MEC.conf

Almost all of us are native Keralites who learnt and grew up with Malayalam. But when it comes to the resources we use to learn, be it MOOCs, or any other article or textbook, will always be in English. We can almost say that even with all the advancements in technology, Malayalam hasn’t caught up with them. When was the last time you read an article on machine learning written in Malayalam? The solution I propose is one which relies heavily upon the open-source community. To create and set in motion, a trend, of creating resources in Malayalam, as much as there are resources in English. In the end, we will have a very good resource pool, entirely in our own native language.

Outline #

• The session will start off by describing the problem we are facing - “a brain drain” of resources and in what all ways it may effect the next generation of students.
• Presently existing solutions, such as the projects started by SMC, IndicNLP etc can be discussed.
• Session closes with an outline of how we can contribute as students and open source enthusiasts to create a more balanced resource pool.
• The point that this will also be a suitable starting point for beginners in open source can be pointed out.

Requirements #

An open mind and the desire to learn

Speaker bio #

I’m a third year engineering student and a FOSS enthusiast. I have previously stumbled with the idea of democratizing and open sourcing learning resources into native languages. I had took part in the KDE Malayalam Localization, where we translated the entire Linux distribution into Malayalam. This inspired me, and I went on to create a website where I had put up machine learning resources which I had written in Malayalam.

Links #

• http://sreeram.me/Essence-of-ML/
• https://sreeram.me
• www.github.com/fillerInk