BlankOn 7.0: Open Source OS Supports Indonesian Traditional Scripts

We have had several posts related to Indonesia Independence Day this week. There was the virtual flag raising movement using SMS and the #17an Twitter hashtag, the launching of a blog aggregator for Indonesians abroad, and the skinny on how the iPad played a role in the ceremony at Istana Merdeka. One thing we almost missed was the release of BlankOn Linux 7.0 Pattimura.

This is the latest version of the open-source operating system, which first began development back in 2004. According to Rahman Yusri Aftian, release manager of BlankOn 7.0 Pattimura, the new version shows the research and development team have made significant progress. That the OS can now run many entertainment software titles without installing additional multimedia codecs is one of the team’s achievements.

There have also been several new features added to increase user productivity. For example, there’s Stardict, an application to translate from English to Bahasa Indonesia and vice versa. This is very helpful for most Indonesians, who can’t speak or read English well. Another helpful feature is the USB modem support which detects many of the USB modem brands sold in the Indonesia. Users only need to plug in the USB modem and they can surf the internet easily and smoothly with the provided Chromium web browser.

But the most interesting feature of the new OS is its support for Indonesian traditional scripts. There are six traditional scripts supported in the latest version: Balinese, Batak Toba, Buginese, Sundanese, Rejang, and Javanese; of these, Rejang and Javanese are the most recent additions. The new application helps users to convert a word into the traditional script of their choice, as shown below.

BlankOn is a Linux distribution jointly developed by Yayasan Penggerak Linux Indonesia (YPLI) and BlankOn developers. It was developed to fulfill a specific market need, as well as to educate people in how to use a legal, non-pirated operating system. And to commemorate the spirit of independence day, it uses Pattimura, as a codename for its latest version.

If you’re interested in the BlankOn 7.0 Pattimura, you can download it from here.

Indonesian traditional scripts