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It is quite unusual, but sometimes dreams work
just as planned. This has been the case of the KhmerOS project
during its first year.
We decided to try create basic software in Khmer
by localizing Open Source Software... and we have done it. We now
have free high quality applications in Khmer for word processing,
spreadsheets, e-mail, browser, presentation tool, webmail, chat...
and a few others (see
details).
We are also finishing training materials and
documentation in Khmer for all these applications.
But this is only the first part of our plan. Now
we start our distribution stage on MS Windows platform (all
applications we have localised work on both Windows and Linux),
while we prepare a full Linux distribution.
The best news is that the Government of Cambodia
has now decided to advance on Open Source, following the leadership
of Deputy Prime Minister H.E. Sok An, and we are working
hand-in-hand with NiDA, the National Information Communication
Development Authority.
We have participated in the creation of an Open
Source Master Plan for the country, which has now been
published by NiDA, and we are now working with them on the
preparation of an Open Source Action Plan that will implement the
calendar and philosophy of the Master Plan. Some parts of the Action
Plan, specially the ones related to localization and creation of
training materials will most probably be directly assigned to Open
Forum within the Action Plan.
We are also preparing a student-certification
program for all the new Khmer applications. With this we hope to
create an environment in which:
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Students will have clear goals for which they
want to study, instead of an abstract “learn how to use the
computer”. They can plan their studies.
-
Students can compare the cost of studying
towards a specific certificate in different locations/academies.
Non-standardised training does not permit comparison.
Certification produces healthy competition between training
centres with clear rules.
-
Students have a certificate that shows their
qualifications.
-
Employers know the level of qualification of
candidates for employment. The qualifications included in each
certificate are made public through a website, so possible
employers know exactly what the certified person has learned.
-
A learning path is structured through the certification systems,
from the first steps towards being well prepared to do for work
by oneself or be an asset for any organization
In our plan, a team at Open Forum will be
providing training for trainers to existing computer teachers.
We are also in touch with computer vendors, to
assure that new computers have our applications pre-installed, while
an internal team will travel the country installing applications in
any computer they can get their hands on.
But this is only our part of the work. NiDA is
taking Open Source very serious, and contacting different Ministries
in charge of training school teachers and vocational training
instructors, so that the training structures of the state will also
participate in the dissemination of Khmer language Open Source
Software.
We could not be happier about how everything is
developing. We set ourselves one year ago to do something that many
people considered impossible, and we have done it so far. Our team
at Open Forum grew from two engineers/translators in February 2004
to six in August 2005. The have really worked as a team and have got
amazing amounts of work done. We have been
counting also with the help of typographer Danh Hong, and the
technical work of Jens Herden, who has given us technical training
and has developed support for Khmer script in all Linux platforms,
created keyboards and done many things that would have been very
difficult to accomplish without him. We have been congratulated
several times on the quality of his work by Open Source project
maintainers.
We have been able to accomplish this work in
spite of severe budget restrictions, as we have not been able to
find any major sponsor or donor for our work. We were able to start
thanks to the generous help of some private donors, and we have
maintained our operations going scrapping money here and there, and
we will probably be able to continue doing it at our present size
during a few months, but we definitely need to find some funds in
order to carry on our distribution and training campaign.
We received a small grant from APDIP, ISOC, AMIC,
APNIC and IDRC to develop an "Open Source Localization Toolkit"
building on our experience, so that it could be shared with other
countries. What started as a pure documentation project very soon
took us directly into the hearth of some projects with direct
participation. By preparing documentation for projects like the
"Translate Toolkit" and "OpenOffice", we have helped define new
simpler localization mechanisms for OpenOffice and other projects,
helping the move towards an standardized Localization Framework for
Open Source.
The fact is that until now there has not existed
a comprehensive approach to Open Source localization, in which the
goals are social, so the project goes much deeper than pure
translation, assuring that the final users actually benefit from it.
On this we are the first country following such approach, and it
seems to work and worth sharing with others.
We have been directly supporting other countries
on their localization efforts at all levels: from a strategic
localization plan for East Timor to day-to-day technical help for
countries like Nepal, Lao or Bhutan. We work very closely with a
team in South Africa to improve localisation techniques.
I have personally participated in several
localization events, such as
AsiaSource,
where I was a facilitator on localization, or the
Asia OSS Symposium, where I
chaired the localization working group.
We really hope that this year our plan will
continue in the same direction, turning Cambodia - before the end of
2005 - into the first country that will have more users of Open
Source applications than users of Microsoft.
Javier Solá
Coordinator - Khmer Software Initiative.
16 March 2005
Technical state of the
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