Got my Neo FreeRunner thanks to Openmoko, Inc.

Nov 14th

Posted by Ajay Kumar in Openmoko

1 comment

On 8th November 2008, I received my Neo FreeRunner phone to work on the Sahana mobile project. In this project, I proposed to use this device as an efficient disaster reporting tool. I choose this stack for a simple reason i.e. Open and Friendly, but I know I have to come up with more justifications which I will be posting soon when I start updating on the project. For now in this post, I would like to sincerely thank Openmoko Inc., the company who donated the phone for the Sahana project to me.

Unboxed Openmoko Neo FreeRunner

Unboxed Openmoko Neo FreeRunner

Special thanks goes to the following people whom I have been in touch regarding this and who liked the project idea and made it possible:

A sincere “thank you” to all of you!! :)

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Why should you participate in the Sahana workout?

Nov 5th

Posted by Ajay Kumar in Events

1 comment

  • Because you know PHP and can code in PHP!
  • Because you get a chance to let your code make a difference to a large cause. Globally!
  • Because you understand availability of information at the right time is important!
  • Because you *want* to do some life changing work! One that can change lives.

Imagine, a missing person has been displaced and lost touch with his family after floods. The relatives fires up an SMS to the system to search him in the database. And finds the person!!! So you can say, that was MY CODE which helped the family unite back after a disaster.***

  • Sahana is a PHP/mySQL based web application that can run over a standalone PC or a client/server & networked environment. So you need to have the knowledge of PHP to contribute to the code of Sahana.
  • Disaster strikes without notice. Sahana has been deployed at various such incidents and used by the government for relief operations. Right from pre-disaster management planning in the New York City USA, to post-disaster management operations in Sri Lanka, Pakistan, China, Philippines, India, Myanmar. So you know where your code goes! Globally and goes for a social/noble cause.
  • In such an emergency situation you need information, which is important, right when it is available. Or at least easily accessible when you want it. Getting information using your cellphone and SMS could be really easy and effective.
  • Sahana system has helped track families and unite missing victims. Certainly these are life changing experiences including saving lives. Getting the right supply of relief materials on the right time are among the few aspects the Sahana system is used in.

The example I have used is based on the scenario where Sahana is deployed with the SMS being setup which interacts with the Sahana server. People send SMS to the Sahana number and it retrieves information from the database. Missing persons information is collected at relief camps and entered into the Sahana central system. So, a person could be misplaced and land up at a relief camp in a distant area and get assistance. But his family could be searching for him/her someplace else.

More information can be found here:

http://wiki.sahana.lk/doku.php?id=dev:foss_in_2008_ideas

I am coming to FOSS.in/2008. Are you?

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Sahana at FOSS Workshop by NRCFOSS in JMIT, Radaur.

Nov 4th

Posted by Ajay Kumar in Events

3 comments

On 7th & 8th November 2008 A FOSS introductory workshop is being organized at JMIT, Raudaur, for Lecturers/Professors of computer / electronic streams at JMIT and neighboring colleges. Proposed strength is 40 participants, which will also include some student members.

Link: http://nrcfosshelpline.in/code/wiki/JmitHaryanaWorkshop

Am planning to conduct a hands-on session to install & use Sahana for the participants. Will be talking to their CSE department to have some kind of contributions done to the project.

I code for SAHANA. Do you?

Sahana India localization sprint report

Nov 3rd

Posted by Ajay Kumar in Events

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We had a Sahana localization sprint session organized in India and over the IRC, for contributors from other parts, on 1st November 2008 from 11 AM to 6 PM. It was exciting to see people turning out on time and eventually participating with some sheer amount of discussions going on in #sahana, the project’s official IRC channel on irc.freenode.net.

The main agenda was to increase the localization statistics, ensuring quality of translations at the same time, of Hindi and other Indic languages. And we ended up adding on contributions to *Hindi* and *Bengali*.

Bangla contribution was kicked off this day with 3 people contributing namely:

[name - country/team - IRC nickname]:

They were able to take up the statistics to 6% on the day for both bn and bn_IN. And at the end of the day we got some good news as well! Mayah Alam Khan got the news that he is going to be a father! after the session. We wish him and his wife a hearty congratulations on this beautiful news :) on the sprint day!

All of them started working on bn_IN first and we merged the same files to bn_BD which would later be modified as per the Bangladesh locale.

For Hindi we had the following people, including me [ajuonline] , working:

[name - country/team - IRC nickname]:

The final statistics for Hindi was taken to 86% from the earlier 82% with some quality check done by installing Sahana with the Hindi language pack and browsing through.

* While the internet at the venue stopped working as soon as we started because of the server problem which couldnt be fixed by the end, the 3 people at the venue, me, Nandeep & Jeba were not able to key in any translations.

I ran off the Internet using my cellphone’s GPRS connection and did the review while Rajesh worked on the files. I would like to specifically mention that the earlier status of 82% was a result of significant contributions from all of us :) Just that this particular day we could not do much.

We had visitors to the channel from the Indian community to check out and talk to us :) and also talk to others about the activity going on. We had a Gujarati language translator, Kartik Mistry [India - kart_ ], sign up on this day too. So we hope to get Gujarati translations taken care of soon!

Special Thanks to:

  • Gora Mohanty of Sarai, New Delhi and a prominent face of the FOSS world in India, for hosting us and help spread the Sahana message.
  • Dominic König – Our translation server admin,  Sahana PMC member and a friend :) , for being present there to assist with issues, instructions and to guide us. He was up at 7 AM in the morning, as per his time zone, for the event!! Thank you Dominic, I must say you rock!
  • The contributors working on the translation, all who are in someway or the other are active FOSS contributors.
  • People who helped spread the message about Sahana translation to the mailing lists and IRC channels in the Indian community, especially from ##linux-india.

The communication channels used were the mailing lists and IRC Channel. The log of the threads and chat specific to this event can be found here:

Conducting such an activity did help spread awareness about “What Sahana is?” and “Localization Needs of Sahana” in the Indian community for sure apart from kickstarting the Indic localization activities, and we have been receiving comments on people talking about Sahana in India and willing to contribute. So I am looking forward to have more contributions from India to this noble project.

Sahana is a useful piece of software and translations of it in various Indian languages is still something to be completed. So in case you are willing to contribute to it, do join in the project mailing list at http://groups.google.com/group/sahana-localization and help translate Sahana!

Report by Dominic König : http://edrs.nursix.org/?p=31

This post on Sahana Blog: http://talksahana.com/2008/11/03/sahana-india-localization-sprint-report/

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