I was chatting with my old school friend Manoj, who tells me that he likes CDs burned rare medium ;-) and also sees only boxes when I type in Nepali language in our chat conversation. He agrees to preview Office 2007, but is not sure if his 'puter is capable of using the cool features without the drop down menus of Office 2007. Very well educated and people from well-to-do families of our society are all using computers, albeit still in what I called 'dark ages' that is not able to see any unicode fonts (read Win 98). The challenges of localization is not only the technical aspects of creating binaries but also being able to evangelize and convert people from the dark ages to the enlightened world of localized computing --- another face in the upper pyramid of digital divide.

Today (as has been for the past couple of days covering telecenters in Bungamati, Dhulikhel, Panauti, Gerkhutar, Devighat) my colleagues Sunaina, Gita and Shrijana went to Sankhu and did an Orientation along with handing over the various equipments for providing 'voice to the voiceless' of the community who without having to go to the streets and shout slogans, using traditional ICTs like radio and newspapers, and modern ICTs like computers and Internet, should be able to influence the policy making bodies of our government. This would hopefully provide the 'power to the people' in its fullest and democratic-est sense.

Some photos of the Orientation Program are posted here: http://www.culminisconnections.com/sites/FITNEPAL/Sankhu%20Telecenter%20Orintation%20Program/Forms/AllItems.aspx

Office 2007 BETA 2 Released

At 10pm I got the email from Microsoft that Bill Gates has released Office 2007 Beta 2 which is going to be available for public review and can be downloaded from http://www.microsoft.com/office/preview/default.mspx.

With the foundations on the building of Nepali version of Office 2007 is also underway with the Style Guide for Technical Writing for Vista and Office 2007 already done and a database of words that should not appear into the software for various reasons are underway at the moment.

This is a historic moment to see a product go into public beta, and here I am up till 2 am still in the office downloading the Bea 2 software. Download speed tonight is exceptionally good. I guess this is a good sign of things to come in Office 2007 ;-)

I also had a long chat with Gehendra Acharya of Lumbini ICT discussing the schedule, contents and logisitics for the Bhasha Workshops to be held in Butwal from May 28-29, 2006. After which I go to Dang to conduct the Bhasha Workshop and then a series of all-Nepal Bhasha Workshops. I guess a lot of questions would be on Vista and Office 2007 and since it is in public beta now, it is good timing. Another good sign of thing to come ;-)

Microsoft Windows Vista, the biggest operating systems that Microsoft has been working on is just around the corner now, and has gone live for Beta 2 public preview from today onwards. I had an opportunity to sit thru a 3 day training on software development on Vista from May 18-20, 2006 at the Microsoft Office in Gurgaon, India off New Delhi. Exciting times ahead with the cool look and feel with Aero glass installed.