During Summer Source we got to know three amazing people from Tajikistan: Asomiddin Atoev, Kamol Obidov and Talat Numanov. They were very excited about transferring to their home country all the FOSS knowledge they gained in Croatia. When they returned to Tajikistan, they did very well in creating a linux training centre and advocating for FOSS on all possible levels. We saw Talat again at Asia Source and during the final plenary session he promised that he would organise a Source Event in Dushanbe. When we met again in Tajikistan four months later Talat, Aso and Kamol gathered their energy and experiences and planned FOSS Road - Central Asian Camp on Free Software Migration inviting Tactical Tech to co-organise the event in Dushanbe.

This workshop - which extended to Tajikistan's neighbouring countries - was organised for those who are interested in the utilization of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) for civil society, the academic community, and public and private organizations. This event was held in one of the most beautiful gorges of Tajikistan in Varzob canyon near Dushanbe - the capital of the country.

If you would like to know what was going on there please visit the workshop wiki

The overall goal of this initiative was to promote utilization of FOSS in activities of public organizations, educational establishments and civil society representatives that enhances reliability, self-sustainability and legality of many ICT projects that have been implemented and/or to be implemented in the countries of the region (Afghanistan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan).

FOSS Road belongs to the family of Source Events organised by Tactical Tech in the past.

Content of the FOSS Road - Central Asian Camp on Free Software Migration:

1. Localisation (advocates, practitioners)
This track focussed primarily on internationalisation/ localisation and interaction with society and its benefits. Furthermore, these sessions covered open standards and their implementation for local needs, taking into account the peculiarities of the local languages. Localisation project management along with atechnical understanding of this process are also some of the most significant issues in promoting effective localization, and were also discussed during the track. The track was moderated by Simos Xenitellis assisted by one of the local experts. Simos is from Mytilene, Greece. He is currently doing his PhD in Information security at the University of London. He has been using Linux for the decade and started working on localisation of Greek language around 1998. Simos is a team leader for the Translation Project/Greek (the translation project for the FSF approved/managed packages) as well as a team co-leader for the Greek GNOME localisation project. More information can be obtained either in the following link http://wiki.asiasource.tacticaltech.org/cgi-bin/wiki.pl or in his personal website – http://simos.info/ 2. Migration (Developers, FOSS projects activists, IT experts of the public sector organizations)
The track on migration reviewed techniques for introducing and getting started with FOSS in an NGO along with total cost of ownership, needs assessment and also drafting a migration plan for the target group. Practical issues were further demonstrated, such as choosing and deploying a distribution (GNU/Linux Debian, Slackware, Mandriva, SuSE, Ubuntu etc), installation, peripherals, limitations, LANs, small-scale server set-up and finally maintenance and user support. In addition, for practical means some selected applications were demonstrated during the session. Dirk Slater, migration track leader during the Asia Source (http://www.tacticaltech.org/asiasource/) and Summer Source (http://www.tacticaltech.org/summersource) and eRiders manager was facilitator of the session, assisted by the regional expert. Dirk Slater is currently eRider Coordinator for the Tactical Technology Collective. Prior to joining TTC, Dirk was Senior Circuit Rider for the Low-Income Networking and Communications (LINC) Project of the Welfare Law Center, helping low-income led organizing groups across the United States increase their capacity to conduct advocacy, public education, and leadership development by utilizing technology. Working with the team of talented Circuit Riders at the LINC Project, Dirk led initiatives on integrating databases more deeply in organizing work, utilizing free/open-source software, and developing interactive peer-learning based workshops on technology use for grassroots groups. Vladimir Petkov a famous erider and blogger from Bulgaria assisted Dirk to conduct this track. As Vladimir writes in his website (http://kaladan.cult.bg) respect for him is a very important thing. If you want to show your respect towards him please visit this site. You won't be disappointed. By visiting his website you will find out how multitalented a person he really is. 3. Publishing (eRiders, web master, bloggers)
This track focussed on open publishing. Participants looked at different publishing systems, such as content management systems (CMS) and blogging tools. They also worked with various groupware systems and got familiar with syndication (RSS). The publishing track was moderated by Ali Gharavi. He is an electrical/robotics engineer by education. By vocation Ali has been a software developer/designer and project manager for a large consulting firm, as well as a web/software development manager for a Swedish telecommunications company. Currently he is working as the technology director for USA-based NGO called the Center for Victims of Torture (CVT, http://www.cvt.org), headquartered in Minneapolis. For more information please go ahead and visit this site - http://wiki.asiasource.tacticaltech.org/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?AliGharavi Vladimir Petkov assisted to conduct this session too. Other sessions covered more technical aspects of FOSS as well as issues like Intellectual Property Rights or software licensing. Heather Ford from Creative Commons South Africa introduced those aspects of FOSS to all the participants. Heather is a South African who has worked for NGOs in the fields of Information and Communications Technology policy, law and management in South Africa, the United Kingdom and the United States. Heather graduated from Rhodes University with a Bachelor of Journalism degree and has a certificate in Telecommunications Policy, Law and Management from the University of the Witwatersrand Link Centre. She worked with Creative Commons when she was a fellow at the Reuters Digital Vision Fellowship Program at Stanford University and is now working as an associate at the Wits LINK Centre. Open Society Institute of Tajikistan (http://www.osi.tj) together with the Civil Initiative on Policy of Internet (http://www.cipi.tj) and the Tactical Technology Collective – Netherlands (http://www.tacticaltech.org) have organised the regional ¨FOSS Road - Central Asian Camp on Free Software Migration¨ It was funded by the OSI Budapest – http://www.osi.hu and OSI Tajikistan – http://www.osi.tj