Intel helps students engineer Saudi Arabia’s digital future

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March 8, 2006

Intel Corporation's vaunted Digital Transformation Initiative for the Middle East reached an important milestone in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia with the announcement of an internship programme aimed at some of the Kingdom's brightest science brains.

The King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals in Dhahran has joined hands with Intel to offer its best students special placements at Intel facilities as part of the Intel Engineering Excellence Program. This program will enable Intel and KFUPM to address the needs of skills development and knowledge transfer, which will in turn contribute towards enhancing the overall Professional standing of the KFUPM graduates.

The Intel Engineering Excellence Program is part of Intel's Digital Transformation Initiative and the first chapter of this initiative has been launched in the Gulf's largest economy. It helps students in ICT-related fields gain unparalleled work experience and training, provide the building blocks for information-based economies, creating job opportunities and improving competitiveness in the global digital marketplace. It also underscores Intel's long-term commitment to promote technology skills, knowledge transfer and economic development in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the rest of the region.

Running for three to six months, the internships are only open to Saudi Nationals. Intel will offer handpicked students internships at its sites around the world. The internships will be implemented through the KFUPM's Cooperative (COOP) Program, which aims to bolster the practical experience of students prior to graduation and equip them with the necessary vocational skills to excel in the workplace. The Intel Engineering Excellence Program seeks top science and engineering undergraduates, post-graduate and doctorate students whose studies encompass relevant subjects in the Information Communication Technology sphere, such as computer science and engineering, wireless communications, and electrical engineering.

A managing committee will review applications, and a policy specialist will monitor the program to ensure internships match the evolving ICT objectives of the Kingdom. This committee will specify technical areas of interest to guide the selection of students, and the most promising candidates will be picked through a series of interviews. A sophisticated reporting and evaluation structure for the internships will also be put in place. In October 2005, Intel announced its Digital Transformation Initiative for the Middle East, which encompasses programs tailored to improve digital accessibility, education, entrepreneurship, and specialized competencies.

Microsoft seeking ways to help illiterate

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digitalLEARNING Network

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March 6, 2006

Working with a local advocacy group at a research lab in India, Microsoft has developed a prototype of a system that would connect illiterate domestic workers in India with families seeking their services. The system uses pictures, video and voice commands to tell women what jobs are available, how much the jobs pay and where they are.

The Associated Press reports in The New York Times that the goal is to help the women see how technology can make finding work more efficient, as the first step toward creating broader tools to help illiterate people benefit from technological advances. The software was on display as part of Microsoft Research TechFest, an annual gathering of employees from the company's various research and development centres. The researchers, located in China, India, England and the United States, provide the company with a mix of far-flung technology and more practical applications. Researchers on the Indian project say they have had to overcome their preconceptions about how the technology should work, and why people would want to use it.

Learn Japanese for IT opportunities

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digitalLEARNING Network

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March 3, 2006

The IT sector of Kerala is seriously contemplating giving Japanese language training courses to professionals.

A handful of language experts 'from the land of rising sun' have come forward to offer training for software engineers and testers who opt for Japanese firms. In the wake of 9/11 incident, software firms have shifted their focus from the US to Japan, which is ranked second in world economy. Hence, the number of students learning the language has shot up in Kerala to take advantage of the opportunity.The Alumni Society of AOTS (ASA) Kerala, at Aluva, too has been involved in Japanese language promotion since its inception in 1989 and has two study centres in Kochi. It is part of a worldwide network of voluntary service organisations whose members have specialised knowledge in technical and management fields acquired from Japan through the Association for Overseas Technical Scholarship (AOTS), Tokyo.To tide up with the situation, IT majors such as Wipro, Infosys, TCS and outsourcing firms are here now make the hey while sun shines.

Digitalisation of European Libraries

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digitalLEARNING Network

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March 3, 2006

The European Commission aims to achieve not a single database, but rather integrated access to the digitised material of Europe's cultural institutions. < ?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

The European digital libraries initiative addresses all types of material: books, audiovisual material, photographs, documents in archives etc. Archives and museums will be invited at an early stage to contribute and make their material accessible and usable through the European digital library.

Good news for the digital learners

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digitalLEARNING Network

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March 3, 2006

Google and the British library the world's greatest research library are joining forces to offer researchers, students and academics desktop delivery of millions of full text scholarly research articles.< ?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

From yesterday, searches on Google scholar will include links to the British Library's document delivery service. Search results will be matched against the Library's holdings and where a match is made, users will have the option to obtain articles held via the British Library's online document ordering interface, British Library Direct. Lynne Brindley, Chief Executive of the British Library said that the library exists for everyone who wants to do research and it gives priority to initiatives that make collection more easily accessible. By partnering with Google Scholar, the British Library will enable users to identify and locate relevant articles more effectively than has previously been possible. They will provide a swift and easy means for users to have the required items delivered straight in their desktop. Below each successfully matched Google Scholar result, a 'BL Direct' link will appear. Users that click on the link will be taken to an online ordering form already populated with the bibliographic details of the desired article enabling copyright fee-paid supply to the desktop. Until now, online subject searches yielded many results that could not provide researchers with access to full text. By linking Google Scholar's search software with one of the world's largest document supply services, users can now complete the discovery-to-desktop-delivery process. Particular subject strengths in the British Library's research collections include medicine, pharmacy, engineering, science, food and agriculture, economics, environment, law and education. Articles that are available from the library can be delivered direct to users' desktops via Secure Electronic Delivery. Google Scholar enables users to search specifically for scholarly literature, including peer-reviewed papers, theses, books, preprints, abstracts and technical reports from all broad areas of research.

Online images tackle child issues

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digitalLEARNING Network

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March 3, 2006

A national children's charity has developed an image vocabulary to enable disabled children to express their feelings and help protect them from abuse. 'How it is' is an image vocabulary which users can browse online. It was developed to help children communicate about a range of important issues.

There are widely recognised gaps in existing symbol vocabularies, which reflect the social position of disabled children and contribute to their increased vulnerability to abuse. For example, children may be able to communicate about the National Curriculum but cannot say ''leave me alone''. The images allow children to be negative, to assert themselves and to describe a range of incidents including painful things that may have happened to them.

A Sussex-based consultancy developed the vocabulary, funded by the National Society for the Protection of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC). There are 383 images available in the set, which can be browsed online, printed or downloaded. The CD is free, subject to availability. It is possible to purchase the set as a CD-ROM and booklet for

Schools’ ICT spending booms in England

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digitalLEARNING Network

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March 2, 2006

Schools spend more than five times as much on computer-based resources as on books, recent figures suggest. An analysis of how state schools in England spend a total

Open source software for educational ICT

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digitalLEARNING Network

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March 2, 2006

Up-to-date advice for all colleges and universities in the UK about open source software is now available. The Joint Information Systems Committee realises that almost every further and higher education institution in the UK is making using of open source software. With the European Commission and the UK Government giving its support to its development and deployment, it has become a central issue for institutional management of IT systems and services in education.

'Open source' refers to software whose source code is openly available to be modified by end-users, in contrast to proprietary software. While such software is already in use in colleges and universities, it is rarely yet part of institutional policies and strategies and there are still a great many misunderstandings concerning it.
In this latest publication, JISC – supported by its advisory service OSS Watch – advocates the use of open source as the default for software development as well as providing guidelines on copyright, licensing, trademarks, patents and development practice.

US stops joining the worldwide web

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digitalLEARNING Network

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March 2, 2006

Internet usage in the US has flatlined, with a third of the country's households stubbornly refusing to sign up. And don't expect any sudden surges of interest – only two per cent of US citizens surveyed by Parks Associates plan to sign up this year.

This leaves 36 per cent of US households without an internet connection at home – and no intention of getting one, either. More worringly for the get-everyone-connected brigade, only four per cent of this sample cited cost as a reason for continuing to be domestic refuseniks, and only eight per cent said it was because the technology was too difficult to use. 31 per cent said they had a net connection at work, and so didn't need one at home, while 39 per cent cited other reasons for not signing up.

Microsoft multi-language software in India

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digitalLEARNING Network

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March 2, 2006

Software major Microsoft launched multi-language 'Windows XP Starter Edition for India' with English and local language computing interface, as part of its efforts to make computers more affordable, relevant and broadly available to first-time users in the country. Nine local languages will be supported on the operating system by the end of this year.

Microsoft also announced that HCL Infosystems, a PC vendor in Noida near Delhi, will be offering from April PCs based on the Starter Edition, on installments of about 399INR per month for an entry level PC. The PC will include Microsoft's entry level productivity application called Works 8, anti-virus software, and educational content. Broadband connectivity will be offered at additional cost.

Although the Starter Edition has been introduced in a number of emerging economies, this is the first time that the operating system will support multiple local languages and English. Microsoft of Redmond, Washington, launched the Starter Edition in Hindi in India last year. Versions of the Starter Edition in other Indian languages may also be considered depending on user response. A decision to include English as an option was taken after the company discovered a large base of users who preferred an English version, according to Microsoft sources.

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