Indian FOSS Timelines, Organizations and Projects

foss_india.md

Indian FOSS: Timelines

This is an attempt to cover the history of Indian FOSS

• 1984: Richard Stallman creates GNU
• 1980s: TeX (softare in public domain) introduced into Kerala by Prof. K.S.S. Namburipad of the Department of Mathematics in the University of Kerala. Source
• 1991: Linus Torvalds releaes Linux Kernel
• 1996: Atul Chitnis and Kishore Bhargava convince CyberMedia (PC Quest) to distribute Linux CDs. Over a million CDs distributed over a span of 10 years. People stood in queues in front of newstands to get a copy of PCQuest.
• 1998: PCQ swaps Slackware Linux with Red Hat Linux.
• 1998-2000: Linux user groups (LUGs) start forming in all major cities [pending: link
• 1999-2001: IndLinux incubated via FreeOS to kick of Indic Localization
• 2000: IT@School project takes shape in Kerala to promote FOSS in schools in Kerala. Project chaired by Dr U. R. Rao, former head of ISRO
• 2001: FOSS initiative named Freedom First was held in Thiruvananthapuram to promote free software in the country. RMS was the chief guest and FSF India was inaugrated.
• 2001: Linux Bangalore (later FOSS.in) kicks off - one of the biggest FOSS events in Asia promoted by Bangalore LUG
• 2002: Satish Babu out manouvers Oracle to get FOSS win a contract at PWD Kerala
• 2002: Public Demo of Hindi Gnome in Banglore Linux
• 2003: Anna University starts promoting FOSS in colleges in TN, gets join funding with CDAC
• 2004: Linux Asia starts, later becomes OSI Days in 2010
• 2007: BOSS Linux introducted by CDAC / NRC FOSS
• 2008: Prof Phatak, RetHat and ohers successfully convince GoI to not endorse OOXML as an ISO standard
• 2008: GRC Lab setup at IIT-B to work on advanced GCC Internals
• 2009: Phase II of NRCFOSS - expansion in programs
• 2010: Free Software Movement of India founded in Bangalore
• 2012: Last FOSS.IN
• 2013: FSMI stops Technical Education board AICTE from mandating Office356
• 2014: Microsoft ends support for Windows XP - State Govt of Kerala mandates all offices to migrate to Linux

1. Can you fix "Chitnis becomes bad boy of Indian FOSS."?
2. " marred by groupism and flame wars." - how do you know?
3. 2014 - OSI Days isn't really big event that can be marked in History. You can remove it.

You completely left out the work of several movements in Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, TN, Maharashtra.

@kartikm, thanks updated. OSI Days seems like the biggest community event - considering FOSS.IN is no longer active. (I have attended neither)

@vincentvikram - Did not find any authentic sources for the "movements" or any indication of activties and memberships

Rushabh, what do you mean by authentic?

http://fsmi.in/ Free Software Movement India
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Software_Movement_of_India
http://www.swecha.org/ Swecha- AP
http://fsmk.org/ Free Software Movement Karnataka
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Software_Movement_of_Karnataka
http://fsftn.org/ No, FSFTN is not part of FSF-I but rather FSMI
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Software_Foundation_Tamil_Nadu_%28FSFTN%29

I have provided both the websites and the related wikipedia pages so that you may look at the newspaper sources. Wikipedia considers secondary sources as authentic.

If you want numbers then a cursory glance at the related FB groups should give you an estimate. Last I checked, FSMK had 7000+ members of whom several hundred are currently active at the GLUG level. The last summer camp had over 200 participants and 50 volunteers who stayed day and night for 7 days http://camp.fsmk.org

But it would be good if you can define what you mean by authentic.

Vikram, thanks updated. But can't help feeling the political twist in all of this. Why did you break away from FSF-India?

The split was organisational and this is mentioned in several emails exchanged across the list.
FSMI is a mass movement and democratic and FSF-India has defined it scope differently
http://fsf.org.in/board-statement-on-recent-issues-1

Note the email quoted below, the people CC'd and the subject. Now look at the archives and see if you can find that email or my reply to RMS :)

http://mm.gnu.org.in/pipermail/fsug-bangalore/2008-November/thread.html#2447
http://mail.gnu.org.in/pipermail/fsf-friends/2008-December/thread.html#5860

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Richard M Stallman rms@gnu.org
Date: 30 November 2008 22:13
Subject: Re: Somebody vandalised the FSF-friends and FSUG Bangalore mailing lists
To: Vikram Vincent vincentvikram@gmail.com
Cc: fsf-friends@mm.gnu.org.in, fsug-bangalore@mm.gnu.org.in, pravi.a@gmail.com, anurag@gnuer.org, abhas@deeproot.co.in, nagarjun@gnu.org.in

States must be controlled by the public because they have power over
the public. Governments represent the public, so they must give the
public a way to decide what they should do. None of that applies to
FSF India, since it does not exercise power and does not represent a
population.

The purpose of FSF India is to advocate the firm ethical position that
software must be free. Most of the people who like using free
software reject this position, and want to make compromises we
consider unacceptable. To give an FSF a democratic structure would
enable the majority with their "open source" views to take control of
it and change its goals and direction. The structure of FSF India is
a necessary precaution to prevent that from happening. To change it
is out of the question.

The FSF India's resources consist of the time and money that people
choose to give to it. Those with different views are free to
establish organizations to promote their views. Whatever you wish to
advocate, you can do so, and the existence of FSF India is no
obstacle. However, if you wish to support an organization that will
continue to uphold the principles of free software, you may be glad
that FSF India is one.