support the free
software movement etc. What is further needed is wrapping up all the
work into products that can be ready to use. These products have to
fulfill the felt needs. What are the needs. Someone has to do a proper
survey.

There are some efforts that cannot be omitted from our view ( in
addition to the ones listed by Hema)
IIT Madras: The acharya site with deep insight and broad vision with
recent gtk based editor of Dr RK Kalyankrishnan, IndLinux and
multyglyph, Dr Yagnanarayana in the area of speech technology etc
projects are efforts of mammoth proportions.
TDIL: I would like to assert that TDIL of Ministry of IT, New Delhi has
been persuing support for the Indian language work for a long time  and
a lot of the same applies to Linux. I can say very strongly that support
for free software is very sympathetic and strong. Vishwabharat, with all
its limitations is a great platform that needs to be used
LTRC ,IIIT Hyderabad  with Vineet Chaitanya and Mrs Amba Kulkarni ,
under the leadership of Rajeev Sangal have done tremendous work on
dictioneries, intermediate stages of Machine translations and even fonts
all exclusively in free software domain.
IISC Banglore: Brahmi and other projects at Lang Tech Research
MGandhi Vishwavidyalay at Wardha : It has a similar objective of pooling
resources.
ISI Calcutta : Pioneers in indian language technology
HBCSE, TIFR, Mumbai: free software and indian language support, active
linux group
IIT Kanpur and IIT Mumbai : TDIL supported language technology centres
The latter particularly in UNL
Banasthali Vidyalay, Rajasthan: TDIL supported localisation initiative
NIC : The major institution of the govt has created a lot of
applications
Western Railway: Rajbhasha.com and Dr R. k. Gupta have done a major
implementation for public use.
Bangla fonts:

Private vendors: Akruti, ShreeLipi, Miyhi, APS etc. have been working
towards development of Indian language writing methods and other
resources.

International:Some of the international worl like Owen Taylor on pango
and Dave Love/Kawabata on Enmacs, Gasper Sinai on Yudit and some people
in Abiword


CDAC , NCST and ER&DCI need not be mentioned for being well known govt
arms of Software Technology .


( a personal note: In fact I had circulated a draft  note on
standardisation to many on this list which was prompted by TDIL . I had
wanted people to help in drawing up a roadmap in collaboration with
software vendors  who have been working on local languages on M$Windows
platform. Dr R. K. Kalyankrishnan of IITM was the only one who was good
enough to give a detailed response. .)

A platform that  can attract all  interested  is needed. An arm to
implement and support the products is needed. How can all this happen .
Venky's trigger on indic computing  may result in a solid  positive
move.The idea of incorporation of a (non-profit) setup may prove
successful if it creates the necessary organisational backbone and
financial muscle  for supporting  a coalescence of several strands. Are
revenue model , training setup, human resource development, organisation
and project management the main weaknesses. If so, may be his proposed
corpration may come up with a ( revenue and revenue sharing along with
ethical  value sharing) model that fits the bill.

I for one believe in blossoming of hundred flowers. So non-incorporated
non-commercial, private or govt ,  efforts may also do many useful
purposes or may even prove better.

Jitendra