RO: Universities start embracing open source software
Romanian universities are increasingly turning to open source software, resulting in increasing numbers of students attending the annual conference on free and open source software, eLiberatica, the organisers announced.
More than one hundred students attended this year's third edition of the conference, which took place in Bucharest last week.
The Politehnica University of Bucharest is using Ubuntu GNU/Linux in its PC laboratories and also has a 'Linux Centre' that is open to students. Another important academic open source example is RoEduNet, the main Internet provider for Romanian universities, which bases it services entirely on open source.
The take-up by universities of open source helps to explain why over the past few years tens of students from Romania have participated in the Google summer of code programming, a program offering stipends to students to develop open source applications. "For the first time, this year's Google summer of code will even have mentors from Romania", says says Adrian Curaj managing director of the Centre for Strategic Management at the Politehnica University.
Every year, the university organises an open source development contest, in cooperation with IBM. Other universities are organising similar open source initiatives.
The eLiberatica conference offers discount entry tickets for students and members of the open source community. "We want to reach out to especially these two groups", explains Lucian Savluc, one of the conference organisers. "Hopefully we will have many more students participate in next year's conference."
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