To Dear Mom and Deeda

Months of planning, preparation and more importantly “brain storming” over what to gift them..  We (refers to my siblings and me) wanted to make their Silver Jubilee Wedding Anniversary very special,  tell them how much they mean to us and how lucky we feel to have them as our parents. Mom and Deeda (Deeda is what I call my dad with love 😉 ) , We really really LOVE YOU. We appreciate your support at every step in life and grateful to you for all your sacrifices for us. You have understood our needs, our feelings and our problems beyond the societal barriers. Wish you very happy, prosperous, healthy long life ahead.

Parents' anniversary

We had planned for a grand Silver Jubilee Wedding Anniversary Party , which was supposed to be a “surprise party”. Best wishes poured in from all our family friends and relatives. My mom’s colleagues had even brought a cake for the occasion.. something that we, the stupid children, had forgotten to plan about 😛  I was speechless seeing the enthusiasm around.

Anniversary cake

Parents, bro and me

My sis and me had even planned to render a short speech on this occasion. But when I began all that I could say was “We love you. Thanks for EVERYTHING” with gratitude filled teary eyes.

My Experiences with FOSS

I picked up the spirit of FOSS( Free/Open source Software) from foss.in 2006. The most wonderful aspect about foss is the community that guides u, the community that supports u. You tend to explore more and more.. The open source philosophy offers you a lot of freedom. Being a student, the availability of source code is a boon to me.

Even technically, Open Source Software is far better than the Proprietary Software. Again, the dedicated community is the key factor here. I salute all those contributors!!!

Many people ask me why I want many people to work on foss(or linux platform for that matter).. I believe that open source is a way of life.. I am not forcing people to use foss. But how wil people compare proprietary software and foss if they are ignorant about foss? How wil anyone know that foss is better if they dont know whats offered by the foss world?

I have been trying to make my friends aware about foss.. The initial response wasnt encouraging. I discussed the same matter even in foss.in 2006 🙂 (I think sm people do remember that..).. That time, Tarique, Sudha and others suggested me to start working on foss.  They said “Ur peers wil listen to u if they find that your work is good and interesting”.. Since a year, i have been doing the same.

We had a techno-managerical fest infinity ‘007 in our department.. V organized an event called “Bond with Linux”. It was a unique event of its kind.. introduced for the first time. It was to encourage the participants to know more about linux and FOSS in general. The response was good.. We hope to conduct many such events in future.

Personally, I did my curriculum project on File Structures on Linux. While the rest of the class did the project on W* platform, i faced a bit of opposition and discouragement initially (people said its very difficult to do it on linux!!!).. But i must admit, some people really supported me a lot. Now, when I am done with the project, every body is appreciating me for doing it on linux.. Great to see this…