KANNADA SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT - What is the future
V. M. Kumarasamy
KANNADA SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT - What is the future
In the light of ever changing OS capabilities, every Kannada software
user is concerned about the fate of Kannada on computers.
Kannada facility on computers are dictated by the OS. Therefore, the
solutions do also vary. The transition of OS from DOS to Windows didn't
have much impact on the users just because of data generated on both of
these OS (DOS and Windows) was based on the same font hacking
techniques. The present transition from non-standard (hacked fonts) to standard
(Unicode) is not the same as the earlier from DOS to Windows.
During the earlier transition Kannada software developers spent money,
time and energy due to their compelling passion towards the Languages.
But the present transition has not attracted any of the Kannada
software developer so far. WHY?
To accelerate the growth and development of Kannada software, Govt of
Karnataka has announced the standards and guidelines on 1-11-2000.
Further, the Govt of Karnataka has sanctioned funds to the tune of Rs.30.55
lakhs to develop various Kannada software. Why the developer (KGP) is
not able to deliver the products?
On one hand GoK has announced the glyph standards to ensure the data
portability on the other hand GOK is implementing its e-Governance
projects based on the non-standard glyphs ignoring the much needed
portability. Who is behind this development? Why should KGP develop a
non-standard Nudi? Why Nudi is not in comfirmity with the Govt guidelines?
Whether one wishes to go in line with Unicode or not, it is the boon
and future and is already available. When the GoK had consulted the so
called Kannada software saviours - KGP, Why they have not developed a
software to enable Unicode on MS Windows 98? This could have enabled every
Kannada software user to use Unicode on MS Windows 98. Why should one
bother about promotion of XP in the name of Kannada. Microsoft is
offering its OS which is Unicode enabled, it is for anyone to embrace due to
its importance. In order to use Unicode with MS Windows XP, one could
download the IME from Basha.
Does anybody still believe in the prosperity of Kannada software?
KKnight
this regard?
If you can give the details about them here it will help the
interested people to contact them and get a kick start and also will
help to spread the word and garner more support.
thanks,
KK
ellak...@yahoo.com (V. M. Kumarasamy) wrote in message news:<587d82ff.04062...@posting.google.com>...
Niels L. Ellegaard
> Are there any organizations and individuals actively doing work in
> this regard? If you can give the details about them here it will
> help the interested people to contact them and get a kick start and
> also will help to spread the word and garner more support.
This page contains some links. However it is mostly oriented towards
the Linux operative system (As opposed to Microsoft Windows)
http://kannada.sourceforge.net/index.php?pg=onlinux
They have a localization file for Windows 2000, but I don't know what
it does.
http://kannada.sourceforge.net/index.php?pg=onwin2k
There is also a file for Openoffice. This program is usable under
windows, but i don't know if the localization files are Linux
specific.
http://kannada.sourceforge.net/openoffice.org/
I would be interested in knowing the number of Kannada speaking Linux
users. Is Linux also used outside universities?
Regards
Niels
--
Niels L Ellegaard http://dirac.ruc.dk/~gnalle/
V. M. Kumarasamy
Forwarded Message:
Subj: Re: Request to S.K. Anand of Cyberscape Multimedia Ltd. Write in
detail about KGP
Date: 6/22/2004 3:26:07 AM Pacific Daylight Time
From: an...@cyberscapeindia.com
To: Nov...@aol.com
Sent from the Internet (Details)
Dear Mr. Kumaraswamy,
As requested by you I would like to share my (bitter) experience with
KGP as one of the founder member, who was later on kicked out of the
organization for daring to question and expose the nefarious
activities of Shri Srinath Sastry and Shri G.N. Narsimurthy, who while
pretending to be doing something very noble for the cause of Kannada,
were all the while plotting and politicking in the background and who
mislead a lot of honourable executive members as well as the general
public and Govt. bureaucrats and who in my opinion are singularly
responsible for hijacking and misleading what was meant to be a good
effort to make Kannada permeate all aspects of computing and therby
flourish in this new medium.
First, though I find this very embarrasing since you have asked for I
need to give a little background of mine for those like you who are
not aware:
a. Way back in 1983, with a group of like minded professionals, I
started a company called VSS Computer Engg. Pvt. Ltd. in Mumbai. As an
Electronics & Communications engineer, with a burning zeal to develop
technology indigenously, I designed one of the the few Z-80 based,
micro-computer called "Asterix" and among other uses we developed it
as an offline composing terminal to feed text ( including all Indian
languages) for photo-composing machines. In those days before DTP, the
publishing industry used photo-composing machines for producing
bromide output and make master plates for printing. So my brush with
languages including, Kannada and the technicalities like fonts, coding
and composing dates from those days. I think the only other group with
this kind of knowledge and experience is the Pune based Modular
Systems Pvt. Ltd, who are our worthy competitors.
b. In Printek-1988 in New Delhi, we were the first to demonstrate the
use of an IBM PC clone, running DOS and Ventura (GEM) version to do
composing in Hindi and then subsequently in all languages like
Kannada. It was called the "Asterix Publishing System". This was the
first step of establishing the DTP industry in the country and it was
a real low cost alternative to the one based on Apple Macintosh and
Apple Laserwriter Postscript printer. For the first time an
inexpensive PC based, GUI based and a non Postscript (HP laserjet)
based DTP solution for Indian languages with much superior quality
than the expensive Apple Mac based system was demonstrated by us. It
is with great satisfaction that today I see that this kind of system
is virtually the defacto standard in the industry.
c. Along with Mr. Mohan Tambe, then at IIT Kanpur, I helped evolve the
first ever GIST card, which was then taken up for further development
at CDAC, Pune and we at VSS were the first to build an ISCII, GIST
card ( Asterix Language Card) based DTP system with GUI support on
Windows 3.0, with ATM fonts and Truetype fonts in Windows 3.11,
working on Ventura 2.0 and Page Maker 2.0 (Windows version).
d. In 1990, along with a colleague Mr. M.S. Sridhar, I founded ACES
Technologies and ACES Consultants and "Akruti" was born. Akruti had
the concept of a DOS based ISCII editor which could edit all Indian
scripts including Kannada which could be imported by PageMaker or
Ventura and was the first to allow direct editing of Hindi, Kannada
and other Indian scripts in the Windows GUI environment. Some of our
newspaper and magazine customers use this solution even today. In fact
Pavanaja was one of our earliest Kannada DTP software customers in
Mumbai. I also was a technical adviser to CDAC for setting up the
Fonts Development Cell, when Mr. Vijay Bhatkar was the Executive
Director and Mohan Tambe was in charge of the GIST technology group.
e. In 1992, I shifted to Bangalore from Mumbai and sort of returned to
my roots to further the development of "Akruti" in Kannada and all
south indian languages. Slowly it dawned on us that, publishing was
just one of the application areas for language software and we started
exploring other areas like office productivity applications like Word,
Excel, Power Point, Lotus Smart Suite etc. all on the Windows
platform.
f. In 1996, we were the first in the country to recognise and launch
(along with Mr. Ninad Pradhan of Mumbai) the first ever Indian
language website called www.indianlanguages.com . This was the primary
starting point for Indian language Web publications like "Mai Boli" in
Marathi, "Daily Milap" in Hindi and "Vishwa Kannada" in Kannada,
edited by Pavanaja.
g. 1996 also saw the founding of Cyberscape Multimedia Pvt. Ltd. which
took over ACES Technologies and ACES Consultants and the "Akruti" line
of products. We also developed some pioneering applications, like the
"Grievance Monitoring System" for the Chief Minister's Secretariat and
KSRTC in Kannada. A payroll system in Kannada with Mr. Sathyanarayana
of Kidwai and a Library management System in Kannada with Mr.
Annamalai of NAL. It was around this time when Srinath Sastry of NAL
and Narsimurthy of SBI who had no clue as to the technicalities of
Kannada software started approaching me to illuminate them about these
technical issues. In fact there were times when they would pick my
brain for hours to-gether on Sundays and late nights to understand the
nitty gritty of these issues. Of course, today they are self
proclaimed experts in Kannada Computing and people like me Mr.
Anbarasan of Applesoft and Mr. Muthu Krishnan of SRG with over two
decades of experience in this area have to be certified by these
amateurs whether our software meets standards or not.
h. Mr. Mohan Tambe subsequently started a company called Innomedia in
Bangalore in which Cyberscape was an angel investor and the idea was
to develop a convergent media solution called the "Chois Pad" a
set-top box, which would provide infotainment services thru cable. Our
contribution was to help in enabling the solution to work in all
Indian languages. It was in connection with this that I facilitated
Pavanaja's shift from Mumbai where he was languishing in BARC to the
more fertile and intellectually active private info-tech industry in
Bangalore and helped him take up a job with Innomedia. Subsequently,
due to some differences with Mr. Tambe and his style of working,
Pavanaja quit and waded thru various jobs to finally start Vishwa
Kannada Softech. Cyberscape too disassociated with Innomedia, but for
the record today, Innomedia with Reliance having aquired 55% stake in
it is one of the leading New Media solutions company and is one of the
key strategic IP that Reliance is going to use to grab a major chunk
of the yet to develop but potentially huge convergent
telecom/infotainment/home computing market.
i. Today, Cyberscape Multimedia Ltd. of which, I am the Managing
Director, is a publicly listed company since 2000, and has more than
18,000 Akruti installations all across the country. Kannada being my
mother tongue does interest me academically still, but the kind of
sordid politics I experienced in KGP makes me feel I would be better
off keeping away from such petty politics and concentrate on the
future technologies and products. We are currently pioneering in the
following areas:
e-Governance: We have a product called e-Karyalaya which handles all
basic office admin functions in Kannada or any Indian language.
e-Banking: We have cyBANK and cyCRED which cater to total branch
automation in local languages for co-op banks and micro-credit
institutions.
DM & KM: With our cyDOCS and cyKNIT products, we cater to Document
management and Knowledge Management in any Indian or Global script.
Akruti WDK / SDK : We enable any software or web application developer
to enable his solution in any local language including Kannada using
our Software Development Kit or Web Development Kit.
We are actively looking at language enabling of embedded devices using
Linux and Windows CE/XP embedded OS.
While I will have a lot to say of my experience with KGP in succeeding
mails, I will currently focus on some specific questions you have
raised:
Do you have any correspondences with KGP and it's Executives? Please
send these in a separate email to me. All of it. Exactly like you have
sent to them or to any KGP persons that were involved at the time you
were in KGP.
Yes, I do have some mails with KGP and its execs. I will be attaching
them seperately.
Who developed KALITHA? Was it developed from Scaratch? Who paid for it
tobe developed?
Do you know how did KGP developed the NUDI software? IS THIS done from
Scaratch? Are there anything COPIED or PIRATED or REVERSE ENGINERED
from some one else's Software that was submitted to KGP? Do you know
anything about this? Who did the majority of NUDI software
development? How long it took to complete that ?
Kalitha was developed in a hush-hush manner, behind our back by
reverse engineering the software obtained for certifying that they
comply with GOK Keyboard and font standards by some part time
developers in active connivance with Srinath Sastry and Narsimurthy. I
think the developer named Harsha was introduced by Pavanaja to them
and probably he knows more about it. I know for sure that our Akruti
font "Padmini" was definitely used without our permission as the
initial font for Kalitha. later when I objected to this in a KGP
meeting. I was asked to prove this or take it to a court of law by
them knowing very well how difficult it is for courts in India with
their scant knowledge of software and IP rights and their very long
decision making time frames to give any kind of speedy justice. Mr.
Srinath Sastry and Narsimurthy had been for quite some time using
Akruti provided by us for their correspondence and other Kannada
related activity and they had also sent me drafts of the font code for
approval. This I see nothing but a stab in the back to someone who
gave them all the technical guidance when they were absolute
ingnoramuses.
Do you know of any relationship between KGP and DIT ? Do you know any
relatives of KGP worked in DIT ?
I think, the nexus and plot to retrospectively finance this NUDI
developement, probably with the connivance of some elements in DIT was
hatched, by the abovementioned active members of KGP without taking
any of us other so called committee members into confidence. Srinath
Sastry's son was spotted on many occasions with DIT members doing some
software work, and Srinath Sastry's daughter used to hang around quite
a bit in KGP office, I do not know if this work was voluntary or there
was some consideration.
You told me that you have read all the emails of Mr. N. Anbarsan and
Mr. Muthukrishanan. Can you write answers in detail to those emails
whether they are telling the TRUTH or NOT. Please be precise in
writing the facts. It helps to solve the problems of KANNADA.
I think most of the points raised by these two gentlemen seems to
reflect facts. Maybe I will take it up point wise in succeeding mails.
More importantly, the fact that they are not true blue Kannadigas
being of Tamil origin, is being used to kind of discredit their
assertions. As far as I am concerned, these two have done a lot for
development of Kannada software and though they are competitors in the
commercial space, I see them as equal partners in the endeavour to
develop Kannada.
Do you know how much of work is completed by KGP for GoK?
I think from the long list of Kannada software development projects
for which funds over Rs. 30 Lakhs were obtained from DIT, expect Nudi
( which is of doubtful origin) and the kind of software which at least
10 commercial vendors and free software developers have been giving
solutions for decades, no other significant Kannada software, other
than a few utilities and a so called e-book which is a replica of the
work done by RCILTS has seen the light of the day. It should have been
very clear to DIT that a rag-tag bunch of amateurs and part time
programmers cannot deliver products, which normally is difficult for
even professional companies with significant budgets to deliver. I
think the whole issue of Kannada software development has been treated
shabbily and very casually by DIT. Hopefully, more sense will prevail
in the future.
Did you quit KGP b yourself ? Why you are not working with KGP
anymore?
As mentioned by Mr. Satyanarayana earlier, using a facade of fake
democracy, I along with Satyanarayana and Pavanaja, who were viewed as
inconvenient were first removed from the committee memberships by some
members who had never showed their face even once in KGP meetings.
Subsequently, on technical grounds that we had not renewed our
membership, we were kicked out of the KGP. Under these circumstances,
is it even wise to associate with such people, leave alone working
with them?
Did you advise KGP not to do somethings in KGP? Did they listen to
you? Have you kept tarck of these things? Please include these in your
email.
I have already mentioned, how we tried to object to some wrong paths
KGP was taking and how we got sidelined. Yes, I do have some mails and
I will send them as stated earlier for public scrutiny.
Thats all for now. More later.
Anand S.K.
Managing Director
Cyberscape Multimedia Ltd.
kknig...@yahoo.com (KKnight) wrote in message news:<a1ef5d2e.04062...@posting.google.com>...
Kannada
involved are more concerned with their personal glorification rather than
working towards a common cause - irrespective of who is right and who is
wrong. I am not surprised that no one takes us Kannadigas seriously.
Maybe the only solution is to grant each of them a Karnataka Ratna...maybe
that will suitably massage their egos.
"V. M. Kumarasamy" <ellak...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:587d82ff.0407...@posting.google.com...
V. M. Kumarasamy
Mr. Sheshadri Vasu's email to Mr. S. K. Anand
-----------------
Forwarded Message:
Subj: Fw: From Sheshadrivasu Chandrasekharan
Date: 6/28/2004 11:01:59 AM Pacific Daylight Time
From: an...@cyberscapeindia.com
To: nov...@aol.com
Sent from the Internet (Details)
Shri Kumarswamy,
Namaskaara,
I think largely due to your relentless efforts to ferret out the truth
behind the sad state of affairs in the area of Kannada software and
the domination of false icons of the so called free software like KGP
Nudi and Sheshadrivasu's Baraha, a lot of bitter truth and hidden
information is coming out from various quarters, which is exposing the
nasty skullduggery by which these false icons have sucked on the blood
of the real workers in the Kannada software arena who have never
claimed that they and they alone have done a great service to Kannada,
but have been contributing silently in the background.
I am forwarding here, an admission by one such icon, the Guru of free
Kannada software, who, perhaps due to the fear of getting exposed by
these revelations, very belatedly realised the need for acknowledging
the unabashed piracy. More than six years after his misdeed, he meekly
apologises for having pirated our "Akruti" fonts. This is a charge we
have also made on KGP. How many more years, do we have to wait for
them to come clean?
Anyway, I hope you keep churning the murky waters of the Kannada
software world for more such nuggets. I sincerely hope at the end of
this great "Samudra Manthan", finally some true gems emerge and adorn
our beloved "Kannada Maate" who must be hanging her head in eternal
shame at the present state of affairs. All the behind the scene
workers like us should be thankful for your fearless crusade against
all the wrong doers.
Hoping for a positive outcome for the sake of Kannada,
Anand S.K.
Managing Director
Cyberscape Multimedia Ltd.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mr. Sheshadri Vasu's email to Mr. S. K. Anand
----- Original Message -----
From: Sheshadrivasu Chandrasekharan <bar...@hotmail.com>
To: <an...@cyberscapeindia.com>
Sent: Tuesday, June 22, 2004 10:18 PM
Subject: From Sheshadrivasu Chandrasekharan
> Dear Mr. S.K. Anand,
>
> I recently saw a remark from you in one of the postings in an Internet
> newsgroup which goes as follows...
>
> "We who have been developing such fonts (AKRUTI) well over two decades would
> not like a repeat of the experience, we had when our fonts were pirated off
> the Web and used without acknowledgement, first by an individual who went on
> to release a free software..."
>
> I thought you may be referring to Baraha software in the above remark, and
> hence is this email.
>
> When I started developing a Kannada software, I had no knowledge of fonts at
> all. I experimented a lot with various Kannada fonts available in the
> Internet, including Akruti. This research helped me to understand the
> technology behind the Kannada fonts and I learnt a lot from these software.
> Initially, I wanted Baraha compatible with other Kannada fonts. But due to
> various limitations of such fonts, I had to come up with my own encoding. I
> honestly admit that I have used the glyphs from one of the Akruti fonts in
> Baraha 1.0, and I was not very serious to mention about it. When I released
> Baraha 1.0, I didn't know it will become popular and used by many people. It
> was only an experiment which I wanted to share with my family and friends.
> But later, when Baraha became popular, for copyright reasons, I had to add
> my own fonts for Kannada and other languages. I have created many new font
> styles, which don't exist in any other Kannada software. My intention was to
> provide the facility for basic documentation needs of Kannada. It was not my
> intention to copy or re-create various Kannada font styles that are
> available in other packages. Instead I have focussed more on portability of
> Kannada text from Baraha to other software such as Akruti, ShreeLipi, e.t.c.
>
> Through this mail I would like to express my grattitude to various other
> Kannada software for helping me to acquire the knowledge. My acknowldgements
> to Akruti software for providing the glyphs which were used in the intial
> releases of Baraha. I apologise for this delayed acknowledgement.
>
> Regards
> Vasu
> ***********************************************************
> Free Kannada/Devanagari software - http://www.baraha.com
> ***********************************************************
______________________________________________________________________
Re: Baraha Kannada, Nudi Kannada Deccan Herald June 24th 2004
In a message dated 7/8/2004 8:26:32 PM Pacific Daylight Time, NovaMed
writes:
Hello Mr. Sheshadri VASU,
Do not take it personal on this. THIS INVOLVES KANNADA.
All should know that when I was the Secretary of Karnatka Cultural
Association of Southern California, "KCA of SC" We have HONORED Mr.
Sheshadri VASU for his work in 1998, during our SILVER JUBILEE
CELEBRATIONS of KCA of SC. Dr. Kambar and Actor Sri . Srinath were
other guests of HONOR at that time. This is for the record.
Just like what we did at KCA of SC, You were honored like this in
several places in USA, Karnataka. Only because of your work in
KANNADA.
You need to be open. If I am doing something wrong you let me know By
asking all these questions to you and to others.
Are other Kannadigas are telling LIES ? on this ? Like Dr. PAVANAJA ?
Mr. Sathyanarayana?
We need to close this matter as qucikly as possible. It can happen
only if we get staright forward answers for some of these questions
from you and also from KGP and it's Executives.
I would liike to get your comments on this by Dr. U. B. Pavanaja. This
comment came on the basis of your PRESS REPORT by Deccan Herald.
Baraha Kannada, Nudi Kannada
Check out http://www.deccanherald.com/deccanherald/jun242004/metro4.asp
I have read the report in www.thaskananda.com also.
http://www.thatskannada.com/sahitya/debate/020704baraha.html
Please do not write to me that you are busy and you want to
concentrate on other things.
You have made statements in www.thatskananda.com, Vijaya Karnataka,
UDAYA TV Interview. Did you any time mention in these reports what you
have done ? and have you told them about your email to Mr. S. K Anand
dated June 22nd, 2004 ?
What Dr. PAVANAJA writing is wrong here? Please let us know?
Now we are coming to know of fight between Dr. Panditharadhya and your
Father BECAUSE of all these things.
Let us get things corrected. You do not know where it leads to.
Expecting an early reply for this.
Thanks
Sincerely
V. M. Kumaraswamy
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In a message dated 7/8/2004 8:25:26 AM Pacific Daylight Time,
pava...@vishvakannada.com writes:
> "Then, I, along with Ganaka Parishad and the State
> Government worked to bring Kannada software for
> official use", he (Vasu) said.
I don't remember any of such efforts by Sheshadri Vasu. In fact Vasu
very reluctant to implement the GoK standard for font and keyboard.
There was a heated argument between Dr Panditharadhya and K T
Chandrashekharan, father of Vasu, in this connection. All along the
time Shasthry, Narasimha Murthy and Panditharadhya were advocating
that Baraha killed Kannada while Nudi saved it! Vasu did implement the
keyboard and font standards after repeated appeals by Shrinatha
Shasthry and Narasimha Murthy.
> Baraha 4.0 was the first
> software that was implemented in Government offices
> with font styles.
I don't think this statement of Sheshadri Vasu is true. There were
many Kannada software being used in state govt much much before KGP,
Nudi or Baraha came into existence.
> But the Ganaka Parishad and the State Government have
> introduced Nudi software as a benchmark system.
I have answered this part in one of my previous mails. If Vasu were to
introduce the GoK standards much earlier than the release of Kalitha
(Nudi), Nudi would not have come into existence.
> Unfortunately for me, the government is insisting the
> use of Nudi software.
Why should be unfortunate to him? He is not selling Baraha.
>While Baraha has fulfilled the terms
> and conditions put forth by the Government, including
> stipulations such as keyboard and transliteration, I wonder
> why they are forcing departments to use only Nudi", he
> said. One of Baraha's many advantages, according to
> Vasu, is that it allows a person who knows Kannada to type
> it in English fonts. He felt preference of software (Baraha or
> Nudi) should be left to end user.
Why the choice should be only between Nudi and Baraha, both of them
are obsolete in the current and future time where Unicode is the world
standard? Actually the choice should be between Windows XP/2003, Mac,
Linux, Solaris, Java Desktop, Unix, etc. all are having Unicode
compliance.
Regards,
Pavanaja
----------------------------------
Dr. U.B. Pavanaja
CEO, Vishva Kannada Softech
Think Globally, Act locally
_________________________________________________________________________
Baraha Kannada, Nudi Kannada
With the Kannada software Baraha's pioneer launching latest versions
with added features and the State Government promoting Nudi also, the
end user stands to gain.
The latest version of the Kannada software Baraha 5.0 was recently
released (last December) and the brainchild behind it plans to release
Baraha 6.0 shortly with added features and in languages including
Telugu, Tamil and Malayalam.
Sheshadri Vasu, the pioneer of the Baraha software, is a self-made
success story. While most people working abroad spent weekends either
working over time at office or planning weekend trips, Vasu worked at
developing the Kannada software.
Thanks to his diligent efforts, Baraha is today popular not only in
Karnataka but also in 50 other countries including the USA, England,
Kenya, Gulf countries, Singapore, Germany and several others. And in
his own words, over 2,000 new people download Baraha everyday.
Vasu, a Bangalorean employed at 詮irst Data Company', New York, is an
Electronics Engineering student and has a Masters degree in
Electronics from Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore. Like
any other Electronics student, he too was preoccupied with repairing
old radio sets, television sets and other electronic devices.
During his post-graduation he developed an obsession for computers and
a project on 選nstrumental Motion Convertor' as part of the academic
course on computers helped him to realise his dream of learning
computers. He was also good at graphics and designing.
He was employed at a couple of software companies in India before he
left for New York. At New York, his mind was filled with the idea of
creating Kannada software which he ultimately called 腺araha'. During
the time of the software industry boom and the concept of e-mail was
at its peak, he ventured into development of a software in Kannada.
"I am an ardent lover of Kannada books. In my childhood days, I used
to read comic books and children's books like Balamitra, Chandamama,
Bombemane and others. And my father who was running a library then had
a collection of over 500 books which inspired me to develop interest
in Kannada", he recalls.
"I had no idea of developing a software in Kannada, but wanted to use
something in Kannada to send mails to my friends and family here", he
told Metrolife when contacted during his recent visit to Bangalore.
"When I introduced the software, I circulated it to a few Kannada
newspaper offices and a few other organisations. I also informed a few
companies which used Kannada in their day-to-day affairs to use it
free of cost. They must have found it handy and started using it and
it became popular. Then, I, along with Ganaka Parishad and the State
Government worked to bring Kannada software for official use," he
said. Baraha 4.0 was the first software that was implemented in
Government offices with font styles. Today, some of the government
offices and department like Police, Education, the State Electricity
Board, Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board and others are using
Baraha.
But the Ganaka Parishad and the State Government have introduced Nudi
software as a benchmark system.
"Unfortunately for me, the government is insisting the use of Nudi
software. While Baraha has fulfilled the terms and conditions put
forth by the Government, including stipulations such as keyboard and
transliteration, I wonder why they are forcing departments to use only
Nudi," he said. One of Baraha's many advantages, according to Vasu, is
that it allows a person who knows Kannada to type it in English fonts.
He felt preference of software (Baraha or Nudi) should be left to end
user.
As for the new versions of Baraha, he added that he has been getting
enquiries and suggestions and promises to work on suggestions offered
by people. Sheshadri Vasu may be contacted through email:
bar...@hotmail.com
CHANDRASHEKHAR G
--------------------------------
"Kannada" <kot...@osu.edu> wrote in message news:<cckj0p$31c$1...@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>...
Kannada
"V. M. Kumarasamy" <ellak...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:587d82ff.04071...@posting.google.com...
> Vasu, a Bangalorean employed at 'First Data Company', New York, is an
> Electronics Engineering student and has a Masters degree in
> Electronics from Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore. Like
> any other Electronics student, he too was preoccupied with repairing
> old radio sets, television sets and other electronic devices.
>
> During his post-graduation he developed an obsession for computers and
> a project on 'Instrumental Motion Convertor' as part of the academic
> course on computers helped him to realise his dream of learning
> computers. He was also good at graphics and designing.
>
> He was employed at a couple of software companies in India before he
> left for New York. At New York, his mind was filled with the idea of
> creating Kannada software which he ultimately called 'Baraha'. During