INTERNAL EMAILS of KGP/KAGAPA

IN FIGHTING AMONG MEMBERS since 2002

PROBLEMS at KANNADA GANAKA PARISHAT “KGP/KAGAPA” since 2002

Anand S. K. email dated December 26th 2002

WHAT the IT SECRETRAY VIVEK KULAKARNI told in 2001 and 2002

Some important information out of

INTERNAL EMAILS of KANNADA GANAKA PARISHAT

From: Dr. U.B. Pavanaja <pavanaja@vishvakannada.com>
To: <KGPExecMembers@yahoogroups.com>
Subject: [KGPExecMembers] (Fwd) Re: nudi lib problem
Date: Monday, December 23, 2002 10:38 AM

> >From the statement of Pavanaja:
>
> ” I remember what Mr Vivek Kulkarni has told, about 15 months
> ago, after watching the demo of Kalitha at KGP. He told
> “once you release this product, the Kannada s/w industry in
> Karnataka will be shut down. Then you should be ready to
> fill the vacuum. You should be able to provide full-pledged
> support. You should have an office to answer telephone
> calls, have a web-based support, suppport by email, etc.
> When you make the roadmap, ask for enough money for support
> activities also.”.

Pavanaja Wrote:

Unfortunately, in every meeting this fact was accepted by
everyone but s/w development orders were undertaken
clandestainly by KGP without informing the executive committee.

Some such examples -
1) Font conversion for Vijaya Karnataka
2) Payroll s/w for D.I.T., Govt of Karnataka. Mr Shrinatha
Shastry’s son is working with Mr Rajkrishna at DIT for this job.
3) Culture directory for Dept of Kannada and Culture, Govt of
Karnataka. A sample has been made.
4) Dasa Sahithya web-site for Dept of Kannada and Culture, Govt
of Karnataka. A sample web-site was made and shown to the
concerned authorities.

None of these were discussed in any of the meetings.

Pavanaja wrote:

In fact, Mr Vivek Kulkarni suggested me to release the source
code under GPL. He told me to do so about 8 months ago. When I
mentioned this to Mr Shrinatha Shastry, he stronlgy opposed it
and told me not to do so. He said he will talk to Mr Vivek
Kulkarni about it. I don’t know what happenned afterwards.
Probably if we had released it under GPL, someone might have
made a Linux version by this time. Many people from Linux
community regularly ask me the question “why the source code is
not available under GPL?”. We should release the source code
since this is Govt sponsored project and hence every citizen has
a right on that. If someone files a Public Intereset Litigation
in the courts, we will be bound to release the source code. It
is better to release the source code before someone forces us to
do so.

People involved at Kannada Ganaka parishat “KGP / KAGAPA”

Dr. Srinatha Sastry
Dr. Pandithaardhya
Mr. G. N. Narasimhamurthy
Mr. Prakash R
Mr. Yatheendranath
Mr. Udaya shankar Puranik
Mr. Harsha Kodanad

Following People were kickedout because of probelms in KGP

For raising issues against KGP-KAGAPA members

Srinatha Sastry, Panditharadhya and Narasimha Murthy

Dr. U. B. Pavanaja
Mr. Anand S. K

On Wed, 17 Jul 2002 Dr. U.B. Pavanaja wrote :

>namaskAra,

>

Has anyone replied to the following mail? If so, please send me a copy. If not, please decide who will reply to this mail and also to all such mails in future.

>

>sigONa,

>Pavanaja

>——- Forwarded message follows ——-

>To: pandita@eth.net, pavanaja@vishvakannada.com,

>gnnmurthy@indiatimes.com, ganakaparishat@ganakaparishat.org,

>ganaka@vishvakannada.com, ganakaparishat@email.com

From: spellchecker group <spellchecker@modular-infotech.com>

Subject: Regarding kannada KGP Keyboard & FontLayOut.

Send reply to: spellchecker@modular-infotech.com

Date sent: Sat, 13 Jul 2002 16:29:55 +0500

Pritiya Panditaradyaji & Dr. U.B. Pavanaja

I would like to introduce myself first, I Mr.Pandurang. A. Hosamani working as a senior software engineer in MODULAR INFOTCH LTD, Pune. Our company has been working for indian language solutions on computer from last 20 years. During this period we have developed many products including the famous SHREE-LIPI.

I would like to thank Mr. Panditaradyaji, Dr. U.B. Pavanaja for their kind help. For all my mails I have got quick & prompt reply from Mr. Panditaradyaji, thank you very much for that.

According to your KGP standards we are developing KGP Font Layout & Keyboard, but it seems we are having two versions of your documents.

I would like to know whether the documents sent by Mr. Panditaradyaji is latest & final(Especially for FontLayOut chart). Please let us know about the same. One more thing please send us the bilingual Fontlayout chart.

Once again thank you very much for your cooperation.

Prtiyinda,

P.A.HOSAMANI

Modular Infotech Pvt Ltd ,Pune

No 26,

Electronic Estate

Pune-Satara Road,

>——- End of forwarded message ———–

>——————————-

>Dr. U.B. Pavanaja

>Editor, Vishva Kannada

>World’s first Internet magazine in Kannada

>http://www.vishvakannada.com/

_______________________________________________

From: uday S puranik <upuranik@rediffmail.com>

To: <KGPExecMembers@yahoogroups.com>

Cc: Dr.U.B.Pavanaja <pavanaja@vishvakannada.com>; <ganaka@vishvakannada.com>

Subject: Re: [KGPExecMembers] (Fwd) Regarding kannada KGP Keyboard & FontLayOut.

Date: Wednesday, July 17, 2002 12:45 PM

Hi

It was decided in the executive commitee meeting, that all such

mails will be and should be replied by the secretary of Kannada

Ganaka Parishat.

Hence you must be sending such mails to the mail id of the

secretary.

with regards

Udaya Shankar Puranik

From: Prakash <prakash@msrsas.org>

To: KGPExecMembers <KGPExecMembers@yahoogroups.com>

Subject: [KGPExecMembers] who needs to answer

Date: Thursday, July 18, 2002 9:04 AM

Dear Friends,

I strongly support Mr. Puraniks view and what was decided in our recent

meetings that the secretary of KGP must answer to all such queries to avoid

ambiguities. I feel other members can send their views to Secretary, KGP

who can make corrections before sending them. As the time has come to show

the strengths of KGP as an organization as felt my many members it is good

for all of us to stand behind our Secretary and pose one opinion as

standard. The other organizations who are interested in KGP activities

should get professional and unambiguous support.

Prakash R.

—– Original Message —–

From: “Dr. U.B. Pavanaja”

<pavanaja@vishvakannada.com>

To: <harsha@vishvakannada.com>

Sent: Sunday, December 01, 2002 8:02 PM

Subject: nudi lib problem

>Dear Harsha,

>

> I have figured out that there is some problem with the kannada-

> nudi.lib and kannada-nudi.dll regarding the calling conventions.

> Logo is working well with kalitha.lib and dll. If I change it to

> Nudi it is giving an error in OMF (Object Module Format). I have

> changed the reference properly. There is no prblem with that. I

> got it verified by one Borland C++ expert from HP.

>

> If you think that there is no error in the Nudi lib and dll,

> then pl send me one simple sample C++ program using Nudi dll and

> lib. I will try to compile by Borland C++ to verify. If you have

> changed the dll and lib recently while doing the “reverse” then

> send that version of dll and lib so that I can check whether

> that is working.

>

> Your immediate reply will be highly appreciated.

>

> Regards,

> Pavanaja—————————————————–

> Dr. U.B. Pavanaja

> Editor, Vishva Kannada

> World’s first Internet magazine in Kannada

> http://www.vishvakannada.com/

>

> Note: I don’t worry about pselling mixtake

—— Forwarded message follows ——-

From: “Harsha Kodnad” <kmharsha@hotmail.com>

To: “Dr. U.B. Pavanaja”

<pavanaja@vishvakannada.com>

Subject: Re: nudi lib problem

Date sent: Mon, 2 Dec 2002 10:32:17 +0530

Sir,

I am sure and confident that there is no problem with kannada-nudi.lib and

kannada-nudi.dll. for defferent compilers and linkers you need to change the

defnitions of the functions and calling method in header file. which you have the

source and you can modify that also. And I am also very sure that you dont need

to change the calling convension since from the begining of KalithaI am using

thewindows standard calling convension ‘__stdcall’ and still it is same. so itmust

work.

Most of the standard libraries provided with companies wont work for different

compilers, As a programmer we need to do some R&D and do some changes in

our source code by which we can use the library. Anybody who has used

windows SDKs, Win32 APIs will be able to easily use my Nudi SDK. cause it

comes out with standard convensions.

I have installed windows ME on my machine yesterday I have some problem

in installing Boreland C++ today I will install it.onceI install everythingI will be

able to give you a nudi header file which is compatible with Boreland c++

compiler so that you can reduce some borden on the programmer.

As a nudi developer I can give you support for nudi as early as possible by me,

but I can’t teach anybody C, C++ or what ever, cause I am not a computer faculty

and also I am not paid for that.

So its not a Nudi lib problem its a programmer’s problem.

You know C, C++, VC++, Palm OS, Windows CE, Win32 Programming, You

are the Project Manager / Developer of Nudi, Palm Nudi, Nudi for Jornada, All

coding also done by you, and I am surprised that you cant solve a silli linking

problem!

Once I have installed Boreland C++, I will call you and tell you the instructions

to link kannada-nudi.lib. what are the canges need to be made in header files and

all those things.

Regards,

Harsha

From: Dr. U.B. Pavanaja <pavanaja@vishvakannada.com>

To: <KGPExecMembers@yahoogroups.com>

Subject: [KGPExecMembers] (Fwd) Re: nudi lib problem

Date: Monday, December 23, 2002 10:38 AM

To: The members of the Software Sub-committee, KGP.

cc: Executive Committee members, KGP.

As all of you are aware I am making a Kannada version of

the world-famous LOGO program, used to teach programming

concepts to school children. The program is written in

Borland C++ Version 5.02. 3 years ago, when I started it,

it was using Akruti fonts but no DLL. Later on it was

changed over to Kalitha font and Kaliha DLL. This

conversion was done by Harsha, who is the developer of

Kalitha and Nudi. Recently when I have appointed a

developer to complete the task. Now the DLL and LIB to be

used have become Nudi. When Kalitha was made, a DLL and LIB

files were given for programmers. LOGO is working with

these DLL and LIB to some extent. LOGO has two windows to

enter the text. In one window, the Kalitha DLL and LIB are

working. In another window Kalitha DLL and LIB are not

working.

When we tried to use the Nudi DLL and LIB, we get linking

errors. It says “Error in Object Module Format (OMF)”. The

header file given with Kalitha and Nudi are different. The

functions and their properties have changed. I informed the

problem to Harsha, the developer of Nudi. He told over

phone that the problem must be in linking. I tried again. I

even called one Borland C++ expert from HP and asked him to

look into. He said that the person who wrote the DLL and

LIB only can solve this problem. When I wrote a mail to

Harsha about this he replied arrogantly that he is not a

faculty to teach C++ programming. He could have tried

linking his DLL and LIB using Borland C++ and sent me a

sample as requested by me. The Nudi SDK contains only a VB

sample and no C++ sample. Now I have decided to finish the

LOGO project without explicitly making use of the SDK.

Instead I will give a LOGO package with all fonts being

changed to Nudi Akshsara. The user has to manually invoke

the Nudi keyboard driver before starting LOGO. This is how

people are using Nudi for DTP. I don’t have any other

option left.

Some contradictions in Harsha’s mail:

In one place he says “As a programmer we need to do some R&D and do some changes in our source code by which we can use the library”. In another place he says “Anybody who has used windows SDKs, Win32 APIs will be able to easily use my Nudi SDK. cause it comes out with standard convensions”.

Don’t you think these two are contradictory to each other? Why at all one should do R & D to use any library is that library is using standard conventions? Again he says “So its not a Nudi lib problem its a programmer’s problem”. But he has not substantiated his claim.

I remember what Mr Vivek Kulkarni has told, about 15 months ago, after watching the demo of Kalitha at KGP. He told “once you release this product, the Kannada s/w industry in Karnataka will be shut down. Then you should be ready to fill the vacuum. You should be able to provide full-pledged support. You should have an office to answer telephone calls, have a web-based support, suppport by email, etc. When you make the roadmap, ask for enough money for support activities also.”.

I am an executive committee member of KGP. I mentioned the problem on Dec.1. So far I did not get any sample file as promised. If an exec. commiitee member also can not get

support for a simple linking problem then I wonder what will be the status of 5 crore Kannadigas who will become dependent on KGP for Kannada s/w developments, mainly for the toolkit.

I don’t put all the blames on Harsha. He is working at Tally. He works mostly up to night 10-11 pm, almost daliy. He has no time to spare for KGP, inspite of a PC being

given to him and money being paid above and over the given PC. KGP should have someone work full-time for Nudi. I request the software sub-committee people to look into this serious problem. Please take remedial action before an outsider writes about these peoblems in newspapers.

What work Rajkrishna and Krishnamurthy are doing? Why are they being paid? As I understand, Nudi works is done by Harsha and Santhosh. Fonts are being made by someone from Koppa. Staroffice and Linux work is done by Ramsimha and his team. Then what are the roles assigned to Rajkrishna and Krishnamurthy? Why can’t they be trained and made in-charge for Nudi? So that we need not torture Harsha.

Thanks and regards,

Pavanaj

From: <anand_sk@vsnl.com>

1. To: <KGPExecMembers@yahoogroups.com>

Cc: <pavanaja@vishvakannada.com>

Subject: [KGPExecMembers] Problems with Nudi DLL’s

Date: Monday, December 23, 2002 5:51 PM

The KGP Executive Committee members,

I am quite pained to hear of the lack of support for the Nudi DLL’s that Pavanaja is facing. If a KGP exec committee member has to face this one can well imagine the plight of a common kannada software developer.

I think the main reason for this kind of problem is that the whole software development for Kalitha and Nudi started of in a hush hush manner and was intended to stab the back of those Independent Software Vendors(ISVs) who were working in this area including people like us who were used by M/s. Srinath Sastry and Narsimurthy to tap on us for any technical expertise, when they had no idea about the the technical issues regarding kannada keyboards and coding issues.

They got a part time developer like Harsha to reverse engineer the fonts and coding and the workings of software like Akruti (submitted to the KGP for evaluation). This is how painstaking work which took software vendors more than a decade to come to the current levels could be easily done within a year or so.

>From the statement of Pavanaja:

” I remember what Mr Vivek Kulkarni has told, about 15 months

ago, after watching the demo of Kalitha at KGP. He told

“once you release this product, the Kannada s/w industry in

Karnataka will be shut down. Then you should be ready to

fill the vacuum. You should be able to provide full-pledged

support. You should have an office to answer telephone

calls, have a web-based support, suppport by email, etc.

When you make the roadmap, ask for enough money for support

activities also.”.

It becomes very clear that the plan to eliminate ISV’s was more than 15 months old. Some blame should also be placed at Pavanaja’s shoulder for having aided and abbetted Sastry and Narsimurthy in this murky business. After all it was he who introduced this very same Harsha to KGP.

Firstly, I think the only way of cleaning up this shady business is to open up the source code to the technically competent executive committee members of the KGP to start with so that support could be provided by them rather than some part time programmers who dance to the tune of a select few.

Later on in true open source methodology, the source may be put out in the public domain available to all Kannadigas.

Secondly, from various media releases we have seen a effort by prominent KGP office bearers belittling the motives of some of the ISV’s saying that they are interested in only money.

I would like to ask a simple question. Which of the members of KGP can purport to live without money. Let us accept that nothing is possible without a commercial interest. One cannot hope to live on government doles forever. Any project, no matter how noble it may be, including promotion of Kannada software will be sustainable in the long run only if it is self sustaining in economic terms.

Yes, we as ISV’s charge money for software, because to develop it, to sustain the development and support it continuously costs money and we have no govt. doles to rely upon.

Nudi’s development and release is not the end of the problem. People like me who have developed Akruti many many years ago are still grappling with the problem of supporting our users accross the length and breadth of the country adequately. So expecting a rag tag bunch of amateurs to do it effectively is asking for too much.

I hope the KGP executive committee members put their head to the long term issue and come out with right answers.

More dangerously, we as ISV’s were told that since there is no need for the basic font and interface software after NUDI, we were told to work on Kannda applications. Our company along with ISL came out with e-Karyalaya, a general administration software for govt. offices.

We find a repeat situation happening in the same hush hush and murky manner wherein after having been assured at committee meetings that KGP will not get into applications, we find that KGP employed people like Rajkrishna along with Srinath Sastry’s son are dabbling with DIT and KDA to come out with a reverse engineered software called e-Adalitha.

I would like Mr. Sastry to state the facts very clearly as to what his intentions and interests in this matter are. At least we as ISV’s are upfront in declaring our commercial interest. The worst people according to me are those who say someting in the front and do something else in the back.

If any of the KGP executive committee members or their family members or proxy organisations have any such hidden agendas, I think they should be bold enough to declare it openly and not pretend to be noble hypocrites.

With deep regret at the shameful going ons at KGP.

Anand S.K.

___________________________________________________

From: Dr. U.B. Pavanaja <pavanaja@vishvakannada.com>

To: <KGPExecMembers@yahoogroups.com>

Subject: Re: [KGPExecMembers] Problems with Nudi DLL’s

Date: Tuesday, December 24, 2002 12:57 PM

namaskAra,

> On Mon, 23 Dec 2002 17:55:21 +0530 (IST)

> anand_sk@vsnl.com wrote

>

> I am quite pained to hear of the lack of support for the Nudi DLL’s

> that Pavanaja is facing. If a KGP exec committee member has to face

> this one can well imagine the plight of a common kannada software

> developer.

>

> I think the main reason for this kind of problem is that the whole

> software development for Kalitha and Nudi started of in a hush hush

> manner and was intended to stab the back of those Independent Software

> Vendors(ISVs) who were working in this area including people like us

> who were used by M/s. Srinath Sastry and Narsimurthy to tap on us for

> any technical expertise, when they had no idea about the the technical

> issues regarding kannada keyboards and coding issues.

>

> They got a part time developer like Harsha to reverse engineer the

> fonts and coding and the workings of software like Akruti (submitted

> to the KGP for evaluation). This is how painstaking work which took

> software vendors more than a decade to come to the current levels

> could be easily done within a year or so.

>

> >From the statement of Pavanaja:

>

> ” I remember what Mr Vivek Kulkarni has told, about 15 months

> ago, after watching the demo of Kalitha at KGP. He told

> “once you release this product, the Kannada s/w industry in

> Karnataka will be shut down. Then you should be ready to

> fill the vacuum. You should be able to provide full-pledged

> support. You should have an office to answer telephone

> calls, have a web-based support, suppport by email, etc.

> When you make the roadmap, ask for enough money for support

> activities also.”.

>

> It becomes very clear that the plan to eliminate ISV’s was more than

> 15 months old. Some blame should also be placed at Pavanaja’s shoulder

> for having aided and abbetted Sastry and Narsimurthy in this murky

> business. After all it was he who introduced this very same Harsha to

> KGP.

I did not introduce Harsha to KGP. He is a distant relative of

Mr Narasimhamurthy. One day, when I had gone to KGP, he was

introduced to me by Mr Narasimhamurthy and Mr Shrinatha Shastry.

I saw the work done by him on DOS regarding Kannada and took him

to Tally. At Tally, we had a plan of developing keyboard drivers

for Indian lanmguages, whih was later abondoned and the toolkits

were bought from CDAC.

I am not part of any murky business. The very first version of

Kalitha was made to test the compliance of other Kannada s/w to

the Govt notification mainly towards keyboard, font encoding and

sorting. When the demo was given, it was not in the form of a

package. After seeing the demo, Mr Vivek Kulkarni suggested to

make it into a package. He also suggested to make a roadmap of

the things to be done apart from this s/w. Then the roadmap was

prepared by Mr Shrinatha Shastry based on the skeleton provided

by me. I gave the plan with cost estimations. But almost all

amounts mentioned by me (based on the industry standard payments

for project manager and developer) were later on slashed to

almost 1/4 th of what I suggested. for ex., I had suggested

Rs.50,000 per font which was reduced to Rs.10,000 per font. Now

everyone knows what happenned to the fonts. There was even an

article in Prajavani’s letters to the editor column mentioning

about the unprofessional fonts supplied by KGP. I had suggested

two alternatives regarding fonts-

1) Buy some good quality fonts from existing vendors

2) Find out a good professioanl font developer of fonts and give

contract to him to make fonts. I had found out one such person

from Pune and requested him to give a good quote for a non-

profit organisation. He gave a quote of Rs.30,000 per font.

Myself and Harsha were strongly against releasing Kalitha without a professioanl font. But all these were thrown to wind and some un-professionals were assigned the task of making fonts.

I had suggested that KGP should have a list of empanelled s/w developers of Kannada which can be submitted to Govt. Govt can give orders to these developers for Kannada s/w developments. My philosophy is “live and let live”. But the philosophy now

followed by KGP is “live and let die”.

I am the person who had foreseen the situation regarding Kannada s/w developments. KGP can not supply s/w to entire Karnataka. Hence it should not venture into application developments. This task should be left to professional developers who will be able to offer professional support for the product and services they offer. Kannada s/w developmental opportunities start with the Govt. If these are fully grabbed by KGP, the Kannada s/w industry will die. Then there will be no industry left to supply Kannada s/w to entire Karnataka. Supplying Kannada s/w to entire Karnataka is definitely beyond the capabilities of KGP.

Unfortunately, in every meeting this fact was accepted by

everyone but s/w development orders were undertaken

clandestainly by KGP without informing the executive committee.

Some such examples -

1) Font conversion for Vijaya Karnataka

2) Payroll s/w for D.I.T., Govt of Karnataka. Mr Shrinatha

Shastry’s son is working with Mr Rajkrishna at DIT for this job.

3) Culture directory for Dept of Kannada and Culture, Govt of

Karnataka. A sample has been made.

4) Dasa Sahithya web-site for Dept of Kannada and Culture, Govt

of Karnataka. A sample web-site was made and shown to the

concerned authorities.

None of these were discussed in any of the meetings.

> Firstly, I think the only way of cleaning up this shady business is to open up the source code to the technically competent executive committee members of the KGP to start with so that support could be provided by them rather than some part time programmers who dance to the tune of a select few.

I agree. I am the initiator of Kalitha (which later became

Nudi). When I asked for the source code for the latest version

to try to make a Unicode version using .NET, I was not given the

source code. I could have helped in making a Unicode version as

I have developed an Opentype font which is needed for Unicode

version.

> Later on in true open source methodology, the source may be put out in

> the public domain available to all Kannadigas.

In fact, Mr Vivek Kulkarni suggested me to release the source code under GPL. He told me to do so about 8 months ago. When I mentioned this to Mr Shrinatha Shastry, he stronlgy opposed it and told me not to do so. He said he will talk to Mr Vivek Kulkarni about it. I don’t know what happenned afterwards. Probably if we had released it under GPL, someone might have made a Linux version by this time. Many people from Linux community regularly ask me the question “why the source code is not available under GPL?”. We should release the source code since this is Govt sponsored project and hence every citizen has a right on that. If someone files a Public Intereset Litigation in the courts, we will be bound to release the source code. It is better to release the source code before someone forces us to do so.

> Secondly, from various media releases we have seen a effort by

> prominent KGP office bearers belittling the motives of some of the

> ISV’s saying that they are interested in only money.

>

> I would like to ask a simple question. Which of the members of KGP can

> purport to live without money. Let us accept that nothing is possible

> without a commercial interest. One cannot hope to live on government

> doles forever. Any project, no matter how noble it may be, including

> promotion of Kannada software will be sustainable in the long run only

> if it is self sustaining in economic terms.

I agree.

> Yes, we as ISV’s charge money for software, because to develop it, to

> sustain the development and support it continuously costs money and we

> have no govt. doles to rely upon.

>

> Nudi’s development and release is not the end of the problem. People like me who have developed Akruti many many years ago are stillgrappling with the problem of supporting our users accross the lengthand breadth of the country adequately. So expecting a rag tag bunch ofamateurs to do it effectively is asking for too much.

>

> I hope the KGP executive committee members put their head to the long

> term issue and come out with right answers.

I agree.

> More dangerously, we as ISV’s were told that since there is no need

> for the basic font and interface software after NUDI, we were told towork on Kannda applications. Our company along with ISL came out with e-Karyalaya, a general administration software for govt. offices.

But then the Nudi SDK should not have any bugs and there should be technical support. I am finding problems here.

> We find a repeat situation happening in the same hush hush and murkymanner wherein after having been assured at committee meetings thatKGP will not get into applications, we find that KGP employed people like Rajkrishna along with Srinath Sastry’s son are dabbling with DITand KDA to come out with a reverse engineered software called

> e-Adalitha.

>

> I would like Mr. Sastry to state the facts very clearly as to what his intentions and interests in this matter are. At least we as ISV’s areupfront in declaring our commercial interest. The worst peopleaccording to me are those who say someting in the front and do

> something else in the back.

>

> If any of the KGP executive committee members or their family membersor proxy organisations have any such hidden agendas, I think theyshould be bold enough to declare it openly and not pretend to be noble

> hypocrites.

>

> With deep regret at the shameful going ons at KGP.

>

> Anand S.K.

I am surprised by the silence of other committee members. We need more committed members to the cause of Kannada than just committee members.

My words are always bitter. Because truth is always bitter. I believe in “vasthunistha” rather than “vyakthinistha”.

I request all the committee members to think beyond some individuals and look at the cause of Kannada.

Thanks for everyone for reading this lengthy mail.

sigONa,

Pavanaja

—————————————————–

Dr. U.B. Pavanaja

Editor, Vishva Kannada

World’s first Internet magazine in Kannada

http://www.vishvakannada.com/

Note: I don’t worry about pselling mixtakes

____________________________________________

—–Original Message—–

> From: Yatheendranath T J [mailto:yathi@adamya.com]

> Sent: Tuesday, December 24, 2002 4:50 PM

> To: KGPExecMembers@yahoogroups.com

> Subject: Re: [KGPExecMembers] Problems with Nudi DLL’s

> namaskaara,

>

> I agree with Uday. We must not forget the basic objectives of KGP.

> I think some are peeved mixing up 2 issues -

> 1. The objectives of KGP

> 2. Commercial considerations due to KGP activity

> May be we need to address these issues separately.

>

> It is sad and unfair if the struggle and achievements made by the active KGP members are belittled. There could be disagreements on the way things are being done, but if the end result is doing good to the upliftment of kannaDa in any way, one should be happy and proud of being a part of it, in some way or the other.

> Best is to stop this chain of mails and fix a place and time for open discussion. So long as we don’t suspect the intentions and integrity of co-members, and if we are open to any decision the committee makes, we sure will be able to resolve all concerns amicably.

> I think, opening nuDi source code to public is a good proposition.

> We need to address IP and other related issues though.

> warm regards,

>

> yathi

Yatheendranath T J Tel: Co-Founder and COO

Off: +91 (80) 322-1780, 322-0594

Adamya Computing Technology (P) Cell: +91-98440-74381865/2,

Dr. Modi Hospital Road, Fax: +91 (80) 322-5071

Bangalore - 560 086, INDIA Web: http://www.adamya.com

================================================

uday S puranik wrote:

> Hi everybody

>

> I am surprised by the tone and tenor of the recent discussions.

>

> If the purpose of this forum is to indulge in mudslinging and

> character assasination, it does no good for the Ganaka parishat

> and I dont want to spoil my name and position in the industry by

> associating with this forum.

>

> The executive comittee members have a mind of thier own and need

> advice on what they should be doing or thinking about.

>

> Any problem can always be sorted out by discussion and that is if

> there is belief in cooperation and not confrontation.

>

> Hope we all can still work together and further the cause of the

> Ganaka Parishat.

>

> with regards

Udaya S Puranik

_______________________________________________

>

> hi,

>

> finally two sensible mails. one from mr. uday puranik and the other

> from mr. yatheendranath.

>

> it is indeed futile to indulge in character assassination and nothing

> will come out of it except a bitter and ugly feeling lingering within

> everyone, including the ones who wrote such mails. we must discuss

> these issues in a meeting when everyone concerned is present. there

> will always be disgreements no matter what path one takes. these

> issues must be ironed out amicably.

>

> regards to all.

>

> -vidyadhar mudkavi

> dec 26, 2002

From: <anand_sk@vsnl.com>

To: <KGPExecMembers@yahoogroups.com>

Subject: Meeting to sort out issues

Date: Thursday, December 26, 2002 2:47 PM

Dear KGP Exec committee members,

I think the suggestion to hold a face to face meeting to sort out the issues aired earlier is fine, can the date and time be worked out and informed well in advance.

Most active groups like the open source forums have very lively discussions online. These are precursors to the actual face to face meetings. I think it may be a healthy practice to follow, since most of the participants would already have done their homework on the issues to be discussed. The reasons for this is everybody’s time is precious and physical meetings entails a lot of time and effort and it should be used in the final stages for conclusive action plans and not for debating.

Online discussions are far better suited for airing out contrary and dissenting views, which can be resolved to a large extent by online debate. This is a very efficient means to arrive at consensus which can be ratified at physical meetings. I disagree that these are chain mails. The first motive should be exchange of views and to step up the level of involvement of the normally dormant members. In fact I find a very disturbing silence on part of the key functionaries of the KGP and complete lack of participation.

In fact though we call ourselves Ganaka Parishat, there is hardly any usage of this wonderful electronic medium for interaction as has been pointed out earlier by Pavanaja. The advantages are besides encouraging transparency it is self documenting and if there is a fear that they may degenerate to mudslinging then the very fact that everything a person says or reacts to is being recorded is enough reason for the medium to be self policing. It is very much like putting our venerable MLA’s and MP’s on camera. Let the people at large judge the quality of the debate and not some interested censors or editors. That is if we have nothing to fear in being forthright and we have the will to swallow bitter truth.

So much so that most of our KGP business could be conducted on email or better still on live online discussion forms to save time and physical inconvenience and beat the distance barrier.

Hope to hear from more of you soon. With regards.

Anand S.K.

Dr. KAMBAR LETTERS

http://ellakavi.googlepages.com/dr.kambarletters

Dr. KAMBAR LETTER TO CM

http://ellakavi.googlepages.com/dr.kambarlettertocm

FONT ISSUES AKRUTHI BARAHA NUDI

http://ellakavi.googlepages.com/fontissues-akruti%2Cbarahaandnudi

Program’s progress

IS THE question of the state of Indian language software always a defensive one, given the extraordinary power, reach, and attraction of English? A look at the Kannada software and its development down the years confirms such a sentiment. Is the Kannada software industry under pressure, and what are the immediate factors at work within the industry?

Early Kannada software, a script-enabling one, was largely geared towards desktop publishing (DTP). Shabdaratna, Venus, Prakashak, and Sediyapu were some of the software that brought publication activity to computers from manual typesetting. This was the mid-’80s when the PCs were just coming in.

While these packages were in use, two other major software — Srilipi and Akruti — made their entry. They were more advanced and Windows compatible. Then came Surabhi, and Winkey, the latter being an advanced version of the earlier Shabdaratna.

By the mid-’90s, Kannada software moved away from DOS-based systems to Windows, and firms producing Windows-based programmes made a kill. The Government, quite clearly, was the biggest customer. However, all was not well with the working of the software, especially in government departments, where a document in one software would not open in another. For instance, data in Akruti would not open in Srilipi. The problem was non-portability of data between software: each software worked well only as an isolate.

A few independent researchers then took it upon themselves to alert the Government to the problem of non-standardisation of Kannada software as well as keyboards. Each software having its own keyboard was bound to present problems. The number of keys and characters, and the modification of the existing English keyboard to ensure compatibility with Kannada characters were important issues to be addressed.

Another set of problems had to do with applications/data processing. Some researchers wondered why Kannada was used only in DTP and not in data processing or database applications. Why wasn’t there a single software that enabled data processing in Kannada? Srinath Sastry of the Ganaka Parishath points out: “If one were to take bus or train tickets, or examination forms, applications are in Kannada, but the data filled in is in English. The resulting output then is English. This was because of the absence of a software that would process the information in Kannada itself.”

A question related to the problem of data processing was then raised. How would one ensure alphabetical ordering — a very difficult proposition in Indian languages? For instance, the order of grammar in one Indian language may not match the order in another, or for that matter between English and other Indian languages.

To address these in some seriousness, the Government convened a conference, Kannada and Computers. Around that time, the Adivesha Co-operative Bank in Shimoga computerised all its transactions in Kannada using the Gistcard software developed by C-DAC. The bank was invited to make a presentation on the benefits of a complete Kannada software setting. Meanwhile, members of what came to be known as Ganaka Parishath, who had been observing these developments, brought pressure on the Government to move towards rationalisation. Dinesh Kumble, computer scientist and brother of the cricketer, had earlier, at a Computer Society of India conference, explained the benefits of Googly, the standardised software he had produced.

Impressed by the bank’s presentation and the Parishath’s call, the Government announced the need to create a technical atmosphere for standardisation of Kannada software and keyboard. If standardisation was achieved, the development of a Kannada database application would not be far behind. But steps towards standardisation were already being launched. K.P. Rao, a software developer, had come up with a brilliant layout. He used the existing English keyboard to devise characters for Kannada on just 26 keys. The swaras and vyanjanas were divided neatly on to the left and right of the keys so as to make it easy to learn and remember. The layout worked wonderfully, and some modifications later, it was announced that the K.P. Rao Keyboard Layout would be the standardised one. All software vendors were asked to stick to these standards by the Government to avoid confusion.

This done, the more important problem of non-portability of data remained. The Government asked software developers to follow the IISCI code on language, evolved by C-DAC, to enable portability. The code, however, was found unsuitable for transliteration purposes. It made navigation between different languages difficult as it could not address language-specific issues; for instance, the problem of vyakarana in Kannada. A technical committee was constituted in March 2000 to look into the problem, and the Ganaka Parishath came up with the Kannada Script Code for Language Processing, (KSCLP) “a milestone in the history of Kannada software”, in 2001. It was this glyph code that enabled some movement between different software. Developers were immediately asked to adhere to the code.

Having experienced the advantages of the code, the Government decided in October 2000 to have a benchmark software, its own Kannada script enabling software with standards fixed by itself. Nudi was really a product of this, a package that provided a variety of fonts around a common code. All private software vendors were then asked to adhere to standards set by Nudi. While implementing standards in Nudi, the Government came across problems in database, primarily language-related sorting issues. But the new Kannada code, a modification of that developed by the C-DAC, helped address the problem by evolving a standard set of characters. The Government adopted this code along with Nudi in 2001, by which time it had largely accepted the benefits of standardisation.

The Government felt that Nudi, which was then producing about 15 fonts, should be converted into a full-fledged software, from a benchmark one. The Parishath complied, and by 2002, Nudi was accepted as the official software and was ready to test other software.

In the midst of these developments, the six to eight private software developers who enjoyed a good market for their products, particularly in the Government, reportedly pressured the Government to put the standardisation decision on hold as they could no longer bank on a guaranteed clientele.

Users would switch over to Nudi and the firms could then survive only so long. A free offer on the standardised software, Nudi, threatened them further. Why would the Government or even a private user want to pay Rs. 10, 000 to Rs. 30,000 when a standardised software was being offered for free? The Ganaka Parishath did precisely that.

A classic market move! If other developers were to survive, they had to standardise their software in line with norms set by Nudi, and if they did, risk losing a guaranteed number of users (as users would choose from different software) or offer their software free of cost, which means they actually make no money/revenue. This was a serious factor that “brought the industry almost to a halt”.

And then came Baraha, a new standardised software, released free of cost from the US. Baraha carried properties similar to Nudi and portability of data was simply not a problem. Moreover, both Nudi and Baraha carried Software Development Kits out of which new customised software could be developed for database applications.

The temptation to choose from the two, therefore, would always be high. Baraha is now widely used by non-resident Kannadigas everywhere.

Why is it that a single private developer did not produce standardised software even after the rather ubiquitous Windows platform came about is a question that needs asking.

Whether this has to do with timing, chance, intelligence or a certain calculation that non-standardisation meant better clientele and revenues, or whether there was a software that did not work well, is not very clear.

And for the question why someone is offering a product free of cost, and why someone else is not, one can say safely that the former has been concerned about the development of Kannada language and culture, while the latter has largely been worried about running a business. The state of Kannada software lies somewhere between this linguistic and business intersection.

G.N. PRASHANTH

http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/mp/2002/10/31/stories/2002103100190300.htm

http://ellakavi.wordpress.com/2007/12/09/ellakavi-google-pages/
________________

http://ellakavi.wordpress.com/baraha-vasu-letter/

http://ellakavi.wordpress.com/kgp-founder-secretary-on-barahanudikagapa/

http://ellakavi.wordpress.com/kannada-fonts-piracy/

http://ellakavi.wordpress.com/nudidanthe-nadeyadavaru/

http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Repository/ml.asp?Ref=VE9JQkcvMjAwNi8xMS8wNCNBcjAwNDAw&Mode=HTML&Locale=english-skin-custom

From font to data U B Pavanaja

Ajourney of thousand miles starts with a single step. The usage of Kannada on computers, like all other Indian languages, started with printing and p u bl i s h i n g , p o p u l a rly known as Desktop Top Publishing (DTP). The biggest challenge those days was to display and print the characters of our languages.

K P Rao, a Kannadiga, first started designing fonts for Indian languages, including Kannada. He also created an input mechanism for feeding Indic characters into computers. Indian languages are highly scientific in nature. Rao utilised this fact and devised the first phonetic keyboard driver for Indian languages. Later, he released a free software for Kannada called Sediyapu.

Then came so many DTP packages for Indian languages. All these were nothing but collection of fonts and keyboard drivers. Every vendor used his own proprietary encoding scheme leading to a bit of chaos. Files created using a particular vendor’s font were not readable using another vendor’s font. There was little standardisation.

The government of Karnataka took the initiative in standardising Kannada on computers and constituted a committee. As per its recommendations, it notified the standard font for Kannada and a keyboard layout in 2001. This layout is nothing but a slightly modified layout of the one devised by K P Rao. The government also released a free software called ‘Nudi’ which adhered to standards.

Kannada doesn’t lag behind other languages on the internet. Earlier, people who put up Indic websites gave fonts for download which had to be installed to browse the sites. Then came the dynamic font technology where the font stays on the server and there is no need to download and install it. Vishva Kannada (www.vishvakannada.com) is the first Indian language website to use dynamic fonts (1998).

In education and using IT, Kannada has made a mark. The state government’s Mahiti Sindhu programme and Azim Premji Foundation’s computer-aided education programmes are good examples. Teaching programming logic in Kannada and thereby developing programming skills are other important aspects which can be implemented by using the Kannada version of LOGO program. This is the first-ever Indian language version of the world-famous programming language for children. The Kannada LOGO has also been conferred with the Manthan Award.

It was cumbersome and next to impossible to create applications in Kannada — things like salary bill generation using the font and keyboard driver technology. The Operating Systems do not understand these fonts. This problem has vanished with the advent of the global standard called Unicode. It removes the need for a font standard. Since the OSs can now understand the data as Kannada, it is possible to sort as per Kannada sorting order and create database applications. These are made possible by the availability of Kannada Unicode enabled OS (Windows XP), Office suite, database and development tool (VS.NET) by Microsoft. The famous Bhoomi software of the state government, ration card application created by Comat Technologies are some pioneering examples of Kannada applications.

All tech constraints in implementing Kannada on computers and developing applications for Kannada have been removed. The only remaining hurdle impeding the use of Kannada in computers is the mindset of the people.

(The writer is an expert on

Kannada and computers)

http://ellakavi.wordpress.com/2007/12/09/ellakavi-google-pages/
________________

http://ellakavi.wordpress.com/baraha-vasu-letter/

http://ellakavi.wordpress.com/kgp-founder-secretary-on-barahanudikagapa/

http://ellakavi.wordpress.com/kannada-fonts-piracy/

http://ellakavi.wordpress.com/nudidanthe-nadeyadavaru/

SHESHADRIVASU BARAHA LETTER, Dr. KAMBAR LETTER TO CM,
PURNACHANDRA TEJASVI LETTERS ON KSD KGP KANNADA, Dr. KAMBAR LETTERS
KANNADA FONTS PIRACY, KHALITHA NUDI BARAHA,
NUDIDANTHE NADEYADAVARU, FONT ISSUES AKRUTHI BARAHA NUDI
ME, Kannada and IT- KGP and Good, Bad and Ugly of it.
KANNADA KEYBOARD Dr. K. P. RAO, CIIL KSD MAY 2004 MEETING,
SOME INNER DETAILS ON KSD NUDI KAGAPA GOK,
I FEEL SORRY FOR KSD KANNADA,
MONOPOLY OF KGP-KAGAPA, KGP’s MONKEY BUSINESS,

http://ellakavi.googlepages.com

http://ellakavi.googlepages.com/home

BARAHA Vasu’s interview to Deccan Herald in 2004

and Dr. U. B. Pavanaja’s comments

Vasu’s interview to Deccan Herald and comments by Dr. U. B. Pavanaja

Vasu gave an interview to Deccan Herald during his visit to Bangalore in June 2004. Here are some excerpts and my comments on them:-

> “Then, I, along with Ganaka Parishad and the State Government worked to bring Kannada software for official use”, he (Vasu) said.

I don’t remember any of such efforts by Sheshadri Vasu. In fact Vasu was very reluctant to implement the GoK standard for font and keyboard. There was a heated argument between Dr Panditharadhya and K T Chandrashekharan, father of Vasu, in this connection. All along the time Shasthry, Narasimha Murthy and Panditharadhya were advocating that Baraha killed Kannada while Nudi saved it!   Vasu did implement the keyboard and font standards after repeated appeals by Shrinatha Shasthry and Narasimha Murthy.

> Baraha 4.0 was the first software that was implemented in Government offices with font styles.

I don’t think this statement of Sheshadri Vasu is true. There were many Kannada software being used in state govt much much before KGP, Nudi or Baraha came into existence.

> But the Ganaka Parishad and the State Government have introduced Nudi software as a benchmark system.

If Vasu were to introduce the GoK standards much earlier than the release of Kalitha (Nudi), Nudi would not have come into existence.

VASU said:  > Unfortunately for me, the government is insisting the use of Nudi software.

Why should be unfortunate to him? He is not selling Baraha.

> While Baraha has fulfilled the terms and conditions put forth by the Government, including stipulations such as keyboard and transliteration, I wonder why they are forcing departments to use only Nudi”, he said. One of Baraha’s many advantages, according to Vasu, is that it allows a person who knows Kannada to type it in English fonts. He felt preference of software (Baraha or Nudi) should be left to end user.

Why the choice should be only between Nudi and Baraha, both of them are obsolete in the current and future time where Unicode is the world standard?

Actually the choice should be between Windows XP/2003, Mac, Linux, Solaris, Java Desktop, Unix, etc. all are having Unicode compliance.

Meeting with Vasu in June 2004

Vasu was felicitated by Upasana in Bangalore during his visit in June 2004. I met him during that function. I discussed many things in general like Unicode features, facility needed in Baraha to convert RTF and HTML documents into Unicode, etc. Casually I asked him where from he is getting the fonts for his Baraha package. As per his answer, there is an artist in Bangalore who draws the shapes on paper and sends them to him. He (Vasu) scans, digitizes and  makes them into fonts. I did not discuss anything about the Akruti font issue.

_______________________________________________

PLEASE READ THESE KANNADIGAS will know what VASU saying to DECCAN HERALD in 2004 is FALSE.

VASU of BARAHA was NOT TRUTHFUL to reporters in 2004. Now also !!!

SHABDRATNA, the first Kannada Word processing Software developed in 1987 by SRG Systems. Now SRG is not in business because of NUDI and KAGAPA and BARAHA.

NUDI  Fonts has COPIED BARAHA Fonts

VASU is the CULPRIT here for KSD

SHABDRATNA, the first Kannada Word processing Software was
launched by the then Director of Karnataka Govt. Computer
Center during January 1987. This was used extensively by
almost all Offices & Depts of the Govt. of Karnataka.
SRG Systems Letter to V. M. Kumaraswamy in 2004.

___________________________________________________________

VASU sends the following email to kannadigas all over the world.

WHY ? Because VASU got Caught for STEALING the IPR.

This following information is also FALSE according to some sources.

___________________________

Dear friends,

Recently I have read some forwarded emails mentioning that Baraha has used fonts copied from other software. This statement is not true and I would like to clarify the same in this mail. As of Baraha 6.0 (to be released shortly), the following fonts are available for use.

BRH Amerikannada

BRH Bengaluru

BRH Kailasam

BRH Kannada

BRH Kasturi

BRH Sirigannada

BRH Vijay

BRH Devanagari

BRH Tamil

BRH Telugu

BRH Malayalam

All the above fonts are designed and hand-written on the paper by the artist Sri. Lingadevaru and digitized (conversion to TrueType Fonts) by me. “Except for “BRH Kannada” all the other Kannada fonts are totally new styles which don’t exist in any other Kannada software“. Most of the Kannada font styles that we see on computers today existed and used in the books, magazines and news papers much earlier. The “BRH Kannada” style follows one such classic type face that was used much before the computers came into existence as shown in the following examples.

Gnana Gangotri – 1971

Amara Chitra Katha - 1978

The above style is a kind of de-facto standard for Kannada, which is used by almost all the publications today. Every Kannada font vendor has created this style using re-digitization (re-digitization is the process of creating a digital font based on an existing font either by scanning a printed letter or extracting from an existing font) and has given his own name. The following are some of the fonts, which have this style. There are many other generic type face styles for Kannada, which can be found in all the software packages.

BRH Kannada - Baraha

Nudi Akshara 09 - Nudi

AkrutiKndPadmini - Akruti

Shree-Kan-0850 - ShreeLipi

SHREE_DECCAN - Prajavani

KPNEWS - Kannada Prabha

Kan Badami - PhonScript Systems

so on…

All these fonts use the style shown in the above examples. We may find a few minor differences, when we compare these fonts. In most cases, this difference is introduced automatically during the digitization process. Some vendors deliberately introduce a few changes to certain glyphs, to be able differentiate from others. Some times, a different character or line spacing is used so that the font looks different when displayed on the screen or printed. Some times, the font size, thickness is modified to give a different look. Whatever may be the difference, they all derive from a common design, which cannot belong to any one individual or company.

The common font styles that existed much before the computers cannot be copyright protected by any one person or company. This is the rule followed for English fonts. The English fonts such as “Arial”, “Times New Roman”, e.t.c belong to this generic category. Here only the brand names such as “Arial” is copyright protected and that name can’t be used for other styles. But the actual character styles (or outlines) in the Arial font may be copied and re-produced by anybody. Font copyright laws vary from one country to another. In Germany for example, only the new font styles that are created after 1981 can be copyright protected by filing a special registered design with the patent offices. I am not aware if any such laws exist for fonts in India.

USA courts have long back decided that fonts can’t be copyrighted AT ALL! Here, the digital outline can never be protected. According to them there can’t be any original font style, because, every font is created by slightly modifying some other font, and there aren’t really “new” font designs! See the following excerpts from the law…

“The Copyright Office has decided that digitized representations of typeface designs are not registerable under the Copyright Act because they do not constitute original works of authorship. The digitized representations of typefaces are neither original computer programs (as defined in 17 U.S.C. 101), nor original databases, nor any other original work of authorship.”

So, in a font, the name, any programming code not describing the font design are all that can be copyrighted. This leaves the door open in the USA to have anyone pay for the output of each character from a typesetter and re-digitize it or extract the design from a font program (and rename it), easily duplicating the design. Most foundries have very similar fonts derived from work largely designed by others. More information about font/copyright can be found at http://ssifonts.com/Myths.htm

When I started developing Kannada software in 1998, I had no knowledge of fonts at all. I had to do a lot of research and analysis on various Kannada fonts freely available in the Internet, which helped me to understand the current technology and the various issues. I am sure the other software vendors created their software only after doing such a research. This is not against any law.

Some Kannada software vendors complained that Baraha has hurt their business because of its free nature. I still believe that the only way Kannada can compete with English is by a user-friendly, quality, free software. If not me, some other individual would have done the same work later. It is unfortunate that no Kannada software vendor utilized this great opportunity. The initial version of Baraha was just an experiment (not so serious…), which I wanted to share with my family and friends. I didn’t know it would become so popular and used by many people. When Baraha gained popularity, I introduced new Kannada fonts in the versions that followed, as mentioned above. I could have easily re-produced the common font styles that existed in other software and competed with them. Instead, I came up with only new styles, which didn’t exist before. My intention is only to provide a free facility for the basic documentation needs of Kannada. I have focused more on standardization issues and portability of data to various formats and Operating Systems, which was ignored (deliberately for business interests?) by other software vendors. Since I don’t have any business interest regarding Baraha, the only motivation for me is quality, usability, portability and the interest in Kannada. Through Baraha, I have made a lot of friends throughout the world, which are more valuable for me than the financial benefits.

Baraha is not a rocket technology! I have simply put together many things that existed already. While doing so, I haven’t violated any copyright laws concerning font software.

Many software vendors and individuals have created Kannada software either out of business interests or personal interest in Kannada culture. Whatever may be the reason, my personal thanks to all of them because they formed the foundation for Kannada in IT. They kept Kannada alive so that it can be rejuvenated today. The credit goes to software companies such as C-DAC, ShreeLipi, Akruti, KGP and many others. KGP did a good work by standardizing Kannada fonts and the keyboard. Some individuals such as Sri. Kasturi Rangachar and Sri. Vishweshwara Dixit here in USA, had attempted to create Kannada software much before the introduction of Baraha. The list goes on… Without the efforts of above companies and Individuals, Kannada on computers would not have grown to the extent it is today.

-Vasu

______________________________

_____________________________________

Dr. U. B. Pavanaja’s comments on VASU’s ABOVE assertions:
 Vasu’s justification and the realities

With this background let me discuss a bit of what Vasu has written in a document and widely circulated in mailing lists. This document is also present in his Baraha discussion group (groups.msn.com/baraha). Let me quote from this document-

—————– Begin ———————————

USA courts have long back decided that fonts can’t be copyrighted AT ALL! Here, the digital outline can never be protected. According to them there can’t be any original font style, because, every font is created by slightly modifying some other font, and there aren’t really “new” font designs! See the following excerpts from the law…

“The Copyright Office has decided that digitized representations of typeface designs are not registerable under the Copyright Act because they do not constitute original works of authorship. The digitized representations of typefaces are neither original computer programs (as defined in 17 U.S.C. 101), nor original databases, nor any other original work of authorship.”

So, in a font, the name, any programming code not describing the font design are all that can be copyrighted. This leaves the door open in the USA to have anyone pay for the output of each character from a typesetter and re-digitize it or extract the design from a font program (and rename it), easily duplicating the design. Most foundries have very similar fonts derived from work largely designed by others. More information about font/copyright can be found at http://ssifonts.com/Myths.htm

———————- End —————————-

Vasu is very cleverly and conveniently quoting from a web-site put up in the year 1997 and has not been updated afterwards.

There is a reason for this site not being updated afterwards. This refers to the classic legal battle between Adobe and SSI. Southern Software Inc. (SSI) used to copy and rename fonts from Adobe and others. They thought they were safe from prosecution because, though they had directly copied the points that define the shapes from Adobe’s fonts, they had moved all the points just slightly so they were not technically identical. Nevertheless, in his 1998 judgment, the judge determined that the computer code had been copied:

The evidence presented shows that there is some creativity in designing the font software programs. While the glyph dictates to a certain extent what points the editor must choose, it does not dictate every point that must be chosen. Adobe has shown that font editors make creative choices as to what points to select based on the image in front of them on the computer screen. The code is determined directly from the selection of the points. Thus, any copying of the points is copying of literal expression, that is, in essence, copying of the computer code itself.

SSI lost the legal battle at the courts. Judgment was in favor of Adobe. Hence SSI did not update their web-site.

Vasu is conveniently quoting from this web-site. One can read in detail about this case in the following web-sites:-

http://scripts.sil.org/cms/scripts/page.ph…UNESCO_Font_Lic

http://directory.serifmagazine.com/Ethics_…/judgement.php4

http://www.ipcounselors.com/19980309.htm

When we conducted a opentype font workshop at Bangalore during March 2003, there was a talk on IPR issues related to fonts by Lawrence Liang, who is an expert on cyber laws. He had discussed this Adobe vs SSI case.

_______________________________________________________

Memorandum to Shri S.M. Krishna regarding Kannada Software:

October 21, 2004

Shri S.M. Krishna,

Former Chief Minister and
Senior Leader Karnataka Congress Party,
Bangalore.
Respected Sir,
As you very well know, Kannada is a language with tremendous richness and antiquity and
resilience with over 2000 years of spoken and written history. There has been an
uninterrupted growth of its literature and art in various mediums like stone and metal
etchings, palm leaf inscriptions and on paper. In keeping with the modern times and
technologies, the latest medium on which it has adapted itself is the computer and electronic
mediums as evident in the usage of Kannada in electronic publishing, multimedia and
educational content, internet websites and emails, discussion groups, e-books, government
administration, word processing and office applications.
There are however some dark clouds hovering over Kannada in these newest electronic
mediums and it faces grave danger due to some harmful developments over the past few
years as a result of which, independent software developers for Kannada software have
virtually been eliminated and a stage has been created for the subservience of Kannada
language to some elements who may not have the interest of Kannada as their prime focus.
Background:
a. A passionate bunch of entrepreneurs had for over two decades pioneered and
provided the facility of using Kannada on computers, when even operating systems
vendors like Microsoft had not provided such a facility.
b. These developers also enabled book and newspaper publishers to avail of the latest
facilities like DTP and Electronic pre-press facilities to produce quality books and
periodicals in Kannada. (Refer Appendix for details)
c. Survival was always a challenge for these developers, for they had to fight piracy,
obsolescence and restricted market volumes but they fought on with love for
Kannada as their main inspiration hoping that some day when Kannada is used
widely on computers their pioneering efforts would pay back.
d. Three key developments have completely shattered the morale and the finances of
these developers and they are reduced to the state of despondency, looking to clutch
on to something else for survival. If the situation persists, the few who remain may
vanish.
These developments are:
·  A so called free software called Baraha was released by an NRI having appropriated
some key Intellectual Property vested in Kannada Fonts developed after great effort
and expense by one of the developers. This has completely killed the potential NRI
Kannadiga market and also the one for casual users of Kannada on computers.
·  On the pretext of standardization and development of a bench marking software,
Government of Karnataka (GOK) encouraged a group of private individuals and
amateurs to develop (or rather dubiously misappropriate and re-engineer) a Kannada
software called NUDI and this against all norms was allowed to monopolize the
Government departments and undertakings thus completely cutting off the main
source of sustenance for these developers.

·  The major operating system vendor, Microsoft has now announced the embedded
Kannada in their Windows XP / 2003 operating system and their Office productivity
suite. The GOK as per the e-Governance Secretary has clearly indicated a
preferential switch to this new system (based on the global standard called Unicode)
even if it means a huge expense in upgrading the existing non Win XP/2003
compliant systems like Windows 98 based systems.
With the independent software developers in a precarious condition and the Microsoft
emerging as the major Kannada software provider on the latest Win XP / 2003 systems, the
vast majority of Kannadigas who cannot afford switching over from Win 98 based computers
will be left high and dry. For many of them the current hardware and software procured by
them at substantial expense are more than adequate for their needs and they have no
pressing need to changeover unless forced to because of incompatibility with the emerging
global standard of Unicode in Kannada.
While Linux may have a sobering influence on Microsoft, considering their global dominance
in the desktop and server operating systems market, it can be reasonably expected that
whatever Microsoft does will greatly influence the future course of usage of Kannada on
computers.
It should be borne in mind that unlike the proliferation of the IT industry in Karnataka (driven
mainly by a flourishing export market and primarily in English), IT usage within Karnataka
and especially the Government will have a deep influence and impact on the culture and
heritage of Karnataka because it hits at the very root of culture, its language, Kannada. Also
the welfare of the masses is at stake if their main medium of communication is in danger.

Recognizing the great danger this development posed to the Kannada language and hence
its cultural and artistic roots, visionary writers and litterateurs like Dr. Purnachandra Tejasvi
and Dr. Chandrashekhar Kambara and others have recognized the grave threat that these
alarming developments are posing and called for some introspection and correction of the
slow poison eating away into the vitals of our state by threatening to destroy its source of
nourishment, the beautiful and expressive language Kannada, which forms the very core
and reason for Karnataka to exist as a separate cultural identity.
The solution:
The future of Kannada is too important for bureaucratic GOK departments or a few
individuals or corporations to mess around with and so it is imperative that an academic
institution like a university working in partnership with technologists be entrusted with the
proper development considering all factors like language, culture, aesthetics, technology
and heritage.
It is essential that a group of individuals passionately concerned about Kannada and having
all the above sensibilities be in charge of guiding the flowering and growth of Kannada in the
new age of Information technology.
It is also important to find funds to ensure that technological problems, which are peculiar to
Kannada in the computer and electronic devices, are researched upon and solutions
developed for them to stimulate and further the growth of the language.

Like for many other computer related areas a very strong Open Source Group needs to be
created and nurtured which will suggest and work on Kannada related technologies without
commercial or financial constraints.
Summary:
There is little time to lose and hence we request Shri S.M. Krishna to persuade the GOK to
constitute a standing group comprising of interested and eminent Kannadiga litterateurs and
technologists to set up a mechanism along with the various universities in Karnataka and
academic institutions like IISC, IIIT and to work towards the noble goal of ensuring that
Kannada flourishes for years to come in the electronics and computer mediums like it has in
the traditional mediums for over 2000 years.
Some of the immediate measures required are:
1. Ensure that Unicode based solutions in Kannada is made available to the existing
base of computers without need to upgrade them at a huge cost and that the
switchover creates the least amount of discomfort by ensuring portability of existing
content.
2. Constitute a two-tier group to look into all aspects of Kannada development in
computer and convergent electronic mediums. The guiding group will look after the
overall development for Kannada software and also ensure funds and right
conditions are created for the same, while a technical group can go into the technical
details and give technical advice.
3. GOK Departments like Department of Information Technology and e-Governance
Secretariat should correct their policy towards Kannada software development by
modifying any G.O. or notification, which stymies competition or favours a particular
group and should stop funding them and withdraw any unutilized funds given without
following proper procedures.
4. Ensure that the existing developers of software for Kannada are given due support
and market access and a level playing field is created for Kannada software
development so that more developers are encouraged to enter the field both in the
commercial area as well as the Open Source Groups.
5. Developments like Nudi, which were funded by GOK can be put in Open Source for
further development.
6. Taxes and levies on Kannada software should be removed.

Submitted on behalf of:
Dr. Purnachandra Tejasvi,
Handpost Mudigere,
Chikkamagalur - 577132
Dr. Chandrashekara Kambara
BSK 3rd Stage
Bangalore - 560085

by Anand S.K.
Managing Director,
Cyberscape Multimedia Ltd.
941, 21st Main, 22nd “A” Cross.
BSK 2nd Stage,
Bangalore - 560070

VASU’s email 2004 to AKRUTHI Owner and What VASU is quoting afterwards is WRONG and What Dr. U. B. Pavanaja says about VASU.

VASU email to Anand of Akruthi

—————–
Forwarded Message:

Shri Kumarswamy,

Namaskaara,

I think largely due to your relentless efforts to ferret out the truth behind the sad state of affairs in the area of Kannada software and the domination of false icons of the so called free software like KGP Nudi and Sheshadrivasu’s Baraha, a lot of bitter truth and hidden information is coming out from various quarters, which is exposing the nasty skullduggery by which these false icons have sucked on the blood of the real workers in the Kannada software arena who have never claimed that they and they alone have done a great service to Kannada, but have been contributing silently in the background.

I am forwarding here, an admission by one such icon, the Guru of free Kannada software, who, perhaps due to the fear of getting exposed by these revelations, very belatedly realised the need for acknowledging the unabashed piracy. More than six years after his misdeed, he meekly apologises for having pirated our “Akruti” fonts. This is a charge we have also made on KGP. How many more years, do we have to wait for them to come clean?

Anyway, I hope you keep churning the murky waters of