Soft Sell

February, 27 (LBO) – Advocates of free and open source software (FOSS) are promoting the concept through a mobile campaign across Sri Lanka starting next month, organizers said Tuesday. 'Foss-Ed on Wheels' a special bus had traveled nearly 500 to Mahavilachchiya in the north central province and Buttala in the Southern province last year, teaching children of all ages the value of free and open source software.

Next month, the FOSS advocacy community is conducting the program in the central hill town of Kandy.

"With its zero-cost licensing fee, free and open source software is considered as the ideal solution to bridge the digital divide," Sri Lanka's FOSS advocacy committee said in a statement.

The FOSS-Ed team will talk about using FOSS applications in day to day life in this two day event to be held on the 3rd and 4th of March 2007 in Kandy.

œWe have a very enthusiastic group of people especially from the universities who like to know more about this kind of software without having to come down to Colombo all the time, Sagara Gunathunga, Co-organizer from the Computer Society, University of Peradeniya said in the statement.

Rajkumar Ga