Linux User Group of Mauritius

Dear Members & non members,

You are invited for our monthly lug meeting this saturday the 4th of july 2009 (04/07/09).

• Time: 10:00 AM Maurtian time
• Location: Linkbynet, 2nd Floor BG court, St jean, Quatres Bornes
• Technical presentation to be done by: Dr. Stefan Brandle, Lecturer at the university of Mauritius.
• Topic of presentation: The Future of Computers in Education
• Map: http://thegodof.net/images/maplugm.png

Please confirm your presence. Last date for cancelation of the meeting is thursday 02/07/09 at 23hr59.

Geeks, nerds, non geeks, non nerds, humans, non humans whatever you are, if you are interested in anything opensource or *nix, you may wish to just try a lug meeting once.

ps. You don’t need to be a linux/unix guru to attend.

lug meetings are usually fun!

Thanks.

+Selven

Secretary of the LUG

Google lance une consultation sur les moyens d’accélérer l’internet basée sur 4 axes:

Broadband Access (Le petit problème de Maurice…)
Browser Technologies (Les petites astuces du renard en feu)
Internet Protocols (Revoir un peu les bons vieux HTTP/TCP/…)
Webmaster Tools (Concilier le beau et le rapide, Flash/…)
Other Ideas (Tout ce qui peut apporter une contribution).

N’hésitez pas à poster vos idées !
http://moderator.appspot.com/#16/e=79951
Read more…

Hello
Vu sur weekend: une conf sur joomla/mysql cluster par des personnes de mySQL, yahoo!, Joomla Core Team …

Cela se ferra le 18 et 19 juillet au swami vivekananda, Pailles.

www.multievents.mu

Autour du kernel, nous utilisons tous une foule de programmes pour récupérer les informations et utiliser notre système du mieux possible. Sous linux, toutes ces informations sont accessibles via /proc. Un peu de curiosité vous montrera les bijoux techniques qu’il est possible de récupérer.
Read more…

How many of you would like to get an LCD TV for Christmas? A lot, I bet. How many of you know that the Sony Bravia LCD TVs are powered by Linux? A lot fewer, I guess.

LCD TVs have a lot of pixels. When displaying a normal-resolution programme (say from the MBC), the TV must use extremely complex image processing algorithms to generate the missing pixels. For example:

• SECAM @ 720 x 576 = 414,720 pixels every 1/25 of a second (I’m simplifying…)
• HDTV @ 1920 x 1080 = 2,073,600 pixels every 1/25 of a second

So the TV must digitally create 5 times as many pixels as in the original frame 25 times per second. As you can easily guess, this requires a lot of horsepower hence the use of a powerful computer inside the TV. Sony has chosen Linux to power that computer (specifically Linux kernel 2.6.11)

For the more curious, have a look at http://products.sel.sony.com/opensource/source_tv.shtml

J’ai eu le problème de la fenêtre blanche avec skype… horreur impossible de voir la famille par cette magnifique fenêtre sur le monde qu’est internet. Merci la 3D !
Read more…

The next LUGM meeting will take place at the usual venue on 4 July 2009 at 10:00. A tentative agenda is:

• Status of registration of the association
• Status of the development and deployment of the new website
• Involvement in the Fedora Electronic Lab distribution (made by a Mauritian, Chitlesh Goorah!)
• AOB

The meeting will be followed by a technical presentation (the exact topic will be confirmed in a few days) and we’ll have lunch together afterwards.

Everyone is invited!

Les distributions pourraient se disposer sur les rayons des supermarchés tellement elles sont nombreuses. On en trouve pour tous les gouts et toutes les couleurs.

D’une classique Ubuntu, installable les yeux fermés à une LFS qui nécessite de faire un peu d’assembleur avant de démarrer. Pour ma part je pense que Gentoo propose une bonne alternative pour les Geeks en mal de pouvoir de compilation avec des ordinateurs toujours plus puissants.
Mais pourquoi se priver du plaisir de la compilation !
Read more…

I’m happy!

After years and years of inactivity (let’s be honest!), the LUGM website is alive again! As you can see, this is a blog and I expect you to make it become alive with a lot of insightful and passionate comments. Of course, we’ll also participate in the discussions.

As you all know, the Linux User Group of Mauritius has a number of objectives namely (i) advocate (ii) support (iii) educate and (iv) make people meet. During the coming months, we will make a number of important announcements concerning events that we intend to organise… with your help! Stay tuned.

The past

When LUGM started 10 years ago, Linux was still a curiosity… especially here in Mauritius.

As a matter of fact, I got into Linux myself par hasard. I had a Windows NT server around 1999 and it was tough to configure (in fact, a lot of things were not working properly.) I stumbled upon a copy of the PC Quest magazine with Redhat Linux 6.2 as cover disk. Little by little, I migrated all the services from the NT box to a Pentium 133 with 32 Mb running the Redhat Linux 6.2 and everything worked great. I then decided that life was too short to care about NT and became a Linux addict.

Of course, things were not always rosy. I fondly remember having to fight with the X-Window configuration files on a daily basis. And a lot of services could only be configured after read documentation and HOWTOs thoroughly. But, at least, they worked as expected…

But Linux was fun! I really enjoyed learning about the UNIX way of doing things. It is then that I decided to share my passion with others, first by announcing the launching of this Linux User Group then by introducing my students to Linux. I remember deploying Linux to the Mauritius Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the University of Mauritius to great effect. Many of the students loved Linux as it allowed them to explore areas of Computer Science that they were not really aware of.

On the commercial front, we did a survey on the use of Linux in Mauritian companies in 2003 and the results are still interesting to read.

Now

Linux is now a common occurrence in Mauritian companies. And this is true for a lot of open source software too. Of course, most of the desktop computers still run Windows (and I expect this to continue for some years until everyone becomes mobile) but a lot of the largest servers in the country are powered by Linux.

Interestingly, a lot of devices being used by Mauritians all day long (e.g. the Mauritius Telecom Livebox and the Sony Bravia LCD TVs) run Linux.

As far as I know, the rate of adoption of open source software is increasing (simply because, for most of them, they work great!)

There is one thing which I don’t like though, the Mauritian Linux community is still largely fragmented and I hope that this new website will enable us all to work together (and also have a lot of fun together.)

The future

It all depends on you. What do you want us to do?

Avinash Meetoo

Who are we ?

The Linux User Group of Mauritius (LUGM) exists since November 2000 and our main roles are:

• Advocate
• Educate
• Support
• Socialise
• Coordinate Linux and OSS activities in Mauritius

Web site and mailing list

• http://www.lugm.org
• http://www.lugm.org/mailing-list/

Scope of the survey

What we were looking for

• Patterns of use of Linux and OSS in Mauritius
• Meaning of Open Source
• Knowledge of our existence

Methodology

• Sample of 80-100 IT managers
• Questionnaire based
• Anonymous

The results: Heard about Linux ?

A vast majority of IT managers has heard of Linux (92.5%)

The rest (7.5%) must be living on another planet

How did you discover it ?

Multiple answered we allowed.

We see the ever increasing role of the Internet as a means fo propagate knowledge.

Where do you use Linux ?

38% of the IT managers questioned do not use Linux, neither at work nor at home.

Of those 62% left, the majority use Linux only at work

This seems to indicate that Linux is being used as a server operating system.

Distribution used ?

Pattern of use of distributions in Mauritius is exactly the same as worldwide.

Red Hat rules !

Applications used ?

Surprisingly, the type of application mostly used is Office applications (presumably Star Office and Open Office).

On the other hand, server applications (Mail, Web, Database and File Servers) amount to 55% which is coherent with the deduction made previously.

What about paid support ?

A majority thinks that Linux support should not be commercial.

This is very surprising given that most of those questioned use Linux at work.

An interpretation is that they are satisfied with the level of support they get in forums and websites.

Deployment date ?

The majority of those questioned already have deployed Linux-based solutions at work. This is absolutely fantastic

Unfortunately, 35% do not know whether they’ll do it or not.

They are the ones we need to convince.

What is Open Source ?

One out of five IT managers does not know anything about Open Source…

Any Contribution ?

Frightening !

38% do not know how to help.

And about 20% do not want to help.

Linux and Open Source is all about give and take !!!

Heard about LUGM ?

55% of Mauritian IT managers know that LUGM exists.

Satisfied with LUGM ?

About half of those who know LUGM are satisfied with it.

It is important that those who are unsatisfied with LUGM’s actions come forward and make proposals.

That’s the whole point of having a community…

Conclusions ?

A majority of Mauritian IT Managers

• know Linux and Open Source software
• have deployed Linux and OSS-based solutions
• do not require commercial support
• do not contribute to the OSS movement.

They could help

• Technically <=> participate in OSS development
• Financially <=> reward deserving developers & projects
• Logistically <=> help in a LUG (for example LUGM )

Copyright Avinash Meetoo | Published under the Gnu Free Document License