Oct 05 2008
Rwanda Linux Users’ Group
Today, at Bourbon Coffee in the MTN Center in Kigali, Rwanda, the first meeting of the Rwanda Linux Users’ Group was held.
3 members of the OLPC core team and 3 employees of Pivot Access attended. And me!
I met Chris Mutessa of Pivot Access at the OLPC Rwanda Workshop event on October 1st. He was running the LED-screen system. Chris uses Linux.
My first hint was seeing VLC on the computer that was running the big screen. My second was how well-versed on computer software Chris was in my initial conversation with him. Then he told me he uses Ubuntu on his own personal laptop, it’s on all of the computers (desktops and servers) at his full time job, and that the same went for all of his coworkers.
Let’s have coffee! I invited the whole OLPC core team.
The drinks were delicious, and the meeting was encouraging. The attendees created a mission statement, or goals for the group:
Rwanda LUG Goals:
- To foster a culture of collaboration and knowledge sharing.
- To promote Free and Open Source software in Rwanda.
- To engage Rwanda in the global Open Source community.
- To accelerate the progress towards the goals of Rwanda’s Vision 2020.
- To create a universal awareness of Rwanda’s technological potential.
If you are in Rwanda and are interested in finding out what Linux is all about (or are already using it), join the public discussion list. There was talk of setting up a website, a public forum for Linux support in Rwanda, and a software development repository for group projects.
