[Indic-computing-users] Indlinux Newsletter Issue 4

[Pramod.R <pra...@ya...>]

Also available at:
http://indlinux.org/newsletter/4.html

!!Localization Newsletter Issue 4, Vol 1 (01 July 2004)

!Editor speak

The Indic Localization Newsletter is now four issues old. One of the
enduring themes of this effort has been a greater interaction with the
community and an increased amount of collaboration. Collaboration is
what we believe is the enduring driving force of Free/Libre Open Source
Software. L10n teams collaborate, community and industry collaborate,
communities-industry-government talk to get in implementations of work
done. The operative word here is 'implementation'.

The L10n efforts across the country are mature and at a stage where the
Project Roadmap is well laid out. We have had a number of LiveCDs being
conceived. The next step would be to take it towards a logical
conclusion. L10n efforts are citizen-centric and deployment oriented.
Thus we should take a good long look at domain-centric implementation.
Identify the vertical domains and map out application specific areas
where L10n can be immediately put into action. We need to do this
perhaps in the form of some loosely structured consortia where the
Government and the Industry are also the stakeholders.

The era of LiveCD is over - long live the LiveCD.

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!News Bits

!News from the Unicode consortium
!Common Locale Data Repository moves to Unicode
The Unicode) Consortium has announced  the release of new versions of
the Common Locale Data Repository (CLDR 1.1) and the Locale Data Markup
Language specification (LDML 1.1), providing key building blocks for
software to support the world's languages. This new release  contains
data for 247 locales, covering 78 languages and 118 countries. There are
also 36 draft locales in the process of being developed, covering an
additional 17 languages and 7 countries.
For more information visit CLDR homepage at http://www.unicode.org/cldr

!Unicode Consortium to decide on changes to Bengali encoding proposals
The Unicode consortium  will be meeting this week,  and among the long
list on the agenda is the issue of allotting a separate code point for
the Bengali Khanda-ta.

Meanwhile,  it has  been  pointed out  that  even if  the proposal  is
accepted,  implementing it  will take  at  least two  years, and  till
then, the  computing community needs to  arrive at a  consensus on how
to encode the khanda-ta. The combinations under discussion are :-
(ta, virama, zwj)
(ta, virama, zwj, zwnj)

The issue  is very sensitive for  the Bangla community,  who, like all
people, hold their dear language close to their hearts. Discussions on
the issue has raised much heat and smoke, that Saraswati* (the mailing
list administrator for <indic at unicode dot org> mailing list) has put
the list on moderation.
(*) Before  you jump into any  conclusion, Saraswati is the  name of a
machine, and not a person.

!Adding a new Indic Language - Tulu
There has been some loud thinking by  Dr. U. B. Pavanaja in one of the
Unicode forums, that Tulu, one of the ancient languages spoken mostly on
the  South-West coast of the  Indian peninsula, should  find a place in
the  Unicode standard.  Raghavendra Bhat, a  Tulu speaker  and free
software advocate, has supported the  proposal, and moves are afoot to
gather  more information  to put  forward a  concrete proposal  to the
Unicode consortium.

Interested  people  should  get  in  touch either  with  Dr.  Pavanaja
<pavanaja at vishvakannada dot com> or Raghavendra Bhat, <ragu at vsnl
dot com>.

!Two new GTK Input Modules for Bangla
Sayamindu Dasgupta <sayamindu randomink org> has announced ImBeng
Reloaded - a set of two new GTK input modules for Bangla. One of them
follows the Inscript layout, while the other follows the Probhat semi
phonetic layout. Details at
http://sayamindu.randomink.org/ramblings/index.php?p=68 .

!Volunteers/Beta Testers requested for Product Feedback
NeoLinux Solutions http://neolinuxsolutions.com is looking for
Volunteers/Beta Testers who are willing to try out the Indic Components
released by the Company. Contact Animesh <animesh at neolinuxsolutions.com>

!Ravikant announces the availability of [Bolnagri] Phonetic layout
The last newsletter announced a phonetic keyboard. The fact is that the
keyboard is now ready for use, improvement and further suggestions.
Download it from : http://indlinux.org/downloads/files/bolnagri.tar.gz
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!Team Watch

The present Kannada team:

# Let's begin with the URL of the project and Screenshots.
   *URLs
     * http://kannada.sourceforge.net/ - Project Home page
     * http://sourceforge.net/projects/kannada  - Sourceforge Project page

   *Screen shots
     * http://kannada.sourceforge.net/openoffice.org/screenshots -
OpenOffice.org Screenshots
     * http://kannada.sourceforge.net/gnome-screens/screenshots.html -
Gnome Screenshots
     * http://kannada.sourceforge.net/mozilla-with-pango.png - Mozilla
rendering Kannada
     * http://kannada.sourceforge.net/xfce-panel-kannada.png - XFCE in
Kannada
     * http://kannada.sourceforge.net/kde-preview - KDE with QT 3.2.0
screenshots


# Why did this L10n start? What was the motive behind this?

  hpnadig: The project started with an aim to help localize free
software in Kannada, initially targetting, but not limited to kde and gnome.


# What are the visions & objectives of the project?

  pramod: Besides the initial aim of translating Gnome, KDE, XFCE,
OpenOffice.org, Mozilla & other FLOSS applications,     our objective
includes making sure the rendering, input, sorting, etc., works to
user's expectations. Long term vision includes more people use and
deploy the work, more applications gets translated and localized.
Another long-term objective is to work towards a greater presence of
Kannada in the public domain, say having the Kannada equivalents of
wikipedia/Gutenberg.


# What is the current status of the Project?

  pramod: We have completed nearly 5% of Gnome 2.8,  60-70% of
OpenOffice.org 1.1.2, which except for the OpenOffice bit looks quite
bare. But speaking of current status of Kannada on Linux, we do have one
font under GPL, two keyboard layouts - one inscript & one semi-phonetic
(nudi).(The latter needs IIIMF).


# Who would volunteer for the project? What is the desired profile? Does
the project need more volunteers?

  pramod: Anyone who is interested in contributing his bit to Kannada,
be it translating the software, documentation or any content or hacking
on Kannada related stuff is welcome. The project definitely needs
volunteers who are committed and are in for the long run.


# What are the plans in future with this L10n?

  hpnadig: The future plans include completion of localization for
gnome2.6, evolution, KDE 3.2 and many other free software that are on
the community work desk.

  pramod: More translations, fixing basic issues with rendering, getting
more OpenType fonts, getting a decent phonetic keyboard and hope to see
the project stabilize instead of the high & low peak of activities we
are seeing now.


# How is the funding being managed?

  pramod: Except for the work on OpenOffice.org, rest of the work did
not receive any funding. My personal opinion is funding is needed more
for translators rather than developers, since the former are rare and
translation is quite a thankless job.


# What are the problems faced by the L10n project(Both technical and
otherwise eg. Pango, OOo etc)?

  pramod: There still is plenty of work to be done both in translations
and we barely would have progressed much if not for the ~OpenOffice.org
translations which were done by Kannada Ganaka Parishath. We hope to use
OO.o's translations for Gnome, KDE & Mozilla.  Rendering has improved in
both GTK & QT, except for some minor quirks with  GTK's deletion
handling & some minor font issues.


# Indic L10n suffer from common technical problems - are you in touch
with other groups that are doing L10n?

  pramod: Yes, We do follow the progress of other language teams and
observe their processes.


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!Help ..F1

!Debian installer to support bi-directional scripts
It has been announced in Debian  i18n list that the current version of
the  Debian  installer  supports  bi-directional scripts  like  Farsi,
Hebrew, and Arabic using libfribidi. This  means  that the  support  for
  Indic  scripts is  possible and somebody has to do the footwork.

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