PLEASE CONTINUE DISCUSSION ON STANDARDIZING SINHALA FOR IT APPLICATIONS IN THIS THREAD. CREATING ICT MYTHS THREAD HAS BEEN ARCHIVED. EXCERPT FROM PREVIOUS DISCUSSION BELOW:
204 Comments
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This posting contains copyright materials and patent pending 13120 content of Donald Gaminitillake
Industrial & commercial acceptibility is copyright of Donald Gaminitillake******************************
Channeling knowledge to its people is a key factor in developing a country. In the present world the human knowledge inflates at a very high speed. Rapid developments of ICT (Information Communication Technology) take knowledge to the remotest corners of the world and they have created totally new changes in the world economic patterns and the human life. The world is becoming a smaller place and the people getting connected to a one wide network of knowledge. Millions and millions of people get connected and derive the benefits of connectivity everyday. The ICT usage in the daily life has altered the life patterns greatly. Every aspect of the human life has been affected by the ICT factor and another era has been dawned.
The three languages widely used in Sri Lanka are English, Sinhala and Tamil. Each of these languages has their own scripts, and this has given rise to difficulties in the utilization of information technology in Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka has a very high literacy rate, but only 10% utilize English. Despite the increase in the use of computers in Sri Lanka, Sri Lankans who function in their mother tongues are hampered by being unable to function electronically in the scripts of their indigenous languages, due to the absence of character allocation tables for Sinhala and Tamil languages. The results of last years GCE O/L examinations reveal that 70% of the students failed in English. How can a student who fails in simple English Language test succeed in learning ICT in English? We need trained teachers to guide in ICT related work. These teachers are supposed to be the English knowledgeable group. If these teachers and the administration are incapable of educating the children to pass the O/L in English Language how can they make these children to learn IT in English?
It is interesting to know that only 14,000 (fourteen thousand) vacancies are available in the University per year. To which about two hundred thousand (200,000) students sit for G C E A/L. About 186,000 (One hundred and eighty six thousand) youth are pushed into the society without any University education or having any form of skill. This energy has to be consumed to develop Sri Lanka not to destruct the country or go abroad and develop other countries as unskilled workers.
In the other hand Sri Lanka is a developing country with a not-so-unique problem regarding Information Technology (IT). At present, IT cannot find function in Sri Lanka’s indigenous languages, Sinhala and Tamil. For good governance and in order to deliver public services in Sri Lanka, it is essential to communicate in both Sinhala and in Tamil. Unfortunately for both Sinhala and Tamil, a compatible allocation table as yet does not exist. This represents a profound obstacle for the future development of Information Communication Technology (ICT) in Sri Lanka. The absence of such a default allocation table obstructs the software development of a cross platform for Sinhala and Tamil. Therefore we propose to introduce a new character allocation table for both Sinhala and Tamil that would transcend the above obstacles and assist in the development of IT in Sri Lanka. This would help 18 million people in Sri Lanka to use a computer with both Sinhala and Tamil languages.
The proposed character allocation table ISBN 955-98975-0-0 (Contents do have Copyright areas & Patent pending areas©2000-2006) would promote civic engagement in numerable ways, as it would empower the people to utilize facilities such as
∑ use of Internet in local languages,
∑ Leap-frog to ICT status of developed countries.
∑ Aid the implementation compatible Prepress system
∑ Educate and develop the rural economy.
∑ Promotion of E-Commerce, E- Governance, E- Learning , E-Health ,Workflow Management systems
∑ Digital Democracy
∑ Since the QWERTY keyboard & Wijesekera keyboard are currently in use, there is no need to learn a new keyboard layout .
∑ Compatible with any software develop by any vendor
∑ Enable use of
∑ OCR software, Voice to text software,
∑ Text to Voice software,
∑ Software for Vision or Voice impaired community,
∑ Software for automated News castings,
∑ Alert systems in medical industry,
∑ Interactive telephones,
∑ Document reading, Language education, Translation of Languages
∑ Language synthesizers,
∑ Toy manufacturing —– to name a few.I believe that this project would directly empower marginalized citizens and offer them greater control over governance at local, community and national levels. As an example, at present, there is not even an electronic cross platforms for dictionaries or thesauri in Sinhala or in Tamil in Sri Lanka. The development of a new character allocation table would greatly enhance the quality of published literature
Sri Lanka registered as a national standard with Unicode a table SLSI 1134 which is incomplete and incorrect. They have not given proper code points for all Sinhala characters. Therefore the font developers are unable to develop correct proper sets of fonts to use in computers.
ISBN 955-98975-0-0 (Contents do have Copyright areas & Patent pending areas©2000-2006) is not fonts but a correct 2byte standard for SInhala in Sri Lanka.
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboJC Ahangama
Mr. Gaminitillake brings up some pertinent questions. I agree that giving each character its own code point is desirable. A slight change is possible if we use the technologies that Unicode provides to store those characters internally in a font. In that case, we do not need to renogotiate with Unicode.
Someone here said something like Fresh Look. This is a very good idea. I humbly propose that for the sake of posterity and the powerless masses the subject of this forum be given a FRESH LOOK.
I intend to write a message each (be it I’d be thrown out) on a subject that needs special consideration. This is the first of those:
EXCLUSIVITY IS BAD
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Judging from the way most of contributors here (and the archived part of this discussion) are referenced, they are a very distinguished group. That means the decisions and opinions of this forum could very well decide what form future Sinhala use would take in the electronic communication age we are entering.This forum is by its nature shielded from the larger user group of Sinhala simply because it is discussed in English. I wouldn’t be surprised that for some of you, the language spoken at home is English. (I have noticed this trend is on the rise among people who have been visiting USA during the last 20 years.)
Also, I have noticed that there is reluctance among people who participate in forums on subjects related to Sinhala to compromise in the use of language. This is evidenced by the fact that I was scoffed at in two forums (Linux / Sinhala Unicode) when I suggested to use romanized Sinhala than English. In fact, I was suspended from the latter for writing in romanized Sinhala.
When using the Sinhala script, the language of choice is not actually regular Sinhala but one that is heavily laden with Sanskrit. It seems that always there is the desire for exclusivity. William Caxton (Donald Gaminitilleka: Your ancestor in your trade!) said, “And thus bytwene playn, rude, and curious I stande abasshed, but in my judgemente the comyn termes that be dayli used ben lyghter to be understonde than the olde and auncyent englysshe.” (Translation: Use plain language. Don’t show off).
I propose that we write in common Sinhala using either romanized Sinhala or by Anglicizing. I know to ask to switch to the US-International keyboard layout is too much. In that case, please just Anglicize. In case you want to know what is Romanized Sinhala, it is at:
(The slashes were changed to pipe characters to avoid message lopping)
http:||en.wikipedia.org|wiki|Sinhala_alphabetAdd
ISBN 955-98975-0-0 (Contents do have Copyright areas & Patent pending areas©2000-2006) is not only a stanared for Sinhla but also a standard for PALI.
Pali is also written in Sinhala script with my system all Pali writings could be standardized. Also with development of OCR based on my ISBN 955-98975-0-0 contents of Ola books could be in electronic media as editedble text. This gives additonal wide spectrum for students of Sinhala and Pali.
Similar system is planed for Tamil Language. Introducing old Tamil script to that of present 247 characters would also enhance the usage of Tamil Litereature in Sri Lanka and India
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboDear JC
quote
we do not need to renogotiate with Unicode.
unquoteQuote from “”http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~mgk25/unicode.html#comb”” UCS
Has UCS been adopted as a national standard?Yes, a number of countries have published national adoptions of ISO 10646, sometimes after adding additional annexes with cross-references to older national standards, implementation guidelines, and specifications of various national implementation subsets:
unquote
Do not worry about unicode
They uncoditionally accept any National standard of any country.
Since most of the indic languages were stuck without a National Standard and lack of knowledge of a 2 byte system had only a typewriter technology — Unicode just allocated 128 locations per language.Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboDharma Gamage
JC,
You say:
[quote]
I lived in Lanka for 37 years and perfectly understand the mentality of socialism — expect the government to provide and then blame it for failure.
[unquote]
It is unfortunate you do not understand the point I make.
No, I never wanted government to provide me a solution. I would have been very happy if that opportunity has been given to private sector, and would have been willing to pay for it.
In fact, in US it was the private sector, not the government that introduced English into computers. I do not think anyone has an issue of paying for it.
Even in Sri Lanka, I know there were several private firms who wanted to offer solutions, but Prof. Sam hijacked their efforts and on his own free will spent the tax payers’ money for developing a ‘solution’.
So if Prof. Sam could not develop a solution even after spending USD half a million to one million, any citizen of this country has the right to question it. I mean, can anyone just rob such an amount of money and disappear?
Prof. Sam and gang has wasted so much of money on this, they have an obligation to answer the questions of the people. After all, it was people’s money they wasted.
I think the point Donald making is: Prof. Sam, Dr. Gihan and clan had wasted x million rupees and they could not come up with a solution. So give me a similar opportunity to waste tax payers’ money! If Prof. Sam can waste tax payer’s money why not me?
Quote
in US it was the private sector, not the government that introduced English into computers.
unquoteIn US the industry paid the costs. (technically absorbed it) Public paid it by buying computers and applications. Sometimes these companies may have got some government or individual grants for R&D
Sri Lanka too received aid to develop the IT sector. Our people had no proper knowledge and went on the wrong track. Technically if they had published my Table early 90’s this probelm would not be there. Instead they went on the typewriter technique and now got stuck.
Quote
I think the point Donald making is: Prof. Sam, Dr. Gihan and clan had wasted x million rupees and they could not come up with a solution. So give me a similar opportunity to waste tax payers’ money! If Prof. Sam can waste tax payer’s money why not me?
UnquoteDo you have any other options other than a 2 byte system and a correct character allocation Table for Sinhala. (incl all indic languages)
I am not going to waste public funds, only I have the solution – That is why I offered my paper to IITC in 2003 and they rejected it. – Then it became a private venture and the intellectual property laws came in place.
The one byte FULL Character Allocations tables are sucessful in Latin Script how come it will be a waste for Sinhala & Pali (–later other indic languages) . I use two byte system — which is far advanced than the restricted one byte system.
I am ready – need the acceptance that SLSI 1134= SInhala unicode is incorrect and incomplete and my credentials to commence the work.
By the way what happen to the TV debate!!!
Have I won by defalut!!!
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboJC Ahangama
Donald,
Everyone has bolted?
Dharma,
Here are two questions:
Who paid for the Unicode incentive in Sri Lanka (Lankans or Someone else)?
Assuming Lankans paid, what would have been your share?Would you pay that amount again to me, your good friend who worked hard for a solution? Or would you be my tester and pay nothing? Both are agreeable to me.
Dharma Gamage
JC,
1.As I said already, I am ready to pay for your solution (assuming it is within my limits) because for your good efforts you deserve a payment. Let me study your mails again and come back to you. Give me some time.
2. However, this does not mean that I will stop complaining/fighting about the unsuccessful initiative of Prof. Sam, Dr. Gihan and gang because as a citizen and tax payer of this country I have every right to know what happens to my tax money. It is not the amount. I am not going to let Prof. Sam rob even one cent from me.
The issues 1 and 2 are not linked.
Dharma Gamage
Donald,
Okay, for arguments sake let us assume Unicode is wrong and whatever your system (Can I call it Donaldcode?) is right.
Assume ICTA or somebody funds you today.
Questions:
1. How long will you take to introduce Sinhala Donaldcode to the major operating systems (at least Windows, Apple, Linux) so we all have a way of using Sinhala without downloading and installing fonts?
2. Will Sinhala Donaldcode be backward compatible so even users having earlier versions of windows can use it?
3. What strategies you use to convince the big guys (Microsoft, Apple) to include Sinhala Donaldcode in their OSes?
4. Why do you think you will be successful in that attempt when even people like Prof. Sam and Dr. Gihan, with all the government support, had badly failed?
Please do not bother us with technical details and your repeated arguments about SLS1134 or whatever. I ask only few reasonable practical questions.
Dear Dharma
Why not we name it as “1/18,874,999 Code”. ( i must thank Helaya for giving that name)
Assuming all funds are paid
– my system is an application that run on windows OS, Mac OS & linux OS
I have to pay some royalties to Microsoft , Apple , sun microsystems and some licence to linux and several other small time developers.
Estimated Time factor is 12 to 18 months
The application is written either in C or Jawa yet to decide.
The Sri lankan developers went on the typewriter concept not having the full character allocation table.
The Sri lankan developers had no working knowledge of two byte system. Even Latin script are on full characters. For Sinhala the final absolute locations were not given by the Sri lankan developers. They had the knowledge only on one byte system.
the German umlaut character Ä is listed in unicode as one character. Defined as ISO 10646 Table 2 row 00 Latin -1 Supplement
DEC 196 as = latin capital letter A with diaeresisNo need to convince any (Microsoft, Apple) big guys as my applications has paid there dues.
Lankan developers failed simply because they could not produce a character allocation table for Sinhala. only I have published it.
Since there are more than 1660 sinhala characters this group had no idea how to fix them into a QWERTY or Wijesekera keyboard.
If they had listen to me in 2003 by now we are on top of Asia on indic langage development
I will give only two sets of default font sets. (something like times or Helvitica) rest is open for other developers. Since all of them use the same encodings the text will be compatible with any application.I will give these developers proper advice and method.
Once the people in Lanka uses the system then it can be taken by the SLSI.
This is the only solution for all indic languages at this moment.
Backward compatibility may depend on the OS. If OS support 2 byte encodings there will be not a problem. I have to check with the team. Problem may be with windows machines that run on one byte encoding OS. I cannot comment how far it will go down on compatibility. Within next 12 months most of the very old computers will phase out.
I had to protect myself from some vultures — that is why I applied for a patent and taken full copyrights. Once everything fall on rails and after I do the default system — if the funds are fully paid — the non commercial areas will be open to the public as the first stage.
This is like developing a highway . once the road is done car manufactures will make Toyotas and Audis, Still someone will try to go on a morris minor.
It better we all get on and solve the problem.
Part of the software has to be done in Sri Lnaka and part outside Sri Lanka.
Need to find a proper Sinhala – English dictionery. Printed before 1960.
not Sinhala – English Dictionery published in 1948 (Dharma Samaya Printers) is by A P de Zoysa
a dictionery printed after that.Sometime in 60’s govt press did some glossaries in Sinhala for scicence subjects. Need those too.
Please run around the maze to locate these.
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboDharma Gamage
Donald,
Sad. You answered only one question I raised and that reply too is not very convincing.
I have no more questions. All the best with your system!
Quote
Why do you think you will be successful in that attempt when even people like Prof. Sam and Dr. Gihan, with all the government support, had badly failed
unquoteThis clearly proves byond reasonable doubt that the one byte system was unsuccessful for Sinhala.
The only other option is two byte system. Most of the countries who uses two byte system is a success story—.Korea Japan china—
If you go through the ISO 10646
One time Korean was in parts then they made it full characters
Korean is interesting they still Key in parts but a applicaytion list the full characters as per character allocation table registered in unicode.The text is full complete characters
Sinhala and all indic languages should shift into a two byte system.
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboJC Ahangama
Donald,
You have taken issue with Lankan Unicode developers for using single-byte code: “They had the knowledge only on one byte system”. It did not even concern them. I think you need to ask your Group about this again. You probably misunderstood them. Single-byte, double-byte, quad-byte etc. are discussions of a bygone era. Windows/Unix/Apple are 32-bit systems (32 bits = 4 bytes). That is, the smallest unit of communication they use is 32-bits long. The number 4294967296 is what my calculator yields for 2 to the power 32.
Unicode is based on code points stated in two bytes even for Chinese-Japanese-Korean. Using sixteen bits to represent numbers yields a huge space (2 to the power 16) to define characters of all languages of the world. According to my calculator, that means they can list 65536 characters. The Unicode code point 0D85 given the Unicode name SINHALA LETTER AYANNA is obviously two bytes long: [0D], [85]. But it is just a number used to uniquely identify it. The capital A with umlaut is at Hexadecimal 00C4 = Decimal 196. You are right. But it is just a number with a name.
The Unicode font developers did not do anything wrong. They just followed the standard and the underlying rules given to them by Microsoft. Microsoft gave them a rendering engine that in one of its sections, specifically addresses Sinhala. (The Dublin presentation by Microsoft hinted at this). The version that includes Sinhala is in beta stage. That is, not yet in a regular Windows System.
Dharma,
That is why they ask you to install these various things. When Microsoft Vista is finished production, it is sure to be in that OS.
This is where the rubs is, — it’s going to cost a fortune for little Lanka. AID means money and obligations too. That is why I say you guys should investigate this further. If things are going to depend on a rendering engine (a program that helps to interpret font files) owned by some campany, we are trapped. Significantly, the Europeans do not need the rendering engine (Uniscribe). So, let’s find out why and whether we can be like them too. I say, yes because I ivestigated on my own. Specifically, if we base our script where the Europeans have theirs then we are free just like the Germans, French or the beloved Dutch! They have an added advantage: Since they use the same charcter set, they can easily learn each other’s language
So, the burden is on me to prove that it can be done? (And you don’t want to pay me even Rs. 50 as your part of compensation to me). What is the use of words if you cannot prove it, you ask. Does that mean I have to present the proof? Even then you guys might say we like Microsoft. Ahangama is stupid and gone crazy. Boo hoo, I can only cry. I should have born in another country where they don’t care less on what happens in Lanka.
JC
Please do not get mix up with the present unicode system
Please leave the present unicode for a momentEncodings could be 32 or next will go up to 64 or 128. These are not the problems
256×256=65536 (that is why I wrote the upper limit is 64,000 per sector)
The present problem is the sinhala character allocation table and its connection to the keyboard then to the OS & applications (eg word , excell or adobe illustrator etc etc)in uise.
First we have to get the sinhala standared right
That is what I have done with my book publicationBased on this publication correct code points will be given to all sinhala characters
It is my duty to furnish a working application to run this table on any system.
(Micorsoft apple and linux) For that I have to pay royalties for these companies
and some of the sub developers.Only JC has a copy of the book not Dharma.
Those who wants a copy pls send me an e-mail
Email address is given on
http://www.akuru.orgDonald Gaminitillake
ColomboI was told by a friend that Prof JB had gone on TV and had claimed that we have only fifty sinhala characters in SInhala language.
With this number how he write his name “DI” on disanayake
I found that SLSI also missed the “GU” KU” on SLSI 1134 and on SInhala unicode chart
Sinhalase are distrying the Language Sinhala
LirneAsia will archive all these for future referances.
Please do not distroy the language SInhala for a gain of few dollars
Donald Gaminitillake’
ColomboHere comes the truth from E&Y
http://www.icta.lk/insidepages/downloadDocs/Nenasala/OutcomeEvaluation_of_PilotProjects.pdf
I quote from the content of E&Y report given by Muchalinda
quote
SME Portal
Outcome is insatisfactory due to many reasons
…..
– Language being a barrier in the use of the portalunquote
So I have proved again and again and again
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboJC Ahangama
Sorry I was gone for few days. I wholeheartedly agree with the sentiments mentioned by Mr. Gaminitillake in his book. The acceptance of the Sinhala Unicode block as the only viable way to take Sinhala to the electronic media is a cup-out. I am not inclined to blame the goverment agency though. It is just that the people involved must have given in to the whole mountain of sales talk by the Western business interests. Sales talk does not look like sales talk. That’s the problem. Over here we are used to saying “Thank you and let us think this over by ourselves”.
It is incredible the way business is planned here and taken out to the customer. Lankans are not trained in seeing the not so obvious motives of kindly American businessmen (they have all sorts of guises). Much more thought should have given to the impact adopting Sinhala Unicode block is going to make on people and their language.
As for me, I see the solution. It is only a proper analysis of the various factors involved and impact it is going to have on various aspects of lives of the people and government that is needed. It is not too late even now because Microsoft has not annouced a release date for the next version of Windows. That date is a critical one because MS is going to come very strongly on our bureaucracy on the need to upgrade and they are sure to succumb.
Some of the points I would consider are:
The current state of the written language in publishing and information disemination
The various areas of the applications of the language
What are the main areas of electronic communiucation to be used by Sinhala?
In formation storage, Information Display, Information interchange?
Are there different ways the language could be supported on computers?
The alphabet and character set and orthography — central to the issue (only Donald spoke about this)
Investigation of solutons that other languages have adopted
Indian experience with UnicodeThese are some of the things that should be studied. That does not need years to do — only heads of analytical thinking coupled with current and intended future users should have had a serious discussion. Even one person with technical background and good access to language authorities (Books and wisely selected people) is all that’s necessary.
I think one of the biggest disadvantages that Lanka has is the difficulty to get Internet access. Otherwise, I cannot imagine why so many people in Lanka were not able to do the research I did myself. Or is it that no technically well versed person was not in the deliberations. Surely, if there was a trained engineer, any engineer, would have followed a scientific path of investigation. Their training is in problem resoluton.
Systematic investigation has to be done. Perhaps it is individuals like us or the printing industry that has to take the initiative.
It’s just sad to see that everybody seems to have accepted going with the Sinhala Unicode block is a foregone conclusion. We should remember that too much is riding on that one decision.
This is perhaps my last time coming here.
JC we need your comments. You live in U S and you see the picture in a different angle.
I thank you for giving a non bias write up.
I have done some research on Indian Scripts. Following is for Tamil.
——
The information that I have is if one has to contact a government office in Tamil Nadu by electronic media one will have to use “TAMIL 99″ If this is the case they too have the same problem that we have in Sri Lanka with Sinhala.Quote
http://tlt.its.psu.edu/suggestions/international/bylanguage/tamil.html#browseFonts by Platform
* Windows – Latha
* Mac OS X (10.4/Tiger) – InaiMathi is supplied with OS X 10.4. For earlier versions, you must install third party fonts——————-
For all indic langiages we have the problem of data compatibility.
See Daily mirror FT april 7 , 2003
Bannari Amman Institute of Technology was given a grant by the state to develop Tamil data base. Simple reason that Text cerated by one software was not compatible with text created by another software. This isolate internet user of Tamil from one another. — This comment was made by Mr R S Kumar Head of Departemnt of Computer Science and Enginerring BIT
—————————–
The same problem is there in India too. Once I do for Sinhala , India will also go in my path.
Apart from Nagari script there are many other minor scripts in India.
The Indian currency note is printed using 15 odd language scripts.By now authorities in Lanka must realize that they are going on the wrong path and correct it.
Due to selfish attitude of few top people the entire country suffer.
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboKeerthi Gunawardane
I would like to make a comment for the followin statment made by Ruwantha some days back.
9. i was present at the SLSI meeting where donald G’s objections were heard. it was almost frustrating that the chairman (mr. rohan wijeratne) gave him such a long audience. he was very tolerant. at the end of the meeting all the printing association supporters who he brought were satisfied that sinhala unicode was the way to go – but not donald. i know some of them from the industry, and they are no more with him on this.
Please note Sri Lanaka Assocation of Printers and my self as the President of the organisation do not want to become the supportes or any one. However when someone address an issue relevent to us we have our concerns over that and we are willing to listen and come up with appropriate actions.
In this case the bottom line is how people in this county can use Sinhala for all electronic matters, printing and publishing. Are we satisfied with the present systems????? We still see many problems and our effort is to encourage the people who can contribute positively to this cause rather than being supporters.
I disagree with your statement
“it was almost frustrating that the chairman (mr. rohan wijeratne) gave him such a long audience. he was very tolerant.”
He has done his job by listning to some others has some other ideas. Please note end of the day what we need is a good system and all we sould support is for that cause and not for individual issues.
Thanks & Regards
Keerthi
JC Ahangama
Keerthi and Donald,
We in the US have found the solution and are working on it. It is not a compromise by any means. See it soon on your own personal computer screen!
The basic problem for Indic is the bundling it together with Semitic languages and calling them Abugida writing systems.
Quote from a web page:
The name [Abugida] is derived from the first four characters of an order of the Ethiopic script used in some religious contexts ([Interestingly,] this order seems to correspond to the ancestral Semitic character order (aleph, beth, gimel, daleth / ABCD / …)
End quote.Peter T. Daniels coined the word, wrote a book, and made money and everyone is so enthralled! That gave Unicode the opening to tap into this gigantic market called India (and little insignificant Lanka. Maldivians are smarter).
The fact is, Indic is Indo-Aryan (that last part of the word is coming back to use after half century of avoidance). Surprise! All western European languages are Indo-Aryan as well. Well, call them Indo-European. What is so special about it, you ask. The answer is long and needs some explanation:
What is a language?
Every language is a set of sounds. And in the case of Indo-European, each language has a shift of sounds from another, but about the SAME NUMBER of sounds. Native speakers of each of the sister language hear and think of the collection of the sounds of their language as the native sound set of their own language. Linguists call them phonemes. Our old grammar books called them shabda. (By the way, modern linguistics is only a rediscovering of work done already by ancient Indian linguists — they acknowledge it now — Among the Westerners, Germans are the experts).You ask for proof? Go read the Sinhala hodiya. It is the most scientifically ordered alphabet, Read about it at:
http://www.LANandWAN.com/Sinhala/hoodiya.htmSinhala is Indo-European because we have what are called cognates shared with other sister languages:
E.g. Sinhala: vatura, English: water, German: wasser
Pali jçaana, English: knowledge, Sinhala: nuvana
(ç = taaluja naasikyaya)Compare two English speakers, one born in America and another in Lanka:
When I say ‘this’, the American hears ‘Tis’. My ‘th’ and English ‘th’ belong to entirely two different classes of sounds: plosives and fricatives. But that is just a shift of sounds between two sister languages.Get to the point JC!
Well, if all the western European languages use the Roman alphabet, why can’t we if we have a similar number of sounds? We can. To see how, search for ‘Sinhala Alphabet’ at Wikipedia.org. Read the classic romanized Sinhala alphabet there. Though that is only for Pali and Sanskrit, we can adapt it.So, JC you want us to use roman characters? You ARE nuts.
No. Unicode says:
‘The character identified by a Unicode code point is an abstract entity, such as “LATIN CHARACTER CAPITAL A” or “BENGALI DIGIT 5.” …
The Unicode Standard does not define glyph images. The standard defines how characters are interpreted, not how glyphs are rendered.’I say, do not compromise anything. Keep the script. Don’t adjust it to accommodate lazy programmers. We want a seat on the front row of the IT Theatre which is reserved for Latin Unicode block users.
Now think about the practical benefits:
I can write to you using Sinhala script and you could read in roman script (because you don’t want to install all that software on your computer)! We both did not wait for next version of Windows and Mac is OK too! Sinhala passes through email servers of every mail server without getting mangled or trashed as garbage. Ever wondered why some messages written in the Google Sinhala Unicode group come through as garbage? Why do we have to go through all this? “bus thiang paying yanne mokatada?” (Romanized Sinhala: bas þiyá payí yanne mokataða?)Go to
http://www.unicode.org/standard/WhatIsUnicode.html
and read the left-hand side column. How many languages really show correctly and how many are just garbage? This is the Unicode web site!! If we do the above, we have Sinhala readable whether using Sinhala script or Roman characters — unique in the world indeed. But aren’t we? Think about it. When a text goes back to a readable form if the requested font is unavailable is called ‘graceful fallback’. Sinhala would be the first that has that too.Tell Unicode and Microsoft to back off. Tell them we think we can do it ourselves. Why do we need specially crafted PROPRIETARY font drivers (Uniscrobe) when we can just use TrueType? What is OpenType for? It is only to accommodate Type 1 by Adobe. It’s a deal between MS and Adobe. I don’t think even Apple is enthused.
JC
What I get from you is (if I am wrong correct)
to transliterate Sinhala into the latin script– step one
Then allocate the sinhala characters to these combinations of Latin Script — step two
Then make a font to suit the step two with proper code ponts – step three
The problem is step three not one or two
irrespective to step one or step two the character has to be the same.
One can use wijesekera key board or any other input method but the character that we should see is the same.
(I always give the umlaut character Ä. irrespective to the input method we all see umlaut character Ä)
For that every one should use a commen character allocation table (which I have done) Idetify all sinhala characters.
This standard is not done in Sri Lanka. What they had done is SLSI 1134 which is incorrect and incomplete set of Sinhala. If Sri Lanka did a proper SLSI this problem never arise.
Without a correct character allocation table (which I have done) listing all sinhala individual characters no software developer will be able to develop any compatible (data) software.
The old professor and his group was paid by the government of Srilanka for 20 years to produce a correct standard but all failed. Only I have done it. Now I have a copyright over this subject. That is why they are furious and not giving me the proper credential to move this project forward.
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboJC Ahangama
Everyone here and specially Dharma,
ANNOUNCEMENT:
Today, the Poson fullmoon day in the US, we have successully tested a fully Unicode compliant TrueType font that displays the Sinhala script. The font that is at the proof-of-concept stage, works perfectly on any Windows XP machine with Service Pack 2 installed. No special software is required. You do not need to enable Asian language support.We tested it in the Notepad and typed in two Pali sutras (karaniiyametta and mangala). The text is readable in Sihala script as expected).
In Notepad you save the file the normal (default ANSI) way. You do not need to select special Unicode or UTF-8 format as required for Sinhala-Unicode files.(below, I am using romanized Sinhala to write names of Sinhala characters. It can be found on Wikipedia at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinhala_alphabet
NB: p and þ are different characters just as n and h are different)Examples words:
The Sinhala name nanðana:
nayanna, nayanna-bænði-ðayanna nayanna (totally 3 characters)The Sinhala word for (sharp perception):
ðiirgha-ispilla-sama`ga-þayanna, kayanna-bændi-
muurdhaja-sayanna-bænði-
muurdhaja-nayanna
(totally 2 characters)This copyrighted Smartfont also flags illegal script constructs such as, mahapraana-gayanna saha maatraáxaya. (There are no such things as ‘ghææ’ or ‘sri’ in Sinhala orthography).
NOTE:
This font is FULLY UNICODE compliant.You are invited to register to test it.
Siddhalepa Vedamahattaya
It looks like people like Prof. Samaranayake and Dr. Gihan Dias are not limited to Sri Lanka. In Bhutan also we find such people.
In Bhutan too there had been a set of people, who have been unsuccessfully trying to integrate local languages into Microsoft Windows for the last two years. Even after that time and spending over half a million US Dollars they still have nothing to show. (Prof. Sam and Dr. Gihan Dias at least has a set of Fonts to show, whatever happened to the standard.)
So now Bhutanese, like our own JC here, have come up with their own solution.
Please check http://www.kuenselonline.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=7030 for details.
JC,
Congratulations! Great. I hope you can use the font to see any Unicode compliant site as well. Hope others can get access to this unicode font which can type easily in romanized form.
Eventhough we use Unicode it’s all drive through our commercial software which has the capability to write in wijesekrara input as well as romanized input. However, designing a easy to use smart unicode font would be helpful to many who fancy typing in romanized form.
Harsha
JC,
Sorry missed your previous post! So is this capable of viewing the existing unicode sites? Can you see goverment sites or unicode group or even google in sinhala?
The main problem here is nobody understand the differance between a FONT and the Character allocation table.
Character allocation table comes before the font. I talk of a character allocation table which is the basic standard for any font. ( irrespective to any language.)
Sinhala unicode table is incorrect and incomplete. Uncoditionally we have to correct it.
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboJC Ahangama
Thank you, gentlemen.
When I wrote the announcement here, I was not sure what kind of reception I ‘d get.
As far as we know, our font is the first Smartfont in the world. Our concern is the entire family of Indic languages. None of the others is as easy as Sinhala, though. Next would be either Tamil or Devanagari.
Let me warn you that we are not completely out of the woods yet. Though Notepad shows the Pali suttas perfectly, MS Word was unable to traverse the orthography tree. It just showed the raw initial input. Same is true with Apple. We will take it up with both these companies. Results would be unsure. Adobe wants to sell InDesign that MS is promoting. (The whole deal about OpenType is this alliance). So, MS would resist.
Our initial assessment is that the Unicode base of Service Pack 2 version of Windows XP is fully established as fore-runner to Vista). However, the processes that Notepad accesses directly are not used by MS Word or any higher level application. I am talking about Unicode standard specification on character processing.
The backward behavior of MS Word is typical of the software industry (or any industry for that matter). The market drives development of applications. This is expected in the capitalist system. Nobody spends money for something that has no market demand. The cars over here consume more fuel than they did 10 years back, a fact well known. Now that the price of gasoline is up, they are talking — only talking. An attempt by the people to organize a boycott of Exxon Mobile did not shift the prices. So, everything is at status quo.
If they think they can, the industry must create the market (e.g. for Vista) that we countered. If we prevail, they’d shift gears to MS Office. That’s hard because it’s a giant hairball. What they probably need to do is to pull some of the guts out of Office to let Unicode shine through.
The somber outlook is that we write using Notepad and deliver in romanized Sinhala. Romanized Sinhala is the skeleton, smartfont is the flesh. So, yesterday I wrote the first message inside Notepad. (I can’t describe the exhilaration I felt.) Then I cut and pasted it into Thunderbird that immediately showed it in romanized Sinhala.
Both the monks who were receiving the message do not have the font, but will be able to read it in romanized Sinhala. They’d have to install the font. At that point, they could copy and paste it to Notepad to savor the power of the smartfont — reading the two suttas in the glory of the oldest writing. (Changing the font inside Thunderbird would show only basic glyphs just like all higher level applications.
Web pages:
The results are the same with the web pages: We see only base characters. So, this phenomenon that the higher level applications not being able to do what the basic Notepad does is both intriguing and revealing. There is a long way in programming to go to port complex applications to go to Unicode. None of these things matters to the West. Bare that in mind. Only market clout would spur action. I think MS would make a special version of Office for Asia (non-CJK, Abugida group).Open source people are mostly centered in Germany. Asians are just following, not innovating, sadly. This is understandable because of the language barrier. This will breakdown with the use of Smartfonts because they would always see the romanized versions and would get used using it directly. And, that in turn would release them out to the mainstream Internet user community. Of course, I am assuming that the governments would provide the Internet signal on telephone lines (at least for institutions) free. That is only a one-time cost well worth its price. The grandiose plans for a fiber grid is hugely expensive to install and maintain. DSL is much friendly with current telephone network we have — my humble opinion. (Then again, I am a cultural fossil frozen 25 years ago, and might be worng).
But, you guys have grander dreams.
PS:
Well, Donald you were right all along about the need for all characters, though approximately. We do not need Unicode assigned code points, though. That would actually isolate us away from the greater IT community. I respect your valor in fighting alone.Harsha, I am talking about Unicode standard, not Unicode for Sinhala. However, to include Sinhala in the font at its Unicode block is not a problem. This would be in addition to romanized Sinhala — Doubles the size of the font. Romanized Sinhala means Sinhala sitting at Latin-1. This means that there would be two incompatible Sinhala versions inside the smartfont. The Wijesekera keyboard method follows writing method of Sinhala — assembles characters to display. The underlying code points are from Sinhala block. Romanized Sinhala makes input as SPOKEN (phonetic, like typing English) and the font applies the orthography. The code points are Latin-1.
JC Ahangama
I am sorry that the first time I did not fully digest what Harsha said.
Of course, I can read those web sites that specify which fonts to use. I do not need a smartfont to read Sinhala web pages — only the various fonts that they use. I can read the posts in the Sinhala Unicode user group of Google because I have installed the beta Sinhala Unicode font support and Asian language support and because I use Windows XP SP2. That is all what is so fancy. You have to have so many things, not to mention expensive things.
There is nothing fancy about typing romanized Sinhala. It is simply down to earth:
h = hal hayanna, a = ayanna, ha = hayanna etc.
What it corrects is the mangling of the language by Anglicizing. It removes the ambiguity introduced by writing Sinhala in English. Romanized Sinhala is a writing system of Sinhala, Pali and Sanskrit.Quote
We do not need Unicode assigned code points,
unquoteYou are correct JC the SLSI will have to give the standard.
Once the natinal standard is done unicode will have to accept it unconditionally.Japan Korea China did it at National level and these vendors accepted it.
Sri Lanka was given ample funds to do this from the World Bank but these guys are just buying hardware . e-this . e-that and not implementing the SInhala and Tamil.
Pay E&Y money to get reports.
http://www.icta.lk/insidepages/downloadDocs/Nenasala/OutcomeEvaluation_of_PilotProjects.pdf
I quote from the content of E&Y report.
quote
SME Portal
Outcome is insatisfactory due to many reasons
…..
– Language being a barrier in the use of the portalunquote
I have been telling the language barrier for the past so many years. They pay E&Y and get the same result. Even then they are not trying to do anything about it.
Somethnig worng somewhere!!!!!!
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboConcerned
Can the moderator make the older postings in this page available weekwise so that we could find the history of this problem??? If Prof feels bad about the remarks about him those can be edited by the moderator.
JC Ahangama
Here is the first feedback we got from a monk wrting in Sinhala:
==============
jayanþa mahaþþayo bohoma sþuþiyi. meka hari leesiyi neva. heta mama þavaþ puruðu venava. suba raaþþiriyak.
[nama] haamuðuruvo.
==============The significance if this mesage is that here we have a Sinhala-only user writing in Sinhala. He used the Notepad to write the message in Sinhala script and cut and pasted it to the Yahoo email page and sent it to me. I spent 10 minutes and 3 calls to help him download the 3 attachments (font and 2 text files) and to copy the font to the Fonts folder. He read the two files in Sinhala script after copying them to Notepad. Yahoo mail stripped off þ from the suttas. he typed them back in appropriate places and recovered the Pali!
We have a new advocate that rpomises to spread the word among brother monks and fiends.
This solution gets those who are less fortunate to participate in English forums like this simply to bypass it and go straight to Romanized Sinhala with the aid of the Smart font. That in turn would demolish the notion that Roman characters mean English but that it is only a vehicle that best helps communication without destroying the language or its orhtography. Romanized Sinhala is the best form of electronic storage for Sinhala because the saved text could be displayed at different levels of character (ligature) formations.
Kattadi Mahattaya
My friend Siddhalepa Vedamahattaya is right. see the warning below issued just few minutes back by the US Government’s Cyber Alert system about Microsoft software. So beware those who are so enamoured by Microsoft, specially at Colombo University.
Read the original at:
http://www.us-cert.gov/cas/techalerts/TA06-164A.htmlNational Cyber Alert System
Technical Cyber Security Alert TA06-164A
Microsoft Windows, Internet Explorer, Media Player, Word, PowerPoint, and
Exchange VulnerabilitiesOriginal release date: June 13, 2006
Last revised: —
Source: US-CERTSystems Affected
* Microsoft Windows
* Microsoft Windows Media Player
* Microsoft Internet Explorer
* Microsoft PowerPoint for Windows and Mac OS X
* Microsoft Word for Windows
* Microsoft Office
* Microsoft Works Suite
* Microsoft Exchange Server Outlook Web AccessFor more complete information, refer to the Microsoft Security
Bulletin Summary for June 2006.Overview
Microsoft has released updates that address critical vulnerabilities
in Microsoft Windows, Word, PowerPoint, Media Player, Internet
Explorer, and Exchange Server. Exploitation of these vulnerabilities
could allow a remote, unauthenticated attacker to execute arbitrary
code or cause a denial of service on a vulnerable system.I. Description
Microsoft Security Bulletin Summary for June 2006 addresses
vulnerabilities in Microsoft Windows, Word, PowerPoint, Media Player,
Internet Explorer, and Exchange Server. Further information is
available in the following US-CERT Vulnerability Notes:VU#722753 – Microsoft IP Source Route Vulnerability
A vulnerability in Microsoft Windows could allow a remote attacker to
execute arbitrary code on a vulnerable system.
(CVE-2006-2379)VU#446012 – Microsoft Word object pointer memory corruption
vulnerabilityA memory corruption vulnerability in Microsoft Word could allow a
remote attacker to execute arbitrary code with the privileges of the
user running Word.
(CVE-2006-2492)VU#190089 – Microsoft PowerPoint malformed record vulnerability
Microsoft PowerPoint fails to properly handle malformed records. This
may allow a remote attacker to execute arbitrary code on a vulnerable
system.
(CVE-2006-0022)VU#923236 – Microsoft Windows ART image handling buffer overflow
Microsoft Windows ART image handling routines are vulnerable to a
heap-based buffer overflow. This vulnerability may allow a remote,
unauthenticated attacker to execute arbitrary code on a vulnerable
system.
(CVE-2006-2378)VU#390044 – Microsoft JScript memory corruption vulnerability
Microsoft JScript contains a memory corruption vulnerability. This
vulnerability may allow a remote, unauthenticated attacker to execute
arbitrary code on a vulnerable system.
(CVE-2006-1313)VU#338828 – Microsoft Internet Explorer exception handling
vulnerabilityMicrosoft Internet Explorer fails to properly handle exception
conditions. This may allow a remote, unauthenticated attacker to
execute arbitrary code.
(CVE-2006-2218)VU#417585 – Microsoft DXImageTransform Light filter fails to validate
inputThe Microsoft DXImageTransform Light COM object fails to validate
input, which may allow a remote attacker to execute arbitrary code on
a vulnerable system.
(CVE-2006-2383)VU#959049 – Multiple COM objects cause memory corruption in Microsoft
Internet ExplorerMicrosoft Internet Explorer (IE) allows instantiation of COM objects
not designed for use in the browser, which may allow a remote attacker
to execute arbitrary code or crash IE.
(CVE-2006-2127)VU#136849 – Microsoft Internet Explorer UTF-8 decoding vulnerability
Microsoft Internet Explorer fails to properly decode UTF-8 encoded
HTML. This may allow a remote, unauthenticated attacker to execute
arbitrary code on a vulnerable system.
(CVE-2006-2382)VU#909508 – Microsoft Graphics Rendering Engine fails to properly
handle WMF imagesMicrosoft Windows Graphics Rendering Engine contains a vulnerability
that may allow a remote attacker to execute arbitrary code on a
vulnerable system.
(CVE-2006-2376)VU#608020 – Microsoft Windows Media Player PNG processing buffer
overflowMicrosoft Windows Media Player contains a stack-based buffer overflow
vulnerability that may allow a remote, unauthenticated attacker to
execute arbitrary code on a vulnerable system.
(CVE-2006-0025)VU#814644 – Microsoft Remote Access Connection Manager service
vulnerable to buffer overflowA vulnerability in the Microsoft Remote Access Connection Manager may
allow a remote attacker to execute arbitrary code on a vulnerable
system.
(CVE-2006-2371)VU#631516 – Microsoft Routing and Remote Access does not properly
handle RPC requestsThere is a vulnerability in the Microsoft Windows Routing and Remote
Access Service that could allow an attacker to take control of the
affected system.
(CVE-2006-2370)VU#138188 – Microsoft Outlook Web Access for Exchange Server script
injection vulnerabilityA script injection vulnerability exists in Microsoft Exchange Server
running Outlook Web Access.
(CVE-2006-1193)In MS06-027 Microsoft has released updates for the Word vulnerability
described in Technical Cyber Security Alert TA06-139A.II. Impact
A remote, unauthenticated attacker could execute arbitrary code on a
vulnerable system. An attacker may also be able to cause a denial of
service.III. Solution
Apply Updates
Microsoft has provided updates for these vulnerabilities in the
Security Bulletins. Microsoft Windows updates are available on the
Microsoft Update site.Workarounds
Please see the US-CERT Vulnerability Notes for workarounds.
Divakar Goswami
Concerned, we do not have a moderator, comments are not edited and we can’t have the posts arranged for you weekly. The archive is available for anyone to browse through.
TV
Someone proposed to have a TV debate on this issue. What happened?????? Hope Sam didnt block that too. Sam has become even stronger during past few weeks and what you guys did here only made him stronger and closer to the President himself.
Mr Harsha de silva will have to answer the question. He was the person who proposed it.
I gave the following conditions
1.
I need internet facility with a computer.a second computer runs on Widows 98 or MAC OSX
2.
I will bring some displays3.
Please provide the unicode chart of Sinhala chaaracters as the basic visual.4.
Need some extratime before the debate with your staff to make prepare some visualsI think they are just scared to face the truth with proper display.
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboTV
Then it is clear. VK has silenced Harsha. This is what he does. I’m not sure about this but the talks are going on that VK vetoed against another project originally supposed to go to Mahawilachchi. A community radio project which was planned for this village had gone to Kurunegala due to VK power.
Forget your hopes for the TV program. Harsha will miss his next presentations and the foriegn tours if he go ahead with this TV program. better you don’t put him in trouble. Dino will be there for another 100 million years as his golayas will take on when he demises.
Bad luck man.
My question is why the media (newspaper and Television) is so weak. Is it because of few perks given to them by the wrong doers? In some countries the business community and the government sector is very scared of the media.
The media expose the facts and the people have the freedom to think openly and comments freely. Also once a topic is taken up they go until the end. In Sri Lanka a topic is taken but within a few days it will be buried. I think it is two way story. Expose a bit take some credit from the public then open the hip pocket and get it filled. It becomes a hobson’s choice!!!
May be this is the system here in Lanka.
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboTV
Harsha de Silva is a guy who go for hypes. Do not depend on him. He wants to market himself. He hasn’t done anything substantial in any field.
Find someone else if you need public opnion for your cause.
Well, VK could fool the first citizen of the country. Why can’t he fool the media?
TV
Donald,
Deal was sealed now. No TV Program. All hidden under the carpet. Yet another victory for VK. Harsha, we sympethize with you. You can’t do much here.Sooner or later these things will come out.
They will have to face the truth in public.
I will voice the case without any fear or favour to anyone
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboConcerned
“VK vetoed against another project originally supposed to go to Mahawilachchi. A community radio project which was planned for this village had gone to Kurunegala due to VK power.”
Can someone explain this????? Is this true???? Why on earth VK attacks this village project in this manner?
harsha de silva
dear tv, donald and others
i offered to have the tv debate in good faith and my offer still stands. sorry tv, no one has silenced me.
however the problem is only donald has taken up the challenge and i cant do a balanced show unless i have both sides of the story.
once i have a nominee from the other side/icta, rest assured i will make it happen. however my time is more important than going behind you people requesting to participate.
if you people in the industry think the subject is important enough, take the challenge and get the other person nominated. please dont blame (and accuse) me (or others) for your inabilities.
thank you
harsha de silvaWe have a real existing problem using sinhala language in computers.
1.Data is not compatible between systems and with applications
2.database sorting not possible
3.Restricted use of SMS and other similar applications
4. no text editable OCR
5.No electronic Dictionaries etcThis is simply because the Sinhala SLSI is incorrect and incomplete.
We have no correct character coding for all sinhala characters
Only I have raised this issue and given a solution (Character allocation table) for Sinhala.
(I now have the copyrights over this issue)The people who were paid by the public funds & grants (over and above several million Dollars) took the payments for the past 20 years and yet unable to give the correct character allocation table for SInhala.
All software developers knows this problem but are afraid of the Emeritus Professor and his group because whatever the little work that these software developers gets will be null and void if they too join me and voice.
Why not Harsha’s TV group do an independent research for the next one month and publish the contents in your show. I will guide the crew to show my part of the story by vedio recording of practical examples. Emeritus Professor and his group can guide the same crew to show thier part of the story. You will need a good editor who will be able to edit the contents without any fear. The public will be able to see the pros and cons.
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboSandhya Herath
I have given the names of the six people who were directly involved in this so called Sinhalisation project. The involvement is highest at the first name and least at the last. As far as I know, this is the correct order.
I repeat the list.
1. Prof. V. K. Samaranayake
2. Dr. Gihan Dias
3. Ms. Aruni Gunatilake
4. Dr. Ruvan Weerasinghe
5. Mr. S.T. Nandasara
6. Mr. Manju Haththotuwa (as far as I know, he was not directly involved in the project. So he might not know the technical details.)All the above six people have been paid by public money, so they have a moral obligation to come forward and defend what they did.
If a member of public complains that any of the above wasted public money and did not deliver what was expected, they have an obligation to defend their work.
So they cannot deny an invitation to a public debate. If they continue to do so, that is an irresponsibility from their sides, as they are paid by the public.
Out of the above six people, only Dr. Ruvan Weerasinghe has come forward and explained his position and why he does not want to debate with Donald. We should appreciate that.
On the other hand, the other five people in the list still behave like kasaaya beepu goluwas. None of them have responded to what Donald or anyone else has said so far.
This is not a question is who is right and who is wrong, but any public servant should serve the people who pay his salary. That is why when challenged, they should come forward and justify what they do.
Especially Prof. V. K. Samaranayake, as the Chairman of ICTA has an obligation to answer the issues Donald raises.
We hope Prof. Samaranayake, at least now behaves like a true gentleman and come forward and be a part of this debate. Otherwise he will not be doing justice to the salary he draws from the public.
Let us hope Prof. Samaranayake will come forward and accept Harsha’s invitation.
If he does not that is a very good indication that he is not suitable for the post he holds right now.
TV
“however the problem is only donald has taken up the challenge and i cant do a balanced show unless i have both sides of the story.”
This shows well only Donald was right in this discussion right from the beginning. Others were basically using pseudo names and even the very few ppl who used names are scared of truth being coming out. All those ppl r dead silent even in this blog and only Donald is frequently visible.
All concerened, please accpt the truth and listen to this man. We don’t belive Donald is 100% correct or capable of doiing what he says. But what he says is true about inferier standards.
TV
“Out of the above six people, only Dr. Ruvan Weerasinghe has come forward and explained his position and why he does not want to debate with Donald. We should appreciate that.”
Everybody says RW is a good guy but due to VK mafia, he cannot come forward.
TV
“We hope Prof. Samaranayake, at least now behaves like a true gentleman and come forward and be a part of this debate. Otherwise he will not be doing justice to the salary he draws from the public.”
TRUE GENTLEMAN, VK???? R U nuts??? Everybody says what he did to Mahawilchi kids are true. Can you expect him to become a gentleman at the age of 70 ? Too late for him.
Quote
But what he says is true about inferier standards.
unquoteSo you accept the present SLSI is inforior standard.
unconditonally we have to correct it.I have given one proposal and have published it.
No one have the guts to give any comment on my sinhala character allocation table.If anyone else has a better one why not publish it. It should not a be a copy of mine or extended version of mine nor based on my matrx thinking.
quote
. We don’t belive Donald is 100% correct
unquoteThe whole unicode system is based on character allocation tables.
Unicode is a listing of these matrixes of various scripts (languages) All these are given an unique number.The problem we have — is — Sri Lanka did not registered the correct sinhala allocation table in the unicode.If Emeritus Professor did that there would have not been any problem. Due to lack of knowledge in typography and typology Emeritus Professor and his group missed the sinhala character allocation table. Emeritus Professor and his group got mixed up with the typewriter technology. The entire group never had any knowledge in Printing and Publishing trade or had any person who is a graduate from a proper university who has done Printing and Publishing as a subject. The Scripts belongs to Printing and Publishing industry. The information technology is just an branch extended from the publsihing industry. Technically a mixture of interaction, Image, Text and Sound. (all in one)
When I raised objections at the SLSI still they could have corrected it without giving any public credit to me. They missed that chance too. Then when I presented the case to Mr Manju — Dr Gihan had the chance to correct and change over. Dr Gihan got angry and walked away. They missed that chance too.
Now it has got locked. Emeritus Professor and his group cannot accept this basic erorr. Error is very basic (and it is at the bottom) the whole empire they built spending millions of dollars of public money falls to the ground. They will have to answer the first citizen too.
We have to go to ground zero and rebuilt. For Emeritus Professor Something like 9/11 happend.
This is a simple story like Munidasa Cumaratnge’s “Hinnsaraya”. Not to forget the freedom of internet.
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboTV
All,
VK loves TV program. I saw him today on ITN with a stupid lady announcer asking stupid questions and prasing VK. VK was showing GoogleEarth software (as if he designed it) and viewers were asked to use it at Nenasalas!!!!!!!
I can’t understand why he is scared of Donald. He loves stupid maidens though in TV programms.
Harsha is trying to go away from the scene. He has sufficient powers to get these guys for a TV program.
Donald, ask VK if he needs Korean currency to appear in TV!!!!
Thoppi Velenda
Harsha,
I suggest you too wear a saree and apply some lipstick. Also you need to act a bit dumb.
That is the only way you can lure VK Samaranayake to appear in your programme. He just loves dumb lasses as much as he loves to put his rectangular face in TV. If you do so he will come running to your TV show. :-)
Quote
I can’t understand why he is scared of Donald.
unquoteHe is not scared of me.
I am the only person who had pointed a mistake he had done — taken the copyrights over the whole issue. His 20 years of work becomes null and void.
Second point is most of the present working models in the IT areas were given some helping hand by me at very early stages – even before ICTA established or E lanka project started.
I know the basic requirments.
First we got to solve the Sinhala and Tamil language issue as soon as possible.
Emeritus Professor and his group will have to stepdown with dignity (which he can do — due to old age) on this issue and pave way for others to take over.
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboAlexander
Donald says [Second point is most of the present working models in the IT areas were given some helping hand by me at very early stages – even before ICTA established or E lanka project started.]
If this is the case, why don’t ICTA and so called president’s manifesto use ppl like Donald and guys working in MV? Isn’t it rediculous to keep repeating the same mistake??? Why use millions of dollars on definite faliures?
Sandhya Herath
[quote]
I suggest you too wear a saree and apply some lipstick. Also you need to act a bit dumb. That is the only way you can lure VK Samaranayake to appear in your programme.
[unquote]I think this is a sexiest remark and it should not have appeared here in the first place.
Prof. Vanniarachchige Kithsiri (VK) Samaranayake is a government servant and as members of public, we all have right to discuss his professional conduct. (for example, whether he wastes public money, whether he takes bribes, whether he ruins IT projects etc.) However, the personal conduct of Prof. Samaranayake is something on his own. Let us not get into that.
Further, I do not see why anybody has to lure him to a TV debate.
I am sure there are producers for Harsha’s programme. All what Harsha has to do is to ask them to formally invite Prof. Vanniarachchige Kithsiri Samaranayake to the programme. If he denies, or ignores the invitation, it is definitely a plus point to Donald. In that case Donald gets a walk over.
However, as a public servant whose salary is being paid by the public it is gross unfair for Prof. Vanniarachchige Kithsiri Samaranayake not to respond the key issued by the members of public.
Prof. Vanniarachchige Kithsiri Samaranayake cannot say he does not know about this blog, as he himself had recently admitted that he sees is regularly at a recent internal meeting at ICTA. (Well, as far as I know his comments about this blog was not too appreciative. Not a surprise. Nobody likes being exposed)
Siddhalepa Vedamahattaya
I too have heard that Prof. Sam has got very annoyed about the comments in this blog.
When somebody from Harvard did a search, this site has come up and it seemed it has been very embarrassing for our good old Sam.
Top Ten
Prof. Vanniarachchige Kithsiri Samaranayake!!!! I got it! I got it!!!! VK too has part of the name Wanni. This is why he crushed Wanni. You can’t have two Wanni’s in IT field. (You can’t have two liones in the same jungle theory.) ha ha ha!!!!!
quote
use ppl like Donald and guys working in MV?
unquoteAbility to work is a disqualification in Sri Lanka and not being a foreigner is an added disqualification.
anyway visit the following site
http://www.horizonlanka.org/media/pariganaka/index.htm
this article was written sometime in 2002 may by Sunanda Karunaratne to a sinhala magazine “pariganaka”
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboBulto
Top Ten,
[quote]
Prof. Vanniarachchige Kithsiri Samaranayake!!!! I got it! I got it!!!! VK too has part of the name Wanni. This is why he crushed Wanni. You can’t have two Wanni’s in IT field. (You can’t have two liones in the same jungle theory.) ha ha ha!!!!!
[unquote]So it is a case of Vanniarachchige Samaranayake vs. Nandasiri Wanninayake.
Sounds like a home vs. home match!
SinhalaLover
Though off the subject, you should read link given by Donald. Looks like Donald has evry right to talk about Sinhala language and its usage in grassroots level. Story certainly is a fairy tale and VK is the bad ugly villain here. Apparently story is written in Sinhala and then translated into English by someone.
Link given by Donald goes as follows,
“THE DREAM COMPUTER SCHOOL IN TIGER-THREATENED VILLAGE
HORIZON SCHOOL IN MAHAVILACHCHIIYASunanda Deshapriya Karunarathna sapari@wijeya.lk May, 2002
I am going to tell you a fairy tale; a fairy tale rich with emotions; on the other hand a fairy tale that tells about a dream coming to life. My location is Mahavilachchiya in Anuradhapura district. It is 40 Km away from the city of Anuradhapura, adjoining Vilpaththu national park, an area threatened by the LTTE terrorists. They attacked the village several times during the period between1988-1996. Even today, home guards armed with T-56 rifles, guard the village in the bunkers scattered around the village.
Our travel guide pointed a damaged place on the tarred road saying, “In 1988 they blasted a land mine here. The bomb had been set to blast the bus, but an army jeep was caught.” We looked at each other.
When the computer has become a toy in the hands of Colombo metropolitan kids and Sri Lankan kids become the owners of software development companies, Mahavilachchiya kids were taken refuge in the jungle fearing LTTE attacks. While the students in Colombo were surfing the web for knowledge, Mahavilachchiya kids had not even seen a computer monitor.
Though this was something common to most of the rural Sri Lankan villages, a young teacher, Mr. Nandasiri Wanninayaka, who was born and bred in the same area, laid the foundation to change this pathetic situation.
Mr. Wanni realized that however much talented the students in these areas, the lack of English Knowledge, the computer phobia and the typical shyness withered those talents.
He took his students out of the classroom to teach them English. They absorbed the language eagerly because they did not have a teacher of English before.
During this time he encouraged the students to publish a handwritten magazine “The Horizon” and he posted a few copies to the foreign missions in Sri Lanka. The US embassy in Colombo was pleased with the effort, presented the Mahavilachchiya village school a computer. But nobody was there to operate a computer. Wanni, using the Help Menu, taught himself the art of using a PC first. Then he imparted the knowledge to his students. The second issue of the Horizon came out as a computer printout.
The unconventional way of this young teacher was a bit hard to devour for a few elder teachers in the school. They paved the way for Wanni to the school. A determined Wanni thought, “I can go back to the rice fields but I will not let die the light which I lit for these innocent kids.” He quit the job.
To improve the English and the computer education, and at the same time to improve the other skills of Mahavilachchiya kids, Wanni started the “Horizon School”. He appointed one of the parents as the treasurer of the institution.
But the Horizon kids lost the opportunity of using their computer. It was safely locked in a schoolroom (in the former school). “The Horizon” magazine again came out as a hand written magazine.
Wanni went to Colombo with the magazine. His intention was to go to the US embassy. He had enough time before the appointment and he just let himself astray along the streets of Colombo. In this walk he came across the huge “Lankadeepa” building. The Sunday Times newspaper that Wanni wrote to occasionally was also in the same building. He stepped in and met Gamini Akmeemana of the “Daily Mirror” newspaper. Gamini listened to Wanni’s story about “wild flowers of Mahavilachchiya” and in the next week Gamini went to Mahavilachchiya. That story was published in IPS (Inter Press Service) website revealing the computer kids of Mahavilachchiya to the whole world.
Mr. Donald Gaminitilake worked in Japan as an image technologist, for a long time. He and his wife Mrs. Bhadra Gaminitillake accidentally read Gamini’s letter on IPS web. Mr. Donald directed the attention of their friends on the article and as a result the Managing director of the East West Company Mr. Sanjeewa Wickramanayaka and the Managing Director of the Andrews Travels Mahen Kariyawasam donated the first computer to the Horizon School. Later the Managing Director of the Slimline Company Mr. Dian Gomes invited Wanni to present a few more used computers to the school. While talking to Wanni he decided to recruit this determined young man into his team. The horizon school got a few more computers and Wanni got a job at the Slimline Company as a Human Resource Executive.
Mr. Donald, who was an expert in website designing, taught Wanni the basics of website designing. Later both designed the enticing website http://www.horizonlanka.org. “We wanted to avoid geometrical shapes such as squares,” said Mr. Gaminitillake.
“We tried to add the greenness of Mahavilachchiya to the website as much as possible. Our aim was to make Sri Lankan expatriates homesick,” added Wanni. I must mention that the site is one of the most picturesque websites I have ever seen.
The texts of this website are written in English by the Horizon students. When you go through these beautifully written articles you will never imagine that the little writers are from a war torn area, hundreds of kilometers away from Colombo.
Dr. Nimal Perera, a medical doctor who lives in North Carolina, USA agreed to offer a scholarship to the student Anusha, after reading her articles and her O/L exam results on the web. The friendly doctor too joined us to visit these kids in the village.
You can contact the web master by wanni@horizonlanka.org . Many Sri Lankan expatriate professionals have come forward to help the horizon kids after visiting the website. As a result they were able to lay the foundation stone to their dream computer center. The building will provide the space for 10 computers. Wanni hopes to finish the task by this December.
“In future the computer centers will fade away. Everybody will learn computers alone. Even our computers are kept students’ houses. But this center provides an opportunity for the students to get together. Even if I am not in the scene someday, they will continue to spread the light I lit for them.” says Wanni. Such is the vision of this iron-willed young man. I couldn’t help having a great respect for the confidence and the humanity Wanni displays.
“While I teach them English and computers I found that they have born talents for singing and dancing.” Wanni bought an electric organ and mastered it by himself then he trained the students to play it. Horizon kids began to proceed freely in the fields of singing music and dancing.
I too was fortunate enough to witness their talents in my tour to Mahavilachchiya. Though they do not even have a teacher for aesthetic subjects, the skills they showed was excellent in their dances. Most of the dances were designed by themselves. Here I must mention the talent of little Radhika who performed even slight gestures in a refined skill of an expert. They have taken a great effort to please us with their mini concert. Our applauses brightened their little faces with joy. Those smiles completely swept away the last fragments of my worry about missing my family on the New Year day. I went to see the Horizon kids on April 15 missing the New Year at home.
“I give the kids training on computer hardware under the repairer of our computers. In the future we will be able to repair our computers by ourselves. Anusha and Gayani are following a computer course in Anuradhapura. I hope to get their service to teach the others in future,” says Wanni.
“The most important thing is having an aim to go ahead. My aim is to send these students to the society with a strong personality and confidence. The next main thing I have to mention is, we have done it. We are going ahead, nothing is magic to us anymore it is only our determination and effort,” added Wanni while we were returning.
To me it is a fairy tale beginning with hardships and a pleasant ending. They have a long way to go I am assured that their teacher Wanni and their foster parents, Mr. and Mrs. Gaminitillake will help them in the future. But Mahavilachchiya needs more help. If that happens, the end of this fairy tale will be happier than a tale written by Hans Christian Anderson.”
I tell about Ms Anusha. With the help of Dr Nimal she passed the A/L in flying colours. She is a student in Colombo campus.
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboSympethizer
I think enough has been said about Prof Samaranayake’s misdeeds. Would it mean any good in repeating them? He must have learnt a lesson and we should let him be in peace. I don’t think he will do something similar again.
Appriciate Donald as he hasn’t made any comment about Prof’s personal life, apart from the subject matter he talks about.
Can we make the TV debate happen? Do not put Harsha in trouble here. Looks like he has his own limitations and we have to understand it.
Sandhya Herath
I totally agree with Sympethizer that we should not bring Prof. V. K. Samaranayake’s personal life to this. I have said the same thing in different words in an earlier post.
However, the issue here is people like Prof. V.K. Samaranayake and Dr. Gihan Dias, whose salaries are being paid by the public of this country act entirely oblivious to the issues raised by the public. They never reply to any of the queries raised by the public, who pay their salaries. This conduct is totally unacceptable.
People like Prof. V.K. Samaranayake and Dr. Gihan Dias go on preaching about the wonders of the e-world and what it brings to the common man, but they very conveniently neglect the power of e-democracy. Just like the bureaucrats of the colonial era they behave as if they know everything and the public of this country should accept what they do without raising question. No matter what they preach, they have not been able to come out of the brown sahib syndrome.
Prof. V.K. Samaranayake and Dr, Gihan Dias are the brown sahibs and they treat us all like harijans who should never question the acts of brown sahibs.
Of course, I fully appreciate what Mr. Wasantha Deshapriya and Dr. Ruwan Weerasinghe did by posting here and addressing the issues raised by Donald and gang like a gentlemen and responsible public servants.
We should have more and more Wasantha Deshapriyas and Ruwans Weerasinghes among us. Hats off to you gentlemen!
If Prof. V.K. Samaranayake does not answer the questions raised by people, I am sure people like Donald have to use other approaches like questioning them in the public forums or using media.
C. Rasaputra
Dear All,
According to the latest information, I hear Mr. Manju Hattotuwa’s contract as the CEO of ICTA has not been extended.
The vacancy had not yet been announced.
Nobody has been called for interviews.
But, you all can guess who will replace Manju in due time. (after a very transparent recruitment procedure, of course.)
Sri Lanka is a country that believes in transparency.
P.S: If you dont know me, I am a Information Security expert living in USA. (I have come to Sri Lanka on vacation.)
Quote
use other approaches
unquoteSee Following sites.
I hope this is more than enough.
The Shell of the ageing and ailing dinosaurs is too hard to crack and our public responsibility is very poor.I have some TV news clipping on this subject. Too heavy to upload. If Sandaya send me your address I can post a CD.
All he has to do is accept the error and pave way for the correction.
————————————
read the other approches that we had made regading the akuru issuehttp://www.akuru.org/newspaper.htm
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboConcerned
Rasaputra,
News circulating in the ICT field is that a guy called Rasaputra is the next CEO of the ICTA. Can it be you????? Well, Manju did his own mistakes but when compared to Dino, Manju is far ahead. Hope Rasaputra does not become another Dino.
People come and go but Sri Lanka has to move forward
Who ever comes please correct the Sinhala and Tamil Language issue
If you think Englsih is the language please change the constitution of Sri Lanka and make only English as the language of the government.
Then the SInhla and the Tamil language issue becomes a private affair.
Without the proper language there is no ICT in Sri Lanka
Either you change the constitution or publish a proper correct character allocation table with correct code points for Sinhala and Tamil. If you are unable to do please do not take up the posting. Give it to a person who can perform the job.
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboConcerned
Dear Future CEO,
Why not keep Donald as an advisor in ICTA since his ideas seems more practical than most of those high tech and higly educated guys?C. Rasaputra
Dear Concerned,
How can I tell you who is the CEO of ICTA in a situation where the vacancy is not even announced or anybody has been called for interviews?
Please wait ICTA Board will announce the vacancy in due course, and some idiots will apply. They will be called for interviews too and will be asked some stupid questions. Then the CEO will be recruited in a very TRANSPARENT manner. How can one tell this man is the CEO before completing this very TRANSPARENT process? :-)
This is a very TRANSPARENT country. In this country no appointements are given through backdoor. No deals are offered to companies ones political masters want them to be given. No bribes are taken from Samsung. Vert TRANSPARENT.
Know It All
Aha,
You talk the talk Rasaputra. Do you walk the walk too. TRANPARENCY is the last thing can happen in this appointment. The talk is that Vikaara Karawanage (VK) Samaranayake has influenced man without a chinthanaya to get a CEO who will let VK what to do. Since VK is too old to type a letter with a key board, he can’t be the CEO. Besides, VK wants someone else to go to courts when it matters. This is why he is comfortable in Kaarya Baarayak Nethi (president) seat. Poor Rasaputra will have to pay for all sins of VK. Rasa, meet those who knows any IT and nooks and corners of this island (like Donalds and those kids in MV) before assuming duties. You won’t lose. You will be in the bad books as soon as you start listening to VK, the ageing Dino.
JC Ahangama
A modern GLOSSARY of terms that all non-technical Lankans too will understand and SHOULD READ.
==========UNICODE TABLE: A list of numbers (called code points) associated with names of alphabetic characters of languages of the world (e.g. 3493 = SINHALA LETTER TAALUJA
SANYOOGA NAASIKYAYA. (They knew that? They knew MY Sinhala letter? Wow! I feel proud)SCRIPT (According to Unicode): A set of shapes of characters used by users of a particular language
ENGLISH: Uses an Alphabet
SIMPLE SCRIPTS: Languages that use Latin character set (have alphabets)
SINHALA: Uses an Abugida (Sounds like a cardboard box falling down a staircase); used by natives of Sri Lanka. It’s script is used by many people world over, especially Germans, English, Japanese and Americans as Pali. It can be completely romanized to look and use just like a Western European language. Plus, it can be shown in traditional characters too! (A Unicode code point is ONLY A NUMBER with a name)
COMPLEX SCRIPT: Right-to-left Arabic and Hebrew plus Left-to-right Indiclanguages!! No way that Sinhala is closer to other Indo-European languages than Arabic, for sure. (No conspiracy here)
ISO: A company based in Europe that controls scientific standards world over and protects European interests and helps or manipulates Third World bureaucrats when it is good for European business interests.
UNICODE, Inc: A company in US whose directors are from Microsoft, Apple IBM and others in the information technology industry. It was formed in the nineties to promote interests of its directors (obviously) and to implement the Unicode system. They had a meeting with ISO and persuaded them to agree to work together. (It was only a family re-union of cousins, not a conspiracy. They did not know at that time India and China are large countries with up and coming development because they do not think far like we S-r-i Lankans.)
DEVELOPED WORLD: Countries with small populations that control world economy by making other countries believe that they have to use western money even when other countries trade among themselves.
THIRD WORLD: Former colonies of Europeans. The colonial masters have conditioned these societies to be permanently subdivided into two main classes: the western oriented elite class (generally fat or go to gyms and jog like in the west and speak English at home) and the ordinary people (mostly thin and look emaciated and speak a native language). The ordinary people are made to think that the world is too complicated and only the elites can figure it out and they only qualify to rule the country. The elites in turn think (secretly) that the world is too complicated and only the sophisticated former colonial master knows best. (When they write their country’s celebrated constitution they get a colonial master’s agent to oversee it, just in case). They sub divide themselves to represent various Western political ideologies – capitalist, socialist, communist etc. — means to come to power and ‘make hay while sun shines’ and let the foreign expert do the ‘right thing’. They don’t do real work but order others around and travel abroad, exactly what the Western business interests want.
Come back! there’s more…
LATIN CODE BLOCKS: Numbers assigned letters used by Western European languages. They are the exception to the rule of Unicode that each code point has a unique name that identifies an alphabetic letter from a particular human language. (Recall TAALUJA…). Latin codes have only English names. The French, German, Italian, Icelandic etc. shamelessly use the code points with English names. (This is not a conspiracy). Some decades back the small European nations decided it is best that they all use the same alphabet, give and take a few. Even Hitler gave up Fraktur, saying it is Jewish when he found it was counter productive for business.SINHALA UNICODE BLOCK: Has every code point given our own character name (Thank you master)
THE INTERNET: A common communication network that transmits information cheaply. In the US, the connection to the Internet is mostly delivered over unused parts of the electrical signal that is anyway present in cable and telephone lines and even the electricity grid. American businesses believe that an always-on flat fee connection to the Internet for their customers is profitable business.
UNICODE ON INTERNET: The Internet is now getting logically sub divided according to Unicode code page blocks. (Arabic, Japanese, Chinese English etc.). Users of each language specific code block can see only their language plus the Latin code block characters. This essentially confines and conditions the ordinary people of the Third World who know only the native language to use and read only their local language, unless they are like African that use Latin characters. To see the effect of this, go to http://www.unicode.org and then click on ‘What is Unicode’. In the resulting window see how many languages are question marks in the left-hand side column.
LANGUAGE: The cultural base of the people. It is also a set of words adjusted and added to by the elite to make subjects of their expertise harder to learn by others. In Lanka the ‘Science elite’ add Sanskrit words to make the learning curve of science a vertical line — to prevent children from learning science.
Quote
TRANPARENCY is the last thing can happen in this appointment.
unquoteBefore Mr Manju was appointed — this post was announced in the News papers. I applied for it.—(after several months) — my application was never acknowledged or rejected but Mr Manju was appointed.
This is Sri Lanka
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboKnow It All
Donald,
There will be no interviews or whatsoever. Rasaputhra is coming from a VERY HIGH place. You are not related to any high place. So, what you are supposed to do is just wait and see till country goes to waste. I don;t think it is real Rasaputhra who is writing in this blog. This must be somone who is fed up with TRANSPARENCY of the high place. THis is a crazy island and this is why u still have Dinos domincating the IT world. Unfortunately, none of our newspapers, IT mags talk about these things because they will lose ad space. This is a world of mafia.
If you want anything done, get hold of a big man’s (MR) brther. This is the new trend of the counry now.
C. Rasaputra
Dear Know it all,
You are you to say I am not real Rasaputra?
I am real Rasaputra, man. Do you know what Rasaputra means in Sinhala? It means the SON OF THE DEVIL. I am the SON OF THE DEVIL. Only a son of the devil can bring the things straight at ICTA and that is why they are taking me there from the BACKDOOR.
Yes, there will be an advertisement of the paper and may be some mock interviews, but dont worry, that will not prevent me from being the CEO from ICTA.
Some may call is Parachuting, but I call it TRANSPARENCY.
Donald, if you have some brains, dont apply for the post of ICTA CEO. Only idiots apply for a post which is already filled.
Unlike Manju and VK, Rasaputra and VK make a good combination. They both share Mahinda Chinthana. They both will try their best to implement Mahinda Chinthana at ICTA.
If anyone of you want to contact me (specially those who seek any position in ICTA) I am presently work at Vice Chairman at the Airport and Aviation Service Ltd.
My contact details are:
Tel 94-11-2252745
Fax 94-11-2253187E-mail:vicechairman@airport.lk
Donald, please write to me. We can meet and discuss how you will help me to implement Mahinda Chinthana at ICTA.
samarajiva
For information.
I was a member of the interview panel that selected Manju Hattotuwa and the original leadership team at ICTA. The position was advertised. My recollection is that something like 39 applications were received for the CEO position. Shortlisting was done by PriceWaterhouseCoopers based on criteria that the panel agreed on. Multiple rounds on interviews were held with the shortlisted candidates, in some case over videoconferencing facilities when persons were living outside Sri Lanka. That was how the selection was made.
It is the practice in my organization to inform persons who are not shortlisted that they are no longer under consideration. But most people who are involved in hiring in Sri Lanka would know that the opposite is the norm (only those who are shortlisted are informed).
Know It All
We don’t care from wich door (back or front) you Son of the Devil comes. Please do the right thing for the sake of the country. eSri Lanka is the only thing that can make MR win next election if rightly implemented.
Donald has to settle his problems with now ProiceWater….
Hope Milnda only listened to PriceWater when Manju was selected.
BTW, What is happening to Manju now?
Sandhya Herath
A person who comes through the back door will never be able to do a straight job.
The corollary is a person who wants to go a good and honest job has no need to come through the back door.
A person is given an appointment through backdoor, definitely;
(a) He is not qualified for the job
(b) Somebody wants him to do some dirty work
(c) Being not qualified enough there is an assurance he will not leave, if he were asked to do unethical thingsI guess Mr. Rasaputra will be a good match for Prof. Sam.
Thakata Thaka!
Jaadiyata Mudiya!Quote
Donald, please write to me. We can meet and discuss how you will help me to implement Mahinda Chinthana at ICTA.
unquoteTo implement the Chintanaya we need the language.
Without the language how come you introduce any program.
Please visit these sites
http://www.akuru.org/it_times.htm
http://www.akuru.org/images/digital divide1.jpg
http://www.akuru.org/images/CAT4march2006.jpg
http://www.akuru.org/images/rawaya2.jpg
http://www.akuru.org/images/lanka29aug.jpg
I have the solution not the Emeritus Professor or his group.
My assistance is always available to develop the Sinhala and Tamil langauge to use in computer.
Once it is done you can use it to implement any Chintanaya
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboIf found a report in the pdf format.
ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL COMMISSION FOR ASIA AND THE PACIFIC
REGIONAL ROAD MAP TOWARDS AN INFORMATION SOCIETY IN ASIA AND THE PACIFICST/ESCAP/2283
I quote several paragraphs selected from this report.
Quote
Other major barrier as regards
the content is the language. There are more than 4,000 languages in the Asia-Pacific region, but over 68 per cent of the websites use the English language.The most pressing common issues in many of the developing
countries that hinder ICT development are:
· Underdeveloped IT industry;
· Inadequate access;
· Inadequate ICT infrastructure;
· Social factors-low literacy, predominantly poor and rural population untouched by and fearful of machines;
· Lack of general awareness about Internet and computers;
· Language barrier, most content is in English, not local
language;
· Absence or inadequate locally relevant content;
· Lack of appropriate bandwidth, particularly in rural areas;
· Lack of availability or poor reliability of power supply where available;Generation, development and enhancement of local content in the local language. It should be accorded high priority to ensure that relevant information is available for users as well as enablers and innovative and participatory use of media and ICTs to encourage gender equality and good governance through the production of content for/by women and communities covering the diversity of interests and concerns.
Develop and commercialize machine or major Asian languages;
Of the more than 6,800 languages in the world, 3,500 (51 per cent) are spoken in the Asia-Pacific region,
(c) Preserving linguistic and cultural diversity and promoting local content
Linguistic and cultural diversity enriches the development of society by giving expression to a range of different values and ideas. It can facilitate the spread and use of information by presenting it in the language and cultural context most familiar to the user, thereby further encouraging the use of ICTs.Promoting broadband networks in the Asia-Pacific region could not only support research, business and personal activities, but also help to preserve cultural diversity and indigenous knowledge and traditions. In this context, an effort should be made to support multilingual domain names, local content development, digital archives, diverse forms of digital media, content translation and adaptation. The development of standard and recognized character sets and language codes should also be supported.
Support for improved localization of assistive technologies, including the resources and specific technologies needed to support effective operation of those assistive technologies. Examples: speech engines for local languages needed for effective operation of screen readers; electronic lexicons for local sign languages needed for rendering audio or textual content into sign language for display in electronic media; and voice recognition algorithms for local languages;
Governments should require that local language applications and content use standard character encoding and modeling, and should encourage dialog on accessibility requirements of character encoding and modeling.
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboVKS
See what a fool Bill Gates is. He is going to do full time charity leaving the big chair in Microsoft for young and wild!!!! I will never leave a big chair for the young as long as I and (my golayas live on this planet.”
I must try getting into Microsoft’s big chair. Who must I bribe. Should get NY Times’ backing on my credentials.
I must try to become the President of Sri Lanka Cricket Board too. After all, I am over qualified as I have done more dirty work than Thilanga.
I must also try to become the president of the Three Wheeler Association too. This is a poweful association and they even fielded a candidate for the election.
I must run for the next Presidential Election too. Who knows the people will country will vote for my Sam Sung Chinthanaya. I can pledge the youth to give more Korean jobs at Sam Sung.
VKS
“Bill Gates transformed his boyhood hobby into a sprawling software empire called Microsoft that made him the world’s richest person and one of the most successful entrepreneurs ever.
Yet Gates was never as ostentatious about his immense wealth as some other high-tech billionaires and the Harvard dropout said on Thursday he plans to reduce his role at the company he co-founded to pour his energy into giving away his billions rather than developing software.
He and his wife, Melinda, have already donated tens of billions of dollars to various causes and their foundation — which aims to improve education and health around the world — is one of the biggest charity funds in history.
Gates also frequently speaks and writes on issues such as fighting cancer and AIDS, and has invested hundreds of millions of dollars of his personal fortune in biotechnology companies.
“With great wealth comes great responsibility,” Gates told Thursday’s news conference, where he said that by July 2008 he will have completed his job transition to the foundation.”
When I aw the name I thought the real VKS had come on the blog and was happy to read his comments.
By the way I wrote an E mail to Mr Rasaputra 36 hours have passed no reply.
I am pasting the text for your perusal
Dear Rasaputra
Greetings from Donald.
Is your office is at the airport or in Colombo?
Anyway I would like to meet you in Colombo
Best
Donald
Donald Gaminitillake
ColomboAnonymous
Donald,
Let him assume duties. Don’t sacare Rasaputra away.
Quote
Donald, please write to me. We can meet and discuss how you will help me to implement Mahinda Chinthana at ICTA.
unquoteIt was Mr Rasaputra wanted me to contact him. Yet to receive an acknowledgement
Now 48 hrs have passed.Donald Gaminitillake
Colomboudadedara man
My Dear VKS,
Oya nahina dehina kale, umbata mona computerda bun?
Umba me heta anidda vala kajja gahanda inna eka, pansalakata gihilla para loketa pinak dahamak karaganin bun.
Great find. I think most of us need this training, specially those who are clinging to the products that they made with half-baked ideas.Dharma,
Keep wishing for a free freedom — it isn’t there. Stop blaming people and act!
For Sinhala there is an incomplete set but these guys never did anything for Tamil Language.
I was the only person publicly voiced equal usage of both languages Sinhala and Tamil using a computer. Both languages do have a problems when using a computer.
I have the Solution but these people are scared even to give it a try because their “Chesse” will get moved.
Donald Gamnitillake
Colombo
Keep wishing for a free freedom — it isn’t there. Stop blaming people and act!
[unquote]
Who wants free lunches? At least I do not. All I said was we have spent so much for this so called standards development and it is gross ridiculous if someone suggests that I still have to pay for using Sinhala in my computer.
Why should I need to pay twice (once to Sri Lanka government in tax and then to you) for the simple task of using Sinhala in my computer?
Please enlighten me what actions should I take.
I lived in Lanka for 37 years and perfectly understand the mentality of socialism — expect the government to provide and then blame it for failure.
You are trapped in the notion that Unicode means Sinhala Unicode page. That is only a concept by Unicode Inc. that furthers the business interests of it’s members and especially the directors. They are not forcing you to accept their idea. They only think that it is a good idea. For me, it is NOT a good idea. The reason is that it isolates Sinhala from the inner circle of Unicode users. Chinese, Arabic and even other Indic languages can afford to use their own Unicode pages because they have large user bases that can provide a useful network of communication — independent internets. Small countries like us should not adopt isolated Code pages. (None of the European nations did. Fraktur and Gaelic are different scripts but are still based on the first two Unicode code pages.) Choosing a code page is OUR choice — individuals as well as the government. Making fonts is our responsibility too. This decision is too grave to be entrusted to a handful of bureaucrats. It’s people’s work. They own and use the language.
Here is a quote by a pioneering mathematician and linguist that is watching my progress (it was obviously an email message with some spelling/language errors):
“In the years up to say, 1960, one studying science at a university would also study latin and prehaps greek, because much of the older stuff was written in these languages. Newton wrote as much in Latin as English, and indeed, the notion of papers written in English, or french or german, was unheard of. Still, times have change[d], and because the english, and later americans, took an early lead in technology, much of the rest of the world came to use these languages [English versions].
India was for a while colonised by the british, and the retention of english there as an official language, is more a case of not trying to put either of a dravidian or h[i]ndu language over the other, and so they created this foreign language as a “lingua franca”.
It’s the same in europe, too. Much more is written in english, even for germans in germany, than in german. It is more because english has a larger vocabulary, and much of the language stuff has been nutted out. English is the new Latin, in this regard.”
We cannot isolate the Sinhala natives from the rest of he world because of a script. While preserving Sinhala, they need to know English too. Basing the Sinhala script on roman character set would facilitate learning of English by exposure. We have found that over the past years English is only the domain of the elite. I know it is a language that can be learned by self study and effort. That’s how I learned it when I (along with others in my 8th grade class) was force promoted to an English-only GCE class. Free access to the Internet coupled with Sinhala based on first two Unicode pages is what I think would hold the Sinhala user withing the greater community of the Internet.