NRCFOSS History

NRCFOSS piloted a proof of concept through which it introduced FOSS Technologies in the formal & non-formal sectors. In the formal sector, NRCFOSS introduced FOSS in engineering undergraduate curriculum of the Anna University with an affiliation of 254 engineering colleges. The strategy was to train teachers of engineering colleges and equip them to offer FOSS electives and student projects in their colleges at the UG/MCA levels as part of the curriculum so as to ensure that large number of Engineers and MCAs are produced every year with exposure, training and skills in FOSS technologies. In the first phase around 207 teachers from around 105 engineering colleges in Tamil Nadu were offered training. In the second phase NRCFOSS would extend the scheme to other states. Already few states have shown keen interest to introduce such programmes in their states.

http://www.au-kbc.org/nrcf/index.htm

http://nrcfosshelpline.in/web/home/

As part of the development of FOSS products and technologies, NRCFOSS has come out with an Indian version of Linux named as BOSS (Bharat Operating System Solutions) with support for Indian languages. It was decided by a committee of experts to have an Indian distribution of Linux so that the language used for the desktop environment and some of the applications can be in the Indian language which will enable the mainly non-English literate users in the country to be exposed to ICT and to use the computer more effectively. In the long term, the BOSS Linux project will attempt to be the standard GNU/Linux distribution for desktop computers in India.

This Linux distribution (distro) is based on Debian Linux and is targeted at the government user initially. The ultimate objective of creating BOSS Linux is to enable the people of India, most of who are not English-literate, to be exposed to Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) and GNU/Linux. It is hoped that with this version of BOSS that is available in the Indian language, more people will turn to FOSS as an alternative to using illegal unlicensed proprietary software

http://www.bosslinux.in/