The AnkurBangla LiveCD beta # 3 is out in the open. Sayamindu had this announcement to make which was posted to possibly all places we could think up:

From: "Sayamindu Dasgupta"
To: ; ;
Cc: ; ; ; ; ;
Subject: [Ankur-distro]The Ankur Bangla Live CD version 1 beta3
Date: Sunday, November 16, 2003 9:19 AM

Announcing.....

******************************************
The Ankur Bangla Live CD version 1 beta3
******************************************

"HiJibiJbiJ"
==========

"keno haaschhi shunbe? mone koro prithibiTaa Jadi chyaapTaa hoto, aar shob jol goRiYe DaangaaY eshe poRto, aar Daangar maaTi shob ghuliYe pyaachpyaache kaadaa hoye Jeto, aar lokgulo sab taar modhye dhopaadhop aachahaR kheye poRto, ta hole - Hoh Hoh ho"

....

"mone koro ekjon lOk aashChe , taar ek haate kulpi boroph, aar haate saajimaaTi, aar lokTaa kulpi khete gie bhule saajimaaTi kheye pheleche - Hoh Hoh, Hoh Ho, Hah Hah Hah ha"

....

"aamaar naam HiJibiJbiJ. aamaar bhaaiYer naam HiJibiJbiJ, aamaar baabaar naam HiJibiJbiJ, amaar pisher naam HiJibiJbiJ"


This is HiJibiJbiJ - from Sukumar Ray's "hojoborolo".

..and the last beta of version 1 of the Ankur Bangla Live CD is named after this fantastic, "ever laughing" (if I may put it in that way) character.

This release features a major upgrade in the core system (Morphix base), which should solve many problems related to hw detection, bootup and other misc stuff. Also, a large number of additions, enhancements, tweaks, fine-tuning, bug fixing has gone into the Ankur Bangla Live CD v1b3; see the Changelog below for the details. There should be an overall enhancement in performance for machines with less RAM (128 MB), especially in the Multimedia segment. Moreover, people using this CD can connect to the Internet now - please see the Changelog for details.

However, in my opinion, one of the most significant enhancements in this release is the inclusion of the "Ankur Bangla Chhar Poka Naashok". ;-) Of course, there are many who disagree with me - my message for them, well....

HUMBUG!!
;-)

This tool helps users to gather debugging information in case the CD does not work properly. After the information has been collected, it is dumped onto a floppy disk, so that it can be later sent to the
developers of the Ankur project. To use this tool, while running the CD, switch to console mode by
pressing Ctrl-Alt-F2, and issue the command 'charpoka' (without the quotes), and the wizard will guide you through the process.
Screenshots of this tool are available at http://clai.net/sayamindu/index.php?m=20031113

The ISO image can be downloaded (approx 380 MB download) from
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=43331&release_id=197316

Bugs should be reported at http://www.bengalinux.org/bugs

Mailing list for people interested in the LiveCD is at http://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/bengalinux-distro

Screenshots are available at http://www.bengalinux.org/screenshots/gnome/

I would like to thanks the developers of the Ankur Bangla team for the great work they have done over the past one year.

A round of special thanks goes out to Indranil Dasgupta and Malay Mitra for helping in the production of the CD.

Also, the people who have been most helpful in the Live CD project are the beta testers - and a HUGGGEEE thanks goes out to them - you all rock!!

(..and thanks also to Sankarshan Mukhopadhyay - for carrying out the hard work of distributing the Live CD to the beta testers who don't have a high speed internet connection).

-happy bug hunting to all-
-cheers-
Sayamindu Dasgupta
(on behalf of the Ankur Bangla Team)


PS: The Ankur Bangla Live CD v1 beta2 has been downloaded 149 times since it was first uploaded to sourceforge.net (not bad for a large ISO...)
:-D

*****************************************************************************

Known issues in this release
----------------------------

* The time is not displayed correctly
* The disk mounting system is somewhat flaky
* The system does not shut down automatically once you exit X (This is
intentional - and will be removed in the final version)
* The sound volume in Totem and in the GNOME mixer are both set to zero
initially, please increase the sound volume once you are logged in.
* GNOME Terminal does not work (no prompt)


Changelog for Version 1.0 beta-3 (HiJiBiJBiJ)
---------------------------------------------

* The core system (which handles the bootstrap process) has been upgraded to Morphix 0.4.1
* The boot failure issue for most machines should be resolved.
* Most of the packages in GNOME were updated.
* GNOME Games is more or less completely translated now (3 cheers for Progga!).
* XFree86 4.3.0 has been patched to the latest version and hand compiled.
* ATI Radeon users should experience increased stability due to the upgrade mentioned above.
* Freetype2 has been upgraded to version 2.1.5
* Some patches from Ximian Desktop 2.4 beta has been incorporated into the stock GNOME install.
* On machines with less than 96 MB RAM, a dialogue now pops up during the boot process, asking if the user would like to create a swap file in an existing DOS partition. This feature has not been tested very extensively - I expect reports from people on 64 meg boxes.
* A network config tool has been added to the Live CD. This tool can handle normal ethernet configurations, and has support for wireless devices. I have not tested the wireless support as I do not have the required hardware setup. Feedback expected on the wireless support thingy.
Screenshot of this tool at http://clai.net/sayamindu/images/network_config.png
* WvDial has been included for modem users (I am still searching for a *stable* GTK2 based dialup tool - if anyone finds one, please let me know).
* The disk mounting subsystem is undergoing a restructuring, and is expected to be unstable - please mail me and let me know if the harddisks/extra cdroms/floppies mount correctly in your system.
* A new tool has been added - called Ankur Bangla Live CD Chhar Poka Nashok. This tool collects debugging and system info and dumps them on a floppy, so that the user can send the info to the development team later.
* The Live CD now supports both the (semi)phonetic Probhat Layout and the Inscript Layout. Also included is a document on how to write Bangla in the Ankur Bangla Live CD.
* Some sample pictures have been added to the "aankibuki" folder on the Desktop
* An OGG file (under the Open Music Green license) has been added to the "gaan baajnaa" folder.
* The Bangla Literary archive has been updated.
* Some blurb on Ankur has been added (still incomplete).
* The file selector originally used in the LiveCD has been removed - it was having some performance issues.
* The buttons on the modified GTK file selector from Ximian work properly now.
* Mozilla has been updated to version 1.5
* Xine lib updated to version 1-rc2
* NVidia drivers updated to version 1-4496
* Support for the integrated ethernet device in Nforce/Nforce2/Nforce3 based motherboards has been added.
* The PCIUtils packages has been added.
* Support for the graphics card (GeForce 4 MX) integrated with NVidia Nforce2 motherboard has been improved (now it uses the nvidia drivers instead of the generic VESA driver).
* General hardware support is also improved now, as I have integrated the latest version of the database used by the hw recognition system to the core.

--
Sayamindu Dasgupta
[ http://clai.net/sayamindu ]

The Illiterati Programus Canto 1:
A program is a lot like a nose: Sometimes it runs, and sometimes it blows.

IndLinux's Milan has yet to touch 80 (the last time it was AnkurBangla (122) - IndLinux (49)) and it sure makes the cockles of one's heart warm to learn and absorb this fact.
The LiveCD is, in Armstrong's immortal phrase 'one small step for mankind'. The CD was created as an announcement of the technical competence and delivery capability of the developer group. Unlike most others involved in Indic L10n efforts, this is till date a completely non-funded, volunteer driven global effort and the results have been outstanding.
Some more work remains to be done. One of the important sister projects remain to be touched upon - The Bangla Gutenberg. In fact, I tend to feel that why call it Gutenberg ? The Gutenberg Printing Press and the related technology was a wonder as it brought the power of words to the common populace. Now if we could only honor the person who created the Bangla type that ensured an equitable distribution of power - that would really be something. A thought line but perhaps a fruitful one...
An interesting project has been identified by near perfect workaholic Progga - a Bengali text to speech program that enhances the accessibility of the Project. This forms one crux of the aim that AnkurBangla stands for - Empowering People. The true merit of a FLOSS project could be measured as an index by the number of socially relevant development paths it can generate. And in an L10n project the possibilities are limitless. More on this later...

- posted by sankarshan @ 11/17/2003 06:44:00 AM