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ISSUE NO 77 NEWS ROUND-UP & SNIPPETS

ETHIOPIC XML INTEREST GROUP FORMED TO OVERCOME SCRIPT PROBLEMS

Ethiopia has its own unique script commonly called Ethiopics that is widely adopted throughout the country by almost all the languages. A unique script with more than 260 characters, 10 numerals and several punctutaion marks, Ethiopics has always been a challenge to adopt to computerization and now to the internet.

An Ethiopics Interest Group that aims to define technical requirements and standards for Ethiopic extension to XLM was recently established by Ethiopian IT professionals and linguists. The Ethiopics Interest Group (formally called Ethiopics XML Specifications Working Group) was established as a response to the Blueberry Draft Proposal of the World Wide Web consortium (W3C) to extend XML allowing the use of Ethopic (and Khmer, Myanmar, and Maldivian) script names in XML elements, attributes, and other places. It is currently possible to use Ethiopic script in the content of an XML document, but the markup must be either in romanization or in another language such as English or French. This omission of Ethiopics was a result of XML having been standardized to support Unicode 2.0, which did not include Ethiopic script, was the then current version of Unicode.

The EthiopicsXML Specifications Working Group aims to:

• Support the draft BlueBerry requirement that is facing some resistance.
• Create or consolidate working groups and organizations with interest in Ethiopics and XML.
• Educate the public on the need for XML/EthiopicXML
• Encourage the development of XML grammar and vocabulary for a variety of applications
• Define technical objectives and requirements based on XML Blueberry Requirements working-draft-of-20June 2001.
• Bring topic for wider discussion once the specifications are developed.
• Submit the proposal for specification to W3C Working Group

A similar group was successful in drafting an encoding standard for Ethiopics for Unicode 3.0 in 1993.

The Blueberry draft document is published at: http://www.w3c.org/TR/WD-xml-blueberry-req .
The EthiopicsXML Specifications Working Group’s mailing list is located at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EthiopicsXML
Further details: Samuel Kinde Kassegne, PhD, <SKassegne@Nanogen.com>

Finally, it is worth noting that Ethiopia now has a group of people working on its national IT strategy....

TANZANIA: REGIONAL POPs NOW AVAILABLE AT WIDE RANGE OF REGIONAL NODES

Members of the Tanzanian list server eThink have been having a fierce debate about whether they should allow commercial advertising to its members. Out of this debate popped the following announcement... According to Zaipuna Yonah, General Manager of Simunet:"As of 14^th September, 2001: 2Mbps Points of Presence (PoPs) are now available at the following regional nodes: Dar, Morogoro, Dodoma, Iringa, Mbeya, Arusha, Moshi, Tanga, Mwanza and Musoma. Next Kibaha, Tabora, Singida and Shinyanga". Simunet says it plans to wire all of Tanzania and Zaipuna Yonah says: "convince me to go where you want the service, I will listen".

ABSA BREAKS ITS LINKS WITH AFFINITY

South Africa’s free ISP Absa has concluded a deal with ICL SA to run its free Internet service directly, cutting out Affinity Internet. The change will be invisible to users, but may see the bank offer paid-for extras in the near future.

(source: http://wwwitweb.co.za)

CAMERROON: SALE OF TELCO AND MOBILE LICENCE PROCEEDS

Contrary to last week’s story, Cameroon’s privitisation commission is rubbing its hands. It has sold two GSM licences and the fixed line franchise. All for 163 million CFA francs. "We have been surprised by the enthusiasm of overseas operators for the GSM licences and we have also been surprised by the lack of it for the fixed line operation", explained a spokesperson for the Commission. The programme of privitisation began in 1998 under the guidance of the World Bank.

Predictably France Telecom’s Cameroonian subsidiary has acquired one of the two GSM licences with an offer of 11 million CFA francs. The second was fought over by South African operators MTN and Telecel. MTN finally triumphed with an offer of 40 million CFA francs. Telecel (supported by Korea Telecom) bought the fixed line franchise for 40 million CFA francs. (source: www.cyberkoki.net)

SOUTH AFRICAN MARKET NOT LARGE ENOUGH TO SUPPORT E-COMMERCE

After years of internet hyperbole, a sad reality seems to be emerging in SA it may not be worth investing heavily in e-commerce activity as there is not enough local business to sustain it, claims PricewaterhouseCoopers.

(source: http://www.bday.co.za/bday/content/direct/
1,3523,922658-6129-0,00.html)

TELECOMS AMENDMENT BILL STIRS UP A HORNETS NEST

Final submissions on the South African Telecoms Amendment Bill must be made to the secretary of the Parliamentary Portofilio Committee of Communications, Rita Schaafsma, (rschaafsma@parliament.gov.za) by 12 pm Wedns. 19 Sept. Some strong responses have already gone off. One response from William Stucke of IOZ covers most bases:

"This document is a nightmare. It looks like a cross between a major grab by the DoC for power and everything Telkom ever dreamed of having in legislation. It seems to be characterised by the following:

1 All definitions, rulings and regulations by ICASA are ignored

2 Almost all requirements for hearings by ICASA are deleted

3 In MANY places, decisions by the Authority have been replaced by decisions by the Minister. This alone is probably unconstitutional, on "separation of powers" grounds.

4 VPN is equated to PTN, not once but in several places. That’s right, a purely software function is, according to this Bill, EXACTLY the same thing as pieces of wire, telephones & a hardware PABX ...

5 The term "VANS" no longer exists in section 40, which is about VANS. That means that anyone who had a VANS license now has an "Electronic transactions" license ?? These terms cannot be equated.

6 The SNO is given a license for VoIP, under the mistaken assumption that Telkom already has one. THEY DON’T. The DoC has quite simply been misinformed on this issue, which they have carried from the Policy Directives to this Bill. I wonder who told them stories ...?

7 Sentech has been given an ill-defined license for "multi-media". No specification of to whom they may supply such a service. We must be VERY careful - specifying particular services which one party may supply under a particular license has the effect, in the minds of lawyers at least, of implying that others cannot do the same without a licence. That’s right, a web site with text, images and animation suddenly becomes the exclusive preserve of Sentech. Let’s just shut down the Internet in SA, shall we?

8 A desire to redefine every term that we have finally got to grips with, 5 years on, and complicate life even more

9 It goes on ...

If you’re worried about, you should get your submissions in quickly. seriously. The Bill can be found at http://www.polity.org.za/govdocs/bills/2001/b65-01.pdf

GERMANY’S CARL DUISBERG FOUNDATION LAUNCHES ICT SUPPORT PROGRAMME

The German Carl Duisberg Foundation &SHY; one of the leading European institutions for international training and human resources development &SHY; is preparing a new training project on behalf of the German government (Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development) for African ICT and business multiplier institutions in the SADC region.

The IT@AB programme will provide participating institutions with state-of-the-art know-how in business IT and generate a network of IT institutions in the SADC region. By the end of a four-year know-how transfer programme, the participating African institutions will:

• closely cooperate with other IT partner institutions both in Africa and in Europe
• offer business-related IT training and consultancy services
• provide Web-based training programmes
• and thus promote the future participation of African business within an increasingly globalized economy.

For the participating African institutions the IT@AB programme will offer essential business IT-related practical know-how as well as relevant interregional and international contacts. The programme will include practice-oriented workshops and seminars for senior and junior executives from the participating institutions in different SADC countries, a one-year intensive training course for "business IT consultants" in Europe, as well as Web-based training. In addition, practice-oriented consulting materials will be provided. The programme is scheduled to run from September 2001 to December 2004. For details go to its web site: http://www.it-ab.net

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