Why? Lets assume that you’ve been a GNU+Linux and Free Software user for a very long time. Maybe 15 years. Maybe even more. What is the first thing that occurs to you when you encounter a problem? Or something breaks down? You search, you discuss on mailing lists,
“We should all own the content we’re creating, rather than just posting to third-party content silos. Publish on your own domain, and syndicate out to silos. This is the basis of the “Indie Web” movement.” I chanced upon the world of IndieWeb and microformats while trying to search for
Foremost - I consider myself to be a sysadmin. More than a “job description”, its an attitude and value system. And today, on SysAdmin Day, as a tribute to sysadmins and hackers everywhere, I thought I must share my perspective about why I am a sysadmin. Sysadmin first, Programmer next
Talk Slides The PDF slides that I used for my talk are available for download. Or you can preview them online as well. Or you can also view these as a JPEG slideshow of images. Tutorial Slides I also presented a tutorial and live demo of a how to build
In my personal opinion, it is meaningless if we attend an inspiring talk by Dr Richard Stallman today and are not able to reflect on his message and act on it. Here is a small set of things that you can do. There is no timeline. But please see which
Overview Here are some free software projects that students can work on. I expect that multiple students will work on the same project but with different approaches. Some of these project are research and documentation projects (tagged: research) while others are development and documentation projects (tagged: development). Modalities These projects
 I thought, instead of just mentioning about the coverage, if I could offer some more details and clarification and share the experience, maybe that might be of greater value. Open Source For You (OSFY) - January 2019 issue Here is a link
Recently, while having a discussion with a friend on how to handle a major technical issue in their college, I mentioned some collaboration opportunities that would have come up if they had chosen to use free software in the first place. When he said that “no one in the college
Background Many students participate in over-night programming events dubbed “hackathons”. Such events provide a good opportunity for students to try their hand at solving one problem over a 24 to 36 hour period. However, in a bid to provide a working solution to the problems they have chosen to work
Background It is disheartening to see well-meaning people using the term “open source” for just about everything. In my view, the term “open source” carries no meaning anymore. Not only does it miss the point and essence of why software freedom matters (and is the real concern) but it creates
Background Dr Richard Stallman (RMS), founder of the GNU Project and the Free Software Foundation, would be visiting India in January 2019. How do we make his visit to India more meaningful? How do we take this opportunity to generate activity around concepts of Software Freedom? What can you do
 Background Here is what I have been thinking about a lot recently: There is a huge gap between our thought process when things are going well versus when things are bad. My observation is that we don’t put in enough