Emmanuel's Visit

Shantabai Ladkat English Medium School, Nanapeth Pune had a unique visitor in November 2011. Emmanuel Engelhart from Switzerland is the creator of a program called "Kiwix" which runs "Wikipedia for Schools", a digital encyclopedia that runs on any computer, has over 6000 articles equal to 20 large encyclopedias. And it is completely free of charge, made to spread to schools for the benefit of teachers and students. 

Our school was one of the first in India to install and use this wealth of knowledge in our computer lab. So Emmanuel came to Pune specially to meet us and spent two full days interacting with all the students and the teachers, seeing his program in action in our lab and he even taught us a little French. We held a special ceremony for him to convey our gratitude for his noble and selfless work in the field of education that can empower millions of students all over the nation.

HOW TO deploy Wikipedia for Schools offline encylopedia on school computers

Bridge the internet divide; spread the light of knowledge to school computers the same way you share movies and songs with your friends: with Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V and a few clicks!

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AOffline_Wikipedia_install_guide.pdf

Thanks to Jessie and Emmanuel for their support and faith; it's an honor to be collaborating with you on this project!

Nikhil Sheth,
Teach for India Fellow, 2011-13
Grade 3 teacher, Shantabai Ladkat School, Nanapeth, Pune

Comment posted regarding Wikipedia for Schools... on Jimmy Wales' blog

Just posted a comment on... JIMMY WALES' BLOG!

Hi Mr.Wales,
I started spreading the Kiwix version of Wikipedia for Schools (2008/09 edition - the only one out there at present) since Jan 2011 when I was looking for something of this sort to put in the net-less computer lab in a school I'm volunteering with. The Kiwix version it's a lot more portable, compact (4GB compressed to 2.8GB and only one file for all the content) and is available for download from http://download.kiwix.org/portable/

I've started a page and a map (for India) where volunteers can co-ordinate on spreading the package (I've christened it WFSOE - wikipedia for schools, offline edition)
http://tinyurl.com/WFSOE (a wikia education pg)
http://tinyurl.com/WFSOEIndiaMap (a google maps link pg)
I'll be joining a 2-yr fellowship programmed shortly where I'll work as a teacher at under-resourced schools in 3 cities in India, as part of a movement to battle educational inequity. The Wikipedia for Schools fills a huge gap and can turn any simple computer into a digital reference library for students, giving them access to information that would be otherwise too expensive for them. I will try to spread this to my cohort of 400+ young people when our training begins in 2 weeks time.

Damn, so many typos and logical errors! I won't be teaching in 3 different cities.. my TFI group will !

Read his post here: http://blog.jimmywales.com/2009/10/24/a-small-wedding-gift/

Changing profile/index location for Kiwix on Windows

Quick primer : Go to http://tinyurl.com/WFSOE
Changing profile / index location for Kiwix on Windows. This can also be taken as a guide for pre-installing indexes for your zim files.
1. Go to a path like this: E:\Users\NIKHIL\AppData\Roaming\www.kiwix.org\Kiwix
--this path is for Windows 7 and Vista and on my PC the OS is on E: drive; for Windows XP it would probably be like
C:\Documents and Settings\Nikhil\Application Data\www.kiwix.org\Kiwix
2. Open profiles.ini to edit (just double-click or open with Notepad or whatever text editor you use)
Add these lines to whatever’s already there:

[Profile1]
Name=Localize
IsRelative=0
Path=C:\Kiwix Profile
Default=1

----------------
3. Make the new folder (“C:\Kiwix Profile” here), leave it empty, run kiwix once and then close it. After running you'll find all sorts of files have been created inside "C:\Kiwix Profile".
4. Shift the index folder from old to this new profile folder and rename it to something legible like "wikipedia_en_wp1_0.8_45000+_12_2010_rc1.zim.idx" (note: this is a folder, not a .idx file. All index folders have .idx or .index at the end.) so you can identify it with your zim file rather than those weird long alphanumeric names. See the library.xml in the old profile folder to figure out which .idx folder is for which zim file in case you’ve loaded multiple zims by now.
In case you don’t have it already, I’ve uploaded some indexes (incl. for the latest english wikipedia zim) on this shared online folder: http://www.4shared.com/dir/ua44LHvy/Indexes.html You can directly download and unzip them to the new profile (using 7-zip).
5. Open library.xml inside the profile in a text editor and make a change like this:
<library current="4dd18dea-9afd-080a-080a-50c68d62072f5675"><book id="4dd18dea-9afd-080a-080a-50c68d62072f5675" path="C:\Wikipedia\wikipedia_en_wp1_0.8_45000+_12_2010_rc1.zim" last="1298420521" indexPath="C:\Kiwix Profile\wikipedia_en_wp1_0.8_45000+_12_2010_rc1.zim.idx" indexType="xapian"/></library>
Take care of your absolute paths.
6. To add more indexes, simply repeat the steps and remember to vary the ‘book id’ variable in library.xml. Also you may set last=”undefined”. It should all be between the <library …> </library> tags.
7. Now run Kiwix again. Hopefully it should be done.

get your copy of Wikipedia for Schools +more at at GNUnify 2011, SICSR Pune, today and tomorrow

Hi Wikipedians and Friends,

I'll be there all day today at SICSR Pune (http://gnunify.in/) and will also transfer to someone at the college; anybody interested in getting a DVD-ready copy of Wikipedia for Schools Offline Edition, you can copy it from us here. Bring a USB or computing device with min 2.7GB free space.

I'm very grateful for the organizers at GNUnify for giving a generous slot tomorrow (12th Feb, 11:45am) to talk and discuss about Wikipedia for Schools project. Please attend! You can read up more on it on http://tinyurl.com/WFSOE


I'm also bringing the dumps of :
Wikipedia English Dec 2010 selection (wikipedia_en_wp1_0.8_45000+_12_2010_alpha1.zim, 3.74GB),
Hindi Wikipedia (wikipedia_hi_all_01_2011_beta1.zim, 483MB),
Marathi Wikipedia (wikipedia_mr_all_01_2011_beta1.zim, 212MB),
Gujrati Wikipedia (wikipedia_gu_all_01_2011_beta1.zim , 112MB)

All these can of course be downloaded online from http://tmp.kiwix.org/zim/0.9/
(Due thanks to Emmanuel and Kiwix team for speedy creation of the Indian language dumps!)

So see you there, and let's bridge the internet divide, using the Largest Ebooks ever Created ! (sorry, couldn't resist using that!)


Cheers,
Nikhil Sheth
+91-966-583-1250
Pune, India
Teach For India Fellow, 2011-13
www.nikhilsheth.tk
Find me on: Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn | Google | RangDe
Join me on: Pune Documentary Club | Let's Do it Pune | Toastmasters in Pune | Wikipedia For Schools project

Cover letter for Wikipedia For Schools

I was asked by a school principal to prepare a letter describing the Wikipedia For Schools so the school trustees can get to know about it before giving their permission to install in in their computer lab. This is where a realization dawned : I had till then just assumed I'd pass on the URL and whoever needs to know will see it and know. It's not so, and I'm glad I was made to sit and create a cover letter as it solidified the initiative. I'm sharing the cover letter here. Please evaluate it and give any recommendations in the comments section.

======================

Date: 9^th February 2011

Respected Sir / Madam,

Sub: Permission to install Wikipedia For Schools Offline Edition in computer lab

I am a Teach For India volunteer and will be joining TFI as a fellow this year (2011-13). I'm presently involved with a grassroots volunteer project where we want to spread an offline version of Wikipedia (largest online encyclopedia in the world), specifically made for school children from ages 8 to 17, to schools all over the country. For details please visit http://www.tinyurl.com/WFSOE

I would like to request permission to install this encyclopedia in the computer lab of your respected institution so that the students and teachers can benefit from it. There are no costs or charges involved.

The package is of 2.7GBs size and can be easily installed or copied from a DVD or a USB Drive to any computer in under 10 minutes. The software running it is Kiwix (http://www.kiwix.org), an open source free reader created for this purpose. We may need to also install "Microsoft Visual C++ 2008 drivers" (included, free) to make it run properly on older computers. Wikipedia For Schools is distributed for free and non-commercial use for spreading to schools around the world. Below is a paragraph quoted from their press release on http://www.soschildrensvillages.org.uk/charity-news/archive/2008/10/2008-wikipedia-for-schools :

Press Release: Wikipedia for Schools

Oct 22, 2008 12:00 PM

SOS Children UK, in coordination with the Wikimedia Foundation, has released a complete 2008/9 revision of the Wikipedia Selection for Schools, which is perhaps the most successful "checked content" project derived from the English Wikipedia. Previous revisions have been distributed off-line widely across the globe including by the Shuttleworth Foundation to South Africa Schools, by the Hole in the Wall project to rural Indian children and through SOS offices worldwide. The updated selection has the content of a 20 volume encyclopaedia - with 34,500 pictures, 20 million words and articles on more than 5500 topics….

….SOS Children's Villages is best known as the world's largest orphan charity (UK Charity No. 1069204) but is also a very large educational charity running 192 schools with 91,000 pupils in the developing world. See www.soschildren.org

To check the contents of this encyclopedia, you can visit http://schools-wikipedia.org which is an online version of the same package. This project has been successfully implemented in Shantabai Ladkat English Medium School in Nanapeth, Pune (contact: TFI Fellow Moiz, 9819117826). I look forward working with your esteemed institution on this project.

Yours Faithfully,
Nikhil Sheth
Teach For India Fellow, 2011-13
Previously working with Tata Consultancy Services Ltd.
Contact:  966-583-1250, nikhil.js@gmail.com

================================
..So... ok??

Points to note:
1. I want to give them a complete and honest picture of what will be going into their computers, so they don't tell later that "Hey, you didn't tell us about this!".
2. The non-commercial, moneyless nature of the project is to be stressed and specified as early as possible so they can be assured that no one is after their school's limited money.
3. The persons we're working with may only have a rudimentary knowledge of computers. They typically are very fearful of viruses, are prone to labeling anything that doesn't work at first try as having "virus". One teacher informed me there was a virus in her comp because she couldn't get through the account creation stage of gmail successfully. (this is one of the reasons we must spread an encyclopedia - to inform people and dispel rumors)
4. The text above is already a one-full-pager so no more additions please - suggest replacements and deletions only if you must.

Troubleshooting the Wikipedia For Schools Offline Edition + Call to Action

That big term shall henceforth be referred to as WFSOE (wow, sounds like a cool game! As it should!)
In my pilot drive at Shantabai Ladkat school in Nanapeth, Pune, I came across some issues when installing WFSOE on some older computers: The indexing process never took off. Now, indexing is what kicks in the first time you open a .zim file in the primary form of Kiwix (the software used here.. look, just go with it, ok?) – it’s necessary if you want to be able to Search thru the WFSOE. So that’s a dilemma : a whole encyclopedia and we can’t even search our favorite topics! So, started looking around.. and thanks to a comment on my original post on WFSOE, I started downloading the pre-indexed, ready-to-DVD version of WFSOE that the awesome folks at Kiwix.org prepared:
http://download.kiwix.org/portable/wikipedia_en_for_schools.zip
Note: Don’t start downloading it yet – it’s freakin’ huge – 2718MB direct download! And, as in many such ventures, I detected a problem only AFTER fully dloading it over 3 days! I can’t say whether the issue is there in the original file hosted on kiwix.org or if it crept in during my downloadathon, but that’s just it – huge file direct download = Russian Roulette. This blog post is the story of that issue, how I hacked my way past it, and the solutions for anyone who wants to download a good, awesome, readily working version of WFSOE. To make things interesting, we’ve got screenshots galore!
Expand this article to read thru it… long length!
If you’re looking for the wiki page, http://education.wikia.com/wiki/Wikipedia_For_Schools_Offline_Edition (short URL: http://tinyurl.com/WFSOE)

If you’re just looking for the Call to Action, go to the very end after expanding.