Localization

Bangladesh Open Source Network

"Throughout history, every generation has had to stand up for freedom. Now it's our turn"

Articles

My Language in Internet
by Munir Hasan
In this article the author describe the problem of a modern language in the era of technology. He concludes that the language which has the ability to survive in the Internet would only survive in the long run. The article summarizes the effort in Bangla language in this area. First published in Daily Prothom Alo, Bangladesh.
Published: Mar 17, 2009
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My Freedom in Software
by Munir Hasan
This software freedom day article was first published in Daily Prothom Alo on 19th September. The writer explained why we need to know about the details of a software which we used for certain purposes. This not only ensure the basic rights of a human being, it also empowered the people with the technology.
Published: Sep 26, 2008
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Why schools should exclusively use free software
by Richard Stallman (Translated by Ferdous Ahmed Tanin)
Richard Stallman explained why schools around the world should use exclusively free software. Cost is not the only reason, freedom is more important.
Published: Aug 29, 2008
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Uses of Open Source Software Increases in Bangladesh
by Mohammad Golam NABI
This article is on the recent trend of uses of Open Source software in Bangladesh. The author looked into matter from the perspective of economic and cultural points. The article was published at Daily Naya Diganta on 20th September as a special article on the occasion of Software Freedom Day 2008.
Published: Aug 26, 2008
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It's not the Gates, it's the bars
by Richard Stallman (Translated by Munir Hasan)
To pay so much attention to Bill Gates' retirement is missing the point. What really matters is not Gates, nor Microsoft, but the unethical system of restrictions that Microsoft, like many other software companies, imposes on its customers.
Published: Jul 31, 2008
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The official language of all 140 million people of Bangladesh is 'Bangla'. Though English is taught in schools, colleges and universities here, a big portion of the literate people can't read English. The localization related activities of the BdOSN divided in Software Localization and Content Localization.

Software localization, lead by Ankur deals with the localization of Linux, Open Office, Gaim etc. The present thrust is with Open Office.org. To involve more people in the localization of software BdOSN organizes boot camp in different educational institution.

One of the main reason that open source is not being popular in Bangladesh is lack of Bangla contents that can reach the mass people. These contents mainly comprise books and web contents. At this moment there are a good number of open contents exists in English language. Some of them are published under GFDL/GNU/CC license and thus suitable for translation in other language. Among these two special types of books may be taken for translation. First, the books that will help people understand open source, benefits of open source, impact of open source in government, education and other important sectors of our lives. Another type of books is tutorials and user guides that will help people to use open source software.

One of the most successful open source projects is wikipedia. Like wikipedia of other languages, Bangla wikipedia is growing also, though still infant. After BdOSN has taken initiative to expedite the growth of Bangla wikipedia, it's growing faster. Though number of entries in Bangla wikipedia is already over 9000, most of these are stubs (i.e. incomplete article). So the next thing to do with Bangla wikipedia is to enrich the current articles or to create new good/complete articles.

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Popularization Localization Bangla Wiki

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