Cutting Chai with DrupalCon Asia 2016

Drupal is the most powerful CMS & fun to work with as a developer as well as a newbie. I started my journey with Drupal by creating my personal website. In Feb 2015, at IIT Bombay, India, I witnessed DrupalCamp Mumbai.

DrupalCamp Mumbai, India was a great success. I was proud to be part of DrupalCamp as a volunteer and part of FOSSEE team who was one of the Platinum sponsors. We are always grateful to Prof. Sunthar for introducing IIT Bombay with Drupal Mumbai Community.

DrupalCamp Mumbai 2015

From DrupalCamp to DrupalCon the voyage took a turn for the best.

I was exhilarated with the announcement of DrupalCon Asia 2016 in Mumbai, India and that too in IIT Bombay. Having worlds largest conference of Drupal in Mumbai galvanized each one of us to do our best to welcome the community from all parts of the world. 

Drupal has inculcated & poised me to create from personal website to a full-fledged conference website for Earth Science department of IIT Bombay called ACROFI 2016(yet to be announced). We are currently indulged in creating a Drupal payment gateway module for IIT Bombay with the help of Conference Organizing Distribution. We will try to arrange a lightning talk on it.

In the video below, I along with the other members of Indian Drupal community have given a warm welcome in distinct linguals.

Ghar bada nahi hai toh kya hua? Dil toh bada hai 

One of the famous lines of Mumbaikars which means "We cannot afford big house but we have giant heart" 

This is how our Drupal Mumbai community is.

Mumbai is a melting pot of uncanny aspirations. It is evidently reflected with bright tints and hues on the website designed for the conference. A perfect blend of our customs and culture along with our national bird with a fan-like crest of spatula-tipped wire-like feathers adds to Desi seasoning.

This is one of the Open source community I like to be active in for all meetups. There are people with whom I like to interact & learn from everytime we meet.

Every time a new release of Drupal becomes available, Drupal user communities around the world gather to share the new release with each other, and eat celebratory cake. This was what we did for Drupal8 release party recently.

Drupal8 Release party

Lastly, thank you Amanda for giving me the opportunity to write a blog for such a coveted event. DrupalCon Asia 2016, Mumbai, India is worth attending with comparably cheaper ticket prices than any other international conference. Wish you a safe journey & a pleasant stay. Can't wait to see you all and meet Dries Sir at DrupalCon Asia 2016, IIT Bombay, India.

ESyS-Particle on Ubuntu

Hi Guys,

I would like to introduce you to another open source tool, ESyS-Particle. 
ESyS-Particle is Open Source software for particle-based numerical modelling.
It works perfectly on Ubuntu OS version 14.04. Working on ESyS-Particle on Ubuntu OS is comparatively easier than Windows OS.
For Ubuntu 12.04 try the following links:
[1]https://answers.launchpad.net/esys-particle/+faq/1792
[2]https://answers.launchpad.net/esys-particle/+question/202232

Or else just try:

$sudo apt-get install esys-particle

Follow the link below for writing scripts for ESyS-Particle:
[3]https://answers.launchpad.net/esys-particle/+faq/1613

Download the tar file on the right side of the webpage below:
[4]https://launchpad.net/esys-particle

In the Doc folder, you will find the pdf guide for the ESyS-Particle.

Njoy!!!

Design your resumes & presentations with LaTeX

LaTeX is a document preparation system and document markup language. It is widely used for the communication and publication of scientific documents in many fields, including mathematics, physics, computer science, statistics, economics, and political science. It can be used to create presentations and innovative resumes as well. IT IS NOT AT ALL TEDIOUS. Here, I will explain you how to create simple presentations and resumes in LaTeX which will look more professional than docx resumes and ppts.

For this we need Texmaker, LaTeX editor. 
For Ubuntu install Texmaker with,
sudo apt-get install texmaker

Download the LaTeX-Tutorial from here.
Now you have a folder named LaTeX-Tutorial with pdf files and tex files. pdf files are the output whereas tex files are the code files for LaTeX.
Right-click on Python-Schedule.tex and select open with Texmaker.

Texmaker

This is a code file for creating simple document in LaTeX. I have created a schedule with rows and columns.
The first line documentclass calls built-in beamer class or document style for the document.
We just add the line. \usepackage{package name} to access all the commands, symbols, environments, etc., that are in the package. These steps are common for all LaTeX code files.
After which the actual document text begins. We have inserted colors and captions for the table.
Note: It is necessary to \end whatever you \begin in LaTeX.

Table in Texmaker

This is actual table content shown in the image. Now to get output/reflect changes in output, we need to generate the pdf.
For that, save the file & then goto Tools->PDFLaTeX
This will create some run time files like .aux, .log etc. in your folder which you can delete later.
Note: Never delete .tex file
You will find that a pdf file is also created which has your table. Even if you delete your pdf file, on executing .tex file, you can generate it back again. You can just share the pdf file with your friends. 
This is the method to create simple document file in LaTeX.

Now let us learn how to create a presentation.
In LaTeX-Tutorial folder you will find oop-unittest.tex file. Open the .tex file.

In this file you will find lot of usepackages which are needed to design the beamer template for presentation.
Here we have used frames to indicate per slide. Every frame(slide) has its frametitle and then we are listing down the text which we want to show in the slides. The listing is possible with itemize. Run the file and you will get a presentation pdf as output.

To get more such advanced templates for resumes use https://www.sharelatex.com/templates.

DrupalCamp Mumbai 2015 unfolds

Platinum Sponsors, FOSSEE, IIT Bombay

The DrupalCamp Mumbai 2015 was held at IIT Bombay on 7th and 8th February. The organizers were Rachit Gupta, Ani Gupta, Vishal Gala, Prof. Sunthar from IIT Bombay, Gobinath Mallaiyan and the others from Drupal Community. The Platinum sponsors were TATA Consultancy Services & IIT Bombay FOSSEE. The Gold sponsors were Blisstering Solutions, Capgemini, Axelerant, iksula, intelliswift & Srijan. The Silver sponsors were TRIGYN, QED42 & other partners. If you are looking for career options, there will not be a better platform for you to come and meet with the top Drupal companies.  All of them had their stalls with wacky goodies and contests with exciting prizes.  The kits in the form of keychains and badges for the event were sponsored by TCS.

There were more than 600 participants varying from students from various colleges to Professionals and Experts. 

Kits

These were the sessions which were conducted at the DrupalCamp Mumbai 2015: 

Mike Lamb +Drupal Mumbai 

The event was kicked-off with a welcome note by Prof Sunthar followed by a keynote by Mike Lamb, the Director of Marketing Technology Strategy at Pfizer, currently a service member of the board at Drupal Association. The keynote was live-streamed as well. 
Note: Some important sessions were recorded and soon will be made available on Youtube.

VMCC, IIT Bombay

Day 1:
Drupal in a day workshop and training by TCS: This workshop was basically for newcomers and students.

The two best workshops conducted were Porting D7 modules to D8 by QED42 and Headless Drupal for Drupal experts by Azri Solutions

Contests

CXO roundtable & Panel Discussion, for heads and decision makers of drupal association only & Birds of Feather for any Drupal enthusiasts were arranged for supportive and productive setting of the DrupalCamp, proliferation of open source in education in India and for discussions related to Drupal and open source. There was also deliberation on Drupal campus ambassador programme(DCAP).
Drupal campus ambassador programme(DCAP) aims to introduce Drupal to top indian universities and engineering college by creating a network of Drupal Campus ambassadors across different universities and engineering colleges of India. 

Panel Discussion

CXO RoundTable

Day 2:
This day was exclusive for Hackathon & Codepsrint.

Codesprint: All the beginners and enthusiasts amassed to learn Drupal.

Hackathon: Especially for skilled Drupalers, where they challenged each others mettle.

Codesprint

So, this concluded the DrupalCamp at Mumbai. Let’s aim for much more accomplishment of the eminent DrupalCon in India in 2016. 

Secure your c#@t$ & m@!l$ with cryptography

Do you want your chat/mail to be secured? Do you want them to be protected from secret readers? Do you want them to be visible only to you and the recipient?  
You are now going to learn symmetric cryptography.
You can have the most secured chat/mail with the following:

Requirements:

1. Mozilla Thunderbird
2. Pidgin Messenger

Note: Gmail has a security option in your account settings called Access for less secure apps. Enable the option to make Gmail available to Thunderbird and Pidgin.

1. Mozilla Thunderbird:

Thunderbird is a free email application that's easy to set up and customize - and it's loaded with great features!

For instructions on how to access your Gmail mails from Thunderbird, visit here.

Once you are done with the setup, its now time to make your mails secured. 

Follow the steps:

• Open your Thunderbird mail client.
• Goto Tools->Add-ons on the top.
• Install Enigmail.
• A new menu called Enigmail appears at the top.
• Click on Enigmail->Setup Wizard
• Click on Next for all instructions.
• Then on the new window select I want to create a new key pair for signing and encrypting my email.
• Then assign an appropriate 8 characters passphrase for security(your private key).
• Then it will ask whether you want to generate certificate for the encryption. Don't skip this step as the certificate will be useful incase you forget the passphrase. 
• You are Done!!!

This entire process generated a certificate, a public key and a private key for your account. 
We must share only the public key with friends to whom we want to send mails to.
Don't worry, Thunderbird takes care of that! Let us see how.

Now send a mail to your friend through Thunderbird:

• Click on Write on the top menu.
• Compose a mail as usual.
• After filling the necessary details, goto Enigmail menu on the top and enable Attach My Public key, Force encryption & Force signing in the submenus.
• Write in the body "PFA my public key".
• Now send the mail.

Your friend will receive an encrypted e-mail from you with the public key attached. Tell him/her to do the same.
Once you have exchanged the public keys, you need to import each other's public keys on your Thunderbird.

For that:

• Open your friend's e-mail having public key attached on your Thunderbird.
• You will find a yellow notification Unverified signature, click on 'Details' button for more information.
• Click on Details and import the public key.
• It will still show Unverified.....
• Now click on Details and sign for the sender. 
• This will make the sender fully authenticated.
• To check the success, goto Enigmail menu on the top and select Key Management.
• You will find all the public keys here. Check whether you have your friend's key in the list.

Now again send a mail to your friend through Thunderbird:

• Click on Write on the top menu.
• Compose a mail as usual.
• After filling the necessary details, goto Enigmail menu on the top and enable Force encryption & Force signing in the submenus.
• Write in the body "Hi, let's hangout!".
• Now send the mail.

Your friend will receive an encrypted mail. Once your friend receives your e-mail on Thunderbird, it will automatically ask him/her to enter passphrase which he/she created(the way you created). That passphrase is his/her private key which he/she wont share with you. That key is used just to decrypt messages by him/her sent to him/her. Once he/she enters the passphrase correctly, he/she can read the message "Hi, let's hangout!". Thunderbird automatically detects authorized sender and decrypts the e-mail. 

Congratulations!!! Now you and your friends can share secrets freely.

There is another method by which you can decrypt messages through terminal.

• Type gpg -d <paste the encrypted code from -----BEGIN PGP MESSAGE----- to -----END PGP MESSAGE----->
• Press Ctrl+d keys simultaneously on your keyboard.
• You will get the message decrypted on the terminal.

2. Pidgin Messenger

• Install Pidgin Messenger.
• Goto Accounts->Manage Accounts.
• Click on Add.
• Select Protocol as Google Talk.
• Add Username of gmail account before @.
• Click on Add.
• Goto Accounts->Manage Accounts->Enable Account

Select the account you created and it will load all the contacts of your gtalk.

Once you are done with the setup, its now time to make your chats secured. 

Follow the steps:

• You and your friend need to install OTR plugin(off the record messaging plugin) for Pidgin through synaptic package manager.
• Open the chat box of your friend who is using Pidgin with OTR installed.
• Go to OTR menu on the top->Select Authenticate Buddy.
• Select the way you want to authenticate your buddy. I will choose question and answer.
• The answer which your buddy will enter must match with your answer. 
• Once they match, OTR will get activated on both of your chat boxes.
• You will see Private written on your chat box.

From now onwards, your chat will be encrypted with your friend.

Other References:
http://en.flossmanuals.net/thunderbird-workbook/send-and-receive-public-keys/
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2121512