A Report on Software Freedom Day 2012

Brief Note

Software Freedom Day which is celebrated worldwide every year was successfully conducted in Petit Seminaire Hr. Sec. School, Puducherry on September 16th of 2012. The SFD was organized by Puducherry Linux Users Group(PuduvaiLUG) along with Pondicherry Science Forum. Members from Indian Linux Users Group Chennai (ILUGC) and Free Software Foundation Movement Tamil Nadu(FSFTN) with their presence provided a great support for the event.

Our Wiki-page:- http://wiki.softwarefreedomday.org/2012/India/Puducherry/PuduvaiLUG

Students, Volunteers, Professionals from various organizations came together to spread the word on Free Software.
They displayed stalls on various Free Software available and shared their knowledge with public people.

Theme of the Event

The main theme of the event was to show people what free and open source software means, the need for using them and the benefits to the people. To take the idea of free and open source softwares to the people various stalls were arranged. The stalls were arranged in such a way starting from the philosophy of free and open source which explained about the history of free and open source movement and need for it. Next, the stall on Wikipedia greatly provided an insight on why people should begin using free and open source tools.

What we did ?

In the coming stalls students and professionals displayed various free and open source tools based on different categories, for example,

Developer tools
1. Python
2. Web development tools like PHP

Multimedia tools
1.Blender
2. VLC

Astronomy tools
Stellarium

Engineering tools
Arduino and much more.

Business tools
Diskeless Client systems using Ubuntu and other tools from Blue Light Open Source Solutions – Aurovile.

Every stall gave a brief and simple explanation on the tools which provided the people a basic idea about Free and Open Source Software. Various GNU/Linux distro(s) were provided to the people who requested it through pen drive and books on python were also displayed. In the closing session of the event a small technical talk given by veterans in Free and Open Source Software gave an in depth knowledge and the true purpose of turning towards free and open source softwares. The first ever SFD event in Puducherry proved to be successful with the tireless efforts of PudvaiLUG and its members. Thanks to all Sponsors, Stall exhibitors, Volunteers, Stall Visitors and media for making this event a great start at Pondicherry.

At the end of the event Ubuntu Stickers were distributed to stall exhibitors.

Press News & Media

News covered in Newspapers (Dinamalar) and Tv Channel (AMN TV)

Pics & Clicks

http://prasanna.openphoto.me/photos/album-1/list

Note: Certificates for students who exhibited stalls will be provided soon.

SFD 2012 – Poster

Click to get full size

 “The Use of Free Software on a large scale will bring the benefits of information technology to more people ” – Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam

Software Freedom Day 2012 – 1st time at Puducherry organized by PuduvaiLUG and Pondicherry Science Forum to be held on September 16th, 2012 (Sunday) at Petit Seminaire Higher Secondary School – Main Campus (Primary Gate), M.G. Road, Puducherry. This event is to create awareness on Free Software and Open Source. Entry Free for all. Come visit the stalls and gain knowledge.

” If you have a cup of Coffee and you share it, it becomes half, If you have Knowledge and share it, it doubles and grows exponentially “

 

List of Stalls – Suggestions

Only few days left until the Celebration of Software Freedom Day. Now here, we are posting idea for stalls, that you may be interested to register and show a demo for public.

Note:- Striken out like this means they are already registered. This page will be updated as new stalls get registered.

1. Wikipedia – Open contribution in any language, Open source projects around Wikipedia.
2. Introduction to Mathematical/Scientific tools- Like Mathematica, GeoGebra, SciLab etc for math and GIS apps like QGIS, physics simulators etc.
3. Popular Open Source apps for *dows: Like VLC, LibreOffice, SciLab, DevCpp, Bluefish, etc.

(You can contact Jesse Francis (atjesse2@gmail.com) from Pondicherry University  for any help to make a stall on above 3)

4. OpenStreetMap – Open street Map is Free world-wide Map created by people like you. You can add any place in map.
5. Mozilla Firefox – A stall on the latest features of Firefox, Add-ons, etc.
6. Open Source CAD tools like QCad, LibreCAD, etc.
7. Android – World’s leading Smartphone Open Source Operating System from Google.
8. Stalls on Science tools like Stellarium, Celestia .
9. Audacity – Open Source powerful Audio editor.
10. Blender – A 3D Graphic / Animation creating tool (Used by Pixar and Disney studios)

You can register your stalls here.
After registering above, check your registration here

For any Queries, Contact

Prasanna Venkadesh:- 9940325718 (prasmailme@gmail.com)