Chief Investigators

Prof. C N Krishnan 
Director, AU-KBC Research Centre

AU-KBC Research Centre,
M.I.T Campus of Anna University,
Chromepet,
Chennai – 600 044.

Email : nrcfoss@au-kbc.in
Home Page :  www.au-kbc.in
Tel : 91-44-22232711/4885
Fax : 044 2223 1034

Mr. M. R. Rajagopalan
Director, Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC) Chennai

Block-II,
6/13 Park Avenue,
Keshava Perumal Puram,
Chennai - 600 028.

Email : nrcfoss@cdac.in 
Home Page : www.cdac.in 
Tel : 91-44-24610880
Fax : 044-24610898 

A) The Background

Govt. of India  has all along been quite supportive of  the Open Source movement at a broad level, and has   initiated  programs  on promoting open source software technologies and practices. The same has also been taken up by a number of state governments, and an experts committee of the Govt. of Tamil Nadu has in 2003 come up with a set of recommendations on how to promote and proliferate this affordable solution. Most significantly, none other than the President of the Nation has himself come out strongly in favour of  this issue in recent times.

With the availability of sophisticated software expertise becoming more wide spread, it is no more felt that only large corporations can guarantee quality and robust technologies and solutions—this is particularly the case with India where we have proven expertise of high order in this domain. It is also to be noted that even large corporations like IBM, SUN, Microsoft etc are also positioning themselves to take advantage of this superior technology for their own businesses. (Please see section I for details )

The following  are a few  immediate applications areas that are possible for FOSS technologies in the country:

The main constraints that are holding back large scale growth of Localisation and  FOSS based solutions in our country are the lack of coordination, standardization and certification , as well as the lack of trained manpower. Today, making a FOSS solution work  often does take a fair amount of technological competence being available at the premises of deployment—it is far from “plug and play”, which fact has kept it confined largely to academic and R&D environs. If the Industry can have such expertise available at its own premises, then they would be quite open to trying out FOSS based solutions. This in turn means that the Programmers and Engineers whom they recruit should have had prior exposure and training in these areas—the best place for which of course being the college itself  from where they are graduating. In other words, the OS –based technologies should be taught as a part of the curriculum itself, which in turn implies that there should be adequate number of teachers who are capable of doing this. The  FOSS Centre (NRCF) proposes to addresses this issue centrally.

Another issue that stands in the way of large scale FOSS proliferation is the lack of appropriate business models  in this area, and this is also attempted to be addressed by the FOSS Centre.

B) Aim and Scope of the Centre

The  National Resource Centre for Free and Open Source Software (NRCF) would  promote the following objectives: 

1.Human Resource Development in FOSS—

    It is believed that non-availability of FOSS-trained Manpower is one of the major reasons for the Industry not venturing seriously into this area, and the present proposal attempts to address this drawback. Here again, there  are two  segments to be addressed, and the following is being planned:

(i)            Formal Sector: Training  teachers of  Engineering Colleges  and equipping  them to offer  FOSS Electives  and student  projects in their  colleges at the UG/MCA  levels as part of the curriculum so as to ensure that  large numbers of  Engineers and MCA s are produced every year  with  exposure, training and  skills in the FOSS  area. In Phase-I extending to the first two years, this would be taken up in Tamil Nadu alone, where 100 teachers from 50 Engineering Colleges would be selected to get trained at the NRCF in teaching and guiding UG (CSE) and MCA students in FOSS. The NRCF, in consultation with the Industry and the Anna University, would develop syllabi for two curricular Electives, and the 100 selected Teachers would be trained in teaching these Electives  to the BE/MCA classes during the penultimate semester and the semester  prior to it. It is expected that each of these 50 colleges would offer these electives to a class of at least 60 students every year, so that a minimum of 3000 engineering graduates with FOSS training would be produced every year at the end of this phase.

NRCF would develop complete Kits/Packages necessary to teach the two Electives, and these would be installed in the 50 participating colleges (the H/W to be supplied by the Colleges), and supported by NRCF. It is expected that these  labs  would be used by the students to do their final year projects in the FOSS area.

In Phase-II, NRCF would extend the scheme to the other states possibly with the setting up and support of  Regional  Resource Centres, and also through the development of  appropriate Business Models.

(ii). Non-formal Sector:  Agencies like  DOEACC, C-DAC and Private parties are already involved in SW Training in this sector, and the plan here is for the NRCF to provide the necessary support to them to extend the same  strongly to the FOSS domain as well. 

2.      Technology, Tools and Solutions development in FOSS-

Coordination, Standardisation, Integration, Testing and Certification of  available  FOSS based technologies, and development of newer ones wherever relevant—keeping in view the problems of  compatibility and inter operability. The focus of this activity will be on the domains of E-Governance, SME s  and School Education. Emphasis would be  on testing and certification of available tools and technologies, and making  them readily useable  by the Industry and users. Indigenous Linux, Device Drivers, Networking and Security Solutions etc. would be at the focus of this work. The FOSS  Portal  and  Repository  being created by the NRCF would contain information on all such resources and this would be widely disseminated. Collaboration with International agencies and  players would be established to ensure that there is no avoidable duplication of efforts while doing this.

3.      Localisation  for Indian languages-

Enabling  easy creation and access of  Indian language content on the web, focus being again on coordination , standardization, testing and certification. Rather than going about creating Indian language content per se by the NRCF, the effort would be on developing , standardizing, testing and certifying Localisation tools, technologies  and resources already available with the community, so that the community as a whole is enabled to create content  relevant to our needs and context as well as access the same with ease. Rather than chase some exotic (though exciting) goals, efforts would be made to see that the Localisation activity of  NRCF does help in ensuring that  more and more of non-English knowing Indians are enabled to reap the benefit of IT and the Internet.  One  specific  task would be to co-ordinate with language communities to bring out FOSS based   Desktop related software  with user interface as well as user guides / help documents in Indian languages. Localisation Communities  already  exist in the following Indian languages- Assamese, Bengali, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi, Oriya,  Punjabi, Tamil, Telugu. Also, industry  has  recently released Indian language support for some of the Indian  languages like Bengali,  Gujarati, Hindi, Punjabi & Tamil.

One of the goals  of this initiative would also be to see that the presence and visibility of Indian Languages on the Web does increase over time. Which languages to pick, what extend of localization effort  to support, etc. would partly be determined by the funds and resources that  would be available for this work. Here again, the work would be guided by international experience where ever relevant.  

4.      Policy Formulation and Global Networking-  

Providing support to the Govt. and other agencies in policy and program formulation in this area, as well as projecting India’s position in the global FOSS community  would be one of he tasks of the NRCF. The concerned Group in NRCF would study the experience and practices in India and the world over and , in collaboration with the concerned players, would analyse and assimilate the same so as to help in drawing the appropriate conclusions from them. Based on this NRCF can come up with recommendations and advice that the Govt. and other agencies may ask for. Joining Global Networks, especially with similar placed nations, and participating in international events, would be an important component of this work so that meaningful  international alliances can be formed that are of mutual benefit. To facilitate networking, an annual event called the “FOSS Congress” would be organized by NRCF with large scale participation from all over the country and abroad.

5.  Entrepreneurship Development in FOSS-

A key aspect of this proposal is the recognition  that large scale promotion and proliferation of FOSS  and Indian language computing is possible only with appropriate business models and entrepreneurship development , as government funded initiatives have severe limits in this regard. This is a relatively unexplored area, and novel insights and thinking is called for—all in close collaboration with players already in the field, both locally and globally. The goal of the NRC here would be to propose and promote models that can lead to reasonable  scales of business activity in this space. This role would require close interaction and involvement of agencies such as NASSCOM, MAIT, CII and similar others as well as the Industry. Success on this question would be critical to the possibility that FOSS and Localisation  initiatives become sustainable and growing.

C) The Methodology of the Centre

The National Resource Centre for FOSS (NRCF) is  being  set up with the following  methodological guiding principles-

The five distinct activities identified for the NRCF  would be initiated and executed  using the  following  five  groups that would be created  in the Centre

i)        Human Resource Development  Group.

ii)       Technology, Tools and Solutions Development Group.

iii)      Localisation  Group

iv)      Policy Formulation and Global Networking  Group

v)       Entrepreneurship Development  Support Group

Each group would  set up its own goals  and plans and  would draw up the necessary programs to realise them. The manpower and resources of the Centre will be pooled together  and shared between these groups.

This proposal will be executed on a collaborative basis  between the Academia (Anna University) and the Industry (C-DAC). Joint teams will be formed  between the two parties for the design,  development, testing & integration, standardisation etc.

D) Expected outcome from the Centre

a)      Two curricular Elective Courses on FOSS  being introduced in the Engineering  Curriculum of TN  along with a supporting laboratory, and 100 teachers from 50 engineering colleges in the state trained in them  who would  ensure that  at least 3000  engineers passing out every year  from TN would have FOSS  exposure and expertise. The model to be  spread to other states from the 3^rd year onwards using he  full-fledged FOSS  kits/packages developed in the first phase. The teaching/training material developed would also be made available to the agencies involved in the non-formal and school education sectors.

b)      The resource centre would function as the one stop clearing house  on all aspects of FOSS related products ,technologies, solutions, resources, standards, testing and certification, policies, recommendations, etc. in the country.

c)      The resource centre would  serve as a  national reference point for all localisation initiatives in India, as well as  coordinate, standardise and support  all such initiatives.

d)      A comprehensive national portal and repository for FOSS and Localisation in India

e)      A range of FOSS based technologies and products ( Indigenous Linux, Device Drivers, Security Products, etc.) targeted specifically at the e-governance, SME s  and school  education segments.

f)        A network of  national FOSS groups, institutions and initiatives, linked suitably to the international FOSS  network  and  fully responsive to international trends. An Annual FOSS Congress  would be  organized by the Centre to show case all such activities and achievements in this space.

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