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Off to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia |
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Thursday, 10 August 2006 |
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I'll be in Kuala Lumpur Malaysia between 11-21 August. Thanks to warm welcome from Colin Charles (OpenOffice.org project) and well-known Malaysian F/OSS guy Ezwan Aizat Bin Abdullah Faiz from Malaysian Open Surce Sofware Society, I'll be giving a seminar related to Pardus in SEACEM building on Thursday, August, 17th. I'll mainly talk about how Pardus project began, the government support behind it, main features of Pardus and such.
Ed: I've uploaded a few photos to Flickr - enjoy!
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Extramadura'daki çalismalar |
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Thursday, 03 August 2006 |
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İspanya'nın Extramadura bölgesi, 2002 yılından beri
yaptığı özgür / açık kaynak kodlu yazılımlara geçiş
çalışmalarında toplam 18 milyon kar ettiğini açıkladı.
Tüm bölge için önemli bir rakam sayılmasa da, bölgede
yeni bir bilişim teknolojileri ekosisteminin oluşmasına
katkıda olduğu için, bu geçişin önemli faydaları var.
O yıllarda hükümetin hedefi, okullarda 70.000 masaüstü
ve 400'den fazla sunucuyu Linux'a aktarmaktı, ancak
bir yetkili bana bu rakamın 100.000'i aştığını söyledi,
ayrıca çalışmalar sadece okul boyutuyla kalmamış,
pek çok kamu kurumu da lisans ücretlerinin havaya
savrulduğunu görüp Linux kullanmaya başlamış.
Böylece ilk yıl 180.000 harcayarak bunun neredeyse
100 katını geri almışlar. Harcamaların önemli bir
kısmı eğitim alanında yapılmış (dolayısıyla ben bunu
dolaylı maliyet kalemi olarak görüyorum).
Şimdi, yeni alınan bir karara göre, okullardaki geçişten
sonra 1 yıl içinde tüm kamu kurumlarında Linux'a
ve özgür / açık kaynak kodlu yazılımlara tam geçiş
yapılacak. Kullanılan Linux dağıtımının adı GnuLinEx, bizim
Pardus'umuza çok benzeyen bir modelde geliştiriliyor.
Web sayfası http://www.linex.org
Geçen yıl 500 makinede GnuLinEx bulunan bir
extramadura okulunu ziyaret ettim. Tüm sınıflarda
eski ya da yeni, pek çok bilgisayar vardı ve hepsi
uzaktan yönetiliyordu. Eski bilgisayarlar ince istemci
olarak kullanılmıştı ve tüm altyapı sadece bir BT
yöneticisi tarafından yönetiliyordu (yanlış okumadınız,
sadece bir).
Hem okullarda, hem de kamu kurumlarında Linux'un
fazlasıyla yeterli olduğu yıllardan beri biliniyor ve
pek çok yerde kullanıma geçiliyordu. GnuLinEx bunun
bir başka canlı örneği olması açısından önem taşıyor.
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Croatian government adopts free software policy |
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Wednesday, 26 July 2006 |
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A news from the Inquirer:
The Croation government has decided to adopt a free software policy and
move entirely to Open Source.
According to a document with the catchy title "Directions for
Development and Use of Open Source Code Computer Programmes in Bodies
and Institutions of State Administration" the Government says it needs
to develop, prepare and procure open-source software.
It also says that open source programmes make the government's business
more transparent and free access to information.
The report (in Croation) can be found here |
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Pardus 1.1 alpha 2 is out |
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Saturday, 15 July 2006 |
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Pardus 1.1 alpha 2
is out with some new features:
- Easy to use desktop: Pardus 1.1 comes with lots of
applications, carefully selected to meet desktop users' needs
- Windows compatibility: Pardus 1.1 can share disks
and printers with other operating systems seamlessly
on the network.
- Java support: With Java Development Kit, Pardus
can run Java applications.
- Network services: Pardus comes with network
services like file server Samba, printer server CUPS,
web server apache, e-mail server postfix, FTP server
vsftp and LDAP server openldap.
- Pardus firewall:
This is a brand new application which comes installed with Pardus 1.1.
- Improved package management system: PiSi now
uses LZMA algorithm, resulting in a 30% speed
improvement, thus leaving more space for applications
on the installation CD.
- New graphical software manager
- User interface improvements in YALI, the Pardus installer
- New Pardus start-up model: This init system, based
on Python, can boot your machine considerably faster.
- New hardware detection system
- More than 300 bugs spotted since Pardus 1.0
- New kernel version 2.6.16
- Improved hardware support, including new SATA
devices, USB ADSL modems, more wireless network cards,
cameras, scanners and printers.
- New icon set: Pardus 1.1 now benefits from brand new
Tulliana 2
icon sets with a shiny and clear look.
- New applications: Service manager is used to start/stop
services on boot time and feedback service lets users
to send their opinions to Pardus developers.
You can immediately download & install Pardus and help us build the easiest Linux distribution in the world. Note that some users have reported a 25-second booting speed with Pardus 1.1 alpha 2. Next release, Pardus 1.1 beta, will be a lot better, shiny, polished, easy and lightning fast!
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OpenOffice.org making inroads |
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Wednesday, 28 June 2006 |
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OpenOffice.org has proven itself to be a stable, efficient, yet compatible office product which has been installed on hundreds of thousands of Windows and Linux machines around the world. As OpenOffice.org Turkey, we are trying to keep a track of which companies benefit from OOo with number of installed machines.
Lately, Sophie Gautier from Francophone project has sent an e-mail to the OpenOffice.org Marketing list an e-mail stating that 400.000 desktops will be converted to OpenOffice.org by year 2007 in French public administrations. This will probably be the biggest move in number, from a proprietary system to an open source software. Good job.
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You have seen nothing, my friend ;-) |
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Monday, 05 June 2006 |
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"I have to say that Pardus is the best Linux distro I have seen so far. I
have tried Suse (was to disappointed with version 10.1), Ubuntu, Kubuntu,
Linspire, Debian. But so far I have not yet seen a distro which is so easy
to install, to use, and so fast.
I also discussed Pardus on dutch linux forums, and others who try it are as
impressed as I am. Pardus rulez.
Problem is that I am dutch, and I can not speak turkish. Besides I think
that there should be a lot more Dutchmen who would enjoy Pardus, so my
question is if it is difficult to install kde-i18nl? I only found it as a
RPM file (of course no pisi), and do you know how I can put Firefox on
dutch?"
Wait for Pardus 1.1 and you'll see "the" distribution. |
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Journal of usability studies, issue 3, volume 1 |
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Sunday, 04 June 2006 |
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"UPA is happy to announce the publication of the third issue of the Journal
of Usability Studies. The issue includes invited essay by Charlie Kreitzberg with a provocative
thesis on: "Can collaboration help redefine usability?". In addition, the
issue includes three peer-reviewed articles on the use of eye movement
metrics for usability evaluation, a case study on a usability evaluation of
a large-scale, safety-critical system, and the use of confidence intervals
for small sample statistics".
The issue is published here.
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Denmark chooses open standards |
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Sunday, 04 June 2006 |
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Sĝren Thing Pedersen of OpenOffice.org project has opened up a web page with an important news from Kopenhagen. The parliament agreed on making the use of open standards mandatory in national IT solutions and software by 2008 (or ASAP). The decision will foster the use of ODT file formats in public administrations. Check his web page here, also for some videos from the parliament. |
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Short-term memory problems in Toefl |
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Saturday, 27 May 2006 |
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Three weeks ago, I entered Toefl examination in Istanbul. My doctorate studies had forced me to score at least 213, and luckily enough, I got 243. The problem was that, I completely amazed (steamed up?) regarding the listening section: Think of two people standing and talking about something for a few minutes, including a 6 to 10 mutual conversation (i.e each person speaks 6 to 10 times). After than, computer asks you a very detailed question about the very first sentence and demands a perfect short-term memory! I wish I remembered what I've eaten in the morning!
Albeit, my high school English teacher Nurhan Gencer has declared to me personally that I was the one who was learning "the last" (if I could learn at all) in the classroom. About 15 years later, Toefl reminded me again. I should probably check two things: My ear or things I know about myself.
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What they are up to in MIT |
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Sunday, 21 May 2006 |
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You bet, the urinal game. Details here. |
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