Introduction to Bihar Linux User Group

As the name suggests, Bihar Linux User Group is a non-profitable association of persons, institutions and any type of organizations, who are using GNU/Linux for any purpose and are related with our Great Bihar , involved in promoting GNU/Linux and concept of Free/Libre/Open Source Software for eliminating software piracy starting from Bihar to Entire Globe. The main objective of this user group is to promote the concept of freedom in software and stop piracy, but, it is also an attempt to bring the whole IT community of Bihar within one group, so, we can share our thoughts with each other. For our soul purpose, we are continuously trying to educate people about piracy and how to eliminate it by using licensed versions of proprietary software or free software like Linux.

For understanding the purpose of BLUG, we must have to understand the basic terms like Piracy, Proprietary Software, Open Source Software and Free Software first.

Freeware, Shareware, Proprietary Software

These are terms that every one of us has heard. Yet, there is an important difference between them. Freeware is typically compiled into binaries that the author distributes and allows other to distribute without a fee. Shareware is a ‘try before you buy’ method of software distribution, and typically allows distribution of ‘demo’ or crippled copies that must be unlocked by a paying customer in various ways.

Proprietary software, on the other hand, is even more restrictive. It does not allow redistribution. It makes you a criminal if you copy it. It makes you rely on a specific vendor. Proprietary license agreements do not respect your rights or feelings.

What ‘Free Software’ means

The term ‘free software’ has been quite a misunderstood term, probably because the English language gives the word ‘free’ two alternative meanings. A common meaning of ‘free’ is ‘zero cost’. The other, is ‘freedom’. That sense of freedom and the interpretation of the word ‘free’ in ‘free software’ are the same. Zero cost, however, is an added advantage that free software often gives us. Free software primarily appeals to humanity, and often to economics.

The idea of free software expects you, the user, to recognize and honour the freedom that each of us have. It does not place us in the shackles that proprietary software does. Free software places an important responsibility on both the developers and users of the software – they must recognise and respect this freedom as an important and integral part of the software, and not restrict others from the freedom they themselves enjoy.

What ‘Open Source Software’ means

Some people found that ‘free’ could be a misleading term, especially when dealing with the common man, the media, and the industry. They also found that speaking about ‘freedom’ was a bad tactic, and did not encourage people to become part of the movement. Eric S. Raymond is one of the most notable proponents of this view. In 1998, he and a few other like-minded people decided to talk differently about software that has been written in collaboration by many people. It was thought better to use terms that would appeal to the common man and corporate. They believed in effective marketing of software and making many people use it. They wanted to motivate the press to say more about the movement, and improve their chances of being seen and accepted by all. This was the beginning of the Open Source Initiative (OSI). Proponents of open source have decided to make the Linux kernel their most successful and most visible flagship, and take on people who would have dismissed talks of freedom and ideology and ethics. Their targets are the MIS people and corporate decision makers, and they aim for maximum audience. They have been very successful proponents of their school of thought.

Confusions and Benefits

The result of all this is a lot of confused people. And people who have just heard of ‘Linux’ or ‘open source’ or ‘free software’ are the most vulnerable. It is important that we take things in the right spirit. It is important that we do not split hairs over whether to scream ‘free software’ or ‘open source’; and that the OSI and the FSF are doing us good in their own ways. We need to realise that all of FLOSS (Free/Libre/Open Source Software) comes to us today due to the combined efforts of the FSF, the OSI, and many others. We need unification, rather that conflict.

The FSF is helping to make better thinkers and better people out of us; the OSI is trying to make us more acceptable to ongoing economics. Instead of weighing the difference and the short or long-terms goals, we must express solidarity with all our fellow hackers.

Giving credit where it is due is equally important. Today, this movement would not have existed, if RMS, Linus and all the others (the developers of Apache, Samba, Perl, KDE and GNOME, for example) had not made really useful software. These pieces of software have their distinct and irreplaceable pedestals, and no one can ever

Do you know what is Piracy?

Unauthorised copying, redistributing, decompiling or installing more than license of proprietary software is a crime, which is called Piracy. Which means you cannot make copies of any proprietary software without written permission of vendor; or give its media to you friend for any kind of use. If you pay for any proprietary software to vendor, you do not buy the software but the license to use it on one or more systems according to licence agreement. So, if you install it on more than licensed number of system the license becomes void and it also comes into the category of piracy. In Bihar it is a big problem because more than 75% computer users are using Pirated software, without knowing about it that they are doing Crime. If you decompile any proprietary software to find its source code, you are doing crime also, because there is restriction on changing a bit of software by you, so, you can not know how these software work and how you can convert them according to your needs.

On the other hand Free/Libre/Open Source Software follows GNU General Public License which is the most liberal License Agreement which provides us the right to freely copy, modify & redistribute them without any kind of legal problem. Since GNU/Linux follows GNU GPL, so you can freely copy, modify and redistribute it to your friends without paying a bit to its developers. You can also gain the source code of software, so, you can modify and convert it according to your needs and redistribute to your colleagues.

Movement in India

India is a rapidly growing IT power. It is for all of us to decide what to do with our vast and highly productive resources – whether to deploy FLOSS that can save our government millions, or to be just another major customer of any foreign software company.

It is for us to decide whether our students should learn their most important computer concept from ‘now click/type this, then that’ kind of courses, or from courses that teach concepts by revealing what really happens inside their machines. This is an important prerequisite for the advancement of knowledge.

It is for us to do our bit for the proliferation and acceptance of GNU/Linux as a mainstream platform in everyday computing. It is not just about reaping the benefits of this movement, but also about contributing whatever we can.

Finally, it is for us to decide whether we wish to remain at the mercy of a few people least bothered about our real needs, or we decide to think clearly and realise the benefits possible by advocating the intended ideas underlying Free/Libre/Open Source Software.

Linux and the Sarkars

Linux was born in Finland but is growing in places as far apart as Malaysia and Brazil . Here’s a quick roundup of the steps taken by governments across the globe towards using FLOSS.

Australia :   After flashing the green light to all its departments and agencies to investigate and adopt OSS , many organisations including the federal government are moving over to Linux.

Brazil :        Recently, the Brazilian government moved 80 percent of all computers in the state institutions and state-owned businesses from Windows to Linux. Meanwhile, the city governments in Recife , Campineas, Sao Carlos , and elsewhere have not only dropped Proprietary softwares but also mandated Linux.

Denmark :   In a report last year, the Danish board of technology argued that the public administration could save billions of Danish Kroners ( Denmark ’s currency) by using free and open source software. The research began with an evaluation of StarOffice and resulted in a deal between Sun Microsystems and UNI-C that allowed school students and teachers to download StarOffice for free or buy a CD at the cost of replication.

Finland :     Dubbed as the homeland of Linux, 28 employees from 13 different government agencies completed a project in April last year to test the OpenOffice.org and StarOffice productivity suites. The government already has about 13 percent of its servers running on Linux.

France :      The French agency, Agency for Technologies of Information and Communication in Administration (ATICA), has been set up by the French government. One of the missions of this agency is to encourage various administrations to use free software and open standards. Linux systems help to keep in order France ’s cultural, defence and educational ministries.

Greece :      The Greek government last year decided that all public schools should be equipped with dual boot (Linux plus Windows 2000) computers. 3000 labs are already up and running.

Israel :        Known as the busiest army in the world, the Israel Defence Force is considering shifting to Linux.

Italy :          Florence (an Italian city) passed a resolution that mandated use of ‘software libero’ wherever possible.

Japan :       Japan has been spending huge amounts of money on Asian software developers working on Linux. It plans to spend one billion Yen for this purpose.

Korea :        HancomLinux signed a deal with the Korean government to supply it with 1,20,000 copies of its Linux desktop office productivity suite-HancomOffice. Coupled with as many Linux users, it accounts for 23 percent of the government’s installed base.

Malaysia :   The government of Malaysia at the beginning of 2002 had said that it would like to see open source implemented wherever it was practical.

Mauritius :   The Mauritius government is adopting Linux and other open source solutions under various sectors. The Mauritius government is also considering the use of Linux and open source solutions in school and colleges.

Nigeria :      456 units of 800i single-processor Linux based blade servers were used to register votes for the country’s first elections run by civilians in 37 Nigerian states.

Norway :     The Norwegian government in mid 2002 cancelled an exclusive contract with Microsoft in order to provide software for computers in Public offices.

Pakistan :    Sometime in June 2002, the Pakistan government launched an initiative to cut down piracy with Linux as the cornerstone. The Technology Resource Mobilisation Unit established by the government is focusing on Linux. This move resulted in Pakistan installing some 50,000 Linux-based computers in schools and colleges all over Pakistan .

Philippines : Similar to Thailand , the Philippines government has made an effort to develop a package of open source software products for government agencies.

Russia :       While most Russian ministries are keeping mum about their IT strategy, there has been evidence of Linux use in Russian government. Some departments, such as the Research and Development Institute of Power Engineering and KosmoServices, are migrating to ASPLinux.

Spain :        The government launched a campaign to convert all the computer systems in government offices, businesses and homes, from the Windows operating system to Linux, a free alternative. At last count, 10,000 desktops had been switched with 1,00,000 more scheduled for conversion.

Sweden :    The Swedish agency for public management is setting up a working group to investigate the value Linux could provide.

Taiwan :     The Taiwanese government is also another examples of governments announcing intentions to pursue open source over major commercial applications.

Thailand :   A technology group subsidised by the government, known as National Electronics and Computer Technology Centre, has developed its own package of open source software to be used on government desktops. Extensions of Red Hat Linux, Linux-SIS and Linux-TLE have been made freely available to government groups.

UK :             Linux seems to be a hit with the government law enforcement agencies, as UK also started switching to Linux desktops late last year with West Yorkshire force and plans to cover 60,000 desktops.

It is quite evident that slowly but steadily, Linux and the entire FLOSS bandwagon is making confident inroads into the offices of global governments.

Money for Nothing

Many people including Software vendors and developers think “How will I earn money if people can also download or share with others my high-priced software for zero rupees?” The answer is resonating in every temple across India .

Outside most Indian temples, we can buy a Hanuman Chalisa, a Durga Chalisa, or any other prayer or devotional poem as a small booklet at whatever price-point suits us. Perhaps, a devotee may give away a few thousand copies for free, with the donor’s name prominently printed on the first page. Walk into any upmarket bookshop, and we just find the same prayer in an illustrated art table book, or as part of a commentary or treatise by a learned scholar, again available at various price-points.

The original prayer remains royalty-free, and non-exclusive. Yet look at the millions of rupees made each year in the sale of such freely available material. Ironic and insightful, how much money is made from something so free, and so widely available? Even more ironic then, is when people ask me how money can be made from GNU/Linux, when it is available in exactly the same way: royalty-free, non-exclusively, and for free.

GNU/Linux allows the most pragmatic approach to making money. Anybody can make money with GNU/Linux. All that is required is a simple shift in thinking. Developers, the millions of skilled workers and cogs of the software industry, hold the key. For the GNU/Linux developer community has proved that for any foreseeable application some software code, in some form, already exists under the GPL. Nothing needs to be coded entirely from scratch. So, developers can pitch for projects, and get handsomely paid, for modifying and enhancing an existing code to suit a customer’s need. They can then release the software under the GPL for the benefit of others as well. Customers gain because they save on money, development time, and avoid several potential pitfalls and blunders. Similarly, software companies can earn money from developing, deploying, testing, consulting, and maintaining, GPL-ed software for clients. In fact, this model truly gives a software company a distinct competitive advantage.

How can you contribute in this movement?

You can actively contribute in meeting our objectives by becoming a member of this group and promoting Linux by your own way. You may promote Linux by providing training, showing its advantages to others, or supporting people who want any help.

·                                                  If you are a student then you can encourage your friends to use Linux and join our group for finding free training and support from us.

·                                                  If you are a hardware or software vendor then you can sell your computer systems preloaded with Linux and encourage your customers to give a try to Linux. It is very safe to install and in some conditions it is more safe & secure than other OS popular in market. We do not say not to install & use licensed version of Windows or other OS, but, if you use pirated versions of proprietary software then you know that you are doing crime. If you have an option for legal software then why you are doing crime, please just give a try to Linux. If you feel any problem regarding it, we welcome you to contact us for free support.

·                                                  If you are a software developer then you can use a language for your development work which is platform independent and may be use across many OS, for example if any program is developed in C, C++, Java, Perl, Python, Ruby etc. Programs developed in these languages may be used on Linux without any change or minor changes. If you are a VB developer you can use its clone named QT designer on Linux, it works the same way as VB does. We are always ready to support you.

·                                                  If you are a teacher, counsellor or faculty member of any institute, you can encourage your students to use Linux because it provides the whole source code of programs, tools and OS also. So, your students can experiment with source code and can study the advance programming techniques with the help of prewritten programs.

·                                                  If you are owner of any Computer Institute or a cyber café then you can use Linux for free and you don’t have to pay for licensed versions of other software. It makes you organization legal and secure.

·                                                  If you are a home user then prepare to switch over Linux because it is a full multimedia enriched OS having each type of multimedia tools inbuilt with it. You can see movies, hear songs, play games (a lot of games freely available in-built with Linux), a superb graphical desktop which is impossible with other OS.

·                                                  If you are an Office user you can find each and every software related to your job at almost Zero cost, and you have an option to convert the software according to your need, and there will be no objections. There are many office software suites like KOffice, Star Office and OpenOffice.org are freely available and often preinstalled in your Linux PC. There are word processors, spread sheet program, presentation software, Personal Information Managers, E-mail Clients, Web Browsers, Instant Messengers, and Financial software also present and preloaded in your Linux System.

Bihar Linux User Group’s Contribution in this Movement

In using Linux there is only one problem, there are very few support persons are available near you to support you in any kind of problem you feel with Linux, either it may be in training of Linux, installation of a new Linux System, or in using any application over Linux. Considering these problems with new Linux users we have stared this group of volunteer members who are always ready to support you. Sometimes earlier some people had tried to do the same thing but they were alone, having no strategy to develop and spread this mentality to help others for promoting Linux. Since there was no profit of members in making others member of this group, they lost affection in increasing membership.

But, we have defined some strategy to increase the membership. If you are a member of Bihar LUG and you encourage some body to join our group, then please enter your Member ID in Parent ID’s field of your friend’s Membership form. This will ensure that you have encouraged him to join our group and for this contribution the group will provide you a certificate of excellence.

There is also very low awareness in computer society of Bihar about Linux. Many of us has only heard the name of Linux. Some people have used WinLinux 2000 sometimes earlier or using till now, which is very poor in user interface and facilities. The world has changed a lot. Now, we have a very user friendly distribution of Linux in only one CD called Knoppix, which may used for booting from CD, working on RAM, saving files on floppies and no use of any Hard disk but there’s a provision to install on Hard disk also. The new versions of Red Hat Linux, SuSE Linux, FEDORA  and other distributions with each and every kind of software applications are also available. There are many plus points with current versions of Linux, about which you will understand in training sessions.

 Disclaimer:  Some parts of this document have been taken from different articles of Asia ’s First Linux Magazine ‘Linux For You’. We know this may be void of copyright, but we think the ‘Linux For You’ team and authors of these articles will not mind it because we have done it only for promoting Linux. ‘Linux For You’ is a very good Magazine, which includes every aspect of Linux very well. We recommend it to buy or subscribe for every member of our group.

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Linux is registered trademark of Linus Torvalds.