After the huge success of WinterWorkshop conducted by Free software movement Karnataka during the last week of January, FSMK along with its growing number of volunteers have on their toes with future events. The recent one was Swataha-short for “ಸ್ವಾತಂತ್ರ್ಯತಂತ್ರಾಂಶ habba”(Free Software Fest). 

Swataha was I think the first of its kind fest to be conducted at a state level. It was 3 days of freedom,technology,hacking and fun-Conducted at PES college of engineering, Mandya. A city located 100Kms from Bangalore.

Even for FSMK this was the first time we were trying out a completely distributed event. Adding to this the complete ground work was handled by students of PES college of engineering,Mandya. With FSMK just acting as a guide for the students.

The fest was distributed over 3 days, with all three days having a number of activities planned for the complete day. Workshops were planned for students of Computer Science and Electronics stream of students. Computer science students saw workshops on latest technologies of Drupal and Android, and those in tronics were introduced to the world of robotics and PCB designing.

Apart from workshops the event also had various sessions about latest free software technologies  handled by industrial experts, students and academicians. Students took on the streets of Mandya on the first day, to help bringing awareness among the people about free software and promoting the use of Free software for regular activities. Students walked around the city shouting slogans, holding placards, talking to the local folks and also helping DTP operators and internet cafe users switch to Free Software.

It was another FSMK event with saw students pouring in hundreds from all over the state. As usual it was another awesome experience meeting and working along with a new set of students.  

With the success of 2 major state level events FSMK gears up for another -this summer! keep a close watch on the fsmk site for more updates.