Today there was little article in the Economic Times (extremely badly titled in the online edition), that talks about the approach the Indian Government should be taking towards OpenSource.

The article mentions a whitepaper that is doing the rounds in the IT Department (and that the article is based on).

Here is the original whitepaper the journalist referred to.

Just for the record.

Today, the 3rd of January, marks a big anniversary for me – 10 years ago, on this day, my first ever article appeared in the January 1993 issue of PCQuest, marking the beginning of my column COMversations.

For the next four years, until December 1996, I attempted to tell people about the wonderful world of communication, the internet, and more, using my own style of writing.

This may sound cliched, but it seems like yesterday that I attended this party in late 1992, at the poolside of the Westend hotel in Bangalore, wondering what I was doing there, when this guy comes up to me, taps me on the shoulder, and said “Hi, I am Prasanto Roy. I have read your sample articles, and I want you write more, so that I can publish them in this magazine that I have just become the editor of, called PCQuest”.

That was the beginning of the ride, and what a wonderful ride it was. Through the years, it gave me the opportunity to “talk” to tens of thousands of people on technical topics dear to me, and it gave me a chance to start (and sustain) projects such as the PCQuest Linux Initiative.

I don’t write as much today as I did in years gone by (I really don’t have so much time), but everytime I sit down to do an article or just a diary entry, I feel the same thrill again – that I am about to put down words that will be read by someone who may find them useful or entertaining in some way.

Ten years ago, I hoped to make a difference with my writings.

Ten years later, I hope I did.

Ah well, what do you not know – another year gone by!

Time doesnt fly anymore – it simply teleports: one moment you are here, the next you are there. Didn’t I just turn 40 a while back? Now I am about to turn 41!

IAC, nothing much happened on 31st night. Shubha and Anjali watched some kitchy Hindi movie on TV, and cried and cried. God knows why – this must be the 10th time they have seen the movie (Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gam), but it gets them everytime.

I sat in front of my machine, shoved in “Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers” and watched it. Great photography, but God help those who haven’t read the book *and* seen the first movie.

For that matter, God help those who have read the book, too. Major “Hollywoodification” – lots of changes of characters, locations and events. Treebeard was a definite let-down – the solid, powerful and deep-thinking character from the book was a wimpy comic strip in the movie. Bah!

But Gollum, he rocks. Major Oscar material!

Having a small party for some friends on Saturday, since no one was really in party mood on 31st. Planning a potluck party – hope it works out OK.

And now for the promised profound thoughts:

Every new year, one is expected to review the previous year, and draw conclusions, so here goes…

My 2002 was probably the worst year of my professional life. I have had my ups and downs, but never this bad. I know the reasons, and much of it was beyond my control, but some incidents do stand out – these include banking on people who then stabbed you in back when you were down on your luck, relying on potential clients who kept you dangling for ages, and finally simply failing to come through, others who kept dangling lucrative stuff before you while they squeezed everything they could out of you, and even some who just dumped you for internal political reasons.

But in all this mess, I have also seen things that make all this pain worth it.

True friends reaching out and helping me after the incident in June (which upset me so badly that I simply couldn’t think anymore), throwing in time, effort and even money to help me recover, sometimes without even telling me.

Relatives reaching out and proving to me that I still have an extended family – something I value greatly.

My collegues at work who stood by me when they saw me in trouble and didn’t give up (like some others did).

My wife Shubha and daughter Geetanjali – they took it all without complaints, and adjusted to every situation.

The managers of LB/2002, who (despite my increasing levels of frustration) saw to it that the event went off without a hitch, allowing me to claim yet another victory in this long battle of mine.

My young friends who allow me to relive a dream through them, and provided me the much needed distraction when I was down, even if they didn’t know what was going on.

Clients who re-affirmed their faith in me and my company, and clients who came back to us after parting ways before.

My pets Judo The Dog and Honey The Cat (and now also Cookie The Kitten) who, by the simple act of existing, managed to help me hang onto my sanity.

Without the help and encouragement from all of them, I would have simply given up.

Today, the nightmare is effectively over, and I think I can see light at the end of the tunnel. I am one of the few lucky ones, I know, and for that I am grateful.

I know that there will be tough times ahead, but let them come.

I have my army with me.

And God bless them all.

Last night, got a surprise invite to a Christmas party by Phenom & Friends – sponsored by Noella.

Had initial misgivings given the age difference, but Mrinal soon set them aside, so I packed up wife and kid (the latter sacrificed an episode of “Sanjeevani”!!!) and headed off for the place.

Am I glad we went, or what?

We sang, we kidded, we ate and we joked. We had a whale of a time!

Throughout the party, only one kind of music played – the Phenom Live CD from LB/2002 – and it sounded so good. It was great fun watching each Phenom member dissect his/her performance

Food was Pizza. Then more pizza. The first lot rocked, the second lot was from Pizza corner and came laden with chillies!

Noella’s dog Tipsy is cute. She provided ample entertainment (especially when she started romancing whatshisname).

Ashwin and Gaurav provided sufficient legpulling to make everyone look taller, and Mrinal and JD took turn at the piano (yeah – a real, live piano!) while Gaurav and I manned guitars, doing “No woman no cry”, “Imagine”, “Everything I do (I do it for you)”, “My Bonnie”, etc. And yeah, we did “Free as a Bird” – and JD *still* couldn’t get the chords right!

No alcohol at all – which goes to prove that you don’t need booze to have a good time. All it takes is good friends, good food and good music.

On the way home, the previously hesitant Shubha and Anjali chimed in – “that was fun – can we do it again?”

Yup. Soon. Real soon!

Thanks, everyone! You made our Christmas!

Merry Christmas, world!

Remember me talking about friend DC in a recent diary entry?

Well, today Mrinal, Gaurav and me went to leach his brain.

At hand was the mastering of the Phenom recordings from their performance at LB/2002.

So we met up at 11:30am today near DC’s place in Banashankari, and the master got to work.

About 7 hours later, we staggered out of his studio, beat but elated – we had managed to complete the mastering of precisely *one* song in that period, but *MAN* did we learn tons of stuff in the process? I took pictures, and made notes – one numbers article coming up soonish.

Mrinal and DC are now going to sit on the mastering of the remaining songs, which we will (hopefully) be able to assemble into a CD (the quality is definitely good enough) that we can then offer broadcasters, as well as make available for download.

I am thrilled to bits to see this project come together so well!

And I am major grateful to DC for spending so much time on this. It was only when we finished for the day that we realised just how much his time is worth (we got sneak previews of stuff he was working on) – having someone like him doing the mastering is Christmas come early!

Tomorrow (Sunday) I am going out of town for a quick trip to new Delhi for a meeting with the Government of India about their formal Linux/OpenSource policy formulation – something I have been working on for years, and am finally seeing happening. More about it when I get back on Tuesday.

BTW – Tuesday is Christmas for us (in Germany, where I was born and grew up, Christmas is celebrated on December 24th). Sadly, we are stuck in Bangalore this year, and most of our friends are all out of town. That sucks.

It has come to my attention that a lot of people misunderstood what I sang at Linux bangalore/2002 – seeing it more as an anti-Microsoft rant than what it was actually meant to be.

To set the record straight, I have written this little piece.

For the record – despite my being a Linux/OpenSource supporter, my stand is “being pro-Linux does not mean being anti-anything”.

I for one would not want to see one monopoly being swapped for another.

Imagine there’s no heaven,
It’s easy if you try,
No hell below us,
Above us only sky,
Imagine all the people
living for today…

Imagine there’s no countries,
It isn’t hard to do,
Nothing to kill or die for,
And no religion too,
Imagine all the people
living life in peace…

Imagine no possessions,
I wonder if you can,
No need for greed or hunger,
A brotherhood of man,
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world…

You may say I’m a dreamer,
but I’m not the only one,
I hope some day you’ll join us,
And the world will live as one.

Imagine — John Lennon (Oct 9, 1940 – Dec 8, 1980)

Well, that’s it. Linux Bangalore/2002 is over and done with. A stupendous success from most perspectives, though I do have issues with some aspects.

From the persepective of participation by delegates and speakers, this event blew away any doubts that Linux and OpenSource are now truly mainstream. Almost 2000 delegates, 70+ highly technical and much appreciated talks by industry and academia speakers, lots of fun for everyone, and a finale that rocked!

I am not going to get too deep into the happenings – all that will be duely recorded on the LB/2002 website over the next few days.

The things I wasn’t too happy about was the stuff and opportunities we missed out because the event was simply too big for those few actual people doing all the work. Don’t get me wrong – everyone pitched in, especially the volunteers who did a fantastic job, but when it is down to 2-3 people actually having to take all the decisions *and* following up on them, things tend to get missed.

Small things (like forgetting to hand over mementos to Phenom after their fantastic show) and big things (with the amount of money left, we should have hosted a dinner for all the delegates and speakers – our caterer Catering Inn would have managed that with ease!).

Not looking into stuff like quantity and quality of photos taken was a serious booboo that we are going to regret for a long time. Ditto audio recordings at the halls. And also photo subjects – many important aspects of the event simply weren’t photographed!

But the biggest miss-out for me was community interaction – there was just so much going on that no one had time for sitting down and exchanging notes on LUG operations, ideas and other brainstorms.

Ah well, next year, I guess.

For me, a highlight at this event was my standing on stage and singing after almost 20 years! I didn’t sing very well (my voice was all over the place) but Phenom covered for the majority of the boo-boos.

I was rusty, but hell – I enjoyed myself!

OK, quick note to tell you that my scifi(?) story continues with The Rising (Part 5 – Bell of Freedom).

Major crammed day today. 3 days left for Linux Bangalore/2002, and there is still so much to be done!

The one bright spot I can look forward to is seeing Phenom perform on Thursday evening after the event finishes. It will be their biggest show yet, and I hope all goes well and everyone has fun.