Hello,
I have worked extensively on accessibility using FOSS in education.
But I wasn't aware of this workshop untill this email.
Wonder what is the agenda?
Happy hacking.
Krishnakant.
On 17/08/11 12:07, Vickram Crishna wrote:
2011/8/16 Guru गुरु <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>>
Friends
for those who have been considering migrating to public software,
two workshops next week...
"FOSS in education" workshop in Mumbai... by CDAC on Aug 26/27.
See details in mail below for registration form/process.
They are priced at Rs 750, and involve a fairly tedious journey out to
Kharghar for the day each. Does anyone on the list have experience of
CDAC workshops of this nature? Is it fruitful? I am particularly
thinking of the workshop on accessibility on the 26th, even though it
seems confined to discussions of FOSS on the desktop (which seems to
me a little antediluvian). Neither workshop announcement has any
genuine details (speakers, subject of presentations, proposed workshop
techniques). Feedback much appreciated, thanks.
Similarly, NATIONAL WORKSHOP ON FOSS ADOPTION IN EDUCATION, on
August 27, 2011 is intended to explore the benefits, role, and
developments of technology, specifically FOSS, in education. FOSS
provides softwares that are free of cost, easily maintainable,
community support, customization freedom, etc. Various FOSS tools
in education will be demonstrated in the workshop. The
participants will also get to experience the work of C-DAC Mumbai
in promoting technology/ FOSS in education. The workshop will
provide an opportunity to interact with participants from
different organizations and industry practitioners.
While the work CDAC is putting in is in the right direction, somehow
it doesn't seem to be very fruitful from the public accessibility
point of view. There are oft-expressed concerns about the
unavailability of BOSS downloads, for instance. GN had mentioned
something about trying to provide a mirror site, and CAMP (for one)
was attempting to do this unilaterally, at least for the current
version. It seems to me to be very tedious to have to continuously
monitor for updates and have to rehost them each time, all without a
process in place.
This jars a bit, when one looks at the workshop objectives, one of
which is "Understand role of repositories (content, softwares) in
technology adoption in education."
The workshop itself is probably not the best place to even raise such
an issue, but with so many keen FOSSers in CDAC it might be a good
time to announce a more healthy policy.
NATIONAL WORKSHOP ON FOSS DESKTOP ACCESSIBILITY on August 26, 2011
will focus on exploring the current trends in the field of
accessibility particularly with regard to FOSS. As you may be
aware a large section of the society comprising people with
different kinds of disabilities finds it difficult to use ICT in
the same way as normal
people do for fulfilling different purposes. It is very much
required to provide such people with assistive technologies that
make theirinteraction with computers more user-friendly and
accessible. This workshop intends to serve as a platform to
encourage the use of FOSS tools and techniques in creating
assistive technologies that are free-of- cost, available to all,
easily maintainable etc. for such a
large portion of population in a country like India. The workshop
will also like to leverage the experiences of all stakeholders to
identify and address the issues in those areas of accessibility
that are still untouched.
The workshop will involve keynote and invited lectures by
distinguished researchers and/or professionals. We take this
opportunity to extend you an invitation for participation in these
workshops. Looking forward to see you or your representative at
the event. Please find attached registration form and workshop
brochures.
This also sounds interesting.
Kindly use the following URLs to access more details about the
workshops:
--
Vickram
Fool On The Hill <http://communicall.wordpress.com>
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