ARCHIVED FORUM: Gurdwara Tapoban Sahib
Computer developed with Gurmukhi fonts
Posted by : Kulbir Singh
Date: 7/06/2004 5:40 pm
To all IT experts out there: Please comment on this news below.
Daas,
Kulbir Singh
Computer developed with Gurmukhi fonts
Perneet Singh
Tribune News Service
Moga, July 6
It may well be called a revolutionary step in IT field that four former students of a Faridkot engineering college have developed the first-ever operating system in Punjabi. This is also probably the first operating system in any Indian language. They have also developed a software package for internet browsing through which one can send and receive e-mails in Gurumukhi, the way it is done in English.
Amanpreet Singh Alam, a resident of Gobindgarh locality, Moga; Gursharan Singh, Narinder Pal Singh, and Susheel Kumar, all ex-students of Adesh Institute of Engineering and Technology, Faridkot, developed this unique operating system in a record time of six months. Jasvinder Singh of Lala Lajpat Rai Institute of Technology, Moga, also contributed to their project.
One has to see it to believe it. Every single command and instruction is in Punjabi. You see words like ‘upbhogi nao’ for user name, ‘gupt code’ for password, ‘raddi’ for recycle bin, ‘weda’ for desktop, ‘jharokha’ for window, and ‘meri pasand’ for my preferences and ‘ateet’ for history etc. Not only this you also get instructions in Punjabi and options like ‘theek’ for OK and ‘rad’ for cancel.
In an exclusive interview to The Tribune, Amanpreet and Narinder said they had localised the Linux operating system in Punjabi and even a layman could operate it with ease. At present they have software packages for word processing, image processing and Internet browsing, besides word pad, calculator and games. They are working on another software package called open office. They achieved this goal under the guidance of Mr Amandeep Singh Romana and in association with IndLinux, Bombay.
When asked as to how they got this idea, they said that various IT magazines were focusing a lot on localised operating systems and software packages and they had attended some conferences and seminars on the topic too, which inspired them to take up this project.
“Initially, we were working on the project for fun, but as we started getting results we put in all our efforts to make it happen,” said Narinder.
Speaking on the purpose of developing an operating system in Punjabi, they said that they wanted Punjabi people, who did not know English, to operate computer with equal ease and the whole community to correspond in their mother tongue through internet at an affordable price. They told that their operating system could bedownloaded from punlinux. sourceforg.net free of cost. IndLinux would also launch its CDs in August and these would be available at an affordable price. They have dedicated their project to the second Sikh Guru, Guru Angad Dev.
Talking about the hurdles they came across during the project, Amanpreet said, “We did a lot of research in finding suitable Punjabi words for various commands and instructions and we consulted some linguists for selecting right words for the same. We chose simple words, which are used in our routine interactions, to make it easier for a layman to operate the system.” “The toughest part was developing Gurumukhi fonts as we could not use already existing fonts due to copyright factor. We worked for 18 hours non-stop daily during those days, but at the end it was worth the effort,” said Narinder.
Having a glorious achievement under his belt, Amanpreet had already received his appointment letter from Red Hat, Pune. While Gursharan and Narinder want to study abroad, Susheel is looking for a job.
This operating system can be utilised in a big way for computer literacy in Punjab and the state government may also help these boys in their research or higher studies. They said that the Punjab Government should implement their operating system in school education and Punjabi University, which may bring an IT revolution in Punjab.
Re: Computer developed with Gurmukhi fonts
Posted by : Jarnail Singh Arshi Gyani
Date: 7/06/2004 8:03 pm
Waheguru Ji ka Khalsa Waheguru Ji Ki fateh.
A good effort. But the reality is that Microsoft is THE Operating system and a host of GURMUKHI/PUNJABI Fonts are already in use ( the only trouble is according to the old proverb 9 poorbeah and 18 chulleh...each FONT has its own keyboard code and none is compatible with the other !! so no spelling checkers or OCR can work with these fonts. A COMMON KEYBOARD MAP for all punjabi fonts is the primary concern so that cut and paste/search/ocr etc can be performed across all fonts.
Google already has PUNJABI and Microsoft also can be read in punjabi.
Linux is a free open source OS but very few people use it due to the dominance of Microsoft
Congratulations to those concerned.
Dass jarnail Singh
Re: Computer developed with Gurmukhi fonts
Posted by : Son of Guru Gobind Singh Ji
Date: 7/06/2004 8:30 pm
Fedora Redhat 2 compilation also comes with Punjabi language support but it's not fully developed yet. Windows XP also comes packaged with Gurmukhi fonts but you have to install them manually using the control panel. After installing the fonts you can see the date and time in Punjabi along with some other tweaks.
Here's the link to PunLinux's all Punjabi website: http://www.geocities.com/punlinux/index.html
Good to see Waheguru Ji's Fateh on the index page :)
Keep it up guys!
Re: Computer developed with Gurmukhi fonts
Posted by : .
Date: 7/06/2004 11:02 pm
"Windows XP also comes packaged with Gurmukhi fonts but you have to install them manually using the control panel. After installing the fonts you can see the date and time in Punjabi along with some other tweaks."
you can get full easy illustrated instructions at http://mkhalsa.com
Re: Computer developed with Gurmukhi fonts
Posted by : anon
Date: 7/07/2004 1:20 am
I've seen a Japanese version of Windows XP. It's awesome that they now have a punjabi version.
