After flirting with tech from 1989 onwards, Sam Varghese began to experiment with Linux in 1998. A couple of years later, he began using the Debian distribution as a single-boot system for his personal use. From that point onwards his interest grew and he has since written widely about free and open source software, with a great deal of his writings based on his own experiences, rather than anecdotal evidence. Open Sauce will focus on a genre of software that is present everywhere but rarely acknowledged; a genre that has little eye-candy but does most of the heavy lifting; a genre that is designed and written by people whose accomplishments are only occasionally recognised. Above all this blog will follow the KISS principle - Keep It Simple, Stupid.

Taking FOSS to the masses

by Sam Varghese

Tuesday, 04 September 2007

Since 2005, a small band of volunteers in many countries has been gathering together on one day of the year to give away free and open source software in order to spread awareness about this genre. Featured Whitepaper 5 Best Practices for Smartphone Support This year the event, Software Freedom Day, will be held on September 15. A total of 290 teams (as of this writing) will be marking the day in Africa, Asia, the Middle East, Oceania, Central, South and North America and Europe. Linux user groups will be involved as will other organisations which serve as gathering points for hobbyist and business users of FOSS. A list of the teams can be seen here . Linux distributions such as Red Hat's community project Fedora, and Ubuntu will be given away on the day. A collection of FOSS that runs on Windows has been collated into one CD, called the OpenCD, and CDs will be distributed as well. The idea is to create awareness about the range of software available for people from all walks of life. While some may dub an event of this as being political in nature, it is worth noting that in the early days of personal computing much of what was developed was freely shared around. The BASIC programming language that Bill Gates and Paul Allen sold as their first product at Micro-Soft was a modified version of Dartmouth BASIC which had been put into the public domain by John Kemeny and Thomas Kurtz. The setting up of the Free Software Foundation in 1984 was the catalyst for the creation of free software to increase by leaps and bounds and 23 years later one finds that it has grown to the point where it is difficult to find an industry or a country in which FOSS is not being used. The events are coordinated by Software Freedom International, a non-profit. SFI's objectives are to: Celebrate software freedom and the people behind it; Foster a general understanding of software freedom, and encourage adoption of free software and open standards; Create more equal access to opportunities through the use of participatory technologies; Promote constructive dialogue on responsibilities and rights in the information society; Be inclusive of organizations and individuals that share our Vision; and Be pragmatic, transparent, and responsible as an organisation. (In Melbourne, the events will be held at the Melbourne Town Hall from 11am to 4pm. It is being hosted by Computerbank Victoria.) Tags See All Tags Linux  Open Source  Sam Varghese  Software  Powered By Joomla Tags Please enable JavaScript in your browser to post your comment!

 

< Next story in category		Previous story in the category >