Education
Introduction
Read this blog for ideas to move forward to producing a specialised educational distro (edu-GNU) for India. A copy of the blog. The project is hosted by Sarovar.org (Indian Sourceforge).
See Current Events organised by FOSS Community India.
Distros to start with
We have two Indian distros already to start with
- EduMorphix
- EduSarge
Don't start with a large project
Nobody should start to undertake a large project. You start with a small trivial project, and you should never expect it to get large. If you do, you'll just overdesign and generally think it is more important than it likely is at that stage. Or worse, you might be scared away by the sheer size of the work you envision. So start small, and think about the details. Don't think about some big picture and fancy design. If it doesn't solve some fairly immediate need, it's almost certainly over-designed. And don't expect people to jump in and help you. That's not how these things work. You need to get something half-way _useful_ first, and then others will say "hey, that _almost_ works for me", and they'll get involved in the project. -- Linus Torvalds, 2004 * Source: Linux Times interview, October 25, 2004.
Background to this initiative
This activity (originally planned for Software Freedom Day) intends to set the stage for an Educational Track in FOSS.IN. It intends to target Teachers as well as students. Some of the projects work in this field are
- Organization for Free Software in Education
- Open Source Education Foundation
- Edu Ubuntu
- Debian EDU
- SchoolForge
- EduMorphix
- How Free Software helps teachers and students
GNU Labs
Mentors for Student projects
Links to the VTU FLOSS campaign
Also it is an effort to link various activities happening around like VTU FLOSS campaign
Coverage of VTU FLOSS campaign in TOI is here
Questionnaire for conducting a FOSS event in a college
Before conducting any free software workshop, I ask the following questions (e-mail/phone) to students and faculty staff of the institute, separately:
1. Have students used GNU/Linux in the college? If yes, for what purpose? Browsing, chatting, application development, R&D?
2. Have students done FLOSS projects online?
3. How many hours do students spend their time in the labs in the college?
4. Are there any companies in the campus doing projects with students?
5. Do students know any foreign language?
6. How many courses/labs do students do per semester?
7. Do students/faculty get Internet access 24x7? What about hostel students?
8. Can students/faculty use mobile phones/laptops in the college premises?
9. Are students/faculty allowed to bring floppies/USB flash disks/CDs to college and use it in the labs?
10. Are Saturdays working days or are they holidays? If holidays, what do most students do during weekends?
List of softwares that can be used by engineering students
Bookmarks via del.icio.us
Some collection of links that might be useful... FN's links on delicious, including a lot related to Free Software and education. In particular, you can find my links here
Sorry that the tags have been a bit haphazardly done, spreading the subject across different tags.
Co-ordinators: those taking this initiative forward
- Praveen A. Email: pravi --dot-- a --at-- gmail --dot-- com
- Thejesh GN. Email: thej --at-- techmag --dot-- biz
- Vivek Varghese Cherian. Email:- vivekvc AT nospam riseup nospam DOT net
- Dilip Vamanan. Email:- dilip AT dilpu DOT net
- Anush Shetty. Email:- itsanushshetty AT gmail DOT com
- Anivar Aravind. Email:- anivar AT nospam gnu DOT org DOT in
- Kushal Das: Email:- kushal AT N0SpaM fedoraproject DOT org
See a list of projects co ordinated by FOSS Community, India