Centre for Internet and Society

Odia Wikisource to Celebrate its First Anniversary Tomorrow!

praskrishna — 2015-12-15T08:14:16Z

Odia Wikisource, a sister project of Odia Wikipedia and a free online Odia language library, will celebrate its first anniversary in Odisha capital tomorrow.

The article was published in Odisha Sun Times on October 25, 2015.

Scheduled to be held at the Institute on Management of Agricultural Extension (IMAGE) in Siripura at 5 PM, the open to all event would welcome everyone taking interest in Odia library movement in particular and Odia language in general, as per a press release issued by Odia Wikisource.

It may be noted that the project, available online at or.wikisource.org, went live on October 20, 2014 after being incubated for over two years. It not only provides free and open access to readers to text that are out of copyright or available under free license, but also allows them to contribute in either digitizing copyright-free text or correcting mistakes made by others.

“Wikisource is different than Wikipedia as the former is published writing republished online where on Wikipedia it is more of aggregating information published elsewhere in an encyclopaedic manner,” explained Subas Chandra Rout, a long time Wikimedian.

All the contributors to the project are volunteers and are fondly called ‘uikiali’ in Odia. These volunteers follow certain guidelines to check through the content digitized by others to make sure there is no copyrighted text posing copyright violation, correct typing and other grammatical mistakes and incorrect attributions.

Authors and copyright holders are also encouraged to provide permission in re-licensing their work under free licenses like CC-BY/CC-by-SA licenses so that some of their content becomes available online and fill the large gap in online availability of Odia books to some extent.

“Last year, the Wikimedia community in Odisha did a remarkable job in bringing in as many as 141 books from multiple authors relicensed under the above mentioned licenses. We, as an institution, played a role in reaching out to many authors and convincing them for a small contribution to the society,” said the Centre for Internet and Society’s Programme Officer Subhashish Panigrahi.

“There is a great dearth of Odia books online. I try to buy some time from personal and office time to continue my contribution. I started from an all time Odia classic ‘Chhamana Athaguntha’ by Fakir Mohan Senapati,” said Pankajmala Sarangi, the most active contributor to the project.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/news/odisha-sun-times-october-25-2015-odisha-wikisource-to-celebrate-its-first-anniversary-tommorrow

Odia Wikisource to Celebrate Its First Anniversary in Bhubaneswar

subha — 2015-12-15T08:19:56Z

Odia Wikisource, a sister project of Odia Wikipedia and a free online Odia-language library is celebrating its first anniversary in Bhubaneswar tomorrow i.e., 25th October, 2015.

The blog post was originally published by Mybhubaneswar.com on October 24, 2015.

Available online at or.wikisource.org, the project finally went live in last year on October 20 after being incubated over two years.

In a nutshell, it not just provides free and open access to readers to access text that are out of copyright or available under free license, but also allows them to contribute in either digitizing copyright-free text or correcting mistakes made by others.

All the contributors to the project are volunteers and are fondly called “uikiali” in Odia. These volunteers follow certain guidelines to check through the content digitized by others to make sure there is no copyrighted text posing copyright violation, correct typos and other grammatical mistakes and incorrect attribution.

Last year, the Wikimedia community in Odisha did a remarkable job in bringing as many as 141 books from multiple authors relicensed under the above mentioned licenses where we, the Centre for Internet and Society’s Access To Knowledge program, as an institution, could play a role in reaching out to many authors and convincing them for a small contribution to the society.

Pankajmala Sarangi, the most active contributor to the project elaborated saying, there is a great dearth of Odia books online. I try to buy some time from personal and office time to continue my contribution. After all, I started from an all-time Odia classic “Cha’mana Athaguntha” by Fakir Mohan Senapati”.

“The Odia language classics could now be read from phones, tablets and of course from computers”

Many important books that are out of copyright are making their appearance on the Odia Wikisource. “Wikisource is different than Wikipedia as the former is published writing republished online whereas on Wikipedia it is more of aggregating information published elsewhere in an encyclopaedic manner”, says Dr. Subas Chandra Rout, a long time Wikimedian.

Odia Wikisource’s administrator Mrutyunjaya Kar welcomes everyone taking interest in Odia library movement in particular and Odia language in general to join this event that is being held at the Institute on Management of Agricultural Extension (IMAGE), Siripura, Bhubaneswar at 5 pm tomorrow.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/mybhubaneswar-october-25-2015-subhashish-panigrahi-odia-wikisource-celebrates-its-first-anniversary-in-bhubaneswar

Odia Wikisource Sabha 2014

praskrishna — 2014-12-09T14:09:03Z

The Odia Wikimedia community, a volunteer community that contributes to Odia Wikipedia and its sister projects, in collaboration with the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), a Bengaluru based non-profit that works in domains like IP reforms, Accessibility, Access to Knowledge (CIS-A2K), etc. are celebrating the launch of Odia Wikisource on November 28, 2014 at Jayadev Bhawan, Bhubaneswar.

Odia Wikisource, a sister project of Odia Wikipedia, is a free online library that houses Odia language books online and is available for free at https://or.wikisource.org. It is not just an online library but it focuses on bringing rare and old books that are out of copyright. CIS-A2K has been instrumental to also encourage many notable authors of Odisha to change their license terms to Creative Commons Share-Alike (CC-by-SA) license, a license that allows public access and ability to reuse the content to expand the knowledge base in Odia language on the Internet.

We are honoured to invite you to join us to take part in the discussion on “Setting a roadmap for Odia book digitization” during 3-5 pm, screening of documentary “Odia: Silalekharu Mobile”, the public meeting and award ceremony thereafter.

Schedule

3:00 p.m. - 4:30 p.m. Roundtable "Digital archive for Odia books" President: Dr Debiprasanna Pattanayak
4:30 p.m. - 5:00 pm: Screening of documentary "Odia: Silalekharu Mobile"
5:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.: Public meeting

Chief guest: Dr Soumya Ranjan Patnaik, Chairman, Eastern Media Ltd. & Editor, The Sambad
Chief speaker: Dr Debiprasanna Pattanayak
President: Dr Haraprasad Das

Download the banner

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/events/odia-wikisource-sabha-2014

Odia Wikisource launched in Odisha capital

praskrishna — 2014-12-07T02:53:32Z

After the success of Odia Wikipedia, it is now the turn of Odia Wikisource to bring the best of Odia literature to the people of Odisha in the language they speak.

The article was published in Odisha Sun Times on November 28, 2014.

Having gone through a rigorous assessment process by the Wikimedia language committee and Wikimedia Foundation’s board before being released last month, the Odia Wikisource was formally launched at Jayadev Bhawan on Friday.

Launching the Odia Wikisource, eminent linguist Padhma Shree Dr Debiprasanna

Pattanayak emphasized the importance of such a project in Odia language to make the best of Odia writing available on computer, mobile and tablet to ensure that youngsters take interest in Odia.

“e-books are the key to take Odia to the masses, especially those who are outside Odisha and have no access to libraries,” he said.

Speaking on the occasion, Soumya Ranjan Patnaik, Editor of leading Odia daily ‘Sambad’ said; “Internet should be treated as a friend of our language rather than as an enemy.”

He announced the relicensing of 19 books published by Ama Odisha under a Creative Commons Share Alike license that will be digitized on Wikisource.

Patnaik evinced keen interest in collaborating with the Odia Wikimedia community in the future for such language and cultural work.

Presiding over the function, noted poet and thinker Dr Haraprasad Das advised the youth for filling the gaps in the Odia language using internet.

“Odia Wikisource is connecting me with my roots, my language and culture”, said Pankajbala Sarangi, who has made the highest of 1200 edits on Odia Wikisource.

The credit for the most extensive work on Odia book digitization, however, goes to Bhubaneswar based non-profit Srujanika that digitized about 740 books.

Started two years ago as an incubator project, the Odia Wikisource is now live on the internet at or.wikisource.org.

The project now houses many precious books including writings of noted authors like Fakir Mohan Senapati, Upendra Bhanj and the entire Odia Bhagabata.

It includes most periodicals that were published between1850-1950. Odia Wikisource will further this work by going one step ahead in digitizing books in the form of text in Unicode so that they appear in a search engine search in Odia language.

It allows readers to read books from computers, mobiles and tablets, even permitting them to print and use the content elsewhere. These books are way lighter than the scanned books. This is making a way for audio books.

Books for which copyright has lapsed and many rare books could be digitized and preserved for the future.

Apart from old and valuable books, books by renowned and contemporary authors like Padma Shree Debiprasanna Pattanayak, Ramakrushna Nanda, Dr Jagannath Mohanty, Dr Subrat Prusty, Bharat Majhi and Nirmala Kumari Mohapata, and many other authors have been taken by the Odia Wikisource team to digitize.

In collaboration with Wikimedians from Bhubaneswar, Bangalore based non-profit Centre for Internet and Society’s Access To Knowledge program was instrumental in training the faculty of Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS). “50 students from KISS have digitized 4 books and are continuing to contribute more”, says Preetinanda Roy.

Wikimedians also converted Odia Bhagabata to Unicode by using the source text from Odia.org. “We are aiming to bring more rare books and manuscripts in Odia in the near future,” said Odia Wikimedian Mrutyunjaya Kar.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/news/odisha-sun-times-november-28-2014-odia-wikisource-launched-in-odisha-capital

Odia Wikisource has a new Wikisourcer, and he is the youngest in the Odia Wikimedia community!

subha — 2015-08-21T17:40:56Z

Prateek Pattanaik (User:Shrijagannatha on Odia Wikisource) is a young researcher of Odia literature and Odissi music. He has not just digitized as many as 54 Odia-language poetry dating early 18th century but has also annotated, both poetic and prosaic translation in his blogs “Sri Jagannatha” and “Utkal Sangeet”. He has also brought a complete book “Kisora chandranana champu” on Odia Wikisource. A recent entrant into the Odia Wikimedia community, Prateek is also the youngest Odia Wikimedian. He has also digitized 18-19th century 54 poem written by various poets.

Right after Prateek finished his first digitization of an entire book “Kishorachandranana Champu” by Baladeba Ratha (1779-1845 AD) on the Odia Wikisource (or.wikisource.org), Subhashish Panigrahi caught up with Prateek asking him about his passion for Odia literature and Odissi music.

Subhashish Panigrahi (SP): Hi Prateek, please tell little bit about yourself?
Prateek Pattanaik (PP): I live among the pristine hills of Damanjodi, in the district of Koraput, Odisha, with my parents. My mother, Mrs.Pallabi Mohapatra, is a teacher in Delhi Public School, Damanjodi, where I study. My father, Mr. Dipak Kumar Pattanaik, is lecturer in Botany in the Government College, Koraput. Currently I'm studying in 11^th standard in the Science Stream.

SP: What influenced you to take so much interest in Odia literature and Odissi music?
PP: When I was young, my grandfather, Dr. P. C. Mohapatra, would tell me bedtime stories that recounted the exploits of Lord Jagannatha – tales about King Indradyumna, Chodaganga Deva, Jayadeva, the Panchasakha; those of Dasia Bauri, Salabega; about how Lord Jagannatha would wander hopelessly in hunger, banished by Lakshmi; how he would chase the eggplant-plucking lady, enchanted by her rendition of the Gita Govinda. Those tales fascinated my imagination, and attracted me towards the Lord. And thus it began, my endless journey of discovering the infinite cult that surrounded the smiling Gods at Puri.

As a kid I brought a triad made of neem wood from Puri. I would worship them, and dress them in the Beshas, costumes of Lord Jagannatha, using thermocole and paints- I smeared sandalwood paste on them and covered them with tiny blankets during winter. My mother inspired me – she was the typical Odia homemaker – from making “Pana” on the “Makara Sankranti” to making 'pithas', a large variety of traditional delicacies. And I would offer all of them to my Lords. She made herbal oils for my Lords when they were ill with fever. She would never say no to me no matter how unrealistic my demands. She tried her hand even at making the traditional “patta chitra” canvases for me to draw.

During my summer vacations, I would unconditionally rush to Koraput to my grandparents, and I still do. My Grandmother, Mrs. Kanak Lata Sabat, who is an Odia-language teacher, taught me the Odia alphabet when I was very young. My father would bring me pictures of Lord Jagannatha from the Temple stall outside the Puri Temple. I became famous in my entire family for my ability to tell them apart without seeing their name. I was stubborn – I told him to buy those Odia books even when I did not know how to read. And those were the first books I read in Odia- filled with vivid descriptions of the Beshas of the Lord; with simple lines from the Odia Bhagabata to complex lines from medieval poets. When I asked my grandmother to tell me who was this man called Upendra Bhanja, whom the books praised no end, she revealed to me the master he was, and told me about his unbeatable command over the words he spoke.

I grew up to being automatically attracted to Odissi Music – which I would hear amidst songs of the Gita Govinda in local Temples, and Patachitras- filled in the soaring structures of the Puri Temple. I myself figured out how to do those paintings, and began by singing songs of Bhajan Samrat Bhikari Bal. Later, I heard of age-old classics from my grandma again – songs which she had learnt while in the third standard- “Ki Shobha go Kunje”, “Galani ta Gala Katha” and so on. I learnt them myself, and began going to my sir who would explain to me the nuances of Odissi Classical Music.

When I was in ninth standard, the Jagannatha temple of Koraput came forward to use my PowerPoint presentations on the Jagannatha cult that I had made them for my pleasure, during my leisure time. They took them and printed them, and made a public exhibition. It was praised no end. I became somewhat of a child-size know-it-all of the Jagannatha cult, but I saw there was still more to discover.

SP: How you started learning about “Champu”?
PP: The word “Champu” itself attracted me. It had a distinct ring to it, an alien-sounding word that was never used in real life. My father told me it was a song in which each line started with the same letter. I asked him to show it to me. He could not. He himself had not seen more than a single song. And when the truth dawned on me that it was not 'a' song- it was a collection of 34 songs, after the 34 letters of the Odia alphabet, I had to get my hands on it. Fortunately, the “Open Access to Oriya Books” (OAOB) project by Srujanika had tons of Odia books digitized and hosted on the website http://oaob.nitrkl.ac.in, and I could finally behold what it was. I was amazed – I ran my eyes down the 'Ka' song,and read “Ka-Ka-Ka-Ka”. What talent! My god, who wrote this? Kabisurya. Kabisurya who? Kabisurya Baladeba Ratha. I discovered the man and was similarly amazed by folktales of his talent.

When I saw the 'Ga' song was the same song my Grandma loved – I was again amused. I knew that all the while! Above each song, it was written 'Raga so and so'. So all of these could be sung. But how could I learn how to sing them? A single recorded CD, from the busstand taught me. In a year, I could sing it entirely. I understood the depth of the lines from the simple commentary below them, and was disappointed by how less known they were in this day and age. I thought what I could do – I sung them at the temple during the Ratha Jatra, and they were an instant hit! People longed to hum those ancient tunes. But they could not. These songs were outdated, no one sung them except a few maestros of Odissi Classical Music, and no one could comprehend them. But people loved them. They did not know what they meant, exactly but they sure did get the feeling. And that was what mattered.

SP: From spending your entire childhood to creating two blogs with so much annotation on these early writings, and using social media to popularize them, to bringing them on Wikisource, what made this leap?
PP: One fine day, it struck me that the same way I made PowerPoint slides, I could make something digital. Why not a website which anyone can see? Wouldn't that breathe new life into the traditional melodies? Good. And so over a span of two long years, I typed out the entire Champu and created two websites; Shri Jagannatha (shrijagannatha.wordpress.com) for the Jagannatha cult, and later, Utkal Sangeet (utkalsangeet.wordpress.com) for the classical songs. The Utkal Sangeet project was a great learning experience, I used tags, so that you could find any song, view it on any device, sort songs by Raga, Tala, Poet, Book, etc. I translated songs, and uploaded their recordings as well.

SP: Did you ever share your work with other fellow researchers? You must have struggled to find these resources, isn't it?
PP: U.S. Researcher in Ethnomusicology at U.C. Davis, Dr. David Dennen AKA 'David Uncle',was the first and only person who helped me. He himself has submitted his PhD Thesis on the Kishora Chandrananda Champu, from villages to research centers. He sent me tons of research books in digital form, painfully scanning them himself only for me, from locations like Australia and America. None from Odisha even assisted; the people at the Odisha state museum refused to let a child like me to see their manuscripts, and none of the research institutions even responded in an email. David uncle constantly inspired me to carry on further, not being swayed away. He encouraged me constantly, and he is as important to this project, on the Champu, as my very own parents.

Then in February 2015, it struck me that I could use social networking to propagate the richness of the Cult at Puri – the grandeur in literature, dance, music, art, sculpture, food and all. I started a new Twitter handle @shrijagannatha, and linked it with my site. Now the handle has 820 followers within 6 months. Many Twitter users have been very appreciative, and they became family now. From the Grandfather @nidhi_budha to the 'untimely gourd' @akala_kushmanda, they post random tweets about Odisha to digitization of the Odia script, with which I struggled greatly at the beginning. This soul, devoted to a similar cause as me, was @subhapa, Subhasish Panigrahi, an active volunteer in the Odia Wikipedia, one of the founding fathers. After months, Persuaded by the Wikimedians, I too contributed the entire text of the Kishorachandrananda Champu to the Odia Wikisource by using my Utkal Sangeet project. It is a collaborative project, which will blossom healthily. Since so many people visit the Wikimedia projects, my small contribution to this free online library could probably quench their literary thirst.

SP: What are your plans to expand your work on Wikisource?
PP: In the future, I plan to make my site even more accessible for the layman. I have a few ideas as of now, to make the ideas reach out to everyone, even someone as young as me. I want to be an active, useful member of this online digital movement for Odia language, and go on with my task forever.

SP: Thanks Prateek for taking time to share such an inspiring and insightful story. Would you like to add more about expanding project for digitizing such valuable literature?
PP: As for my future plans, I would like to type out other such works of Kabisurjya Baladeba Ratha, like his “Ratnakara Champu”, “Premodaya Champu” and even the satirical “Hasyakallola”. I would definitely contribute the same to Wikisource. The books being rare, they may be lost if not saved. I would like to translate the Kishora Chandrananda Champu, the main one, into English in its entirety – word by word, retaining its true essence so that the Western Audience and even people of their states can understand the marvel it is. Now, I'm researching on various commentaries and references so that I can write my own. The form itself is rare, and more so, such an intricately interwoven part of the typical 'Odia' identity that it cannot be ignored. Let the world glance upon the talents of (Upendra) Bhanja and Kabisurya (Baladeba Ratha) and identify that a small, peaceful state in the East has been the birthplace for such great art.
Thanks!

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/kisorachandrananachampu-on-odia-wikisource

Odia Wikisource Goes Live!

subha — 2014-11-07T13:30:46Z

Odia netizens have more than one reason to celebrate this festive season.

Odia Wikisource went live just before Deepavali and is now available for Odia readers who are eager to access Odia books online. There are over 40 million native Odia speakers living in Odisha and diaspora in the US, UK, UAE and other parts of the world and yet Odia Wikipedia currently only has 8441 articles (October 2014) as compared to Malayalam which has a comparable number of speakers and over 30,000 articles on the Malayalam Wikipedia. Internet is one of the largest sources of information.

Wikisource is an online library that holds notable published works that are in the public domain or are freely licensed as Creative Commons Share-Alike. Authors and publishers can now choose to donate their books and publications, and provide open access to readers.

Odia is the 11th Indic language to have this project, and is available at or.wikisource.org. Readers can now access many rare books, which are out of copyright, also reuse the content, and commercially reproduce the books with the power of.

None of the state's government portals in Odia have content in Unicode to make them searchable and reusable. The largest digital archive in Odia, a joint initiative of Pragati Utkal Sangha a Bhubaneswar based non-profit and National Institute of Technology Rourkela, created under the project Open Access to Oriya Books (OAOB) has over 740 books published between 1850 – 1950, which have been digitised. These are stored in a PDF format, which restricts searching of content.

Odia Wikisource went through a thorough and long approval process after it was incubated in late 2012, first by the Language Committee and then the Wikimedia Foundation's Board. Amir Aharoni, Member, Language Committee and software engineer, Wikimedia Foundation was of the opinion that Odia Wikisource, had tremendous potential, especially in educating children: "In schools in Odisha, are there lessons of Odia literature? If the answer is yes, then it can do a very simple thing - make these lessons more fun and help children learn more! Everybody says that in Kerala this worked very well with Malayalam literature."

An MoU was signed in January 2014 between Centre for Internet and Society’s Access To Knowledge (CIS-A2K) and Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS), an educational non-profit that supports over 20,000 students from indigenous communities, to collaboratively spearhead open knowledge projects. However, it was later felt that students and faculty could use their time more effectively if they were taught to digitise Odia books on Odia Wikisource. Workshops have been conducted to train faculty, who in turn will teach students about typing more books on Wikisource. Nine faculty members and 45 students are chosen for this work in the first phase.

Earlier this year, fourteen books (13 in Oriya and one in English) pertaining to a range of subjects have been relicensed under Creative Commons License will be made available on Odia Wikisource. At present, three books have been digitised and proofread, and another is in the process of being digitised. KISS is also digitizing 11 books of Odia author Dr. Jagannath Mohanty that were relicensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0 earlier this year, due to CIS-A2K’s efforts. Pankajmala Sarangi, a Wikisource writer, who had digitised two books and has played a key role in getting approval for Odia Wikisource says, "I would be happy to contribute by typing more books on Odia so that they can be stored and available to all. We can take this to masses through social, print and audio & visual media and organizing meetings/discussions." Five modern Odia poetry books from Odia poet Bharat Majhi and four books including one encyclopedia from notable Odia children litterateur Ramakrushna Nanda have been relicensed under CC-by-SA 4.0 recently. These books will soon see their digital versions on Odia Wikisource.

CIS-A2K has been instrumental in identifying four new Wikisource contributors to help to digitise the Odia Bhagabata, an Odia classic compiled in the 14th century. They will join five other Wikimedians who have been contributing on a regular basis to Odia Wikipedia. Wikipedia and Wikisource contributors are excited about this development and this is reflected in the quotes given below.

“Odias around the globe will have access to a vast amount of old as well as new books and manuscripts online in the tip of their finger. Knowing more about the long and glorious history of Odisha will become easier,” says Mrutyunjaya Kar long time Wikimedian who proof-reads books on Odia Wikisource.

Saswat Kumar Swain, a Wikisource contributor says, “It is sad to see that there is not much information in Odia language even after it got the got classical status. This is a really nice initiative. I'd request all Odias to read Odia Wikisource and if possible contribute to make Odia Wikisource bigger & better.”

“As a contributor I find it is easier to edit in Wikisource than Wikipedia. I think common people will get more out of it than Wikipedia as the later is rather meant for people who need research type of article. The forgotten golden articles will surface to prove that old is gold,” says Dr. Subas Chandra Rout, Odia Wikisource contributor.

The project release took little more time because of various technical problems. User:MF-Warburg, admin of Wikisource who played a key role in helping to set the new wiki calmly tells the community, "glorious preparations take time" when Odia Wikimedian and Odia Wikisource's first admin Srikant Kedia pings him multiple times about the release of the project. Srikant, who has been active on Odia Wikipedia and done major work in connecting with the global community and fixing bugs says, "I speak Marwari at home as it is my mother-tongue, I studied in an English medium school as English is a common language worldwide and a need of today. And I am associated with Odia Wikiprojects as Odia is my janmabhumi (motherland) language. My great grandfather came to Odisha over 100 years ago and this language is very precious for me. It is my pleasure to promote Odisha and Odia language."

Preetinanda Roy, KISS's lecturer and coordinator of the KISS-Wikisource project feels that the students learn a lot during workshops and Wikisource write-a-thons. She is currently helping 8 of her colleagues at KISS to train 45 students to digitize books on Odia Wikisource.

Odia Wikisource offers a breath of fresh air for online readers who are eager to access and make available free open content in Odia.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/odia-wikisource-goes-live

Odia Wikisource Celebrates 1st Anniversary this 25th October

praskrishna — 2015-12-15T08:10:22Z

ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଉଇକିପାଠାଗାର ୧ମ ଜନ୍ମତିିଥି (Odia Wikisource’s 1st anniversary):

ଆଗାମୀ ୨୫ ତାରିଖ ଦିନ ଇଣ୍ଟରନେଟରେ ଉପଲବ୍ଧ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ପାଠାଗାର “ଉଇକିପାଠାଗାର”କୁ ବର୍ଷେ ପୂରିବାକୁ ଯାଉଛି । ଏଥି ନିମନ୍ତେ ଆମେ ଭୁବନେଶ୍ୱରରେ ପାଳୁଛୁ ଉଇକିପାଠାଗାରର ପ୍ରଥମ ଜନ୍ମତିଥି । ଆଉ ଏ ଉତ୍ସବରେ ଯୋଗଦେବା ଲାଗି ଆପଣଙ୍କୁ ରହିଲା ବିନୀତ ମାଗୁଣି, ଆସିବେ ନିଶ୍ଚେ । ଅଧିକ କିଛି ଜାଣିବାକୁ ଚାହିଁଲେ ଆମ ସହ odiawiki@gmail ରେ ମେଲ ଯୋଗେ ଯୋଗାଯୋଗ କରିପାରିବେ । ଧନ୍ୟବାଦ!

This was published by Bhubaneswar (Buzz) on October 24, 2015.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/news/bhubaneswarbuzz-odia-wikisource-celebrates-1st-anniversary-this-25th-october

Odia Wikisource campus project at Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences

subha — 2015-08-16T15:42:56Z

The Centre for Internet & Society's Access to Knowledge team organized a closing ceremony, on December 3, to conclude the three months campus project for Odia Wikisource at Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences, Bhubaneswar.

Students who were part of nine teams led by nine faculty members were assessed based on the team performance and the team led by one of the faculties, Nilima Samant, was awarded as the best performer. Similarly Preetinanda Roy, a faculty member, who also happened to be the project coordinator was awarded as the best performer among all. The institute's CEO Dr. Prasanta Kumar Routray felicitated the awardees and all the faculties and students who took part in the project. Other senior members from Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences management also joined.


Odia Wikisource campus project at Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS) closing ceremony. This is a group photo after the event. Photo by Subhashish Panigrahi (Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license).

Addressing the audience Dr Routray said, "we are extremely thankful to Subhashish and CIS-A2K for this great support. If these students could learn Odia typing in such a short span and digitize 4 books then we should get more valuable content in their native languages digitized."

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/odia-wikisource-campus-project-at-kiss

Odia Wikipedia: Three Years of Active Contributions Gives Life to a Ten Year Old Project

subha — 2014-02-04T08:56:35Z

Odia Wikipedia has carved its mark as the largest online encyclopedia in Odia language that is edited by a volunteer editor community.

This was published by HASTAC on January 31, 2014.

By 29th of January this year it is 10 year old and 5000 articles rich. Though this was started as one of the first four Indic language Wikipedias. In 2011 there were only 550 articles with practically no contributors. The initial Wikipedians struggled to reach out to more people. Luckily, with more people coming on the Internet – primarily on social media platforms, collaboration became easier. Odia Wikipedia’s facebook page and group became the social gateway to get used to working within the Odia language. This is one of the languages which has very little online presence when it comes to having content as Unicode text. Many people still struggle with the outdated pirated operating systems installed in their computers which added more hurdles in the way of all the community led Wikipedia outreach programs. There has been more developments in recent days in language input and online contribution in Odia. More people started searching for online content using Odia in Unicode. This is where Odia Wikipedia played a crucial role in promoting a massive growth in content which is reflected in the readership. Monthly page views which remained consistently low over the years started growing from less than 1000 to more than 400,000 and at times hitting the 500,000 mark. This is the highest among all the websites that have Odia content. With a variety of new projects and more contributors than ever, Wikipedia Odia happily celebrated its its 10th anniversary over two days. Odia Wikipedians gathered in two different educational institutes; Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences in Bhubaneswar on the 28th of January and Indian Institute of Mass Communication in Dhenkanal on the 29th.

Day 1

First day of Odia Wikipedia 10 began with the traditional Chhena poda by noted linguist Padmashree Dr. Debiprasanna Patnaik. Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS) has recently collaborated with The Centre for Internet and Society for the resource gathering, documentation and archival of 62 tribal communities of Odisha and neighboring eastern Indian states and initiating Wikipedia projects in the indigenous tribal languages. The first few phase of the workshop brought about 15 students pursuing their masters in Arts, Science and Commerce disciplines and 10 faculty members.

This project also will also dovetail into the Mother Tongue based Multilingual Lab that has been set up in the institute to foster educational materials in tribal languages. Dr. Patnaik spoke to these contributors about the native languages and the importance of documenting language and cultural heritage online. Subrat Prusty, General Secretary of Janasammilani and founding member of Odia Biswabidyalaya gave a talk on the factors that have diminished the native languages and how collaborative efforts could revive dying languages through a 5000 word free-license dictionary in Odia. With the audio recording of Dr. Patnaik introducing himself, Odia Wikipedians inaugurated the Voice intro project as the first Indic language project. Odia Wikipedians interacted with the students and teachers at KISS to get their inputs on the kind of knowledge imparted by introducing Wikipedia editing. Later these will streamline the process of writing to the linguistic team for pledging for the classical language status of Odia.

Day 2

The second day of Odia Wikipedia 10 was celebrated in the Indian Institute of Mass Communication (IIMC) Dhenkanal campus . Students who had participated in the series of Odia Wikipedia workshops earlier in the year took part in this event. Sampad Mohapatra, a TV and print media journalist inaugurated the event by lighting Dipa and cutting a birthday Chenapoda. Mohapatra shared his experiences on how the entire media industry relies on Wikipedia for collecting information and how contribution in regional languages will benefit the students through more job availability in the regional media. Professor Dr. Mrinal Chatterjee who heads the institution shared the way accessing knowledge is slowly moving to internet based search. He discussed strategies of how bringing more online content in regional languages will help the academia and the students. Usha Padhee, Secretary of Mass Education Department, Odisha Government distributed awards to the top Wikipedia contributors. She later presented on the role of media in educating society and Open Educational Resources in new tools of imparting knowledge.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/hastac-january-31-2014-subhashish-panigrahi-odia-wikipedia

Odia Wikipedia: Sambalpur University Workshop

Sailesh Patnaik — 2017-04-17T06:44:47Z

An Odia Wikipedia orientation-cum-workshop program was organised for the students of Sambalpur University on 27 November, 2016.

Over the last couple of years, the Odia Wikipedia community has been successful in organising workshops and outreach programs in different parts of coastal and central Odisha. With over 38 active Wikipedians (as of 2016), the Odia community is growing everyday and expanding across different parts of Odisha. The recent increase in the number of Wikipedians in western Odisha inspired the community members to conduct an introductory Wikipedia workshop in Sambalpur University.

On 27th November 2016, an orientation-cum-workshop program for Odia Wikipedia was organised for the students of Computer Science and Application Department and the Odia Department in Sambalpur University. 57 participants, comprising 30 male and 27 female participants attended the event. 5 faculty members were also present. Dr. Chitta Ranjan Dash, the Vice Chancellor of the University was the Guest of Honour for the workshop. Three Odia Wikipedians- Mrutyunjay Kar, Jnanaranjan Sahu and Nistha Ranjan Dash facilitated the workshop as mentors.

The workshop began with an introduction to Odia Wikipedia and Odia Wikisource digitisation efforts by Dr. Sarada Baboo, a professor from the Computer Science and Application department. The first session introduced the various Wikimedia projects to the participants. The participants were given an introduction on how to contribute to the different Wiki projects. They were also given an orientation on Wikipedia policies and guidelines. After this, the participants were introduced to Odia Wikipedia and its development over the years. The post lunch session trained participants on creating user accounts, articles, and other basic dos and don’ts on Wikipedia. During the training session, over 20 Wikipedians were able to create accounts.

The Wikipedia workshop in Sambalpur University was an important step to raise awareness about the Wikipedia movement in western Odisha, This was the first workshop in Sambalpur University and the second workshop in western Odisha after three years. Over 196 colleges are affiliated to Sambalpur University, in seven different districts in western Odisha. A regular follow up with the University, the faculty and the students will help in furthering the free knowledge movement in western Odisha.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/odia-wikipedia-sambalpur-university-workshop

Odia Wikipedia: Needs Assessment

subha — 2013-07-17T06:35:15Z

This blog encompasses the status of Odia Wikipedia and assessment of the needs for growth of the community.

This blog is part of the annual work plan for Odia Wikipedia which was updated on Odia Wikipedia and Meta Wiki.

Odia is one of the official languages of India. It is the official language of Odisha and the second official language of Jharkhand. Odia is also spoken in parts of West Bengal, Jharkhand, Chattisgarh and Andhra Pradesh. By 2011 census there are 3.6 crore Odia speakers across the world. Literacy rate of Odisha is 73.45 per cent (82.4 per cent male, 64.36 per cent female).

Majority of the computer users in Odisha were on Microsoft Windows platforms. Windows did not have a stable Odia language support until the release of Windows Vista. This would have forced majority of the computer users prefer English on Odia for internet communication. As per the 2011 census only 5.1 per cent of the 9,661,085 households of Odisha had computers and 1.4 per cent (357,460 households) of the households had access to internet. Odia Wikipedia has only 13 active contributors[1] who are based both in and out of Odisha and contributed to 3715 articles.[2]

Low computer/internet penetration, lack of promotion/outreach of Odia Wikipedia are some of the major factors which resulted in low Wikipedia participation. Odia Wikipedia celebrated its 9th anniversary on January 29, 2013 which is marked to be the date of its first edit in 2004.[3] The project was inactive for about 8 years until February 2011.[4]

Community building process slowly started by February-March 2011 by some of the active wikipedians in Bengaluru and gradually in six other cities in and out of Odisha.[5]The community so far has organized 18 meet-ups, 10 workshops and worked on a major media donation project on Wikimedia Commons.[6] Six on-wiki projects on various subjects[7] and rolled a Wikipedia education program.[8]

Fact Sheet

Wikimedia projects	No. of Editors/Contributors (2011-12)	No. of Editors (2012-13)	No. of Active editors (2011-12)	No. of Active editors (2012-13)	No. of Articles/ entries (2011-12)	No. of Articles/ entries (2012-13)	No. of Page views per months
Wikipedia	29	64	19	14	1951	3209	330161
Wiktionary	6	14	1	2	98	155	30618

Identified Needs

This section gives a broad idea of the challenges for community/wikipedia growth for which there is a need of programatic and technical intervention.

Lack of awareness

Lack of media presence: Mainstream Odia language media is still unaware of the presence and importance of Odia Wikipedia. There is a need for wider media coverage about Odia Wikipedia.
Lack of focussed meetups/outreach events due to dispersed community: Outreach events and meetups have not been customized for the target audience and have been done in a low scale because of the small community dispersed in six different cities. Physical meetups often have been more on technical issues and not much focus on designing strategies for growing content and community. Experienced wikipedians conducting outreach need to be trained properly to conduct productive outreach events.
More city centric communities: Majority of community members are located in three major cities; Bhubaneswar, Cuttack and Nalconagar. This has resulted in outreach events being more delimited to these three cities only. There is a need for taking Odia Wikipedia to more cities.
Target age group for outreach: Till date the targeted audience for outreach are mostly engineering/other students based in cities where English is predominantly the language of communication in terms of written/computer communication and partly verbal communication. Many of the elderly masses are unaware of even the existence of Odia Wikipedia. More of young professionals, elderly and retired professionals need to be involved in the outreach.

Accessibility issues

Technical hindrance

Lack of Unicode usage: Printing industry professionals still use non-Unicode fonts for typing. There are at least three major different typing schemes and font categories used across the industry (includes book/magazine/newspaper publishers, print/digital media). Font converter tools of high accuracy are needed for easy conversion of such available content and using them as primary resources.
Lack of support in typing schemes: Those who are experienced in typing schemes other than the ones used on Odia Wikipedia (InScript, Transliteration, Phonetic) often fail to adapt the typing schemes of Odia Wikipedia. There is a need of new typing schema for simplifying typing in Odia.

Content

Lack of Open-Source culture: There is very little presence of the open source methodology across academia, media industry and public and private sector organization. A lot of resources produced are either not digitized and distributed or copyrighted. This has been a road block to the Wikipedia community to make use of any kind of archived and digitized resource. Wikipedians need to be connected to more open source communities, exchange ideas/information and spreading words across other communities.
Lack of resource dissemination because of support: Some of the digitized resources are not being distributed because of shortage of manpower and resource. A book digitization project initiated by Srujanika faced many hindrances during distribution including copyright issues, hosting and manpower for support. Such resources need to be gathered and distributed for community use.

Community

Role of experienced wikipedians: There is a need of more experienced wikipedians coming forward to take the lead of projects along with their primary contribution for articles. Wikipedia could be a platform for them to reach out to more people who are in the domain of knowledge dissemination and language resource building.

[1]. Wikimedia stats. January 2013

[2].https://or.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Statistics

[3].http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oriya_Wikipedia

[4].http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:Tinucherian_and_Shijualex/Wiki_Community_development_in_India_and_newsletter/Report#Bhubaneshwar

[5].http://shijualex.in/indic-language-wikipedias-statistical-report-2011/

[6].https://or.wikipedia.org/s/ay

[7].https://or.wikipedia.org/s/jf

[8]. https://or.wikipedia.org/s/cgj

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/odia-wikipedia-needs-assessment

Odia Wikipedia: Article in Dhatri

praskrishna — 2014-12-07T01:34:23Z

This article was published in Dhatri on December 1, 2014.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/news/article-in-dhatri

Odia Wikipedia's 10th anniversary at Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS), Bhubaneswar

praskrishna — 2014-01-30T12:01:22Z

The Centre for Internet and Society's Access to Knowledge along with the Odia Wikipedia community invite you to the tenth anniversary celebrations of Odia Wikipedia t Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences, Bhubaneswar on January 28, 2014 from 10.00 a.m. to 4.00 p.m.

କିଛି ଦିନ ତଳେ କଳିଙ୍ଗ ଇନଷ୍ଟିଚ୍ୟୁଟ ଅଫ ସୋସିଆଲ ସାଇନ୍ସେସଠାରେ କର୍ମଶାଳା ଓ ସ‌ହବନ୍ଧନ ପରେ ସେଠାର କର୍ତ୍ତୃପକ୍ଷ ଓ ଶିକ୍ଷକ ତ‌ଥା ଛାତ୍ରମାନେ ଆମ ସମସ୍ତଙ୍କୁ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆର ୧୦ମ ଜନ୍ମତିଥି ଅନୁଷ୍ଠାନ ପରିସରରେ କରିବା ପାଇଁ ଅନୁରୋଧ କରିଛନ୍ତି । ମୁଁ ଏଥିରେ କେତେଜଣ ବରିଷ୍ଠ ଭାଷା ଗବେଷକ ଓ ଭାଷାବିଦମାନଙ୍କୁ ଅନୁରୋଧ କରିଥିଲି । ଏଯାବତ ସେଣ୍ଟ୍ରାଲ ଇନଷ୍ଟିଚ୍ୟୁଟ ଅଫ ଇଣ୍ଡିଆନ ଲାଙ୍ଗୁଏଜେସ (CIIL), ମହୀଶୂରର ପ୍ରତିଷ୍ଠାତା ଓ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଭାଷାବିଦ ପଦ୍ମଶ୍ରୀ ଦେବୀପ୍ରସନ୍ନ ପଟୃନାୟକ, ଓଡ଼ିଆ ସାହିତ୍ୟ ଏକାଡେମୀର ଅବାହକ ଓ ଭାଷାବିଦ ଡ. ଗୌରହରି ଦାସ ତ‌ଥା ଭାଷା ଗବେଷକ ସୁବ୍ରତ ପୃଷ୍ଟି ସମ୍ମତି ପ୍ରଦାନ କରିଛନ୍ତି । ଦୟାକରି ସମସ୍ତେ ନିଜ ତରଫରୁ ମଧ୍ୟ ଅଧିକ ବରିଷ୍ଠ ଗବେହକମାନଙ୍କୁ ଅନୁରୋଧ କରିବା ସ‌ହିତ ଏଥିରେ ଅଂଶଗ୍ରହଣ କରି ଏହି ସାମୁହିକ ଉଦ୍ୟମକୁ ଫଳବତୀ କରାଇବାରେ ସ‌ହ‌ଯୋଗ କରିବେ ।

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/events/odia-wikipedia-tenth-anniversary-kalinga-institute-of-social-sciences-bhubaneswar

Odia Wikipedia Workshop in IIMC, Dhenkanal

Sailesh Patnaik — 2017-04-17T06:31:41Z

An Odia Wikipedia Workshop was conducted at IIMC, Dhenkanal on 31 January, 2017

Since 2013, the Odia Wikipedia community has collaborated with the Indian Institute of Mass Communication, Dhenkanal for enabling students of the institution to partake in and contribute to the Wikimedia movement. An Odia Wikipedia workshop was conducted for the students of the institution on 31 January, 2017. The students were given an orientation on the basics of editing Wikipedia on the web and on their smart phones in addition to an explanation of Wikipedia policies, history of Wikipedia and Wiki News.

The 45 English and Odia language students with a male: female ratio of 60: 40, who took part were given a live demonstration of these topics. Along with the help of supportive faculty members, the students were exposed to Commons and Incubator as well. Overall, the event saw the creation of 20 new editors on Odia Wikipedia. A follow-up workshop is also being planned for the students in the coming months.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/odia-wikipedia-workshop-in-iimc-dhenkanal

Odia Wikipedia Workshop at VSSUT, Burla (Coverage in the Sambad)

praskrishna — 2013-08-19T08:51:59Z

An Odia Wikipedia workshop was organized on July 26 and 27, 2013 at Veer Surendra Sai University of Technology, Burla. The Sambad (Sambalpur edition) covered the event.


Below is a scanned version of the news published in the Sambad on July 27, 2013:

Click below for more details:

Link to event page: http://bit.ly/14VdEdG (CIS has been credited for financial support).
Link to the report on mailing lists: http://bit.ly/1eWsKyl

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/odia-wikipedia-workshop-at-vssut-coverage-in-sambad

Centre for Internet and Society

Odia Wikisource to Celebrate its First Anniversary Tomorrow!

Odia Wikisource to Celebrate Its First Anniversary in Bhubaneswar

Odia Wikisource Sabha 2014

Schedule

Odia Wikisource launched in Odisha capital

Odia Wikisource has a new Wikisourcer, and he is the youngest in the Odia Wikimedia community!

Odia Wikisource Goes Live!

Odia Wikisource Celebrates 1st Anniversary this 25th October

Odia Wikisource campus project at Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences

Odia Wikipedia: Three Years of Active Contributions Gives Life to a Ten Year Old Project

Day 1

Day 2

Odia Wikipedia: Sambalpur University Workshop

Odia Wikipedia: Needs Assessment

Fact Sheet

﻿Identified Needs

Odia Wikipedia: Article in Dhatri

Odia Wikipedia's 10th anniversary at Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS), Bhubaneswar

Odia Wikipedia Workshop in IIMC, Dhenkanal

Odia Wikipedia Workshop at VSSUT, Burla (Coverage in the Sambad)

Identified Needs