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Amit Saha
[[Image:{{{image}}}|none|none|Amit Saha]]
Personal Information
Birthday: {{{birthday}}}
Birthplace: {{{birthplace}}}
Home: Canberra, Australia
Fedora-specific Information
FAS-Name: amitksaha
Fedora-Mail: amitksaha@fedoraproject.org
Fedorapeople: http://amitksaha.fedorapeople.org
Miscellaneous Information
private Mail: droidery@gmail.com
GPG-Key: {{{gpg}}}
Homepage: echorand.me
Jabber: {{{jabber}}}

Hello there! I am Amit Saha. I am a Ph.D student at the University of New South Wales, Australia and my research focus is on Optimization using Evolutionary Algorithms. I have been involved in several open source efforts in the past, like the NetBeans IDE and bits and pieces in some other projects. I pursue technical writing as a serious pastime for 3+ years now. My blog has all the random bits and pieces and links to my articles and community efforts.

I shall summarize my efforts in the Fedora community on this page. My immediate plan for contribution to the Fedora community is to create a Fedora scientific spin which i describe next.


Fedora Scientific Spin

I am a long-term Linux user and have been into full-time scientific research for the past 3 years now. Everytime I have to do a fresh-install of Linux (not so frequently, ofcourse), I have to download a bunch of tools which I use regularly. For example, gnuplot, xfig, LaTex compilers, numpy, etc.

How cool would it be to have a Linux distro which already had these installed? Say hello to Fedora-Scientific

Update #1: June, 24 - 2011

I finally started acting on this idea of mine with an email to the rel-eng list [[1]].

After discussions on the mailing list with Bill Nottingham, I proposed a patch to the comps-f16-xml.in file [[2]].

I already have the kickstart file ready for this one, which I shall post to the mailing list soon, once I have tested my ISO. It currently stands at 1.1 G.

Update #2: June 29 - 2011

Started discussions on Spins SIG [3]

Update #3: July 03 - 2011

Created spin page at Scientific_Spin

Lot of interesting feedback and +1s on the local LUG list

Update #4: July 05 - 2011

Based on the suggestions on CLUG, added a number of development tools and libs and other packages. Please see the kickstart file linked from Scientific_Spin for the details. From being a bare-bone scientific distro, its becoming fully-loaded!

Update #5: July 08 - 2011

Moved the spin page to "Ready for Wrangler" category. I am currently using a Fedora scientific build on my desktop and all the custom applications seems to be working fine! There is also a discussion page for the spin now. Go there and leave your comments/suggestions.

Update #5: August 17 - 2011

The spin is still under review. I thought it might be a good idea to have both a GNOME 3 and KDE based spin. Infact I think I like KDE more now :-) So there will be two kickstart files, one for GNOME 3 and other for KDE. Uploaded some screenshots accessible from the Spin page.

Update #6: October 9 - 2011

The spin has been moved to the Ready for SIG category now. I have decided to go ahead with the KDE based desktop. Time to rejoice.

Fedora Resources

Creating a Fedora Live CD

Fedora Custom Spins

Nightly Rawhide Builds

Other Fedora Activities

Member and List administrator of Fedora Science and Technology SIG

Miscellaneous (random notes to self)

TODO: Blog post explaining the current state of the kickstart file, packages installed, ISO size, etc. Example test cases/programs for the various libraries/tools to see if everything is working as it should

TBD: Explore Yorick for packaging. Will possibly be of interest to SciTech SIG.

TBD: LaTex-Beamer for packaging - Beamer included in "texmaker". DONE.

TBD: Explore openopt for packaging.

Contact

Blog: http://echorand.me

Email: droidery@gmail.com

IRC: Not much of a IRC user.