Centre for Internet and Society

Odisha: Wikipedia workshop at IIMC, Dhenkanal

praskrishna — 2013-10-03T10:15:25Z

Wikipedia workshop was held at the Indian Institute of Mass Communication, Dhenkanal, on Monday. The workshop was inaugurated by Head of IIMC, Dhenkanal, Dr Mrinal Chatterjee.

This post was published in Odisha Diary on September 30, 2013.

Inaugurating the workshop, Dr Chatterjee said, “We are always sourcing knowledge from Wikipedia. So now it becomes our duty to enrich it by writing articles for Wikipedia.”

He specifically asked Odiya Journalism students to write more in Odia Wikipedia as there is less content in Odia as compared to other Indian languages.

Subhashish Panigrahi, Program Officer, Access to Knowledge, Centre for Internet Society, coordinated the entire event along with members of Odia Wikipedia, Dr Subas Chandra Rout, Mrutyunjaya Kar and Sasanka Sekhar Das. They provided hands-on training about editing, styles and techniques of writing on Wikipedia to the students.

“Anybody can write and edit available articles on Wikipedia,” Panigrahi said while encouraging students to volunteer for Wikipedia.

Not only Odiya and English, students were also encouraged to contribute articles in various other Indian languages. Students of both Odiya and English Journalism were present during the day-long workshop.

Odiya Wikipedia team are planning to organise a series of workshop with IIMC, Dhenkanal in coming months.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/odisha-diary-september-30-2013-odisha-wikipedia-workshop-at-iimc

Odisha: Odia Wikipedia reaching 5000 article mark!

praskrishna — 2013-12-31T05:10:30Z

Many are not aware of the existence of Odia Wikipedia and other Indian language Wikipedias. But Odia Wikipedia has been growing gradually all these years and has become the most searched website and largest online encyclopedia in Odia language.

The Report by Odisha Diary bureau, Bhubaneswar was published on December 17, 2013. Subhashish Panigrahi is quoted.

Initiated in 2002 Odia Wikipedia saw its first edit in 2004 and suffered from low contribution for almost seven years. But slowly the gloomy scene changed with the first workshop in Bengaluru which started initiating more consecutive Wikipedia training workshops in Bhubaneswar, Cuttack, Nalconagar, Baleswar, Dhenkanal and many other cities. Over these years after many outreach workshops individuals who are experts in different subject areas and organizations and institutions like Indian Institute of Mass Communication, Dhenkanal and KIIT University have been associated with the Odia Wikipedia editor community.

After Gopal Chandra Praharaj's Purnachandra Ordiya Bhashakosha and Binod Kanungo's Jnanamandal no such progressive encyclopedic compilation was done in Odia. Where the encyclopedias take years for reprinting which is also negligible in regional languages Odia Wikipedia articles get revised every now and then. “This has been possible because of the collaborative writing mechanism of Wikipedia All of us keep editing the articles that refine the content and make it free from biased and incorrect facts.”, says Mrutyunjaya Kar, one of the very active Wikipedians. Some time ago noted linguists like Natabara Satpathy and Deepak Kanungo raised questions about the authenticity and writing standards of the articles on Odia Wikipedia.

"But I think we have overcome those issues of poor quality content. And the very thing Wikipedia got is the gradual growth of articles in terms of amount of information and accuracy. Something that attracted me to Odia Wikipedia is the way one liner stub articles grow to good quality articles in few days", says Subhashish Panigrahi, Programme Officer to Centre of Internet and Society's Access To Knowledge program that is working for the growth of Indian languages. Many of the valuable aspects of Odisha's history, diverse languages, cultural heritage and tourism are being documented and shared for free on the internet which otherwise would not ever come to the limelight.

Available in 286 world languages Wikipedia is edited by more than 77,000 contributors across the world. Odia Wikipedia has only a small community consisting handful of contributors. We aim to reach out to more people to spread the sum of the entire knowledge in our own language, says another active contributor Shitikantha Dash. Odia Wikipedia could be accessed at: https://or.wikipedia.org

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/orissa-diary-december-17-2013-odia-wikipedia-reaching-5000-article-mark

Odisha: KISS to create tribal languages and heritage repository

praskrishna — 2014-02-03T08:33:08Z

World' largest tribal residential institute Kalinga Institute of Social Studies (KISS) is going to initiate a project in collaboration with Centre for Internet and Society's Access To Knowledge program (CIS-A2K) to gather academic and research resources on tribal languages and diverse cultural heritage.

The report by Odisha Diary Bureau was published on January 20, 2014.

Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS) is the largest tribal residential institution in the world. It is home to over 20,000 tribal students from 64 tribes living in Eastern and North-Eastern parts of India that not only provide them accommodation, food, and free education from kindergarten to post graduation but also provide them 24/7 health care in the in-house hospital and many vocational trainings to empower them as able citizens of this nation ensuring their successful future. UNICEF in association with KISS has established a Children Development Resource Centre (CDRC) as part of the larger UNICEF-KIIT University joint initiative for the Centre for Children Studies (CCS) that aims in promoting evidence-based policy making by building a knowledge base thorough research and other development programmes on children's issues focusing on the state of Odisha.

KISS in collaboration with Bernard van Leer Foundation is currently devising education systems in native tribal languages that even do not have scripts. With over 17 Memorandum of Understanding (MoU)s and many more in process. KISS is bringing up a new stream of sustainable growth for tribals below poverty line by educating them and imparting knowledge in their own languages.

UNICEF, UNESCO, UNFPA, College of Charleson (USA), Bernard van Leer Foundation, Vedanta Foundation, NALCO Foundation, English Access Micro-Scholarship Program (Federal Govt.), Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Oracle Educational Foundation, Intel Technology, CPU Joint Volunteers (South Korea) are some of the organisations that KISS is working in tandem with to take the Indian tribal cultural diversity and heritage to the outside world by giving the aboriginal natives their space in this world.

Centre for Internet and Society is a Bangalore based Non profit organization which works primarily in the broader domains ofinternet and policy research, accessibility, open knowledge and open education. Its Access To Knowledge program is funded by the Wikimedia Foundation and works in fostering the volunteer Wikimedia community that contributes in enhancing Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects. Its primary mandate is upbringing Wikipedia editors by outreach, creating primary resources for sources of reference in multiple ways that lead to enrich Wikipedia.

This collaboration will bring detailed research and multilingual documentation about several aspects of tribals of India and would work as an Open Education Resources (OER) for academicians and researchers. This event is organized on 11th January 2014 atKalinga Institute of Social Studies premises at 11 am. KIITUniversity's Founder-Chairman Dr. Achyuta Samanta is going to inaugurate this project formally on this occasion.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/orissa-diary-january-20-2014-kiss-to-create-tribal-languages-and-heritage-repository

Odisha Dibasa 2014: 14 Books Re-released under CC License

subha — 2014-04-14T10:57:43Z

Odisha became a separate state in British India on April 1, 1936. Odia, a 2,500 year old language recently gained the status of an Indian classical language. The Odia Wikimedia community celebrated these two occasions on March 29 in Bhubaneswar with a gathering of 70 people.

Originally published on the Wikimedia blog on April 8, 2014. Media coverage of the event can be accessed here.

Linguists, scholars and journalists discussed the state of the Odia language in the digital era, initiatives for its development and steps that can be taken to increase accessibility to books and other educational resources. 14 copyrighted books have been re-licensed under the Creative Commons license and the digitization project on Odia WikiSource was formally initiated by an indigenous educational institute, the Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS). Professor Udayanath Sahu from Utkal University, The Odisha Review’s editor Dr. Lenin Mohanty, Odisha Bhaskar’s editor Pradosh Pattnaik, Odia language researcher Subrat Prusty, Dr. Madan Mohan Sahu, Allhadmohini Mohanty, Chairman Manik-Biswanath Smrutinyasa and trust’s secretary Brajamohan Patnaik along with senior members Sarojkanta Choudhury and Shisira Ranjan Dash spoke at the event.

Eleven books from Odia writer Dr. Jagannath Mohanty were re-released under Creative Commons Share-Alike (CC-BY-SA 3.0) license by the “Manik-Biswanath Smrutinyasa” trust, a trust founded by Dr. Mohanty for the development of the Odia language. Allhadmohini Mohanty formally gave written permission to Odia Wikimedia to release and digitize these books.

The community will be training students and a group of six faculty members at KISS who will coordinate the digitization of these books. “Collaborative efforts and open access to knowledge repositories will enrich our language and culture,” said linguist Padmashree Dr. Debiprasanna Pattanayak as he inagurated the event. Dr. Pattanayak and Odia language researcher Subrat Prusty from the Institute of Odia Studies and Research also re-licensed three books based on their research on Odia language and cultural influence of the language on other societies under the same license. KISS is going to digitize some of these books and make them available on Odia Wikisource.

An OpenType Odia Unicode font, “Odia OT Jagannatha” designed by Sujata Patel from Odialanguage.com was released under the OFL license. This is the first Odia OpenType font that the community actively tested. A new Odia offline input tool called “TypeOdia” by Wikipedian Manoj Sahukar was also released for public distribution. DVDs containing the font, the input tool, Odia language dictionaries, offline Odia Wikipedia in Kiwix, Wikipedia editing guide, ISCII to Unicode font converter, various free and open source software packages and Ubuntu operating system.

Active Odia Wikipedian and Admin Mrutyunjaya Kar gave the inaugural speech. Subhashish Panigrahi from the Center for Internet and Society read the annual report and vision of Odia Wikipedia. Chief guest Dr. Debiprasanna Pattanayak discussed about the efforts put forth that brought the Odia language as the sixth Indian classical language. A large majority of Odia publications are not available on the internet and readers are devoid of easy accessibility. He further discussed the process of digitization for preserving valuable books that are out of print and the old palm leaf manuscripts. Professor Udayanath Sahu presented on the process, progress and implementation of machine translation project in Utkal University.

Experienced Wikimedians conducted an advanced Wikipedia workshop on the second day of event at KIIT University, Bhubaneswar. It was attended by a majority of the existing Wikimedians from the community including new Wikipedians who signed up for the Odia Wikipedia Education Program at the Indian Institute of Mass Communication, Dhenkanal. Mrutyunjaya Kar presented on WikiData and various tools for linking and accessing information in multiple languages on various Wikimedia projects. Ansuman Giri discussed advanced technical aspects such as the use of various gadgets, proper categorization, how to use subpages, how to auto-list archive pages, customizing WikiLove feature, user rights modification, including how important it is to cite biographies of living persons with secondary sources, etc. Shitikantha Dash discussed copyright and issues regarding uploading images and other media files on Wikimedia Commons. Dr. Subas Chandra Rout presented on “notability, referencing and creating citations for the notable topics.” Subhashish Panigrahi discussed the work plan for the year, failure of program projects, collective learning and the dos and don’ts of community building.

We hope that more authors will come forward and re-release their books under CC-BY-SA license. The Odia community is excited to see or.wikisource.org go live. A few Wikipedians are even interested in typing their favorite free licensed books to make them available on Wikisource. I believe it’ll be challenging to train the KISS students to type and proof-read the written texts. In the CISA2K’s draft plan, the goal to have the number of editors seems overestimated. The students need to have some knowledge about Wikimedia and how it works in general before they start working. We hope that the books will be digitized properly and in coming days more users will join us in the process as we will have more free books in Odia Wikisource. I appeal to the Odia people to be a part of the Odia Wikimedia community and make Odia Wikisource a successful project, we need all the time you can devote. :-) Ansuman Giri, Odia Wikipedian


A group picture of Odia Wikipedians (by Jnanaranjan Sahu, CC-BY-SA 3.0)

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/odisha-dibasa-2014

Odisha Day 2014: Coverage in Sambad

praskrishna — 2014-04-11T12:32:39Z

Odia newspaper Sambad covered the Odisha Day 2014 and published a report on March 31, 2014.


Above: Scanned version of the report published in Sambad on March 31, 2014.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/sambad-march-31-2014-odisha-day-2014

Odisha Day 2014

praskrishna — 2014-04-08T04:39:56Z

CIS-A2K in collaboration with the Odia Wikipedia community is organizing this event on March 29, 2014 at Jayadev Bhawan, Bhubaneswar.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/events/odisha-day-2014

Odisha 2014: Coverage in Odisha Samay

praskrishna — 2014-04-08T05:48:13Z

Odisha Samay published a report of the Odisha 2014 event on March 30, 2014.


Above: A scanned version of the report published in Odisha Samay on March 30, 2014.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/odishasamay-march-30-2014-odisha-2014-coverage

Odia Wikisource, its Potential

subha — 2014-12-05T01:47:37Z

I wrote an editorial in Odia newspaper the "Samaja" on November 17, 2014. I have written about Odia Wikisource, its potential and how people can get involved in it with a short note about the digitization done already. I have also highlighted the authors and copyright holders who kindly have donated their work under CC-by-SA license.

The original article published by the Samaja in Odia on November 17 could be read here.

ଓଡ଼ିଆ ବହି ପ୍ରକାଶନ ପାଇଁ ନୂଆ ରାହା
ଶୁଭାଶିଷ ପାଣିଗ୍ରାହୀ
ଓଡ଼ିଶାରେ ପ୍ରଥମ ଛାପାଖାନା ସ୍ଥାପିତ ହେବାଠୁ ଆଜିଯାଏ ବିତିଛି ଏକ ଲମ୍ବା କାଳ । ଏ କାଳ ଭିତରେ କେତେ ଲକ୍ଷ ପାଣ୍ଡୁଲିିପି ଲେଖା ହୋଇଥିବ, କେତେ ବହି ଛପା ହୋଇଥିବ । ଏ ଭିତରେ କେତେ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଓଡ଼ିଶା ବାହାରକୁ ଯାଇଥିବେ । ତାଙ୍କ ଭିତରୁ ପଢ଼ାରଙ୍କୁଣା ଲୋକେ କ'ଣ ସବୁବେଳେ ସବୁ ବହି ପାଇପାରୁଥିବେ? ଓଡ଼ିଶାରେ ଥିବା ଅନେକ ମଧ୍ୟ ଲାଇବ୍ରେରୀ ଯାଇ ବହି ଖୋଜିବା ଅବସ୍ଥାରେ ସବୁବେଳେ ନଥାନ୍ତି । ଲୋକେ ବହି ପଢ଼ିବାର ସଳଖ ସୁବିଧାଟିଏ ନପାଇଲେ ଧୀରେ ପଠନ ଅଭ୍ୟାସ କମିଯାଏ । ଆଜି ଓଡ଼ିଶାର ଅଗଣିତ ପାଠକଙ୍କ ପାଠକୀୟ ରୁଚି କେବଳ ଖବରକାଗଜ, ସାପ୍ତାହିକୀ ଆଦି ପଢ଼ାକୁ ଖସି ଆସିଲାଣି । ଏ ବେଳା ଏକ ଭାଷା ପାଇଁ ଶୁଭ ନୁହେଁ । ଆଉ ଓଡ଼ିଆର ଶାସ୍ତ୍ରୀୟ ମାନ୍ୟତା ପାଇବା ପାଠକପଣ ବଢ଼ାଇବାରେ ମୁଖ୍ୟ ଭୂମିକାଟିଏ ନିଭାଇପାରିନାହିଁ । ତେବେ କେଉଁଥିରେ କିଛି ଊଣା ରହିଯାଇଛି କି? କାହିଁକି ଆଜି ଭାଷା-ସାହିତ୍ୟର ଶ୍ରୋତା-ବକତା ଉଭୟ ସମାନ? ବହି ଉନ୍ମୋଚନ ହୋଇ କେବଳ ଲେଖକ ମହଲରେ ବଣ୍ଟାହୋଇ ସମୀକ୍ଷା ହୋଇଯାଉଛି, ସଭା କିବା ବହିମେଳା ହତା ଡେଉଁନାହିଁ?

ଆଧୁନିକ କାରିଗରି ବଳରେ ବହିକୁ ଅଧିକ ପାଠକଙ୍କ ପାଖକୁ ନେବାରେ ଏଯାବତ ଅଳ୍ପ କିଛି ଉଦ୍ୟମ କରାଯାଇଛି । ରାଜ୍ୟ ସରକାରଙ୍କ ସଂସ୍କୃତି ବିଭାଗ ପକ୍ଷରୁ ସାରଳା ମହାଭାରତ ଓ ଭାଗବତ ଆଦି କେତୋଟି ପୁରୁଣା ପୋଥିକୁ ଟାଇପ କରି ଡିଜିଟାଲ ସଂସ୍କରଣ ତିଆରି କରାଯାଇଥିଲା । (ଓଡ଼ିଆ.ଓଆରଜି) ୱେବସାଇଟ ଜରିଆରେ ବିଦେଶରେ ଥିବା କେତେଜଣ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଅନେକ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ବହିକୁ ଟାଇପ କରି ଏବଂ ସ୍କାନ କରି ଇଣ୍ଟରନେଟରେ ଉପଲବ୍ଧ କରାଇଥିଲେ । ପୁରୁଣା ବହିର ଡିଜିଟାଲ ଅଭିଲେଖ କରିବା କାମ ବିଧିବଦ୍ଧ ଭାବେ କିଛିବର୍ଷ ତଳେ ଭୁବନେଶ୍ୱରର ସୃଜନିକା ଅନୁଷ୍ଠାନ ତରଫରୁ ଏନଆଇଟି ରାଉରକେଲା ଓ ପ୍ରଗତି ଉକ୍ରଳ ସଂଘ ସହଯୋଗରେ ଏକ ପ୍ରକଳ୍ପ "ଓପନ ଆକସେସ ଟୁ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ବୁକ୍ସ' ମାଧ୍ୟମରେ ଆରମ୍ଭ କରାଯାଇଥିଲା । ଏଥିରେ ସ୍କାନ ହୋଇଥିବା ମୋଟ ୭୪୦ଖଣ୍ଡ ବହି ଓ ପତ୍ରପତ୍ରିକା ଭିତରୁ ୨୦୦ରୁ ଅଧିକ ବହି ଇଣ୍ଟରନେଟରେ ଡାଉନଲୋଡ଼ କରିବା ପାଇଁ ଉପଲବ୍ଧ କରାଯାଇଛି । ଏସବୁ ପ୍ରମୁଖ କାମକୁ ବାଦ ଦେଇ ଆଉ କେତେକ ଉଦ୍ୟମ ମଧ୍ୟ ହୋଇଛି । ତେବେ ଏଯାବତ ହୋଇଥିବା ଏସବୁ କାମରେ ଲେଖାଖୋଜା ବା ଟେକ୍ସଟ ସର୍ଚ ସୁବିଧା ନାହିଁ । ଅର୍ଥାତ, ଇଣ୍ଟରନେଟରେ ଓଡ଼ିଆରେ ଟାଇପ କରି କିଛି ଭାଗବତର ପଦଟିଏ ଖୋଜିଲେ ସେ ପଦ ଥିବା ସ୍କନ୍ଧଟି ମିଳିବ ନାହିଁ । ପାଠକୁ ଲୋକଙ୍କ ପାଖରେ ପହଞ୍ଚାଇବା ପାଇଁ ଏ ଏକ ବିରାଟ ସମସ୍ୟା । ତେଣୁ ଆହୁରି ଲକ୍ଷେ ବହି ସ୍କାନ କରି ଇଣ୍ଟରନେଟରେ ରଖିଲେ ମଧ୍ୟ ତାହାକୁ ପାଠକେ ଖୋଜି ପାଇବେ ନାହିଁ ।

ହେଲେ ସ୍କାନ କଲାପରେ ପୁରୁଣା ବହିର ଲେଖାକୁ ଟେକ୍ସଟରେ ରୂପାନ୍ତର କରିବା ଏତେ ସହଜ ନୁହେଁ । କମ୍ପ୍ୟୁଟର ଟେକନୋଲୋଜିରେ ନାନାଦି ସାଧନ ନିର୍ମାଣ କରାଯାଇଥିବା ଜଗତର ବହୁବିଧ ଭାଷାରେ ଏ ସ୍କାନ ଛବିରୁ ଟେକ୍ସଟ ରୂାନ୍ତର ଲାଗି ଅପ୍ଟିକାଲ କ୍ୟାରେକ୍ଟର ରେକଗନିସନ (ଓସିଆର) ନାମକ କାରିଗରୀ ବ୍ୟବହାର କରାଯାଏ । ତେବେ ଛବିକୁ ଚିହ୍ନି ତାକୁ ଅକ୍ଷରରେ ରୂାନ୍ତର କରିବା ଦୁରୂହ ଓ କମ୍ପ୍ୟୁଟର ତାଲିମ ଦେବା ସମୟସାପେକ୍ଷ । କାମଟି କିନ୍ତୁ ଏ ଭାଷା ପାଇଁ ଏକ ବିଶାଳ ବରଦାନ । ତେବେ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ସମେତ ଭାରତର ଅନ୍ୟାନ୍ୟ ଭାଷାରେ ଏଯାଏ ଓସିଆର ସେତେ ବେଶି ନିର୍ଭୁଲ ଭାବେ କାମ କରିନାହିଁ । କମ୍ପ୍ୟୁଟର ଜ୍ଞାନ ଥିବା କିଛି ଲୋକ ୬-୭ ମାସ ଲାଗିଲେ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ପାଇଁ ଏ ଉପକରଣର ବିକାଶ କରାଯାଇପାରନ୍ତା । ବିକଳ୍ପ ସମାଧାନ ହେଲା ବହି ପାଠକୁ ଇଉନିକୋଡ଼ ନାମକ ମାନକରେ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଲିିରେ ଟାଇପ କରି ଟେକ୍ସଟ ରୂପେ ଇଣ୍ଟରନେଟରେ ଉପଲବ୍ଧ କରାଇବା । ଏ କାମ କିନ୍ତୁ କେବଳ ମୂଲ୍ୟବାନ ବହିମାନଙ୍କ ପାଇଁ କରାଯିବା ଉଚିତ । ଧରାଯାଉ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଆଈମା କାହାଣୀ କି ଅବଲୋକରା କାହାଣୀ କିମ୍ବା ବାକି ଲୋକକାହାଣୀ ସବୁ ଏତେ ଉପାଦେୟ ଓ ଯୁଗୋପଯୋଗୀ ସେ ସବୁକୁ ଥରେ ଟାଇପ କଲେ ଅନେକ ଲୋକଙ୍କ କାମରେ ଲାଗିବ ।

ଓଡ଼ିଆରେ ଇ-ବହି ବା ବହିର ଡିଜିଟାଲ ସଂସ୍କରଣ କରାଯିବାର ନୂଆ ରାହାଟିଏ ନିକଟରେ ଖୋଲିଛି । ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଉଇକିିପିଡ଼ିଆର ସହଯୋଗୀ ପ୍ରକଳ୍ପଭାବେ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଉଇକିପାଠାଗାର ନାମକ ଏକ ନୂଆ ପ୍ରକଳ୍ପ ଆରମ୍ଭ ହୋଇଛି । ଏଥିରେ ଥିବା ବହିସବୁ or.wikisource.org ରେ ପଢ଼ିହେବ । ଭାରତରେ ପ୍ରକାଶକ କିମ୍ବା ସ୍ୱତ୍ୱାଧିକାରୀଙ୍କ ଦେହାନ୍ତର ୬୦ବର୍ଷ ପରେ ବହିର କପିରାଇଟ ଲୀନହୋଇ ବହିଟି ପବ୍ଲିକ ଡୋମେନରେ ଗଣାଯାଏ । ଏହି ଶ୍ରେଣୀର ଓଡ଼ିଆ ବହିସବୁକୁ ଓସିଆର କିମ୍ବା ଟାଇପ କରି ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଉଇକିାଠାଗାରରେ ରଖାଯାଇପାରିବ । କିନ୍ତୁ ଏ ପ୍ରକଳ୍ପର ଏକ ବିଶେଷ ସୁବିଧା ଲେଖକ ଓ ପ୍ରକାଶକଙ୍କ ମଙ୍ଗଳ ଲାଗି ମଧ୍ୟ ରହିଛି । ନିଜ ବହିକୁ ଅନଲାଇନ ବିତରଣ କରିବାକୁ ଚାହୁଁଥିବା ପ୍ରକାଶକ କିମ୍ବା ଲେଖକ ନିଜର କପିରାଇଟର ସର୍ତ୍ତାବଳୀକୁ
ସମ୍ପୂର୍ଣ୍ଣ କପିରାଇଟରୁ ଆଂଶିକ କପିରାଇଟକୁ ମଧ୍ୟ ବଦଳାଇ ପାରିବେ । ଏହି ଆଂଶିକ କପିରାଇଟର ନାଁ ହେଲା କ୍ରିଏଟିଭ କମନ୍ସ ସେଆର-ଏଲାଇକ (ସିସି-ବାଇ-ଏସଏ) । ଏଥିରେ ଅନ୍ୟ ଜଣେ ଏକା ସର୍ତ୍ତରେ ପୂର୍ବ-ପ୍ରକାଶିତ ଲେଖାର ପୁନଃପ୍ରକାଶନ କରିାରିବ । ଏହା ବଳରେ ବହିଟିକୁ ଅନ୍ୟମାନେ ପଢ଼ିପାରିବା ସହ ବିତରଣ ମଧ୍ୟ କରିାରିବେ । ଏ ବିଶେଷ କପିରାଇଟ ଆଜିକାଲି ଏତେ ଜଣାଶୁଣା ହେଲାଣି ଯେ ଜଗତର ଅନେକ ଜଣାଶୁଣା ଶିକ୍ଷାନୁଷ୍ଠାନ ଓ ପ୍ରକାଶକ ନିଜର କିଛି ବହିକୁ ଏହି କପିରାଇଟରେ ବିତରଣ କରୁଛନ୍ତି । ଆହେ ଦୟାମୟ ବିଶ୍ୱବିହାରୀ ଓ ଅଗଣିତ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଶିଶୁକବିତା-ଗପର ରଚୟିତା ରାମକୃଷ୍ଣ ନନ୍ଦ, ସୁଶିକ୍ଷକ- ଭ୍ରାମଣିକ-ଦାର୍ଶନିକ ଡ.ଜଗନ୍ନାଥ ମହାନ୍ତି, ଭାଷା-ଗବେଷକ ଡ. ସୁବ୍ରତ ପୃଷ୍ଟି ଓ କବି ଭାରତ ମାଝୀଙ୍କ ବହିମାନ ସ୍ୱତ୍ୱାଧିକାରୀଙ୍କ ଅନୁମତି କ୍ରମେ ପୁନଃଲାଇସେନ୍ସ କରାଇ ଉଇକିାଠାଗାର ପରିସରକୁ ଅଣାଗଲାଣି ।

ଓଡ଼ିଆ ପାଠକେ ଏହି ଉଇକିାଠାଗାର ପ୍ରକଳ୍ପରୁ ଆଉ ଏକ ସୁବିଧା ମଧ୍ୟ ପାଇପାରିବେ । ଏଥିରେ ଟାଇପ ହୋଇ ବହିସବୁ ସିନା ଗଚ୍ଛିତ ହେବ । ହେଲେ ସେସବୁକୁ ଟାଇପ କରିବ କିଏ? ଅନେକ ସମୟରେ ଯାହା ସରକାର କିମ୍ବା ଏକ ଅନୁଷ୍ଠାନ କରିନପାରେ ସେତେବେଳେ ଜନସାଧାରଣଙ୍କ ବଳର ଉପଯୋଗିତା ବୁଝାପଡ଼େ । ଆଉ ଉଇକିପାଠାଗାର ସମ୍ପୂର୍ଣ୍ଣ ଭାବେ ଏହି ସ୍ୱେଚ୍ଛାସେବୀଙ୍କ ବଳରେ ବଳୀୟାନ । ଜଣେ ଚାହିଁଲେ ଲେଖାର ଭୁଲଟିଏ ସୁଧାରିପାରିବ, ବାକିଥିବା ପୃଷ୍ଠା ଟାଇପ କରିାରିବ ଆଉ ଅସମ୍ପୂର୍ଣ୍ଣ ବହିଟିଏକୁ ସମ୍ପୂର୍ଣ୍ଣ କରି କୋଟିକୋଟି ପାଠକଙ୍କ ପାଇଁ ପଠନର ଏକ ନୂଆ ଝରକା ଖୋଲିଦେଇ ପାରିବ ।

ଅନେକେ ବିରସି ଉଠନ୍ତି ଗୁଗୁଲରେ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ନାହିଁ ବୋଲି; ଇଣ୍ଟରନେଟ୍‍ରେ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଭାଷାରେ ଲେଖାର ଅଭାବ ତା'ର ଏକ ବଡ଼ କାରଣ । ଯେଉଁ ଭାଷାରେ ଇଣ୍ଟରନେଟରେ କାରବାର ଯେତେ ଅଧିକ ସେ ଭାଷା ନୂଆ ପିଢ଼ିର ସେତେ ନିଜର । ଆଉ ଯେଉଁ ଭାଷା ଏବେର ପିଢ଼ି ତୁଣ୍ଡରେ ଯେତେ ଅଧିକ କଥିତ, କାମରେ ଯେତେ ଅଧିକ ବ୍ୟବହୃତ, ସେ ଭାଷା ଭବିଷ୍ୟତରେ ସେତେ ଛାମୁଆ ହେବ । ଓଡ଼ିଆ ପାଇଁ ଉଇକିପାଠାଗାର ଭଳି ଏକ ବିଶ୍ୱମାନର ପ୍ରକଳ୍ପ ଅଧିକ ଲେଖକଙ୍କ ସମାଗମରେ ଭରି ଆମ ଭାଷା ପାଇଁ ଏକ ବିଶାଳ ପାଠାଗାରରେ ପରିଣତ ହୋଇପାରିବ ।

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/the-samaja-november-17-2014-subhashish-panigrahi-odia-wikisource-its-potential

Odia Wikisource workshop at New Delhi

subha — 2014-12-30T01:08:00Z

The Centre for Internet & Society's Access to Knowledge team in collaboration with "The Intellects" organized a seminar in New Delhi on December 14, 2014. Subhashish Panigrahi gave a talk.

The seminar was on the Relevance of Bhagabat Tungi in the evolution of Odia language from Buddha era to digital age. After attending the event one of the participants Pankajmala Sarangi took great interest in Odia Wikisource which was then an incubator project. Since then she has digitized three books and is now proofreading Odia Bhagabata, an Odia language classic from the 14th century. Having the highest number of edits in Odia Wikisource, Ms. Sarangi took interest to build a community in Delhi. Another Odia Wikilibrarian Sitikantha Kheti also joined in to organise the first Odia Wikisource workshop in Delhi. These Wikimedians, a Delhi based group The Intellects and CIS-A2K collaboratively conducted a workshop.

The Intellect's president Debendra Rout addressed the participants and broadly spoke about the goal of the workshop and long term plans in Delhi. Both the Wikilibrarians shared their experience on Odia Wikisource. The workshop started with self introduction of the participants followed by screening of a documentary "Odia: Silalekharu Mobile".

Video

A handbook with details on the project, Odia input and keyboard layout was distributed among all. Subhashish Panigrahi demonstrated Odia input and the process of digitization of books on Wikisource. Plans for more workshops and digitization sprints were also charted out.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/odia-wikisource-workshop-new-delhi-december-14-2014

Odia Wikisource Turns 3

manasarao — 2017-10-23T05:40:20Z

Odia Wikisource, the Odia language version of Wikisource, an online digital library of free content textual sources run by the Wikimedia Foundation, celebrates three years of contributing to the free knowledge movement this October. Odia Wikisource is a sister project of Odia Wikipedia, the oldest Indian language Wikipedia. The Odia Wikimedia community, a group of active contributors to Odia Wikimedia projects in India, has been working towards digitizing rare books that are no longer under copyright as well as encouraging authors and publishers to free-license their work under the Creative Commons ShareAlike License 4.0. This license allows anyone free use of the work with due attribution. The books are usually digitized into Unicode text by scanning them using Optical Character Recognition technique. This ensures their easy accessibility on the Internet so that people may easily copy, share and use these works for citations and references. If the books are damaged to a degree that they cannot be scanned, volunteers take the painstaking effort to manually type out whole books and manuscripts.

Odia Wikisource contributors/ CCBYSA4.0 User:Psubhashish

The Odia Wikisource project was realized on 20 October, 2014 after a two-year incubation period. Says Pankajmala Sarangi, long time Odia Wikimedian active on Wikisource, "since [2014] more than 300 old and rare books have been digitised and made available online. Before that, searching [for] a book in Odia was not possible even if it existed in pdf or some other format. Now it has become easy and all the books available on Wikisouce are easily searchable." In addition to digitization, the Odia Wikimedia community members conduct regular quality checks of the content from time to time by ensuring proper licensing, attributions and other errors that may be avoided by thorough proof-reading. While these quality checks follow global guidelines that have been localised to help volunteers prevent vandalism of any form, it has not been without its challenges. Ms. Pankajmala explains that the lack of Odia text on operating systems is problematic for access and availability.

Despite the challenges, Odia Wikisource counts amongst its accomplishments the digitization of a twelve volume 14th century Odia classic as well as 16th century palm leaf manuscripts from the Dadhibaman Temple in Bargarh, Odisha. Taking the movement to classrooms, Odia Wikisource was introduced to students of the Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences to pique the interest of young minds in the preservation of Odia language texts online. The many advantages of Odia Wikisource has also been illustrated to institutions with the Utkal University library encouraging the digitization of their rare books and manuscripts by Odia Wikimedians.

Sangram Keshari Senapati, another active Odia Wikimedian explains that Odia Wikisource is important for the preservation of those books which run a high risk of being lost in the coming years. He says, "our future generation must get a chance to read them." Adding to this, Ms. Pankajmala says, "Sky is the limit for Odia wikisource. We will try to digitise more books, most probably triple the number of existing books. We'll even try to reach more libraries and authors and get more books and further digitize them. The number of wikimedians may also flourish till that time."

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/odia-wikisource-turns-3

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 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