Open Source Worldwide
There is tremendous interest in open technologies in countries outside the United States. Representatives from South Africa, Mali, Korea, Japan and many other nations attended the 2006 CoSN International Symposium on open technology. In the developing world open source software and applications make it possible to deploy software that would be cost prohibitive if it were proprietary.
For non-English speaking countries there is always the need to localize software to other languages. Fortunately many open source learning management and content management systems have been designed with localization in mind; they keep the text separate from the functional code.
Ubuntu Linux has become one of the most popular international Linux releases because it is completely free, including free shipping of installation discs. It comes with the Gnome desktop interface. Edubuntu is a variation that is customized for the student desktop.
Dr. Nicholas Negroponte from MIT has announced a “$100 laptop” that is intended to be affordable to students in the developing world. A low cost open source operating system is essential for this effort. http://laptop.media.mit.edu/
The K Desktop Environment (KDE) for Unix and Linux has been translated into 70 languages. The KDE edutainment project was started in Europe and now has a worldwide following. Sharing open content worldwide is a more difficult effort because of the many cultural and language barriers. Perhaps with portability and interoperability of content will also come ease of localization.
