Technology

OUSL and SLASSCOM cooperate to develop innovative degree

Open University of Sri Lanka (OUSL) and the Sri Lanka Association for Software and Services Companies, SLASSCOM have entered into an agreement to designing and conducting of an innovative degree course in Software Engineering for students of the Open University.

Earnings from exports of IT-BPO sector have shown a steady upward trend during the past decade, and in 2007 IT-BPO exports have reached an estimated $ 213 million which makes the IT-BPO industry the fifth largest industry in the country.

The industry has set a target of $ 2 billion in export revenue from the IT-BPO sector during the next five years.

One of the key prerequisites for this growth to be realised is the acceleration of human resource capacity development in the country. The OUSL, SLASSCOM effort is aimed at expanding the number of technology professionals in the country.

The new Bachelor of Software Engineering (BSE) program is designed to produce industry ready professionals in partnership with the industry. ADB assisted Distance Education Modernisation Project (DEMP) primarily funded the development of the program.

The program covers the major subjects of computing according to the ACM/IEEE curriculum guidelines.

The degree has been specially designed in response to industry demand to produce graduate software engineers. BSE is an innovative industry-oriented degree program in software engineering where students can complete the degree in 3 years.

It is mandatory for students registering for the BSE degree to undergo a minimum period of one year's industrial training at a software company.

Commencing from the second year, students can continue on an industrial placement while studying to complete their degree.

Chairman SLASSCOM Ranjit Fernando, said: "We are delighted to work closely with the Open University in ensuring that the new course is relevant, well delivered and much sought after by those who intend pursuing a career, in the fastest growing IT industry, globally. We endorse this degree program and encourage aspiring new entrants to take up this exceptional opportunity to step in to a career in IT".

The BSE degree has been endorsed by the industry and the course has been designed with the active participation of leading software companies in Sri Lanka who are members of SLASSCOM. SLASSCOM member companies will also assist in the placement of students for industry exposure while they are studying as a part of the cooperation agreement.

The Dean of the Engineering Faculty of The Open University of Sri Lanka, Dr. Janaka Liyanagama upbeat about the collaboration said, "SLASSCOM and OUSL have understood that providing hands-on work experience for the students is pivotal. Students will not only have the opportunity to practise and apply knowledge and skills acquired throughout his/her studies in an industrial setting and also be exposed to professional practice throughout the placement".

"SLASSCOM gave us their fullest cooperation throughout the development of this Bachelor of Software Engineering Program. They provided the Industry requirements at the curriculum development stage. They actively participated in course teams, They assisted us in developing individual courses; They have agreed to assist us in the delivery of some of the courses, where the best experts are available in the industry" said Dr. J. Liyanagama.

All of the courses offered in this program will also be available online via in the National Online Distance Education Service (NODES).

Computer literacy for estate children

Mukesh Kanthan, aged 16 from Theresia Estate, Dickoya, walks 3 kilometres to school and is among the band of enthusiastic students who stay after school each day to gain computer literacy at Tienstin Tamil Maha Vidyalaya , where 350 girls and boys, primarily from the six surrounding estates receive primary education. "I want to do computer hardware and software engineering" Mukesh claimed enthusiastically.

To help fulfil his dream someday, MJF Charitable Foundation, established by Dilmah Teas has set up the school's computer lab with 3 PCs complete with UPS and printer. It is one of the many instances where children of estate workers working for Regional Plantation Companies (RPCs) are experiencing a quality of life that their parents could not even dream of.

Kahawatte, Elpitiya and Talawakelle are plantations companies that are linked to MJF. The first batch of students from Tienstin to offer IT as a subject sat for the O/L examination last year.

There are also special English and Maths classes for O/L students.

"There is a significant improvement in the exam results after we commenced the extra classes" said S. Kamalanathan, the Project Co-ordinator who revealed that the foundation has also adopted the Dunkeld Tamil Maha Vidyalaya at Maskeliya, providing a computer lab among other benefits.

To enhance the life and outlook of youth resident in the surrounding estates, several Regional Plantation Companies in Hatton extend their support to the Regional Vocational Training Centre at New Valley, Norwood.

The Training Centre is conducted by the Vocational Training Authority of Sri Lanka in a building that belongs to Bogawantalawa Plantations.

Here nearly one hundred students aged between 18 to 25 years, almost all of them, children of estate workers, learn a variety of trades ranging from household wiring and electrification, carpentry, dressmaking and beauty culture to IT.

MJF has provided the equipment for the computer lab.

They also equipped the training centre with several industrial Juki sewing machines as well as zig-zag machines, over-lock machines and standard sewing machines.

Ms. M. Logeswari, the Juki machine instructor was appreciative.

"Both boys and girls from the estates like to come for the 2-month training that equips them to the possibility of even seeking employment abroad." she said.

"Thanks to the RPCs, our training centre has a bank of 6 PCs, each with an UPS plus a scanner and a printer where students get Internet savvy with proficiency in MS Office up to NVQ Level 3" said the Computer Instructress Ms. P. Thilakawathy. The Officer in Charge of the Training Centre, Mr. P.G.A. Dharmakeerthi spoke with pride about the training that paves the way for lucrative employment for the young students and makes their future brighter.

"We have a job placement officer who helps them find employment after their training" he said.

Undeniably, the profile of estate sector youth is changing with the efforts of RPCs to kindle their ambitions, with special focus on IT. "There are many examples of how RPCs across the country have set up computer facilities to enrich the estate community" said. Kamalanathan.

WS02 recognised for leadership and innovation

WSO2 has been recognised as a 2009 SD Times 100 award winner in the SOA and Middleware category. This is the second year in a row that WSO2 has been named to the SD Times 100 list; in 2008 the company was recognised as a winner in the Middleware category.

SD Times identified WSO2 as a company that has "demonstrated leadership and innovation in the areas of SOA-enablement and in creating enterprise middleware."

The magazine noted that: "By using smart middleware, and by adding Web services to existing or new applications, enterprise software can become smarter as well, and the cost to create new functionality can drop by an order of magnitude."

"We are honoured to be recognised as a leading provider of SOA and middleware solutions by SD Times, one of the world's premier information sources for software development technology and best practices," said Dr. Sanjiva Weerawarana, the CEO of WSO2.

"It is strong validation of the value that our comprehensive and highly flexible open source SOA middleware brings to enabling today's heterogeneous service-oriented architecture."

February 2009 marked the debut of WSO2 Carbon, the industry's first fully componentised SOA framework. Built on the OSGi specification, WSO2 Carbon enables developers to easily deploy only those components they need. This eliminates the complexities of middleware integration, resulting in significant savings in SOA project time, money and staffing. With WSO2 Carbon, developers also have unprecedented flexibility.

They can implement component-based SOA products-such as the WSO2 Enterprise Service Bus, WSO2 Web Services Application Server, WSO2 Registry and WSO2 Business Process Server-or deploy any combination of the more than 100 Carbon components on which these products are built.

SD Times (www.sdtimes.com) is the twice-monthly newspaper of record for the software development industry, reaching more than 60,000 subscribers in 131 countries.

The Seventh Annual SD Times 100 list, selected by the editors of SD Times, honours the companies, organisations and individuals that have helped lead the way to a "new software world through their ideas, inventions and new implementations."