Sinhala Linux-Who started it and where it is now?

Sinhala Linux-Who started it and where it is now?

Posted on April 11, 2011 |

I can categorically say one thing for certain, it was our own Anuradha from Kandy who started Sinhala Linux, way back in late nineties and early this century but it went into hibernation after tsunami in 2004 but now it has emerged in 3 or 4 Linux versions I have tested.

They are as follows

1. Fedora 13 2. Debian 6.0.0 3. Sabayon 5.5 4. Hanthana Linux 5. Fedora 15 Alpha ( believe-downloading 15 KDE alpha currently)

My profuse apologies to FEDORA Team for jumping the gun and giving the credit to Debian as the first distribution supporting Sinhala Linux.

I was wrong and apologies are with this little update on Sinhala Linux.
I have dissociated with Fedora from Core 3 but did not use it for 10 versions (3 to 13) for many reasons but it is not the purpose of this writing.

First thing first, it was Fedora 3 that allowed the Sinhala font to be used, and I am proud to say I used it with open office a decade ago when nobody was interested in Linux.

Then Mandrake (not Mandriva) allowed the Sinhala font installation but I was never expecting the Sinhala capability of Linux until now with Anuradha drawn into other work by accident.

I have changed myself a lot and given up all and gone to PCLinux which is only in English and 32 bits version.

Reason being the introduction of Live CDs which it was pioneer from Big Daddy stage.

It has FullMonty and there is a version of it named (not by them, texstar tells me) as apartheid (it means what it says) which has brought bad taste to Linux community (only for white people-Mr.Shuttleworth of Ubuntu must take action now to wean the bad eggs in Linux community even if they are not under his fold).

There is Linux dedicated to Bible and I see no problem with it but Obama in high office this propaganda is something not for the current century.

What I am getting at is, all Linux Distributions including PCLinux should have multi-language capability and I give lot of credit and marks for that. It is now happening in, French, German, Spanish and Russian.

Linux is global and for everybody unlike Microsoft or Apple Mac and multi-language capability is a must.

Coming back to Fedora when I realized that it has Sinhala capability and it is changing fast I decided to download all 5 CDs of Fedora 13 and DVD. I downloaded all the versions of Fedora 14 and I was not impressed and did not check Sinhala capability since Fedora 15 was round the corner.

After nearly 3 days of downloading I managed to have a DVD in my hand and tried it and found the Sinhala capability (I now invariably check for that ability now) in installation. So my ignorance was exposed and I have to correct that right away.

In defense of Fedora, I have all the versions of Redhat from 7 to 9 and Fedora Core from 1 to 3 and now Fedora 13 and above.

Suffice is to say, the most number of books and CDs I have are from Redhat and Fedora even though I did not use it for my work recently. My entry into checking 100 Live CDs was a harbinger and the Rediscovery of Linux Potential and for two years I have been downloading and testing Linux and I am in the final (stage) lap of honours to all Linux Distributions and Communities, especially with multi-language capability.

Not only that I found a Fedora Bible (the book) with Fedora 6 version CD / DVD and bought it to add to my collection and for reference purpose and I am gong to support Fedora with all my heart from now onwards in spite of forgivable misgiving with Redhat Team, sometime ago.

My only concern is that Redhat is introducing so many changes in so little time, will it be possible to have a stable edition like Debian (with many derivatives) for me to use.

I might even consider dropping PCLinux if they are resistant to other languages other than English.

It is time for other distributions to take the lead from Debian and Fedora and take Linux to new heights with muli-language capability.

Sorry for me being political here.

I hate politics of all types whether, it is economic, power, race or language.

Update on Fedora 15 Alpha KDE I have now downloaded and tested the pre-release alpha version and it has no Sinhlaa capability in installation. In addition it has some difficulty in detecting hardware. It appears sleek and my genuine fears already compounded by its rapid change in many areas including file system and program selection make me feel hesitant to recommend for a newbie, especially in Sri-Lanka.

Best bet is to use Fedora 13 and see how it works but download DVD version, (or 5 CD version) and not live CDs (see how it works for you).

This is the same reservation I have for Hanthana Linux which is based on Fedora 15.  

I have not been able to download it beyond 700 MiB but I will keep trying.

Fedroa 13 took almost 3 days with one or two seeds. Debian multi arch is taking about 7 days with one seed. It is painfully slow even with K-Torrent if seeds are not there.

In the mean time I have downloaded many others including CTKarchlive, Trisequel, Astrumi and Puppy and many other small utilities, including sound drivers for Microsoft.

I am also happy to report I managed to download Taylor Swift Swift Linux after about 40 (forty odd) attempts. That was something based on Debian and AntiX (Mepis) and plays a Taylor Swifts song at boot time which was very pleasing. It is meant for low RAM of 256 or so and old computers. Download and try it please if your Internet is fast enough!