IT industry needs more professionals - Dr. Ruvan Weerasinghe

International Information Technology Conference (IITC):

By Indeewara THILAKARATHNE

[email protected]
 

Main area of focus of the 9th International Information Technology Conference

* Localization and Language Processing Applications
* Mobil Applications
* E-Learning
* Innovative Applications of free and Open Source Software
* Information System Security, Privacy and Legal issues
* E-Government and rural ITC Applications
* Human Computer Interaction
* Networking Technology Applications
* Web Services and Internet Applications
* Computer Forensics
* Visual Computing and Multimedia Applications
* Software Processes

Here in an interview with Sunday Observer, Dr.Ruvan Weerasinghe, Director University of Colombo School of Computing stressed the pivotal role the University of Colombo played through CINTEC in setting industrial standards in IT education in Sri Lanka and points out need for a national research agenda for researches in the field of Information Technology.

Q: What is the pivotal role the University of Colombo playing in IT education in the country?

A: The main involvement of the University was in the education sector. However, the university is compelled to advise the Government on procurement of software systems and involved in state sector computerization projects especially through CINTEC (Computer Information Technology Council of Sri Lanka).

Other than these involvements, University's main focus was on education. Sri Lanka mainly used standards and computer science curriculums developed in the West as they were the bench mark in the Industry. Therefore, the graduates the University was producing were actually good for workforce in UK and USA. But over the years, Sri Lankan IT industry has grown and matured. Especially at the turn of the millennium export market became active in Sri Lanka.

Companies like Vertusa realized that they need people of certain calibre and not to persons who would have followed just three months or six months coursed in IT. Now our IT export market almost insists that one should posses a degree to join the industry though the IT Industry has lower level jobs for those who followed Diplomas and Higher Diplomas. As there was no other Diploma that was one year duration at the time, NIBM offered a Diploma in IT. It became a yardstick by which to measure the other Diplomas offered at the time.

There are some accepted Diplomas with one year duration of study. We (University of Colombo) realized that market was completely fragmented and very often the piece of paper is not worth what is written on. Because of that reason and as university cannot intake sufficient numbers of students for IT, even currently the University cannot grow so fast because the state's financial commitment is limited, University of Colombo commenced external degree BIT (Bachelor of Information Technology). Government has to cater not only to IT but also for all areas. If you look at University intake, the biggest number of intake is for Arts Faculty. Out of the ten thousand schools only 2400 school teach up to A/L and 640 schools have laboratories and can teach science subjects. So the balance schools have to produce students for the Arts stream. So it is a political issue. So the allocation of resources is not based on demand in the market. State sector computerization was at a minimum stage and if at all, it was person driven.

Even today, the number of graduates demanded by the IT industry is much more than the University can produce. The graduates produced by the private sector and Institutions affiliated to Foreign Universities has been growing. Where ever Institution training for accredited certification, I think they are serving the country. But most of the Institutions are training for their own Diplomas and Certificates. A lot of people are misled. They think that students who followed these courses can secure jobs. If they could not get jobs, they ask the same organizations and the institutes recommend their Advanced Diploma. In the end people, spend so much money and could not still get the correct skills.

In the year 2000, we introduced a degree BIT (Bachelor of Information Technology), realizing that University could not produce sufficient number of graduates and private sector can but it produces Diplomas and Certificates. We broke the degree into three years as that was the industry standard by then because NIBM Diploma was a good benchmark. First year, if a student successfully completed the studies, the University offers a Diploma and second year a Higher Diploma and third year the degree.

The difference between BIT and internal degree is that internal students can sit for repeat examinations conducted at the university. However, for BIT students should sit for the current examination. In 2006, University of Colombo offered a fully fledged online degree BIT. Now students can follow BIT online without attending an institute. Sri Lankans still prefer to have one to one interaction. One policy is that University recommends an Indian version of the text books as Sri Lankans hardly afford to buy US or UK versions. As a result a fair number of our students are students in other universities following other courses including students following Medicine.

These students follow the degree online.

By product is that standards of teaching at several institutes have gone up as they have to teach for BIT. Through the learning management systems we can track whether most students are studying and are they spendings time on particular lessons. We made it compulsory requirement so that every student participate in the online assignments. Though students can follow the first year, Diploma is offered only if the student did online assignments. We encouraged them to learn it but if IT graduates can not behave online, the degree is worthless. Though there may be problems in connectivity, students are now getting used to it. We found some of the students are really good and we have hired some of the students.

Q: Apart from extensively engaging in the IT education, what are the other areas you are engaged in?

A: Internally we have a computer science degree in the University with the aims of providing software engineers for the industry and produce Computer Scientists. Those are the people who will go for higher studies abroad and conduct researches. In 2004, UGC requested us to increase the university intake. So we commenced an information system degree. This degree is looking at who the real system can be applied, find IT solutions and to make use of the systems. These students should know about businesses, management, some of sociological issues and psychological issues. It is a broad curriculum.

We open out this programme for any stream. However, we have a screening test. For this year, we have taken a batch of 80 and most of the students are from bio-science and physical science streams. We called it BICT but actually degree is for information systems. The products of this degree have occupied various positions in corporate sector such as Business Analysis, Information System Specialists and Quality Assurance Engineers and also employed in state sector occupying positions such as IT Executives and IT Consultant. They have an overall view.

Q: One of the objectives of a university is to produce knowledge in addition to dissemination of knowledge. So what have you achieved in the field of IT related research in Sri Lanka?

A: Normally research has to have a feeder. So the feeder is that there is a three year degree programme targeted at the industry and students can study another year which is dedicated mostly to learning research methods and research seminars. Only forty students are selected from 160 and 20 out of Information System degree. We train them in research. At the Infortel exhibition, there were areas where research ideas were showcased.

However, one business man can hire and develop research ideas into a product.

Pokuru PC

Example is Pokuru PC. The Pokuru PC allows four screens and keyboards to be connected to one PC. School in Ambalangoda has only five PCs. But now twenty students are using those five PCs. That we showcased it at Infortel.

Another example is now most of the mobile phones have Wi-Fi and idea was developed to use Wi-Fi hub to communicate via wireless hub. If a person is away from Wi-Fi zone still that person can communicate through third party's mobile phone which is within the radius of the Wi-Fi zone. Tele-banking and teller machines services can be operated in remote parts through an agent with mobile phones.

Q: What is the significance of IITC in Sri Lanka from the perspective of improving research in Sri Lanka?

A: One of the aims of the conference was to bring all the research from all the universities together. This time we had a particular focus on the IT industry. Out of the 27 papers that were presented at the conference, six papers were from the Industry which is an encouraging sign. Every two years, IT conference takes place in parallel with Infortel exhibition.

The conference was followed by series of workshops on cutting edge technologies. For instance there was a workshop on Android a platform -independent operating system introduced by Google which can be run on any devise or PC. We had workshops on embedded system, security and on conducting Research. UCSC stall at the exhibition won the award for the best stall in career and training.

Q: What are the potential areas that Sri Lanka can excel in?

A: Sri Lanka still does not have an IT research agenda. We are just conducting researches that are of interest to each researcher. We are now trying to develop such agenda. For instance, we are very strong in plantation but we do not have any IT products for plantation sector.

Equally we do not have a very good IT system to support our excellent healthcare system.

Banking, Telecommunication and Garment industry have taken IT to optimize the operations. Here we have to be bit innovative.

Open Source Software

Other sector where we have expertise but have not used technology optimally is defense or military. Another big area Sri Lanka has really excelled is in open source software.

Today we have some open source software developers who are of global standards. For instance, the team which developed Sahana, a Disaster Management Software developed by non profit organization Lanka Software Foundation, has been called to Pakistan, US when it was hit by Kathrina and in Philippines when flood occurred.

Now there is a global community around that Sahana project, free and open sourced software. Open source softwares are ideal for Sri Lanka as so much money is out flowing in terms of purchasing license software.

Therefore, we are promoting licensed open source software. For instance one can use open source softwares such as Open Office, together with windows.

It is completely free and also distribute free of charge. One can also use Fire fox, web browser. There are open sourced softwares for almost every application. Even one can also use open source operating systems such as Lenox. So we are encouraging the government to use open source softwares.

One can down load open source softwares from Websites. However, Lenox system locates required softwares and down load them.

UCSC has through a company "Thikshana" bidding for IT tenders offered by World Bank and we also provide consultancy services for Ministries including Foreign Ministry and outreach has been expanded through conducting workshops in diverse parts of the country.