Software Freedom Week'08@Amity University(23rd-25th Sep)
Software Freedom Week - A world wide
celebration of free software with a aim to educate the people about the
benefits of high quality FOSS in every field was the most important event
celebrated by all of us to make people realize the value and power of open
source, to make them aware of the existence of free softwares and their
wonderful usage. At
celebrated this event at a very big scale targeting all the students of our
college.
After the induction program when we all
sat down and started preparing for Software Freedom Week in our college it
seems to be a quite impossible task to do it on a good level with only 1 days
of preparation. I was'nt really sure and was very nervous to how to do this in
10 days, how to involve more and more people in this event. Then suddenly i
look back and it comes like a real pleasure to me when i saw my one and a
half year hardwork of building a community in my college sets all the pathway
for me to go for this event in a big way. My team agreed to put their whole
efforts into this and was really very happy and exiciting.
The event, revised in name and called as
software freedom week, was organized by the team of Amisun Club in the campus
for three days viz. 23rd , 24th , 25th of September 2008. This event featured
events of notable caliber and technical spirit. Sparked by the storming minds
of Amisun committee and fueled by Dr. Ajay Rana the event picked up fire which
spread across amity universe very fast.
We did everything from planning to designing
and implementing only in 10days to make this event successful. Our tag line was
THINK FREE… which made every thing clear about our clean intentions of not
involving any monetary funds at the time of registrations or otherwise from
sponsors as well. Every sponsor had sponsored a part of event or prizes of the
events.
Registrations were opened
a week before the event started. The link was uploaded on the official amity
technical placement site and amizone main web page for the on line
registrations. In total 1380 registrations were taken on line. A unique way of
publicizing our events was suggested by our team members and was initiated by
canvassing in every classroom by a team of 3-4 members in every department and
registrations were taken through every class representative in all the
sections. By this method we got around 1500 registrations from all the
departments. 2 days before the event help desks were put up outside every
block. We got in total 1500 registrations through help desks. Before the event we
had around 4380 registrations for 17 events. This excluded on the spot
registrations which crossed 2000.In total 6380 students attended the event. In
every member and volunteer of Amisun there was a stream of passionate hot blood
running in the veins which had the urge to made this event a success and
explore what lies beyond the limits.
Inaugural Function:-- The inaugural program of the Software Freedom Week
was held at 9.30 am in the morning at C Block Auditorium. The auditorium was
full of students waiting to get their queries answered. The occasion was graced
by the presence of the following eminent guests and delegated from IT firms of
global repute:
Mr. Gurusaran Singh, Associate
Director, Tech Mahindra
Director, Computer Associates (CA)
Mr. R.K.Chauhan, DGM-IT, NTPC
Mr. Sandeep Chauhan, Steria
Dr. Balwinder Shukla, Pro Vice Chancellor,
Dr. Ajay Rana, Director, Amity Universe
mentioned, there were Faculty Placement Coordinators from various departments
all over
welcome address to the guests of the day and an introduction to the Software Freedom
Day (SFD). It was followed by lamp lightening by the delegates, which signifies
the illumination of minds by knowledge. Bouquets and momentos were then
presented to the guests. After that all the delegates showed some light on FOSS
and enlighten the audience with their wonderful experiences.
this elite occasion there was a Debugging Contest for programming lovers on
23rd and 24th of September. It was a great opportunity for all programmers who
love to go through the pain of struggling through the dense forest of grey
cells in their mind and then reach to the final code. There were in all three
levels for the contest which required a lot of efforts from a participant from
theoretical basic concepts to practical programming knowledge.
Fest of FOSS:-- The Install fest was one of the exciting events in which the
crowd showed great interest and enthusiasm.The participants were asked to bring
their laptops with them. We were already having 100 CDs with us containing all
the Free softwares of the Open CD and some more free softwares like virtual box
added by us. We started with a brief explanation of all the softwares in the
CD. The participants were really shocked to see that these kinds of softwares
exist for free also to use freely without having a constraint of trial
version.They really liked thunderbird a lot. After having an Interactive
discussion on Free softwares and installing some of them we moved to
installation of open solaris on their laptops.
5
Workshops in the entire event:-- There were total five workshops in the entire
event. The workshops were given by experienced engineers of Sun Microsystems
Mr. Panchaleshwar Nayak and Mr. Sudeep Mathur , Angad Singh- Sun Campus
Ambassador Tech Lead, Hemlata Jindal- Core Committee Member Amisun and one by
me. The workshops given by Panchaleshwar and Sudeep sir was intended to clear
the basic doubts about open source, advantages to an end user, how to
contribute, why to contribute. The presentation by Angad , hemlata and me was
intended to go into some details of the technology, showing some demos,
explaining the features and usage of technologies like Netbeans, Sun Spots,
Solaris operating system. In all, the workshops were highly appreciated and
enjoyed by all students.
Debate
Competition:-- The first literary event that was conducted as a part of
Software Freedom Week was Debate Competition Many participants were
enthusiastic about this event as for the first time in the university an
technical debate in a fest was being conducted. The event was conducted for 2
and a half hour duration It was a great pleasure for the audience present in
the event as they were benefited with this debate. Things were more
comprehensible when a questionnaire was conducted at the end of the event which
lasted for half an hour. It was very difficult for the judges to announce for
the winner as every candidate had presented himself in a perceptible manner.
on open source. Registrations were open for all and free of cost. All the
contestants were supposed to paint on faces of their team mates. The theme of
the face painting was open source softwares. Main purpose behind such an
activity is to explore beyond the limits. Teams registered in the team of 2.
This particular event attracted all the budding artists to show their best as
well as a great number of spectators. The participants showed great enthusiasm
towards the new horizon and proved to be silver line in the dark sky of
software illiteracy.
this event everyone had a different concept of SFD in all. It was no more just
technical it was also creative and full of fun. Time limit given to each team
was 30 min. After proper judgments, winners were declared according to the
relevance of painting with the given theme
Designing:-- A technical adventure with a ride through creativity of student’s
minds. The theme of this event was software freedom and open source. Response
was good. The logos were strictly complied with the given theme and time limit
of 45min for each team was given. The main crowd in this event was those
talented students who had a lot of creative junk in their mind to add more
glitter to the sparkling software freedom day.
second day of Software Freedom Day celebration
an event called “KBC Contest” was
organized with an objective of the contest was to look for the most intellect
student, who is a Computer Geek and has the
event in which 800 students were present and participated with full zeal and
interest. It was a very fair game since our huge volunteer team was maintaining
discipline and order. Our contest host was brilliant on her part and kept the entire
show lively and humorous. There were in all four rounds in the contest.
the theme of open source, it was one of the fun events included in our 3-day
celebrations of software freedom week. The splendid event was held on 24th and
25th September from 2pm onwards. A team of maximum 3 members was allowed. There
was a very big response from our technical as well as non-technical crowd since
it was a game which had no pre requisites, no technical knowledge, and no fees
at all. The registrations were free of cost. Over 500 people were present on
both the days to participate. Game was divided into 3 levels, the first two
being the elimination rounds.
Gaming as of now has its dimensions extended towards reality and it forms a
major part of software section that attracts present youth. We at Amity
university conducted a LAN gaming event which was
heartily welcomed and enjoyed
by the students. The event was conducted on 24th and 25th of September. The
gaming event featured 5 games, namely- Counter Strike, FIFA 2008, Need for
Speed Most Wanted, Unreal Tournament and Age of Empires. Some Open Source Games
like Plane shift and
the participants and were really appreciated.
Article
Writing:- A fantabulous break for the writers was given through our channels
via ocean of open source.
Article
writing was the first ever techno-literary event held in our campus. Theme of
this event was Open Source. The word limit was 1000 words and the main
criterion for selection was that it should not be cut, copy and paste from net.
It was not held on-the-spot rather the contestants were given ample time to
think about the mind-boggling theme. Online registrations and registrations at
help desks were accepted. The submission of articles were taken by 25th
September 2008 by our volunteers from different help desks. We received a great
response. This provided the biggest platform ever for those who hid in the
corners of the class scribbling words at the last page of their diaries to show
their talent on the final draft.
Hunt:-- A 2 level gaming and mind ravishing extravaganza was held on 25th
September starting from 10 am onwards. The total registrations were so many
that we had to put a condition of first cum first serve. So the first 50 teams
were selected. Registrations were free of cost as per our software freedom week
tag line-Think Free! The theme of this event was pirates and Open source. Team
of maximum 4 members was allowed. In this wonderful game, team players had to
find hidden articles, locations or places by using a series of clues. The
contestants were given the first clue, the solving of which would lead
the location of the second clue and so on until a trinket or other significant object
was found by solving the final clue. The clues were related to open source
questions and mathematical puzzles. There were in total 2 rounds.
&& Rock Show):-- Shaking the ground with the beats of freedom was the
aim The theme was open. It was a relaxation and fun event for all the
participants and the volunteers of our software freedom week2 participants
composed a song on Software Freedom and one of them sung it in the presence of
the whole gathering. This event helped our participants and volunteers to
reboot their minds and get refueled for the upcoming events. The rock show was
held while the results got compiled. Corrosion band performed 4 songs from a
movie
dreams. At the end 4 winners were declared. The song composed on open source technologies was very much enjoyed by the audience, Its really very interesting listen it fully . You can download and listen it at :-
great learning experience for all, It was full of fun and excitement. I am very
much thankful to my college management that helped us out in every possible
manner and let this event happen on such a short notice. I would like to thanks Sun Microsystems for their support and help and all out sponsors.The success of this
event id the result of hard work of Core Committee Amisun and 138
volunteers. A pic of our team at the end of event on 25th September.
View all pics of the event at:--
http://picasaweb.google.com/
