Representatives from NGOs, academic institutions, government, schools and colleges attended the Workshop on “Public Software for Social Sector – Principles and Practice”, held in Jaipur on 25 Feb, 2010. The event aimed at promoting awareness about the advantages of Public Software amongst those who have not heard about FOSS or have inhibitions adopting it; addressing the perceptions of people who are aware of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) to Appreciate the benefits of public software over proprietary software; and helping people/institutions who are convinced about the imperative for public institutions to adopt public software to adopt it.

Read the workshop concept note

Read the workshop session plan

Click here to see IT@Schools Presentation

Click here to see Internet Awareness Programme for Grassroots Organisations Presentation

The workshop was co-organised by Digantar with UNESCO, Knowledge Commons, Digital Empowerment Foundation, IT for Change. It is as part of a series of events being organised this year throughout India on public software and its imperative for the public sector.

For more information, please email Jaipur@Public-Software.in.

Testimonials:
"The Kerala IT @ school project was amazing. It was a properly managed developmental process which was adopted by the Kerala Government. The Kerala teachers hardworking & accepting IT enabled school education is appreciateable. I have also made a personal interaction during the group discussion with Mr. Sabareeshji. He is very friendly & helping person. His vast knowledge, dedication & long experience in this particular field makes him a perfect Guruji (IT savy).

The session on 'Open Source & Education' & Demo presentation after lunch was much more useful & informative. I was not aware about Ubantu (Public Software) in the past and always use Microsoft applications & programmes only since last 10-11 years. The concept of Intellectual Property & Public property was superb.

I think such more workshops required in Jaipur to mark the social change in this particular sector, focusing Public Software specially Ubantu (easy to use, approachable & substitute of Microsoft applications/softwares)"

A.K. Cherwal
Advisor & IT Incharge
Social, Educational & Technical Development
Organisation (SETDO)

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*Public software can be defined as software developed for the public good, which is publicly owned. Public ownership also implies that it cannot be privatized or privately owned. It is freely shareable and customizable and hence is basically Free and Open Source Software. Public software is of two kinds:

1. Public Software developed to promote public good - that helps government (public sector) to fulfill goals of government - software that supports NREGA transactions in a transparent manner;

2. Public software itself as a public good - new digital goods such as Wikipedia where the software itself performs public interest functions.

Public Sector for the purpose of these guidelines, is defined broadly as comprising of institutions working for public interest. While this includes not only governments but also academic institutions, civil society (NGO/CBO), community media institutions etc, there is a special role for the government as the key public sector actor in promoting public software.

The conference commenced with presentations and talks relating to the importance of public software to society, especially to the social sector by senior academics and practitioners. A volunteer team will help individuals and organizations migrate to public software platforms. Institutions which are keen to migrate to public software could register with this team and plan this process.