Biz-Tech

Nenasara mobile digital library helps rural community

Sanjeevi Jayasuriya

The launch of Nenasara mobile digital library project was held Wednesday under the patronage of Telecommunication and Information Technology Minister Ranjith Siyambalapitiya.

The Nenasara project is for distribution of software and information technology content prepared under the e-Sri Lanka initiative which are very useful for the public.

All software and IT content that have been prepared up to now will be available for distribution under this mobile digital library program.

The program is launched with the objective of distributing the relevant IT content at village level with specific sectors targeted. The sectors include farmers, fishermen, students and hearing and vision impaired persons.

The Nenasara mobile library for digital content project is yet another important project implemented under the e-Sri Lanka initiative for supplementing the knowledge of the people of rural areas regarding information technology, an official from Information and Communication Technology Agency of Sri Lanka (ICTA) said.

Information technology software, applications and content have been created to fulfil various community needs under the e-Society development program. Motivating people further for using these information technology applications and content that would lead to an economic, social and cultural resurgence of the rural community and different professions, he said.

The Nenasara mobile library contains information on various topics and 210 subjects and will be of service to the public, government and non-government organizations, community organizations and social service institutions. The project was launched by the Nenasala and in Weligama fisherfolk found areas where fish is concentrated and disseminating this information to the fishing community through SMS using satellite technology was done.

While distributing very important software, applications and content free to persons who require them, the project officers who visit the villages along with Nenasara will also take steps to provide free basic training to the community for effective use of these aids. Over Rs seven million has been invested in this training project.

[email protected]

Kaspersky launches Endpoint Security 8 anti-malware

Sanjeevi Jayasuriya

Data protection has increasingly become important where 70,000 new threats to information technology emerge every day. This calls for a better level of protection and control of the information technology infrastructure, Kaspersky Lab Chief Product Officer Peter Merkulov said.

Avian Technologies (Pvt) Ltd, the official sole distributor for Kaspersky Lab anti-virus software for Sri Lanka and Maldives launched Kaspersky Endpoint Security 8 for Windows and Kaspersky Security Centre.

The new endpoint protection solution and comprehensive management console are designed to keep business ahead of emerging threats with intelligent security solutions from the leading anti-malware experts at Kaspersky lab, he said.

Kaspersky accounts for 75 percent of the local market share and is confident that the company could maintain and expand the current customer base.

“We have an encouraging customer base locally and are moving to a bigger market share. The number of Kaspersky users globally are over 400 million. The solution secured the first place among similar products in terms of protection, usability and reliability,” he said. The company recorded $ 2.0 billion worth market share in 2010 and expects to expand it to $ 4 billion by 2014.

“Our customers are assured of superior quality of protection due to the cutting edge technology of the product. This product has been endorsed by AV test and secured the highest marks in its first independent testing,” Merkulov said.

“With the new release, a comprehensive Endpoint protection platform that consists of seamlessly integrated security modules is delivered. We have merged real-time, cloud assisted protection with intelligent proactive endpoint protection.

We have created a compelling security centre that will help companies of all sizes to protect themselves against emerging IT threats including targeted attacks and thereby improve productivity,” he said.

WSO2 becomes full member of OSGi Alliance

WSO2 is now a full member of the OSGi Alliance. The worldwide consortium is dedicated to creating open specifications based on the OSGi Service Platform that enable the modular assembly of Java-based software.

As a full member of the OSGi Alliance, WSO2 has full voting rights and will contribute directly to specification development.

The move extends WSO2’s commitment to OSGi compliance in order to provide enterprise middleware that enables agile service-oriented architecture (SOA) and composite application implementations. In 2009, WSO2 launched the award-winning open source WSO2 Carbon, the fully componentized enterprise middleware platform that complies with OSGi.

Today, WSO2 Carbon features 12 middleware products based on 150-plus components, which all use the same core enterprise-class framework and graphical unified management console.

It is complemented by the award-winning WSO2 Stratos, the 100% open source cloud middleware platform that builds on and extends WSO2 Carbon.

Because WSO2 Carbon and WSO2 Stratos share the same OSGi-compliant code, developers have unprecedented flexibility for writing applications once, deploying them on-premise or in the cloud, and then rapidly adapting them to meet changing enterprise demands.

“Four years ago, when we first began componentizing our middleware platform, many people still questioned the viability of OSGi-based enterprise software,” WSO2 director of architecture Afkham Azeez said.

“Now Global 2000 enterprises are using our WSO2 Carbon and WSO2 Stratos platforms, and even integrating their own OSGi-based components, to enable agile deployments on-premise and in the cloud.

“We’re honored to become a full OSGi Alliance member and look forward to contributing our real-world enterprise experience to the evolution of the OSGi specifications.”

“Modern enterprise software environments need tools that standardize the integration of existing code and make reusing existing components affordable, robust and reliable,” said Peter Kriens, director of technology of the OSGi Alliance and managing director of the OSGi consulting firm aQute.