Kiran Jonnalagadda’s Blog

Earlier this year, I applied to NRC-FOSS for funding for a project to build an open source OpenID Provider wrapper around existing SQL and LDAP-based authentication databases. They haven’t made up their mind yet, but in the meantime I figured I’d release my spec. Here it is.

Gracie and Crowd provide similar functionality, though I’m not sure they serve my exact use case.

NRC-FOSS is setting up a network of resource centres across the country. These centres are basically a phone line and email address with one or two persons to respond to queries from the general public, represent the FOSS community at events, and otherwise further the cause of Free and Open Source Software. Resource persons get a stipend. The job is ideally suited for freelancers with spare time and a passion for FOSS.

NRC-FOSS is now seeking to setup a centre in Bangalore and needs resource persons. If you are interested, please contact Kenneth Gonsalves. More information is at the mailing list and the website.

The National Resource Centre for Free and Open Source Software (NRC-FOSS) is a joint initiative of the Government of India with CDAC Chennai and Anna University’s KBC Research Centre, also in Chennai. The two units operate independently. While CDAC has focused on building an Indianised distribution, AU-KBC has built educational materials and the upcoming network of city-specific resource centres.

FoU Camp, Foss.in and Barcamp Bangalore in a row.

Tomorrow is FoU Camp, the sorta-annual gathering of members of Silk-list. Silk is now nine years old and easily among the more interesting lists I’m on. With attendees coming in from across the country, and some from around the world, this will be one event well worth attending.

Last year, six of us went to Coonoor for an extended weekend, discussed topics ranging from burnout to what it means to be a hacker, and took lots of pictures of the camp, and tea estates. This time the location is Bangalore, and a lot more people are attending. If you’re interested, join the list.

Barcamp Bangalore 2 is next weekend. You may recall the previous iteration in April, when we gathered 150 people into Yahoo!’s reception area for a day of unstructured discussions. Jess and I made plans then for what the next iteration would be like, partly resulting in FoU. Having not the bandwidth to organise another Barcamp however, we announced the list’s closing, when a new team sprang into action. They’ve done a great job putting it together.

The focus this time is on startups. Over 90 have been invited to participate. The list of registered attendees is already longer than April’s. This Barcamp will be on Dec 2 & 3 in the conference rooms of Thoughtworks, on Airport road. Register if you haven’t already.

The unacknowledged elephant in the room is, of course, Foss.in (I wish they had an appropriately sized image that I could use here). Now in its sixth year, this event has grown to be a significant gravity centre. It’s largely responsible for the date and attendee list of FoU Camp. I’ve been off the FOSS circuit lately, having wandered into open standards and other realms of intellectual property, but it’s hard to miss this event given its far-reaching impact.

FoU Camp has no event charges. Everyone covers their own. Barcamp is free thanks to sponsor support. Foss.in has a minimal cover charge, intended to ensure entry is limited to those who really want to be there. Pre-registrations close today. Hurry up!

Nokia’s open source projects page has a couple of interesting projects: Perl for Symbian and an Internet radio client (binary download available).