Free as in Freedom

These are just some thoughts that came to my mind on reading the new draft policy on ICT and Education of the Government of India.

1. Our education system attempts to provide the same kind of education throughout the country through institutions such as the CBSE and ICSE, while, in the states, every child studies the same material irrespective of his/her immediate society. Thus, a tribal child studies the same things as the urban child and a fisherman's child. While this is certainly desirable to a certain extent, the child acquires few skills needed to live in its surroundings and can get easily alienated from its immediate society. In fact, the curricula is biased towards the needs of the urban child, thus even alienating the rural child from the school curriculum. This is an issue that has occasionally been discussed by our education experts. To an extent, it has been rather difficult to tailor the curriculum to suit the needs of the children in different parts of the country.

Now ICT provides a means of providing appropriate curricula to children in each corner of the country. While there has to be a common curriculum for the entire country, a part can be common just to each state and another part can be customised for each part of the state. For example, while there can be a common curriculum in, say, English, Science and Mathematics for the whole country, the local language varies from state to state, history should have a certain amount of local content (say, 20%), and there can be some material of local relevance in each region (say, 5% overall) apart from history that may be decided in consultation with local people. With ICT, it is possible to plan, create and deliver such diverse curricula and evaluate the students on their achievements too without much difficulty. The national policy should have such goals as its ultimate targets.

2. Any education system is naturally aimed at the average student. As a result, students who have much lower learning abilities and those who are exceptionally brilliant suffer. Students who find it difficult to cope with the curriculum are often helped by providing separate, and sometimes personalised, tuitions. But exceptionally bright students often suffer boredom, eventually lose interest in studies and perform badly in their examinations. This is particularly sad because society loses its brightest brains. Perhaps, this is one of the reasons for India not producing as many outstanding scholars and innovators as it should have considering the high number of scientists and researchers it is producing.

Here again, ICT can provide a way out by offering students opportunities to explore the subjects beyond what their curricula demand, thus satisfying the needs of the exceptionally bright children. By providing a way for them to satisfy their curiosity and explore avenues for knowledge beyond their text books, their minds are kept busy and free of ennui, and they feel a sense of achievement that could drive them to achieve more. With the help of ICT, all this can be done and even the evaluation process can be personalised, providing a "flat" playing ground for all students and making them most useful for society.

3. Another area where ICT should be roped in is in helping children with learning and physical disabilities. Conditions like Dyslexia and Autism are supposed to affect 5 to 10 percent of children in any population. As a nation, we have not been paying much attention to the needs of such children. ICT can be of help in the education of such children. Interestingly, there are people in India who have been working to develop this technology for the education of people with such disabilities. A large fraction of our people, including school teachers, is still unaware of such conditions and tend to punish the children for not performing well. This is a tragedy. They are individuals who can contribute much to society, as much or more than other "normal" individuals. It is time for the Government of India, and the governments in the states, to start paying attention to such issues, educating teachers and parents about learning disabilities and educating them on how to handle such children.

Similarly, ICT can help children with physical disabilities (including blindness and malformed or absence of hands) to lead a more normal life and learn like other students. Again, pieces of Free Software such as Orca (screen reader) are extremely useful not only because they are available free of cost but also they allow us to customise them for the number of different languages and dialects in the country. The proprietary equivalents are not only extremely expensive but also do not allow customisation for our languages. It is time that the Ministry for Human Resource Development looked into these matters and adopted a policy that will be of relevance to them.

(തേജസ് പത്രത്തില്‍ ഒക്ടോബര്‍ 2010ല്‍ പ്രസിദ്ധീകരിച്ച ലേഖനം)

ഇക്കഴിഞ്ഞ സെപ്റ്റംബര്‍ 10-12 തീയതികളില്‍ കോഴിക്കോട്ടുള്ള നാഷണല്‍ ഇന്‍സ്റ്റിറ്റ്യൂട്ട് ഓഫ് ടെക്നോളജിയില്‍ വെച്ചു് സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറും വിദ്യാഭ്യാസവും എന്ന വിഷയത്തെപ്പറ്റി ഒരു സമ്മേളനം നടന്നു. അതു് സംഘടിപ്പിക്കുന്നതില്‍ ഈ ലേഖകനു് ഒരു പ്രധാന പങ്കുണ്ടായിരുന്നു. 10-ാം തീയതി വൈകിട്ടു് സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ പ്രസ്ഥാനത്തിന്റെ സ്ഥാപക നേതാവായ റിച്ചാര്‍ഡ് സ്റ്റാള്‍മാന്റെ മുഖ്യപ്രഭാഷണത്തോടെ ആരംഭിച്ച സമ്മേളനം സ്ഥലത്തെ നിയമസഭാംഗമായ ശ്രീ പ്രദീപ് കുമാറാണു് ഉത്ഘാടനം ചെയ്തതു്. ഈ സമ്മേളനത്തിന്റെ പശ്ചാത്തലത്തില്‍ അവിടെ ചര്‍ച്ചചെയ്ത വിഷയത്തെപ്പറ്റി ഒരു വിലയിരുത്തല്‍ നടത്താം.

കേരളത്തിലുള്ളവരെ സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ പരിചയപ്പെടുത്തേണ്ട ആവശ്യമുണ്ടെന്നു തോന്നുന്നില്ല. നമ്മുടെ പള്ളിക്കൂടങ്ങളിലെല്ലാം ഉപയോഗിക്കുന്നതു് സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറാണല്ലോ. എങ്കിലും എന്താണു് സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ എന്നു് വിശദീകരിക്കട്ടെ. കമ്പോളത്തില്‍ വിറ്റഴിക്കുന്ന സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറുകള്‍ ഉപയോക്താക്കള്‍ക്കു് സ്വാതന്ത്ര്യം നല്‍കുന്നവയല്ല. ഒരു നിശ്ചിത എണ്ണം കമ്പ്യൂട്ടറുകളില്‍ ഉപയോഗിക്കാനുള്ള അവകാശം മാത്രമാണു് അവയുണ്ടാക്കുന്ന കമ്പനികള്‍ ഉപയോക്താക്കള്‍ക്കു് നല്‍കുന്നതു്. മാത്രമല്ല, മനുഷ്യര്‍ക്കു് പഠിക്കാനാകുന്ന സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറിന്റെ മൂലരൂപമായ സോഴ്സ് കോഡ് അവര്‍ പരമരഹസ്യമാക്കി വച്ചിരിക്കുകയാണു്. അതുകൊണ്ടു തന്നെ സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറില്‍ എന്തെങ്കിലും മാറ്റം വരുത്തണമെന്നു് ഒരു ഉപയോക്താവിനു് തോന്നിയാലും അതു് ചെയ്യാനാവില്ല. എത്ര കമ്പ്യൂട്ടറുകളില്‍ വേണമെങ്കിലും ഏതാവശ്യത്തിനും ഉപയോഗിക്കാനും മറ്റുള്ളവര്‍ക്കു് പകര്‍ന്നു കൊടുക്കാനും മൂലരൂപം വായിച്ചു് പഠിക്കാനും അതില്‍ മാറ്റം വരുത്താനും എല്ലാം സ്വാതന്ത്ര്യം നല്‍കുന്ന സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറാണു് സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍. 1983 സെപ്റ്റംബറില്‍ റിച്ചാര്‍ഡ് സ്റ്റാള്‍മാനാണു് ഇതിനു് തുടക്കം കുറിച്ചതു്.

വിവരവിനിമയ സാങ്കേതികവിദ്യ, അഥവാ ഐ.സി.റ്റി (Information Communication Technology, ICT) എന്നതു് മനുഷ്യന്‍ വികസിപ്പിച്ചെടുത്തിട്ടുള്ള സാങ്കേതിക വിദ്യകളില്‍വച്ചു് ഏറ്റവും കൂടുതല്‍ സാദ്ധ്യതകളുള്ളതും നമ്മുടെ ജീവിതത്തെ സ്വാധീനിക്കാന്‍ ഏറ്റവും കഴിവുള്ളതും ആയവയില്‍ ഒന്നാണെന്നു പറയാം. നമ്മള്‍ കാര്യങ്ങള്‍ ചെയ്യുന്നതിനെയും ചിന്തിക്കുന്നതിനെ പോലും വല്ലാതെ സ്വാധീനിക്കാന്‍ ഈ സാങ്കേതികവിദ്യയ്ക്കു് കഴിഞ്ഞിരിക്കുന്നു. സന്ദേശങ്ങള്‍ കൈമാറുന്നതു മുതല്‍ അച്ചടി, ഛായാഗ്രഹണം, സംഗീതരചന, ചലച്ചിത്രനിര്‍മ്മാണം എന്നിങ്ങനെ നമ്മുടെ മിക്ക കര്‍മ്മരംഗങ്ങളെയും കമ്പ്യൂട്ടര്‍ മാറ്റിമറിച്ചിരിക്കുന്നു. ഉദാഹരണമായി, കടകളുടെ മുന്നില്‍ വയ്ക്കുന്ന ചെറിയ ബോര്‍ഡുകള്‍ മുതല്‍ വലിയ പരസ്യബോര്‍ഡുകള്‍ വരെ ഒന്നും ആരും ഇപ്പോള്‍ കൈകൊണ്ടു് എഴുതാറില്ല. സെല്‍ഫോണ്‍ മുതല്‍ വാഷിങ്ങ് മഷീന്‍ വരെ പല ഉപകരണങ്ങളിലും ഇന്നു് കമ്പ്യൂട്ടറിന്റെ ചെറിയ രൂപം കാണാനാവും. ഇത്രയധികം സാദ്ധ്യതകളുള്ള ഒരു സാങ്കേതികവിദ്യ വിദ്യാഭ്യാസത്തിലും സ്വാധീനം ചെലുത്താതിരുന്നാലേ അത്ഭുതമുള്ളൂ.

വിദ്യാഭ്യാസത്തില്‍ ഐസിറ്റിയ്ക്കു് വ്യത്യസ്തമായ രണ്ടു് പങ്കുകളുണ്ടു്. ഒന്നു്, കമ്പ്യൂട്ടറിനെയും ഇന്റര്‍നെറ്റിനെയും കുറിച്ചു് പഠിപ്പിക്കുന്നതിലാണു്. രണ്ടു്, എല്ലാ വിഷയങ്ങളും പഠിപ്പിക്കുകയും പഠിക്കുകയും ചെയ്യുന്നതു് എളുപ്പമാക്കാനാണു്. ആദ്യത്തേതിനെ ഐസിറ്റി വിദ്യാഭ്യാസമെന്നും (ICT education) രണ്ടാമത്തേതിനെ ഐസിറ്റി സഹായത്തോടെയുള്ള വിദ്യാഭ്യാസമെന്നും (ICT enabled education) വിളിക്കാം. ഐസിറ്റി വിദ്യാഭ്യാസത്തില്‍ രണ്ടു ഭാഗങ്ങളുണ്ടു് --- ഹാര്‍ഡ്‌വെയറും സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറും. ഹാര്‍ഡ്‌വെയറിന്റെ ഉത്പാദനത്തിനു് സങ്കീര്‍ണ്ണമായ സാങ്കേതികവിദ്യ ആവശ്യമാണു്. അതിനു് സങ്കീര്‍ണ്ണമായ ഉപകരണങ്ങളും ആവശ്യമാണു്. അതുകൊണ്ടുതന്നെ അതു് ചില രാജ്യങ്ങള്‍ക്കു മാത്രമെ സാധ്യമായിട്ടുള്ളൂ. എന്നാല്‍ സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറിന്റെ കാര്യം അങ്ങനെയല്ല. അവിടെ ഏറ്റവും ആവശ്യമായതു് അറിവാണു്. ഒരു കമ്പ്യൂട്ടറും പ്രോഗ്രാമിങ്ങിലുള്ള അറിവും ഉണ്ടെങ്കില്‍ ആര്‍ക്കും സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ സൃഷ്ടിക്കാം. കമ്പ്യൂട്ടറിനു് വില കുറഞ്ഞുവരുന്ന ഈ കാലഘട്ടത്തില്‍ ഇതൊരു വലിയ കടമ്പയല്ല. ഐസിറ്റി വിദ്യാഭ്യാസത്തിന്റെ ഒരു പ്രധാന ഭാഗം അതുകൊണ്ടു് ആര്‍ക്കും സാധ്യമായതാണു്.

നമ്മള്‍ വിദ്യാര്‍ത്ഥികളെ കമ്പ്യൂട്ടര്‍ സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ നിര്‍മ്മിക്കാന്‍ എങ്ങനെയാണു് പ്രാപ്തരാക്കേണ്ടതു്? ഇപ്പോള്‍ തുടര്‍ന്നുപോകുന്ന രീതി അവരെ പ്രോഗ്രാമിങ്ങ് ഭാഷകള്‍ പഠിപ്പിക്കുക എന്നുള്ളതാണു്. C, C++. Java തുടങ്ങി പല ഭാഷകള്‍ പ്രചാരത്തിലുണ്ടു്. ചെറിയ കുട്ടികളെ മലയാള അക്ഷരങ്ങളും വാക്കുകളും മറ്റും പഠിപ്പിക്കുന്നതുപോലെ വിദ്യാര്‍ത്ഥികളെ ഈ ഭാഷകളിലെ പദങ്ങളും അവയുടെ വ്യാകരണവും പഠിപ്പിക്കുക എന്നതാണു് ഇപ്പോള്‍ ചെയ്തുവരുന്നതു്. എന്നാല്‍ അതുകൊണ്ടു് ഭാഷാപഠനം ആയോ എന്നു് നമ്മള്‍ ചിന്തിക്കേണ്ടതാണു്. ഏതു് ഭാഷയിലും ഉപരിപഠനത്തിനു് തയാറാകുന്ന വിദ്യാര്‍ത്ഥികള്‍ ആ ഭാഷയിലെ സാഹിത്യവും പഠിക്കുന്നുണ്ടു്. ഭാഷ ഉപയോഗിക്കുന്നതില്‍ അതിസമര്‍ത്ഥരായവര്‍ എങ്ങനെയാണു് എഴുതുന്നതു് എന്നു് നേരിട്ടനുഭവിച്ചറിയാനാണല്ലോ സാഹിത്യം പഠിക്കുന്നതു്. അതുപോലെ, സിനിമ പഠിക്കുന്നവര്‍ പ്രഗത്ഭരായ സംവിധായകരുടെയും മറ്റും ചലച്ചിത്രങ്ങളെ പാഠപുസ്തകങ്ങള്‍ എന്നവണ്ണം പഠിക്കുന്നു. ഐസന്‍സ്റ്റൈനും ഗൊദാര്‍ദും റേയും ഘട്ടക്കും ഒക്കെ അവര്‍ക്കു് പാഠങ്ങളാണു്. അപ്പോള്‍ പ്രോഗ്രാമിങ്ങ് ഭാഷ പഠിക്കുമ്പോഴും അതില്‍ പ്രഗത്ഭരായവരുടെ കൃതികള്‍ പഠിക്കേണ്ടതല്ലേ?

ഇതു് സാദ്ധ്യമാകുന്നതു് സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറിന്റെ ലോകത്തു് മാത്രമെയുള്ളൂ എന്നു് വ്യക്തമാണല്ലോ. കാരണം കമ്പനികള്‍ നിര്‍മ്മിച്ചു വിലയ്ക്കു് വില്‍ക്കുന്ന സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറിന്റെ മൂലരൂപം അവര്‍ ഒളിച്ചു വച്ചിരിക്കുകയാണു്. അതു് മറ്റാര്‍ക്കും കാണാനാവില്ല. ആ നിലയ്ക്കു് എത്ര പ്രഗത്ഭരായ പ്രോഗ്രാമര്‍മാര്‍ കച്ചവട സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ രചിച്ചിട്ടുണ്ടെങ്കിലും അതിന്റെ മൂലരൂപം കണ്ടു പഠിക്കാന്‍ വളര്‍ന്നുവരുന്ന പ്രോഗ്രാമര്‍മാര്‍ക്കാവില്ല. അതുകൊണ്ടുതന്നെ വിദ്യാഭ്യാസത്തില്‍ സ്വതന്ത്രസോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ ഉപയോഗിക്കേണ്ടതു് അത്യാവശ്യമാണു്. എന്നാല്‍ അതിനു് മറ്റു കാരണങ്ങളുമുണ്ടു്. ഗ്നു ലിനക്സ് പോലെയുള്ള ഒരു സ്വതന്ത്ര ഓപ്പറേറ്റിങ്ങ് സിസ്റ്റത്തിന്റെയും ഫയര്‍ഫോക്സ് പോലെയുള്ള വെബ് ബ്രൌസറിന്റെയും പ്രവര്‍ത്തനരീതിയും വിശദാംശങ്ങളും ആര്‍ക്കും പഠിക്കാവുന്നതാണു്. ഒരു കാറിന്റെ പ്രവര്‍ത്തനം മനസിലാക്കാന്‍ അതിന്റെ ഭാഗങ്ങള്‍ വേര്‍പെടുത്തിയെടുത്തു് പഠിക്കുന്നതുപോലെ ഇത്തരം ഒരു സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറിന്റെ പ്രവര്‍ത്തനം പഠിക്കാന്‍ അതിന്റെ ഭാഗങ്ങള്‍ വേര്‍പെടുത്തിയെടുത്തു് പഠിക്കുന്നതു് നല്ലതാണു്. ഇതും സാദ്ധ്യമാകുന്നതു് സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറില്‍ മാത്രമാണു്.

ഇനി പല ആവശ്യങ്ങള്‍ക്കായി കമ്പ്യൂട്ടര്‍ ഉപയോഗിക്കാന്‍ പഠിപ്പിക്കുമ്പോഴും സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ തന്നെയാണു് ഉത്തമം. കാരണം വിദ്യാഭ്യാസ സ്ഥാപനത്തില്‍ ഉപയോഗിക്കുന്ന അതേ സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ സ്വന്തമായി കമ്പ്യൂട്ടറുള്ള വിദ്യാര്‍ത്ഥിക്കും ഉപയോഗിക്കുന്നതിനു് പ്രയാസമില്ല എന്നുള്ളതാണു്. കോളജില്‍ ഉപയോഗിക്കുന്നതു് വിലകൊടുത്തു വാങ്ങേണ്ട സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറാണെങ്കില്‍ പല വിദ്യാര്‍ത്ഥികള്‍ക്കും അതു് വാങ്ങാനുള്ള സാമ്പത്തികശേഷി ഉണ്ടാവണമെന്നില്ല. ഇത്തരം സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറുകള്‍ക്കു് വലിയ വിലയുമാണു്. അപ്പോള്‍ നിയമം ലംഘിക്കുകയല്ലേ അവര്‍ക്കു് നിവൃത്തിയുള്ളൂ? മാത്രമല്ല, അതു് ഉള്ളവരെന്നും ഇല്ലാത്തവരെന്നും വിദ്യാര്‍ത്ഥികളെ വേര്‍തിരിക്കുന്നു.

ഇന്ത്യയിലും മറ്റു പല രാജ്യങ്ങളിലും വിദ്യാഭ്യാസരംഗത്തു് സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ ഉപയോഗിക്കാനായി പല പദ്ധതികളും നടപ്പിലാക്കുന്നുണ്ടു്. ഐസിറ്റി ഉപയോഗിച്ചു് വിദ്യാഭ്യാസം നടത്താനുള്ള ദേശീയ പദ്ധതി (National Mission on Education through ICT, NMEICT), FOSSEE (Free and Open Source Software in Science and Engineering Education) എന്നീ പദ്ധതികളെപ്പറ്റിയും ഇന്ദിരാഗാന്ധി നാഷണല്‍ ഓപ്പണ്‍ യൂണിവേഴ്സിറ്റിയുടെ ഇന്റര്‍നെറ്റിലൂടെയുള്ള തുറന്ന വിദ്യാഭ്യാസ പദ്ധതിയെപ്പറ്റിയും ഇറ്റലിയിലെ സോളിടെക് എന്ന പരിപാടിയെപ്പറ്റിയും മറ്റും അവയുമായി ബന്ധപ്പെട്ടവര്‍ സമ്മേളനത്തില്‍ സംസാരിച്ചു. ബോംബെയിലെ എസ്.എന്‍.ഡി.റ്റി. വനിതാ സര്‍വ്വകലാശാല എങ്ങനെ പൂര്‍ണ്ണമായി സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറിലേക്കു് മാറി എന്ന കഥ അതു് നടപ്പിലാക്കിയവര്‍ അവിടെ അവതരിപ്പിച്ചു. കൂടാതെ, എല്ലാ വിദ്യാഭ്യാസ സ്ഥാപനങ്ങളും സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ മാത്രം ഉപയോഗിക്കാനുള്ള ആഹ്വാനം സമ്മേളനം പ്രഖ്യാപനമായി സ്വീകരിക്കുകയും ചെയ്തു. ഈ പ്രഖ്യാപനം http://wiki.hipatia.net/index.php/DeclarationEduconf2010 എന്ന വെബ്സൈറ്റില്‍ ലഭ്യമാണു്. അതില്‍ പറയുന്ന ആശയങ്ങളോടു് യോജിക്കുന്നവര്‍ പ്രഖ്യാപനത്തില്‍ തങ്ങളുടെ പേരുകൂടി എഴുതി ചേര്‍ക്കണമെന്നു് അഭ്യര്‍ത്ഥിക്കുന്നു.

നമ്മുടെ വിദ്യാഭ്യാസ നിലവാരം മെച്ചപ്പെടണമെങ്കില്‍ അതു് മാര്‍ക്കു വാങ്ങാനും ഡിഗ്രി സമ്പാദിക്കാനും മാത്രമുള്ളതാകരുതു്. വിദ്യാഭ്യാസം അറിവു് നേടാനാകണം. വ്യക്തിത്വ വികാസത്തിനാകണം. പരസ്പര സഹകരണത്തോടെയും പരസ്പര ബഹുമാനത്തോടെയും കൂടി സമൂഹത്തില്‍ ജീവിക്കാന്‍ പഠിക്കാനാകണം. ഇങ്ങനെയൊക്കെ ആകാനായി സഹായിക്കുന്നതാണു് സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍. അതു് ഡിജിറ്റല്‍ വിടവു് നികത്താന്‍ സഹായിക്കുന്നതാണു്. പരസ്പര സഹകരണത്തിലൂടെ വളരുന്നതാണു്. അതുകൊണ്ടുതന്നെ വിദ്യാഭ്യാസത്തില്‍ സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ മാത്രം ഉപയോഗിക്കേണ്ടതാണു്.

Apparently under pressure from copyright holders, governments have been extending the period for which "all rights are reserved" and today it extends to the ridiculous period of sixty years after the life of the author. This is obviously not meant to benefit the creator nor an incentive for him or her to create more. Then what could this be for? It could only be for copyright holders who are not the authors. And in what way could this benefit society? It can obviously benefit only some individuals or organisations. In practice, often the publishers who hold the copyright.

This is something that had been in my mind for quite some time - a conference on Free Software and Education. The idea is to get speakers to explain the importance of using Free Software in education, demonstrate pieces of software that can be, and that are being, used in different levels of education, and give a call to all educational institutions in the country (and even abroad) to use only Free Software.

Now it seems this is going to come true. When I suggested this idea, there was positive response from the Boards of FSF India and SPACE. The response from Prof. Mohandas of the National Institute of Technology, Calicut, (NITC) also was positive. So we planned to do this as part of the Golden Jubilee celebrations of NITC, which starts in October. But then Richard Stallman decided to come to India, and NITC was interested in him coming for the conference. So we had to advance the programme to September beginning. Stallman had to leave India on 12th, so the conference had to be before that. And Prof. Mohandas suggested 11th and 12th, with the inauguration on 10th evening. And RMS agreed. So the conference will happen on those days.

The response from speakers also was good. Prof. Nagarjuna (Homi Bhabha Centre for Science Education), Chairperson of FSF India, immediately agreed to speak. And FSF India decided to become one of the organisers. Prof. Kannan Moudgalya and Prabhu Ramachandran of IIT, Mumbai, also were enthusiastic. Prof. K.R. Srivathsan (PVC, IGNOU) eagerly agreed to speak. And my good friend Juan Carlos Gentile decided to make it an international affair. He has found several speakers from abroad, including Marco Ciurcina from Italy and Diego Saravia from Argentina, and they all will speak through video netowrking. He is also arranging for live webcasting. And all of them and many others are willing to endorse the call the conference will make to use Free Software in education.

In short, this conference is becoming a much bigger affair than I ever imagined. My only regret is that the Chief Minister of Kerala, who is a great supporter of Free Software and normally makes it a point to participate in any meeting in which RMS is present, will not be available to inaugurate the conference. It is good that he has agreed to send a video message. I hope there will be good participation from different parts of the country. And that this will give a boost to migration in educational institutions in the country and to substituting proprietary software in university curricula with Free Software.

ഇന്നു്, അതായതു് 2010 ജൂണ്‍ 15നു്, മനോരമയുടെ ടെലിവിഷന്‍ ചാനലില്‍ ഒരു വാര്‍ത്ത വന്നതായി എനിക്കു് ഈമെയ്ല്‍ ലഭിച്ചു. ഒരു സുഹൃത്തു് ഫോണ്‍ വിളിച്ചു് പറയുകയും ചെയ്തു. വാര്‍ത്ത ഇതാണു്: സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ മാത്രമെ പാടുള്ളൂ എന്നു് സര്‍ക്കാര്‍ വാശി പിടിക്കുന്നതു കാരണം സംസ്ഥാനത്തിനു് 214 കോടി രൂപയുടെ ധനസഹായം നഷ്ടപ്പെടാന്‍ പോകുന്നു. സംസ്ഥാന വിദ്യുച്ഛക്തി ബോര്‍ഡിനുവേണ്ടി ബില്ലിങ്ങിനും മറ്റും ആവശ്യമായ സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ നിര്‍മ്മിക്കുന്നതിനായി കേന്ദ്രസര്‍ക്കാര്‍ അനുവദിച്ചിട്ടുള്ള തുകയാണത്രെ ഇതു്. അതുടനെ ചെലവാക്കിയില്ല എങ്കില്‍ സംസ്ഥാനത്തിനു് ആ തുക നഷ്ടപ്പെടുമത്രെ. സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറുപയോഗിച്ചു് അത്തരം സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറൊന്നും നിര്‍മ്മിക്കാനാവില്ല. (ഇതു് ആരുടെ അഭിപ്രായമാണെന്നു് വ്യക്തമല്ല. മനോരമ ന്യൂസിന്റെ വെബ് സൈറ്റില്‍ ഉള്ള വാര്‍ത്ത വായിച്ചാല്‍ ഇതു് മനോരമയുടെ അഭിപ്രായമാണെന്നേ തോന്നൂ.) ഈ പണം നഷ്ടപ്പെടാന്‍ പോകുന്നു എന്ന വാര്‍ത്ത എവിടെനിന്നു കിട്ടി എന്നുള്ളതും വ്യക്തമല്ല.

ഒരര്‍ത്ഥത്തില്‍ ഈ വാര്‍ത്ത വലിയ ദോഷം ചെയ്യുന്ന ഒന്നല്ല. കാരണം സാമാന്യ ബുദ്ധിയുള്ള ഒരാള്‍ക്കു് അതിലടങ്ങിയിരിക്കുന്ന മറ്റുതാല്പര്യങ്ങള്‍ കാണാന്‍ കഴിഞ്ഞു എന്നു വരാം. പണം നഷ്ടപ്പെടാന്‍ പോകുന്നു എന്നു് പറഞ്ഞതു് ആരാണു് എന്നു് അവര്‍ വ്യക്തമാക്കിയിട്ടില്ല. പണം തരുന്നതു് കേന്ദ്രസര്‍ക്കാര്‍ ആയതുകൊണ്ടു് സംസ്ഥാന സര്‍ക്കാരിന്റെ നയങ്ങളൊന്നും പാലിക്കേണ്ടതില്ല എന്നു് അര്‍ത്ഥം വരുന്നില്ല. സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറുപയോഗിച്ചു് ഇങ്ങനത്തെ ആവശ്യങ്ങള്‍ക്കുള്ള സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറുകള്‍ നിര്‍മ്മിക്കാനാവില്ല എന്നു് ഒരു വിദഗ്ദ്ധന്റെയും വാക്കുകള്‍ ഉദ്ധരിച്ചു് സ്ഥാപിക്കാന്‍ ശ്രമിച്ചിട്ടില്ല. അതു് ലേഖകന്റെ അഭിപ്രായമായാണു് മനോരമയുടെ സൈറ്റില്‍ കാണുന്നതു്. ലേഖകന്‍ സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ വിദഗ്ദ്ധനാണെന്ന സൂചന പോലുമില്ല. മാത്രമല്ല, ഏറ്റവും കുറഞ്ഞ ടെന്‍ഡര്‍ നല്‍കിയ കമ്പനിക്കു് സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ നിര്‍മ്മിക്കാനുള്ള പണി നല്‍കി എന്നൊരു വിചിത്രമായ ആരോപണവും ഉന്നയിച്ചിരിക്കുന്നു. ഇതിന്റെയെല്ലാം പിന്നില്‍ മറ്റെന്തോ ഉണ്ടായിരിക്കണമെന്നു തോന്നിക്കാന്‍ ഇനിയൊന്നും വേണ്ടല്ലോ.

ഒരു കുട്ടിക്കു് ഒരു ലാപ്‌ടോപ്പ് (One Laptop Per Child, OLPC) എന്ന സംരംഭത്തിനുവേണ്ടി തയാറാക്കിയ XO എന്ന ലാപ്‌ടോപ്പ് മുതല്‍ സൂപ്പര്‍ കമ്പ്യൂട്ടറുകള്‍ വരെ സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറായ ഗ്നു ലിനക്സ് ഉപയോഗിച്ചു് പ്രവര്‍ത്തിക്കുന്നു. ഇന്റര്‍നെറ്റ് ഉപയോക്താക്കള്‍ക്കു് ഏറ്റവും പ്രിയംകരമായ സെര്‍ച്ച് എഞ്ചിനായ ഗൂഗിളിന്റെ സെര്‍വ്വറുകളില്‍ ഉപയോഗിക്കുന്നതു് സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറായ ഗ്നു ലിനക്സാണു്. രണ്ടാം സ്ഥാനത്തു് നില്‍ക്കുന്നു എന്നു പറയാവുന്ന യാഹുവിന്റെ സെര്‍വ്വറുകളെല്ലാം മറ്റൊരു സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറായ Free BSDയിലാണു് പ്രവര്‍ത്തിക്കുന്നതു്. നമ്മുടെ LICയുടെ കമ്പ്യൂട്ടര്‍ ശൃംഘല പ്രവര്‍ത്തിക്കുന്നതു് ഗ്നു ലിനക്സിലാണു്. അതുപോലെ തന്നെ ജര്‍മ്മനിയിലെ മ്യൂണിക്ക് നഗരസഭയുടെ കമ്പ്യൂട്ടറുകളും. പിന്നെയാണോ വൈദ്യുത ബോര്‍ഡിന്റെ ബില്ലിംഗ് നടത്താനുള്ള സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറുപയോഗിച്ചു് സാധ്യമല്ലാതെ വരുന്നതു്!

ഇത്രയേറെ പ്രചാരവും പഴക്കവുമുള്ള ഒരു പത്രം ഇത്രയും തരം താഴുന്നതു് കഷ്ടമാണു്. അവര്‍ക്കു് അതില്‍നിന്നു് എന്തു നേട്ടമാണോ ഉണ്ടാകുമെന്നു് പ്രതീക്ഷിക്കുന്നതു്, ഇത്ര മോശമായ പത്രപ്രവര്‍ത്തനത്തിലൂടെ അതിനേക്കാള്‍ കൂടുതല്‍ നഷ്ടമേ അവര്‍ക്കു് ഉണ്ടാകാനിടയുള്ളൂ. കയ്യില്‍ കിട്ടുന്നതെന്തും ഉപയോഗിച്ചു് സര്‍ക്കാരിനെ അടിക്കാന്‍ ശ്രമിക്കുന്നതു് മനസിലാക്കാം, അംഗീകരിക്കാനാവില്ലെങ്കിലും. പക്ഷെ വടിയല്ല ചാണകമാണു് കയ്യില്‍ കിട്ടിയതു് എന്നു് മനസിലാക്കിയില്ലെങ്കില്‍ സ്വന്തം ശരീരമെ വൃത്തികേടാകൂ. സര്‍ സി.പി. രാമസ്വാമി അയ്യരെ എതിര്‍ത്തു് ജയിലില്‍ പോയ ചരിത്രമുള്ള മലയാള മനോരമ ഇങ്ങനെ അധഃപതിക്കുന്നതു് കാണുമ്പോള്‍ ദുഃഖമേ വരൂ.

On May 9th evening, Charles told us that he would be leaving early morning next day, and that Quiliro would come and pick us up to go to the Catholic University. I found out that we were going to the IT Department of the University and was wondering what I should speak and how I should start. I thought that I could start by asking them how much money they paid to the copyright holders for teaching about Turing machine. But at the University, we came to know that students and teachers from a school in the name of a freedom fighter of Ecuador had come to listen to our talk. And in the hall, I found that the people from the school far out numbered others. So I had to change my strategy. So I started by asking them whether they had studied Newton's laws and who the laws belonged to. Or who the theory of relativity belonged to. The students said that it belonged to Einstein, probably not grasping the meaning of my question. Then I asked them how they could learn or teach these theories without paying the authors. The students immediately said that they were free, and that they belonged to everyone. In that case, I asked, how come people were allowed to own some pieces of knowledge and not allow others to use the knowledge without payment. My job was done, and, I think, the children got the message loud and clear. It only remained for me to point out that software is like knowledge ant that, like knowledge, software also should be free (as in freedom). I told them that Free Software is like free knowledge and got them to agree that they will at least try Free Software. With that, I gave the stage to Juan and Rafael. Both of them talked for quite some time, and I thought that is better because they can directly speak in Spanish (rather than translate when I speak).

I met a small child there wearing a T shirt that said GNU/Linux. He became friendly to me and we sat on the floor of the dias talking for some time - he in Spanish and I in Malayalam, just as i used to do with the third child of Charles. But this time Quiliro was there to do a bit of interpretation for me. I met the family as I came out of the building and they had taken a few photographs with me carrying the child. I did request them to send me the photos, but I have not yet received them. I shall put them up here as soon as I get them.

From the University, all of us went to the airport. Rafael, his brother-in-law, Quiliro and others were there to see us off, and we soon left Ecuador on a TACA flight. The airport had free wifi access and Juan and I made use of the opportunity to check our mails. I just sent a mail to Lucho saying that we were leaving. Since the flight was in the evening, and it became dark soon, there was nothing interesting to see and the wait at Lima also was normal. We reached Asuncion early in the morning and Lucho and his girl friend were there waiting for us at 3 in the morning. We went straight to his house and soon were asleep. Before I went to sleep, I just sent a mail to my brother-in-law in Dubai, Ajith Kumar, saying that I was back in Asuncion and would try to get the flight from Dubai postponed by a few days.

The next morning, we went to the travel agency that, as Juan found out, had booked my tickets and got the flight from Dubai to Delhi postponed by a few days. It cost me US $ 150, which, I thought, was a bit high. Later, it turned out that I could buy a new ticket from Dubai to Kerala for a similar amount. That would have saved me the fare from Delhi to Thiruvananthapuram. Anyway, the money was spent and there was nothing I could do about it. From the travel agency, we had to go quickly back to Lucho's home because he was called to sort out some problem in some system that he was looking after. So he left us home and quickly went out. And I started wondering how I would go to the airport. Juan told me that Nicolas (Pereira) would come to drop me to the airport.

My flight was supposed to be at 6 pm and I should be at the airport by 3 pm. The drive to the airport was supposed to be about 30-40 minutes. So I was expecting Nicolas to reach by about 2:15 pm. When there was no sign of Nicolas, Juan called him. Nicolas said that he was in a meeting and would reach in ten minutes. He also said that he knows someone in the airlines, so there will not be any problem. Finally, both Nicolases came and we all went to the airport. On the way, Nicolas Caballero said that there were two pieces of good news. One was that the electricity company had offered US $ 100,000 every year to conduct a Free Software conference. That was good news indeed! I asked him how much that would be, in real terms, in Paraguay. Nicolas said that the Free Software Asuncion conference for which I had originally gone there, had cost only about US$ 55,000. Then I asked him whether they could keep apart some money for starting an institute for Free Software. Nicolas responded by saying that that was the second good news. The same company had offered a million US dollars to start such a Centre! That was absolutely great!

We must have reached the airport around 4:30 pm and I had no problem in checking in. They allowed my small suitcase and my laptop bag to be taken in the cabin so that I wouldn't have to wait for the baggage in Dubai. The only problem was that I had to cart it around in Sao Paulo. I did not have to pay airport taxes because that was included in the ticket. So we finally said good bye and Nicolas said that we should meet again. I suggested that he organise a Free Software conference in Canada (where he was moving to in a couple of months). They had to go in a hurry because they had a meeting at 5 pm, and I walked in. I had about an hour to wait before the flight took off, which I spent mostly reading Freakonomics. Soon we were ushered into a Boeing 747 which took off as scheduled. And that was chau to Asuncion and Latin America.

Nothing much happened on 2nd, 3rd and 4th. We did go to a place where Lucho's friends were doing a podcast called Mango Podcast. There was a discussion about Free Software involving a few of Lucho's friends, Juan and me. One of them apparently thought that I was being misled by Lucho about the state of their country. But he did not raise the issue. He appeared only around the time we were closing the programme and asked me whether all companies are bad and why a company that was started with good intentions could not continue to be good. I told him that I have not seen companies making a lot of money without being unethical and that as the companies become big, they become powerful and corrupt. He said he was hoping that I was wrong and that a company could make money without being unethical. I told him that I too hoped that he is right, but that he will probably realise that his desire could not be true as he grew up. I said so because he looked very young. I learnt only later that he was 33! Of course, Juan was more direct and told him that 80% of what he said was crap and the remaining 20% he didn't hear :-) There was also a question about making money from Free Software and we (Juan and I) explained the model of providing service as a business. Juan told them that he was living from Free Software and also about how there are so many ways in which Free Software could help a person to live. As suggested by Charles Escobar, we went to a travel agency and booked our tickets to Quito.

We were taken to the airport by Lucho and Claudia (Lucho's wife) and seen off at 5:30 in the morning because the flight was at 7 pm. The flight was via Lima, Peru, where we had about an hour to spend. We arrived in Quito in the early afternoon and Charles was waiting for us. We were taken to his house (he drives a Lada car, the first one I have seen) where I slept for some time after food. We then went straight to Charles' place of work, the Israel University. From there, Juan and I were taken to the office of the National Union of School teachers, where they asked about the Kerala experience in using Free Software in education. They said that IT was not part of the education system and that the government was not giving much priority to education. They also said that they had had a detailed discussion about constructivism in education and decided that Vygotsky's system was better (they said "Levgotsky" but I guess they must have meant Vygotsky). They were interested to know how the system was implemented in Kerala and I told them that it may be possible to arrange for a discussion. I met Tatyana here, who translated my words into Spanish and what the others said in Spanish to me in English. And she did a very good job. One of the teachers there did video interviews with me and Juan for their website.

Quiliro Ordóñez from Ecuador had written to me and Juan asking about when we can meet, and we met him in the evening on our way back from the University. We had some food from a restaurant where I ate something that was like idli but slightly sweet and steamed or baked in a banana leaf. Another thing was wrapped in corn leaf (again steamed or baked) that came with a kind of chutney containing onion and chillies. This was the first time I was eating something spicy after coming to Latin America and it felt nice. But as a result we reached home very late and I was too tired to even try to log into the Internet.

Charles said that we had to leave early morning the next day (May 6th) because vehicles with registration numbers ending with a particular digit are banned on every day and this day he could not take his car into the city after 7 am. So we had to leave at about 6 pm. We went straight to Charles' office and from there we went with one of his students, Danillo Rojas, to a radio station for a discussion on Free Software. The radio station is run by a Socialist member of the National Assembly. His name is Paco Velasco and he is a supporter of Free Software. He himself anchored the show and he turned out to be a very bubbly character in the show (or, as Juan said, a very "electric" character). He was supported by another person who, I think, was the regular anchor for the programme. The show went on for one hour and four or five people called in, all of them supporting Free Software. Later, the Free Software activists here and Juan got several mails from people who had listened to the radio programme. It was a good success in that sense.

From the radio station we went to the Israel University where we had a short break with coffee and some snacks. And what was there in the plate of snacks? Surprise! Banana chips with onions and tomato! A very pleasant surprise indeed! We then went to an auditorium in the building where I gave a brief talk on Free Software for scientific data analysis and visualisation. It had to be very brief because we had to quickly go to the Army Polytechnic. This was a really interesting experience. Col. Sanchez, who was in charge of the Department of Electronics and Communication, invited us to give a seminar on the use of Free Software. Tatyana was with us and we learned that she worked in the institute. She was the person who took us around and organised the seminar. The hall was full and there were students standing. I again started with a Kathakali video and pictures of different parts of Kerala. Then I went on to explain how Kerala had migrated to Free Software and why only Free Software should be used in education and in the government. I said that Juan will explain the reason and what happened in Venezuela. Tatyana did a very good job of translating my speech once again. By the time Juan finished his speech, the conference had already been going on for about two hours and people were still standing. At one point of time, I had to mention about how the media is now very alert about the use of non-free software and how on a couple of occasions it made a noise when there were attempts to use non-free software. I was surprised by the big applause that followed.

Then they had a short coffee break and reassembled for the talk by Rafael. I thought most of the people would leave, but most of the audience was still there when Rafael started! This extent of interest apparently surprised even the faculty and authorities of the polytechnic because apparently no one used to sit for more than half an hour! Rafael spoke about the Elastix distribution for which he is working and explained how one can make a living out of working for Free Software. We were free for what remained of the day. Mario Albuja, who was there, invited us (Juan, Tatyana and me) to dinner and we went up the hill to a place that gave us a good view of the city. It was beautiful with all the lights. I talked about doing some studies about the schools, like the one I proposed in Paraguay, and they said that we can do. I hope it really happens.

On May 7th, we again went to the radio station, but I was there only for less than half an hour. I had to then go to a school where Quiliro had arranged a talk with a few teachers and students. I started with an introduction to Kerala and went on to speak about why Free Software should be used in schools. I started by asking what they would do if they got a packet of sweets. They said they would share it with everyone, and then I went on to the question about software. It turned out that neither the teachers nor the students used legal versions of Windows, and hence they were largely unaware of the legal issues related to copying proprietary software. Teachers were asking about Kerala, and how the state is different from the rest of India. A teacher asked me about what kind of software is used for teaching. I showed them things like Kalzium, Stellarium and Gcompris, and I think the students and the teachers were really excited. But Rafael Bonifaz was there soon telling me that we needed to go to some other place. I had to leave the place with the teachers and students apparently wanting to know more. I hope the local community would keep in touch with them.

The place we went to was the office of the Telecommunications Minister, Jaime Guerrero. He looked like a traditional Britisher, with a very impressive bearing. It was Juan who spoke most of the time. But the minister seemed to be impressed and we got to take a photograph with him. I did not understand what the Minister of Telecommunication had to do with Free Software, especially because we were talking mostly about education. I was told later that it was this ministry that supplied computers to the schools. I hope the minister was convinced about the need to give computers with Free Software to the schools, but I am not sure whether someone is going to give training in using the computers.

The next stop was at the office of the National Electoral Council. The head of the council (Director?) was present and there also I spoke about the importance of using Free Software especially for critical applications in the government. Juan spoke about the experience of Venezuela. The Director asked whether there were applications for specialised purposes like GIS and I explained about GRASS. But I did mention that there could be some specific areas where Free Software is not yet available. There were questions about Kerala and how the state had decided to migrate to Free Software. The impression we got when we left was that the doubts they had about using Free Software was largely removed.

Next we went to the Ministry of Education, where we met a small team who apparently are in charge of education. They consisted of teachers and technologists. We spoke about why Free Software is important for education and how Kerala migrated to Free Software. The interest in Free Software seemed to be low. They were saying that the country does not even have computers in all schools and that the major problem they were facing was in creating content. I said that I did not think textual and picture content in digital format was not the most important thing, and that the full potential of the digital technology could be exploited only with applications that allowed children to explore specific subjects or topics. One teacher asked what was the advantage of using Free Software other than the cost. I explained how we had localised GNU/Linux and how Windows was still not giving a desktop with Malayalam. But, apparently, they were not very much enthused. As we moved out of the hall where the meeting was conducted, a TV crew was waiting for an interview. They asked a few questions to me and a few to Juan. I don't remember exactly what they asked.

We then rushed to the Secretariat for Informatics which is headed by Mario. They had apparently been waiting for some time and they had food ready for us. They did a presentation about what they are doing to introduce Free Software in the government. They said that most of the servers were running Free Software, including some of the critical applications. Mario seemed to be taking pains to show us that they were really promoting Free Software in the government. But, apparently, many desktops were still running Windows. Since the discussion was mostly in English, I did not need an interpreter. Where needed, Juan did the job.

Our next stop was at the organisation in charge of "intellectual property" laws. The person in charge (Director?) explained that their stand was that IP laws were needed, and they had a positive role to play, but the legal system often distorted the laws to the advantage of companies and the disadvantage of the public. He said that they were working to make the IP laws more friendly to the consumers. Juan told him that IP laws should vanish, but the Director said that he believes that IP laws do help creators, and that it would be wonderful if people published their creative works under Free licences, but those who did not want to do so should have the freedom to do as they wished. I asked him about patents and the patenting of traditional knowledge. He said that other countries are taking traditional knowledge from here and the country was trying to get paid for it. And I replied that, as far as I was concerned, anyone was free to take the knowledge and use it but they cannot try to control the knowledge through patents or other such things. Juan and the Director agreed to disagree, but my stand was somewhere in the middle, though I never said so. I didn't need an interpreter here because the Director spoke good English.

We then went to Charles' institute, from where all of us (Charles, Juan, Quiliro and I) went to CIEEPI, which is an association of electrical and electronic engineers of Pichincha. Esteban also joined us at the University. The institute had arranged some food for us, which consisted of a salad. But I was not in a mood to eat cold food, and I did not eat. The discussions were mostly in Spanish with Juan speaking from our side. It appeared that they were interested in some kind of tie up with SPACE, but it was not clear to me what they were looking for. After the meeting, Charles, Juan, Esteban, Quiliro and I left for home. But then Quiliro suggested that we go to an old part of the city. We went to the top of a small peak Panecilo where there is a monument with a huge statue of Virgin Mary with wings looking at the city below. It was apparently built in Europe and transported here in pieces. The construction is said to have taken one hundred years, though it was installed only in the late 1990s. The place had several small shops selling curios, all of them run by natives. Some of the things were very intersting, but I didn't have any money to buy anything. Charles bought a keyring for me, which has a small leather thing attached to it. We also ate something that consisted of a cooked ear of corn with cheese. We also had a traditional drink which was available in two forms, with and without alcohol. I had the one without alcohol and it was sweet and nice. The television was showing a programme, interestingly, about India.

From there we went to an old part of the city with narrow streets and finally to a square with the President's palace on one side, an ancient cathedral on the second, a very old building that now houses the Majestic Hotel on the third and a new building housing the Municipal office on the fourth side. In the centre was a monument to the memory of the people who were killed during the war of independence with the Spanish. Apparently, half the population was killed by the Spanish and the leaders imprisoned. The local Spanish leaders needed permission from the Spanish government to kill the leaders. So the leaders were kept in prison for a year and then killed. The old buildings were really majestic, including the cathedral, and a sharp contrast to the monotonous modern buildings we see everywhere else. It was a real experience to be at a historic site where the first declaration of independence was signed in the Americas. Ecuador is, therefore, known as the Light of America for this reason. It was a fine end to a rather busy day and, as we returned, my mind was full of the sacrifice of thousands of people for the freedom of their countrymen and the cruelty that imperialist regimes meted out to them, including what the British did in India.

The last two days we have been relatively free, though we were not idle. Yesterday, we went to a local organisation that was promoting OLPC in Paraguay. Their office was located in a rather posh house in an expensive locality. We met some young guys there who spoke good English and were apparently trained in Boston. One of them told us that he had been on IRC with Sayamindu Dasgupta just before we reached and apparently Sayamindu told him that I was in the country. Sayamindu was to join the group in Boston soon.

They talked about promoting OLPC here and evolving methods of using the machine to teach. They were also talking about Free hardware. As the discussions dragged on, it was getting to be time for lunch and all of us went to a restaurant. But we were supposed to go for a meeting on MMSL (the organisation that conducted the conference) at 2 pm and we quickly left, with the OLPC guys still enjoying their food. On the way, Juan and Lucho expressed their displeasure with the group because they appeared to be first world guys approaching the problem with a typical first world approach. Juan thought they were kind of undesirable and Lucho seemed to agree. Juan said that if this was how OLPC was being promoted here, we needed to push for another computer taking its place.

At the venue of the MMSL meeting, we found Nicolas (Cabellero and Pereira) and a new person who was to be the Director of Free Software for the Ministry of Education, Oswaldo Daniel Cruz Ramirez. Later, Gladys Canese, the President of MMSL, joined us. Nicolas Caballero introduced us to Oswaldo, who would be one of the people who would be coming to Kerala. He outlined the ideas the Ministry is pursuing and left us to discuss things with Oswaldo. Before a serious discussion could happen, Nicolas left us because he had some important and urgent work to finish. While we were discussing Oswaldo coming to Kerala and how he can prepare himself for the visit, Nicolas came again to introduce a journalist who had come to interview me.

The journalist, who turned out to be from Uruguay (Juan's country) was fluent with only Spanish and Juan had to interpret. There is nothing much to write about the interview because he asked only the usual questions and we all thought that he did a poor interview. After he left, I sat with Oswaldo and talked a few things about what he can read to prepare himself for coming to Kerala. I gave him my card and told him to send me a mail so that I could send him some links that would be useful. Nicolas and others were going to the Congress to present a proposal for digital television that can also help in education, and invited us to join. I declined though Juan was inclined to go, and we all came back home.

At home, I lay down and fell asleep. I was woken up by noises and was told that there were a couple of journalists to interview me for an online newspaper. The guy could speak good English, so it was much easier. He asked me a couple of good questions apart from the routine ones. He asked me whether I though that Free Software would become popular when there were so many proprietary software companies opposing it. I said that I was sure that it was only a question of time before Free Software becomes ubiquitous and he asked me how long I expected that to take. I said, I think, that I could not be sure but it may take maybe two years, maybe five. It was a short interview and he said that it would be published in about two or three days. I felt nervous after the interview because I had been asleep and was afraid that I might have said something that I should not have. But Juan said that I handled it well, and that the man was from a far right newspaper. In such interviews, I am always afraid that they may distort what I say and highlight something that was totally unintended. Hope that doesn't happen.

Today (May 1) we were mostly lazing around but for a visit to a school that teaches children with disabilities along with normal children. We were received by an elderly lady who was, as she said, working with a government school. She decided to start such a school after she retired. She said that she started with children with Down's syndrome but now had no such children in the school. They apparently had children with Dyslexia, Autism and physical handicaps. She said that she had got training for handling such children and she was the first to introduce inclusive education. All over the country, children with such challenges were taught separately. She showed some photographs of children apparently celebrating, but I couldn't see any physically disabled child in them. We couldn't see any special gadgets (wheel chairs, etc) for children with disabilities either. We also met her son and another young person who said they were involved in training and development in Mechatronics. Though I thought that the lady was doing very good work, later we had doubts whether they were really speaking the truth. I suggested that Lucho go there on a working day, if possible, and find out whether there really were physically or mentally challenged children there. I had talked to her about the school in Kolkata where such children were taught along with others, the only such school in India and she wanted to get in touch with them. I promised to send them the contact details. Later, Juan said that they were also apparently looking for money. That made me wonder what their intentions were. But Juan said that we will try to do something for them. I left it at that, hoping that Lucho will go there one day and see what exactly is happening.

The rest of the day was mostly idling and I slept a lot.

After the conference, I have been largely idling, though I was involved in discussions with some of the people related to the government who are working to bring Free Software in education in the country and a two-hour discussion on the radio in which Marco, Juan, Charles Escobar and Chepi Gimanez (who also interpreted for me) were involved. Day before yesterday, that is April 27, I had an opportunity to talk to some students and faculty in the Department of Law at the National University here. Since I was going to talk to legal people, I decided to talk on Technology and Law.

I said that law tells us what to do and what not to do, while technology decided how we do things. In that sense, the two are related. Therefore, I argued, law should be compatible to technology. I spoke about how the copyright law came into being and how the rights of the authors were extended to ridiculous periods (60 years after the death of the author), becoming a stumbling block for creativity. I then talked about showed how the copyright law was inhibiting the sharing of knowledge when technology existed that made it possible for any music or book to be transmitted to any number of people around the globe in an instant. I also spoke about how the Recording Industry Association of America objected to the tape recorder technology and continues to object to people sharing music and movies although music sharing had not brought any harm to the industry. There were questions on why people should not get money by selling music and withholding free downloads. Juan explained the matter and at the end apparently everyone agreed on the idea of Free Knowledge. There were some students who stayed back after the talk and talked to us (Lucho, Juan and me). A couple of students told me that they are familiar with the Indian culture and like it very much. I had showed them a video of Kathakali and another of Thrissur pooram (and a dozen images of Kerala) and this is what prompted them to tell me about the Indian culture.

Yesterday was a rather busy day. We went to a local school here, in a poor neighbourhood. I will write about it elsewhere. At 2 pm, we went to the IT department of the National University, which is in a different campus. This was a large and beautiful campus with lots of trees and beautiful buildings with exposed brick. Here, the talk was organised by a faculty member, who seemed to be favouring Free Software. The students slowly trickled in and ultimately we had something like fifty students. I again started with the videos and images from Kerala and that seems to have caught their imagination. The talk was on Technology and Society and I started with why we develop technolgy and for whom. There was one student who was quite knowledgeable about these things and supported Free Software. He was making the right responses whenever I raised questions. I started with how technology changes the way we do things and the kind of benefits that society gets. I then brought the discussion to how businesses tried to block the benefits people can get from technology, mentioning the effort of RIAA to ban the tape recorder technology. I pointed out that it is stupid to attempt to block technological development based on arguments about how the new technology can harm the existing systems because every advance in technology has harmed the existing system. For example, I mentioned how computers had led to painters of sign boards losing their jobs. Interestingly, there were questions about the social and political system in Kerala and how Free software development was funded in Kerala. There were, of course, also questions about how programmers will live if they gave away the code they write as Free Software. With help from Juan, I explained why software is like poetry or any other creative work and we don't need people to earn their livelihood writing software for general use. One thing I forgot to mention was that most software developers live by writing custom software, which need not be Free Software at all because it is to be used only by a limited number of people.

Here also there were people discussing with us after the talk but we needed to move again. Before that, we were invited to the office of one of the faculty members, which was the incubation centre for businesses. They were working with an enterprise based on Free Software and were wondering about some kind of collaboration with SPACE. We spent a very pleasant time there before we moved to the next meeting.

The last meeting of the day was in the Sociology department of the same University, which was in another building in the city. This building was apparently the house of a very wealthy person and looked like an old palace. This time we had a class full of students and a few faculty members, and there was the Director of the faculty, an elderly gentleman who told me that he had come to India on a few occasions. He sat for quite some time before he excused himself. But he spoke to the audience before he left and apparently told them about the importance of the topic, and that soon people who are computer illiterate would be considered to be similar to people who could not read or write. I started with the concept of alienation of the worker from work and how technology impacts society. I then moved to ICT and how it is influencing the way we do things. I told them about Free Software and how this idea of freedom is beginning to create a revolution in the way we think and do things. I told them that this movement has led to freedom movements in other sectors, like Wikipedia, and also debunked the idea that people will do things only if they get some benefit out of it. I told them about how the law is preventing the full potential of the technology from reaching society. I also told them that, as Sociologists, it was their duty to study the changes happening in society and how effectively the technology was reaching people. I also told them that Kerala had adopted Free Software for all public applications, and particularly for school education. Interestingly, there were questions about the political and social situation in Keala and whether other states in India were similar. Discussions after the talk went for a long time and I was happy to see that so many students were enthused by the idea.

We returned very much satisfied with the day's efforts, though rather exhausted.

I was invited to the Free Software Conference at Asuncion, Paraguay, to talk about the IT at School project. Being almost on the other side of the planet, the journey was rather tough. I have written about it in my blog Free as in Freedom. Here I will try to write about the conference as such.

I reached the conference venue only at night on the first day of the conference, and so missed half the presentations. The second day morning, I was initially told that my talk would be at 1 pm. But then, the person in charge of organising, Nicolas Cabellera, came and told me that a person who was supposed to do a workshop on Python had withdrawn at the last minute. He thought this was a kind of attempt to sabotage the conference. He asked me whether I would use that time. I said that I could do a workshop on LaTeX, something that Juan Carlos had told me I would have to do here. And he was extremely happy that I saved the day for them!

I finished just a simple introduction to LaTeX in the given time, and I found that it was helpful to a few people -- in fact they came and said so to me. I had little time to have my lunch and get my presentation ready. But when I was ready, I was told that there were a couple of presentations before mine. A young person (forgot his name) spoke about some work they are doing with discarded hardware. There was one more presentation before I was told that next will be mine. But before that, about twenty chairs were arranged in front of the audience, and people like Charles Escobar, Diego Saravia, Nicolas Cabellero, Juan Carlos, Marco Cuircina, and others, including me, were asked to sit there. Then Diego Saravia spoke about the confusion of several distributions and sometimes code getting written for specific distributions (which is not what Free Software is about). Since all talks were in Spanish, and most people followed only Spanish, I was provided with an interpreter who helped me understand the gist of the speeches, and also interpreted my talk. He turned out to be a n interesting guy and we got along very well. Being a professional interpreter, he had come to me in the morning, and we had sat together and gone through my presentation so that he won't be surprised by some words.

I started my presentation with two videos, one of Kathakali and another of Thrissur Pooram. This was followed by about a dozen pictures of Kerala. I then presented some statistics about Kerala, comparing it with Paraguay, such as area, population, density of population and literacy. I then went through a brief introduction to the geography and history of Kerala, focussing on social and political reforms. Only after this did I start talking about IT@School. After explaining how it started and IT was introduced as part of the curriculum, I explained how they were pressured into migrating to Free Software, and now were moving to IT Enabled Education.

I ended my presentation with questions about why many of these things happened in Kerala, and not in any other state. I pointed out that it has no easy answer, but probably was due to its geographical isolation and so many historical reasons. I tried to explain that it is not possible to simply copy a process that was successful in one part of the world and expect it to be equally successful in another part. There were just a few questions at the end, but nothing really interesting. Overall, I thought I could have spoken better. I think I was hampered by the fact that I was still under the influence of the tiring journey that lasted about 28 hours and also under jet lag. Moreover, I think, the fact that the people could not follow English well, and therefore their responses came only after the interpreter explained in Spanish what I had said, also might have affected my speech. Anyway, I am happy that several people appreciated my presentation.

Here are some photographs from the event:

Asuncion is the capital of Paraguay in Latin America. President Lugo, who is now in power, strongly favours Free Software (FS) and wants to promote FS in the country. But there is no strong FS community in the country to help him -- a strange situation; in most places we have strong communities but the authorities are dificult to convince. In the situation, it was decided to organise an International Conference on Free Software during April 23-24. Nicolas Caballero of the Technical Unit for the Modernisation of Administration was in charge of organising the conference. Some of the leading developers and activists, like David Sugar, Marco Ciurcina from Italy, Charles Escobar from Ecuador, José Perez from Bolivia and Diego Saravia from Argentina, were invited. Because my friend Juan Carlos Gentile played an important role behind the scenes, and he has been thinking that Latin America should have tie ups with India, I got invited to the conference.

Being an invitee, they were supposed to send me my ticket to Asuncion. There was no sign of the ticket for a long time, and then my friend Juan asked me to go to Delhi and collect my visa, with the assurance that the ticket would reach me soon. So I reached Delhi on 18th night and my son picked me up. That night I was told that there was a mistake, I should go to the Consulate only on Tuesday because when they said Monday, what they had in mind was their Monday. Because of the nine and a half hour difference in time, that would be Tuesday in Delhi. I went to the Consulate on Tuesday and they were virtually waiting for me. Though I was now armed with the passport and ready to leave, the ticket still did not arrive. So my friend Juan suggested that I try for a ticket from India. That was when I too learnt about the problem the organisers also were facing -- the rush for travelling to Europe when flights resumed after being held up for several days due to the volcanic eruption in Iceland. But I was still able to find a seat via Mumbai-Dubai-Sao Paulo. But I decided to wait till the organisers confirmed that they would reimburse.

But meanwhile they were able to get hold of a ticket, also via Dubai-Sao Paulo and I received it on 21st evening. The ticket was for early morning of April 23, reaching Asuncion late night the same day because of the large time difference. The flight from Delhi was at 04:15 hr and the scheduled arrival in Asuncion was at 23:05 hr, which means a total travel duration of almost 28 hr 20 minutes! This was going to be the longest (distance-wise) journey I have ever in my life time!

I decided to carry as little luggage as possible and to confine it to cabin baggage. My son and my friend Sundar were of the opinion that I should carry plenty of clothes, but I stubbornly stuck to my plan and carried only one luggage (that could be checked in if needed) and a laptop bag that contained only a couple of books in addition to my laptop and accessories. My son, Akshay, and our friend Balachandran dropped me at the airport. When I checked in, I was not sure how the luggage would go, but the man at the counter of Emirates allowed me to carry both the bags with me in the cabin. So that saved the time required to wait for my luggage and reduced the tension about possible loss of luggage.

We had reached the Delhi airport around 01:30 hr on 23rd and the flight took off on time. Then there was a tough wait at Dubai airport for about four hours. I found a seat and started reading a book. It was tough to read the book on the one hand and keep awake on the other. But I somehow managed it because I had slept euring the day time and throughout the flight (except when the served the food). The flight from Dubai to Sao Paulo was the toughest part, lasting some 16 hours. I allowed myself to fall asleep whenever possible, but I needed to keep moving my feet so that they did not swell due to the long periods of being seated. I could not bring myself to watch the television programmes being dished out either. It was a truly challenging period, but finally we landed at Sao Paulo.

The wait at Sao Paulo was shorter, about three hours, and that period passed off relatively quickly. The flight from Sao Paulo to Asuncion was operated by TAM, an airlines from Paraguay. While both the flights from Delhi to Dubai and Dubai to Sao Paulo were operated by Emirates, and used huge Boeing 777-200 aircraft, the one to Asuncion was a smaller aircraft, possibly 747. And there were very few passengers. there was just one more passenger in the row in which I was sitting near the window. The flight was short, about two hours, and we soon landed.

As I came out of the aircraft and entered the airport building, I saw a person waiting with my name printed in large characters. I approached him and nodded to indicate that I was the person. Then things happened very quickly. I was taken through a special route (I thought it was the diplomatic channel) and seated in a luxurious lounge. A lady came there and collected my passport and customs declaration forms. Before I could use the toilet and sit down properly, she was back saying that everything was okay and I could leave. The gentleman who received me found a guy who was waiting for me with a car and I was soon moving towards the hotel where I am still put up and where the conference was held. This was an astonishing experience for me! I was being treated almost like a state guest!

The way passengers were treated in Dubai airport, I thought, left much to be desired. The officials there almost treated the passengers like cattle, though their language was always decent. Their body language showed what they thought, and occasionally they were rude to non-white passengers. I would have thought that their natural allies should be countries like India. Things were much better in Sao Paulo and some officials were really helpful. In the hotel, the counter clerk showed surprise when I told him that I was from India. I must be one of the very few Indians who have come to this hotel, and maybe even this country!

(About the conference itself, I should be soon writing in space blog, with photographs. See http://spacetvm.blogspot.com/)

The Government of Paraguay is organising an International Conference on Free Software at Asuncion, the capital of the country. Some important names in the Free Software world - such as Marco Ciurcina, Diego Saravia, David Sugar - will be seen in the list of participants. I am one of the lucky guys to be invited there. It would be nice to see some of my old friends including Marco and Juan Carlos, and meet people whom I have met only through the Net. But, more importantly, this conference is expected to give a boost to migration to Free Software in the whole of Latin America, particularly in Paraguay. The conference is scheduled on the same day that a huge Free Software event, something like the Software Freedom Day, is happening in the whole of Latin America (http://www.flisol.info/). In a way this is unfortunate because are bound to miss one of them. But, in a way, it is good because together they make a great day for Free Software in Latin America.

I am supposed to speak on the Kerala experience, mainly the experience of the IT@School project. Arun of FSF India was also scheduled to go, but he backed out when things got unduly delayed. His case is different from mine because he is doing his MPhil now and cannot be away for long. In my case, I have been told that I may get to participate in other conferences and discussions. So I may have to stay for a couple of weeks or longer.

I am basically not very fond of travelling, so I am not really looking forward to the journey. One thing that I would enjoy is to visit some of the sites of ancient civilisations like the Mayans. I don't know whether I will be able to do that. But if I do, I shall write about it here. Got the visa. Waiting for the ticket now.

(Document Freedom Dayയുമായി ബന്ധപ്പെട്ടു് തേജസ് പത്രത്തിനു വേണ്ടി എഴുതിയ ലേഖനം)

മാര്‍ച്ച് 31 ഡോക്യുമെന്‍റ് സ്വാതന്ത്ര്യ ദിനമായി ആചരിക്കുകയാണു്. എന്താണീ ഡോക്യുമെന്റ് സ്വാതന്ത്ര്യം, എന്താണതിന്റെ പ്രാധാന്യം തുടങ്ങിയ കാര്യങ്ങള്‍ നമുക്കിവിടെ പരിശോധിക്കാം.

പണ്ടുകാലത്തു് കേരളത്തിലെ ഔദ്യോഗിക രേഖകളെല്ലാം മലയാളത്തിലായിരുന്നല്ലോ. കടലാസു് ഉപയോഗിച്ചു് തുടങ്ങുന്നതിനു് മുമ്പു് ഓലയില്‍ നാരായം ഉപയോഗിച്ചു് എഴുതിയിരുന്നു. അക്കാലത്തു് ഉപയോഗിച്ചിരുന്ന അക്ഷരങ്ങള്‍ പലതും ഇന്നെഴുതുന്ന രീതിയിലായിരുന്നില്ല. പിന്നീടു് കടലാസും മഷിയും ഉപയോഗിച്ചു തുടങ്ങി. അക്കാലത്തെ രേഖകള്‍ കടലാസില്‍ ആയതുകൊണ്ടു തന്നെ ഓലയിലെഴുതിയ രേഖകള്‍ പോലെ വളരെക്കാലം നില നില്‍ക്കുന്നതല്ലായിരുന്നു. മാത്രമല്ല മഷികൊണ്ടു് എഴുതിയതു് ക്രമേണ മാഞ്ഞു പോകുകയും ചെയ്യും. ടൈപ്പ് റൈറ്റര്‍ എന്ന യന്ത്രം വന്നതോടുകൂടി ഈ പ്രശ്നത്തിനു് ഒരല്പം ആശ്വാസമായി. എന്നാല്‍ ടൈപ്പ് ചെയ്തെടുക്കുന്ന രേഖകളിലെ വാക്കുകള്‍ വായിക്കുന്നതു് ബുദ്ധിമുട്ടായിരുന്നു. കാരണം മലയാളത്തിലെ എല്ലാ അക്ഷരരൂപങ്ങളും ടൈപ്പ് റൈറ്ററില്‍ ലഭ്യമല്ലായിരുന്നു. ഈ പ്രശ്നം പരിഹരിക്കാനായി മലയാള ലിപിയില്‍ത്തന്നെ മാറ്റം വരുത്തുകയുണ്ടായി.

രേഖകളുണ്ടാക്കാനുള്ള ഏറ്റവും പുതിയ സാങ്കേതിക വിദ്യയാണു് കമ്പ്യൂട്ടര്‍. അമേരിക്കയിലാണു് ആധുനിക കമ്പ്യൂട്ടര്‍ ഉത്ഭവിച്ചതു് എന്നതുകൊണ്ടു് ഇംഗ്ലിഷും അതുപോലത്തെ ലിപി ഉപയോഗിക്കുന്ന ചില യൂറോപ്യന്‍ ഭാഷകളുമാണു് കമ്പ്യൂട്ടറില്‍ തനതായി കൈകാര്യം ചെയ്യാന്‍ കഴിഞ്ഞിരുന്നതു്. മലയാളമുള്‍പ്പെടെയുള്ള മറ്റനേകം ഭാഷകളില്‍ രേഖകളുണ്ടാക്കുന്നതിനു് ഒരു വിദ്യ ഉപയോഗിച്ചിരുന്നു. അക്ഷരങ്ങള്‍ പ്രദര്‍ശിപ്പിക്കുന്നതിനും മറ്റും കമ്പ്യൂട്ടര്‍ ഉപയോഗിക്കുന്ന ഫോണ്ട് അഥവാ ലിപിസഞ്ചയത്തില്‍ മലയാളം അകഷരങ്ങള്‍ ഉപയോഗിക്കുക എന്നതായിരുന്നു വിദ്യ. അടിസ്ഥാനപരമായി കമ്പ്യൂട്ടര്‍ കൈകാര്യം ചെയ്യുന്നതു് ഇംഗ്ലീഷ് ഭാഷ തന്നെയായിരുന്നു. അതുകൊണ്ടുതന്നെ ഇതിനു് പല പരിമിതികളുണ്ടു്. പിന്നീടു് ലോകത്തിലെ എല്ലാ ഭാഷകളും ഉള്‍ക്കൊള്ളാന്‍ കഴിയുന്ന യൂണിക്കോഡ് എന്ന സംവിധാനം വന്നപ്പോഴാണു് മലയാളവും കമ്പ്യൂട്ടറില്‍ തനതായി ഉപയോഗിക്കാനായതു്.

ഇന്നു് വലിയ ശതമാനം കമ്പ്യൂട്ടറുകളും ഉപയോഗിക്കുന്നതു് മൈക്രോസോഫ്റ്റ് കമ്പനിയുടെ വിന്‍ഡോസ് ഓപ്പറേറ്റിങ് സിസ്റ്റമാണു്. സര്‍ക്കാര്‍ തലത്തില്‍ തന്നെ സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ പ്രോത്സാഹിപ്പിക്കുന്ന കേരളത്തില്‍ പോലും സ്ഥിതി ഏതാണ്ടു് അങ്ങനെ തന്നെയാണു്, മാറി വരുന്നുണ്ടെങ്കിലും. പ്രധാനമായി വാക്കുകളടങ്ങിയ രേഖകള്‍, അതായതു് ടെക്‌സ്റ്റ് ഡോക്യുമെന്റുകള്‍, ഉണ്ടാക്കാന്‍ വിന്‍ഡോസില്‍ ഉപയോഗിക്കുന്ന പ്രധാനപ്പെട്ട ആപ്ലിക്കേഷന്‍ സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറുകള്‍ (പ്രയോഗങ്ങള്‍) എല്ലാം സ്വതന്ത്രമല്ലാത്തവയാണു്, കമ്പനികള്‍ നിര്‍മ്മിച്ചു് കച്ചവടം ചെയ്യുന്നവയാണു്. അവയിലോരോന്നും അതില്‍ നിര്‍മ്മിക്കുന്ന രേഖകള്‍ കമ്പ്യൂട്ടറില്‍ സൂക്ഷിക്കുന്നതു് (സേവ് ചെയ്യുന്നതു്) അതിന്റെ സ്വന്തം രീതിയിലാണു് \dash\ അതായതു് അതിന്റേതായ രഹസ്യ ഫോര്‍മാറ്റിലാണു്. ഇതു് അല്പം വിശദീകരിക്കാം.

കമ്പ്യൂട്ടറില്‍ എല്ലാ വിവരങ്ങളും (പ്രോഗ്രാമുകളും രേഖകളും) സൂക്ഷിക്കുന്നതും കൈകാര്യം ചെയ്യുന്നതും രണ്ടക്ഷരമുള്ള ഒരു ഭാഷയിലാണല്ലോ. 0, 1 എന്നീ അക്കങ്ങളാണു് ഈ രണ്ടക്ഷരങ്ങളെ സൂചിപ്പിക്കാന്‍ സാധാരണ ഉപയോഗിക്കാറുള്ളതു്. മനുഷ്യര്‍ക്കു് വായിക്കാനാവുന്ന ഭാഷയില്‍നിന്നു് കമ്പ്യൂട്ടറിനു് മനസിലാകുന്ന ഈ (ബൈനറി) ഭാഷയിലേക്കു് മാറ്റി എഴുതുമ്പോള്‍ അതിനു് എന്തു് രീതി വേണമെങ്കിലും ഉപയോഗിക്കാം. ഇംഗ്ലീഷ് ഭാഷയിലെ അക്ഷരങ്ങള്‍ മാത്രമാണു് സൂക്ഷിക്കേണ്ടതെങ്കില്‍ അതിനു് സാധാരണ ഉപയോഗിക്കുന്നതു് ആസ്ക്കി (ASCII) എന്ന രീതിയാണു്. എല്ലാ ഭാഷകളും ഉപയോഗിക്കാനാകുന്ന രീതിയാണു് യൂണിക്കോഡ്. പല രേഖകളിലും അക്ഷരങ്ങള്‍ കൂടാതെ കടലാസിന്റെ വലുപ്പം, അക്ഷരങ്ങളുടെ വലുപ്പം, വരികള്‍ തമ്മിലുള്ള അകലം എന്നിങ്ങനെ പല വിവരങ്ങളും അധികമായി സൂക്ഷിക്കേണ്ടി വരും. ഇതിനായി പ്രത്യേക കോഡുകളും രേഖയോടൊപ്പം ഉണ്ടാവണം. ഇതെല്ലാം സൂക്ഷിക്കുന്ന രീതി തീരുമാനിക്കുന്നതു് രേഖയുണ്ടാക്കാന്‍ ഉപയോഗിക്കുന്ന സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറാണു്. സ്വതന്ത്രമല്ലാത്ത സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറുകളുടെ കാര്യത്തില്‍ ഇതു് നിര്‍ണ്ണയിക്കുന്നതു് സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ നിര്‍മ്മിച്ച കമ്പനിയാണു്. അതു് മിക്കപ്പോഴും രഹസ്യവുമാണു്.

മേല്പറഞ്ഞ കാര്യങ്ങളുടെ ഫലമായി സ്വതന്ത്രമല്ലാത്ത പ്രയോഗങ്ങളുപയോഗിച്ചു് നിര്‍മ്മിക്കുന്ന രേഖകള്‍ കൃത്യമായി തുറന്നു കാണണമെങ്കില്‍ അവ നിര്‍മ്മിക്കാനുപയോഗിച്ച പ്രയോഗങ്ങള്‍ തന്നെ വേണമെന്നു വരുന്നു. ചിലപ്പോള്‍ മറ്റു ചില പ്രയോഗങ്ങളിലും അവ തുറന്നു കാണാനായി എന്നു വരാം; പക്ഷെ അപ്പോള്‍ നാം കാണുന്നതു് നിര്‍മ്മിച്ചയാള്‍ ഉദ്ദേശിച്ച തരത്തില്‍ തന്നെ ആവണമെന്നില്ല. ഉദാഹരണമായി, മൈക്രോസോഫ്റ്റ് വേഡ് എന്ന പ്രയോഗത്തില്‍ നിര്‍മ്മിച്ച ഒരു രേഖ വേഡ് പെര്‍ഫെക്‌ട് എന്ന പ്രയോഗത്തില്‍ തുറക്കാനായി എന്നു വരാം. പക്ഷെ രേഖ മാറ്റമൊന്നും കൂടാതെയാണു് കാണുന്നതു് എന്നു് ഉറപ്പാക്കാനാവില്ല. പലപ്പോഴും ഒരു പ്രയോഗത്തില്‍ നിര്‍മ്മിച്ചതു് മറ്റൊന്നില്‍ തുറക്കാനേ ആവില്ല. അങ്ങനെ വരുമ്പോള്‍ നമ്മള്‍ ഒരു കമ്പനിയുടെ സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയര്‍ തന്നെ ഉപയോഗിക്കാന്‍ നിര്‍ബ്ബന്ധിതരാകുന്നു. അതായതു്, നമ്മള്‍ ആ കമ്പനിയുടെ ആശ്രിതരാകുന്നു.

എന്നാല്‍ ഇങ്ങനെ ആവേണ്ട കാര്യമില്ല. അതിനു് രേഖകള്‍ സൂക്ഷിക്കുന്ന രീതി തുറന്നതായാല്‍ മതി. അതായതു്, രേഖകള്‍ സൂക്ഷിക്കാനുപയോഗിക്കുന്ന രീതി എന്താണു് എന്നു് ആര്‍ക്കും മനസിലാക്കാനുള്ള മാര്‍ഗമുണ്ടായാല്‍ മതി. ഇതു് മറ്റൊരു ഉദാഹരണം കൊണ്ടു് വിശദീകരിക്കാന്‍ ശ്രമിക്കട്ടെ. ഒരു സൈന്യത്തിലെ ഉദ്യോഗസ്ഥര്‍ പരസ്പരം സന്ദേശങ്ങളയക്കുമ്പോള്‍, വിശേഷിച്ചു് യുദ്ധകാലത്തു്, സാധാരണ ഭാഷയാവില്ല ഉപയോഗിക്കുന്നതു്. കാരണം ശത്രുസൈന്യത്തിനു് സന്ദേശം പിടിച്ചെടുക്കാനായാല്‍ പോലും അവര്‍ക്കു് മനസിലാക്കാന്‍ കഴിയരുതു്. അതിനു് ഒരു രഹസ്യ ഭാഷയാവും ഉപയോഗിക്കുക. ആ ഭാഷ അറിയാത്തവര്‍ക്കു് അതു് വായിക്കാനാവില്ലല്ലോ. അതുപോലെ ഒരു പ്രയോഗം അതുണ്ടാക്കുന്ന രേഖകള്‍ സൂക്ഷിക്കാനുപയോഗിക്കുന്ന രീതി അറിയാതെ ആ രേഖകള്‍ തുറക്കാനാകുന്ന മറ്റൊരു പ്രയോഗം (ആപ്ലിക്കേഷല്‍) നിര്‍മ്മിക്കാനും ആവില്ലല്ലോ. ആലോചിച്ചു നോക്കൂ, പണ്ടുകാലത്തു് സര്‍ക്കാര്‍ രേഖകള്‍ ഒരു രഹസ്യ ഭാഷയിലാണു് എഴുതിയിരുന്നതെങ്കില്‍ ഇന്നവ നമുക്കു് വായിച്ചു മനസിലാക്കാന്‍ ആവുമായിരുന്നില്ലല്ലോ.

രേഖകളെല്ലാം കമ്പ്യൂട്ടറില്‍ നിര്‍മ്മിക്കുകയും സൂക്ഷിക്കുകയും ചെയ്യുന്ന ഇക്കാലത്തു് ഇതു് പ്രശ്നമാകാം. വളരെക്കാലം സൂക്ഷിക്കേണ്ട രേഖകള്‍ നിര്‍മ്മിക്കുമ്പോള്‍ സുതാര്യമായ രീതിയില്‍ സൂക്ഷിച്ചില്ലെങ്കില്‍ പിന്നീടു് അവ വായിക്കാനായി എന്നു വരില്ല. അതിനു് വഴിയുണ്ടു താനും. രേഖകള്‍ സൂക്ഷിക്കാന്‍ സുതാര്യമായ ഫോര്‍മാറ്റുകളുണ്ടു്. വെറും ആസ്ക്കി, അഡോബിന്റെ പോര്‍ട്ടബിള്‍ ഡോക്യുമെന്റ് ഫോര്‍മാറ്റ് (പി.ഡി.എഫ്), മൈക്രോസോഫ്റ്റിന്റെ റിച്ച് ടെക്‌സ്റ്റ് ഫോര്‍മാറ്റ്, തുടങ്ങി പലതുമുണ്ടു്. എന്നാല്‍ മാനദണ്ഡങ്ങള്‍ സൂക്ഷിക്കുന്ന സാര്‍വ്വദേശീയ സംഘടന (International Standards Organisation, ISO) അംഗീകരിച്ച തുറന്നതും സ്വതന്ത്രവുമായ മാനദണ്ഡമാണു് ഓപ്പണ്‍ ഡോക്യുമെന്റ് ഫോര്‍മാറ്റ് (ODF). ഈ രീതിയില്‍ രേഖകള്‍ സൂക്ഷിക്കുന്ന ഒരു പ്രയോഗമാണു് സ്വതന്ത്ര സോഫ്റ്റ്‌വെയറായ ഓപ്പണ്‍ ഓഫീസ്. എന്നാല്‍ സുതാര്യമായതിനാല്‍ ഈ രീതിയില്‍ രേഖകള്‍ സൂക്ഷിക്കാനും അത്തരം രേഖകള്‍ കൃത്യമായി തുറക്കാനും കഴിയുന്ന പ്രയോഗങ്ങള്‍ ആര്‍ക്കും നിര്‍മ്മിക്കാവുന്നതാണു്. ഇത്തരം സുതാര്യതയാണു് ഇന്റര്‍നെറ്റ് വഴി ആശയങ്ങള്‍ കൈമാറുന്നതു് സാധ്യമാക്കിയതു് എന്നോര്‍ക്കുക. വെബ് പേജുകളിലിടുന്ന വിവരങ്ങള്‍ രഹസ്യ ഫോര്‍മാറ്റുകളിലായിരുന്നു എങ്കില്‍ എത്രയോ കുറച്ചു പേര്‍ക്കു മാത്രമെ ഇന്റര്‍നെറ്റിലെ വിവരങ്ങള്‍ ഉപയോഗിക്കാന്‍ കഴിയുമായിരുന്നുള്ളൂ!

മുകളില്‍ സൂചിപ്പിച്ചതുപോലെ സര്‍ക്കാര്‍ രേഖകളുടെ കാര്യത്തില്‍ ഈ സുതാര്യത അത്യാവശ്യമാണു്, വിശേഷിച്ചു് സര്‍ക്കാരുകളുടെ നടത്തിപ്പിലും പൊതുജനവുമായുള്ള ഇടപാടുകളിലും വര്‍ദ്ധിച്ചുവരുന്ന തോതില്‍ കമ്പ്യൂട്ടര്‍ ഉപയോഗിച്ചു വരുന്ന ഇക്കാലത്തു്. ഇന്നുണ്ടാക്കുന്ന രേഖകള്‍ പത്തോ ഇരുപതോ അമ്പതോ വര്‍ഷത്തിനു ശേഷവും തുറന്നു കാണാന്‍ കഴിയണം എന്നതു് നിര്‍ബ്ബന്ധമാണു്. ഒരു കമ്പനിയുടെ നിയന്ത്രണത്തിലുള്ള ഫോര്‍മാറ്റിലാണു് രേഖകള്‍ സൂക്ഷിക്കുന്നതെങ്കില്‍ ഇതു് സാധ്യമാവണമെന്നില്ല. നമുക്കാവശ്യം വരുമ്പോള്‍ ആ കമ്പനി ഉണ്ടാവണമെന്നില്ല. ഉണ്ടെങ്കില്‍ തന്നെ അന്നത്തെ ആഗോള രാഷ്ട്രീയത്തിന്റെ പശ്ചാത്തലത്തില്‍ അവര്‍ നമ്മോടു് സഹകരിക്കണമെന്നുമില്ല. എന്തായാലും ഏതോ ഒരു കമ്പനിയുടെ നിയന്ത്രണത്തിലാവരുതല്ലോ നമ്മുടെ പ്രധാനപ്പെട്ട രേഖകള്‍.

രേഖകളുടെ സ്വാതന്ത്ര്യം എന്ന ആശയം പ്രചരിപ്പിക്കുന്നതിനാണു് ഡോക്യുമെന്റ് സ്വാതന്ത്ര്യ ദിനം ആചരിക്കുന്നതു്. ഇന്ത്യയില്‍ ഇപ്പോള്‍ ഇതിനു് വിശേഷിച്ചൊരു പ്രസക്തിയുണ്ടു്. ഇ ഗവേണന്‍സിനു് ഉപയോഗിക്കേണ്ട മാനദണ്ഡങ്ങള്‍ നിര്‍ണ്ണയിക്കുന്ന നയം കേന്ദ്ര സര്‍ക്കാര്‍ രൂപീകരിച്ചു \mbox{വരികയാണു്.} തുറന്ന, സുതാര്യമായ, ഫോര്‍മാറ്റുകള്‍ മാത്രം ഉപയോഗിച്ചാല്‍ മതി എന്നതായിരുന്നു നയത്തിന്റെ കരടുരേഖയില്‍ അടുത്ത കാലം വരെ പറഞ്ഞിരുന്നതു്. വിദഗ്ദ്ധരും പൊതുജന സംഘടനകളും മറ്റുമായി ചര്‍ച്ച നടത്തിയായിരുന്നു അതു് തീരുമാനിച്ചിരുന്നതു്. എന്നാല്‍ ഇപ്പോള്‍ അതില്‍ മാറ്റം വന്നതായി കാണുന്നു. ഉടമസ്ഥാവകാശമുള്ള രഹസ്യമായ ഫോര്‍മാറ്റുകളും ആവാം എന്നായിരിക്കുന്നു ഇപ്പോഴത്തെ നിലപാടു്. ഇതു് ദീര്‍ഘകാലത്തെ കാഴ്ചപ്പാടില്‍ നമ്മുടെ രാജ്യത്തിനു് തീര്‍ച്ചയായും നല്ലതല്ല. രഹസ്യമായി കൊണ്ടുവന്ന ഈ മാറ്റം ഉപേക്ഷിക്കാന്‍ സര്‍ക്കാരില്‍ സമ്മര്‍ദ്ദം ചെലുത്തേണ്ടതു് അത്യാവശ്യമാണു്.

When you buy a male plug (often known as a 'top'), you don't normally have to worry about whether it will fit into the female plug (power outlet) you have at home. This is because both of them are manufactured according to standards that are followed by the industry. It is easy for anyone to design and construct a 'top' that fits into an ordinary power outlet because the standards are available for anyone to study and make use of. So anyone can manufacture plugs that fit existing sockets or vice versa. And everyone benefits. Similar is the case with so many other devices and components we use that life would have been so much more difficult for us without these standards. Another example is bolts and nuts. One could buy bolts and nuts of the same size from different shops and still use them together.

The same is true in the case of the ubiquitous modern device, the computer. The keyboard is the same on all of them, the compact disks we use are of the same size and we need not relearn the use of a keyboard when we buy a new computer, nor do we have to specify a certain size for the CD we buy. These are all examples of open standards that have been adopted by the industry. And these standards make our life easier because we need not unduly worry about what we buy. However, that is not necessarily the case with what we use in the computer.

Society has started using the computer for all kinds of purposes, including creating documents, pictures, animations, videos, databases and so on. These are stored in a manner that only a computer can decipher. This happens transparently so that even computer users may not realise how they are stored. For instance, when I type this article, it is stored in the computer in the form of what we call a “file”. A file is a collection of ones and zeroes stored electronically. Each character in a text document like this one or each tiny bit of colour in a picture is represented in a computer by a group of ones and zeroes. What set of ones and zeroes represent a character is decided by the method of encoding used for creating the file. For many purposes, the rule by which this conversion is made is open to the public – such as ASCII or Unicode. But certain applications, such as Microsoft Word, save files it creates in a manner that is not open. It writes files into hard disks in a purely “binary” format that consists of ones and zeroes in an order that is determined by a rule that is known only to the makers of Word. In other words, that file can be opened and the original document seen in the proper manner only if Microsoft Word is used. Of course, some other people have worked out the manner in which Word does it, but not perfectly. Therefore, the file could be opened, albeit imperfectly, using some other applications also. This is the case not only with Microsoft Word, but is true of all proprietary applications including Adobe Photoshop, Lotus 123 and CorelDraw. Of course, this is the default behaviour and each of these is capable of saving the files in other formats (which, again, may not be perfect).

But that is certainly not an ideal situation. What it means is that we users become dependent on the software that we use to create our documents to open them. That means, if we want to open a document created using Microsoft Word, and see it in the way we had made it, we will have to use Microsoft Word itself. The problem is that we don't know what a later version of the application will support. There is no guarantee that a file created with an earlier version will be cleanly opened by a new version of the same software. More importantly, in today's dog eats dog world, there is no guarantee that even the company wll exist a few years hence. And this is not mere speculation. WordPerfect used to be the most popular word processor some years back. But very few people use it today, even though it is probably the best word processor ever according to many people. WordPerfect was purchased by Corel, which itself is a struggling company. It could be wound up any day, and WordPerfect may no longer be available. And no other application today can cleanly open documents created with WordPerfect.

Such a situation is bad enough for private documents. Imagine the situation in which important documents related to the matters of a country are stored in formats created by proprietary software companies – formats that are not open and therefore inaccessible to anyone other than those who created the software. It could become very difficult to retrieve the information. Or critical information about citizens of a country. The risk is not only of the information getting locked in, but also of a software company potentially holding a country to ransom. It may be appropriate to narrate an incident in this connection.

Venezuela is a poor country that is very much dependent on its oil resources. Petróleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA), often pronounced Pedevesa, is a state-owned company that runs the oil industry there. A whole lot of processes, including metering, invoicing, billing, and customer service, was handled by proprietary software. At a particular point in the political transformation that happened in Venezuela, a large number of employees who were managing the computer system resigned and left suddenly, and took the user manuals with them (it seems under instigation from external sources that wanted to create trouble for the new regime). Not only was the whole system left without anyone to manage, the entire data, in a format designed by the company making it inaccessible to others. The company, conveniently, refused to help the country. The entire economy of the country was on the brink of collapse. It was saved only because a group of young people managed to migrate the entire computer system to Free Software – software that would save all information in a format that is open, ensuring that it will always be accessible.

Obviously, governments should ensure that all their data are stored in open formats so that at no time will they held to ransom by agencies, external or internal, that wished to create trouble for them. Use of standards is a requirement for a technological society. The standards for the units of measurement were an important step in the history of mankind. The possibility of interoperability of equipment such as telephones, radios or televisions, among others, is based on common standards of operation. The only way to ensure that everyone can build appliances, equipment or software that interact with each other is the use of open standards. This enables the storage and exchange of information and data between individuals or groups in different places and times.

There seems to exist an argument that proprietary standards should be allowed to co-exist with free and open standards. But this is meaningless, since there can be only one standard for one purpose. Else, it ceases to be a standard. Imagine having the metre and the fathom as "standards". While the former is a measure of length that is defined as precisely as humanly possible, the other is a rough measure based on the distance between the fingertips of an average individual's hands. Let us forget this aspect for the moment, and imagine that the fathom is another standard. What could happen is that some people could specify lengths in terms of the metre, and others could use the fathom. People would have to go on converting from one system to the other. Of course, this may contribute to improving the computing skills of individuals, but it could contribute much more to confusion. Remember the times we used to get bolts, nuts and screws in both the Imperial and the metric standards. Many unwary people landed up purchasing bolts that would not fit the nuts and screws that wouldn't go into threaded holes that were meant for them.

In any case, it is not good for government documents that will have to be maintained for a number of years. Problems could be especially severe if the "standard" adopted is not Free and Open and is proprietary. In the case of Free and open standards, even if the application that created the documents ceased to exist, the government could hire someone to create an application to open the document, since the format is open. Documents that are encoded in proprietary formats, such as the .doc format of MS Word or the .pm format of Adobe Pagemaker, would make it extremely difficult to open if the original application ceases to exist. Even if it did not, the government would become dependent on that company for ever. It is for such reasons that Free Software activists and others who understand the trap have been saying that the formats used by the governments for storing documents should be free and open.

But the latest draft document on formats to be used for e-governance speaks about other formats co-existing with free and open formats, which it had not till the previous draft. Why this change was made is totally unclear. Till the previous version, the draft was prepared after extensive consultations with the industry and the community, making it rather transparent. But the latest draft was prepared by someone (a bureaucrat?) under the strong influence of one or more company executives. The government seems to have placed the interests of the companies before those of the nation and the people. I would like to join a number of people including Free Software enthusiasts to urge the government to drop this move and admit only the use of Free and Open formats for documents of the government.