Books of courses on Open Source Software online (for free)
 | The Free Technology Academy (FTA) has published the first set of course books online: 'Introduction to Free Software' and ‘The GNU/Linux Advanced Administration’. The FTA, a European consortium that the Open Universiteit is part of, has published the books under a free, copyleft license. You are encouraged to use, translate, adapt and redistribute these materials. |
Free software
The first book, "Introduction to Free Software", introduces the reader to the main concepts behind Free Software: the history of the movement, its philosophical background, the most important projects and experiences, the motivations of community and developers. This book is a translation and updated version of the Spanish "Introducción al Software Libre" and was created using the SELF Platform. This book is the main learning material for the FTA module "The concepts of Free Software and Open Standards". You can download a copy on the FTA-site.
GNU/Linux
The second book, with more than 500 pages, is "GNU/Linux Advanced Administration", covering the main knowledge and skills needed by GNU/Linux systems administrators. The list of topics includes Unix history, migration and coexistence with non-free systems, administrator tools, shell scripting, kernel configuration and compilation, network administration, network services, data administration and much more.This book is the main learning material for the FTA Module 2 "The GNU/Linux Operating System". You can download a copy on the FTA-site.
On the Free Technology Academy
The FTA is a Consortium formed by the Open University of Catalonia (Spain), the Open University of the Netherlands and University of Agder (Norway) and is led by the Free Knowledge Institute (FKI). It has received the support from the EC's Lifelong Learning Programme to set up an international educational programme on Free Software.
The use of Free Software (also referred to as Open Source software or Libre Software) is rapidly expanding in governmental and private organisations. However, still only a limited number of ICT professionals, teachers and decision makers have sufficient knowledge and expertise in these new fields. The Free Technology Academy aims to address this gap by providing high level courses that fit into larger Master Programmes at the participating universities. At the Dutch Open Universiteit they fit into the master programme of the faculty of Informatics.
Enrolling at the FTA
The courses will be taught completely online in a virtual campus based on the Campus Project interoperability framework. The FTA learning materials are all in English. They are available to anyone without restrictions and free of charge.
Enrolling in the online courses has several benefits, derived from a full learning experience that involves a tutor and a study group formed by other students. Students are offered tutoring, group discussions, individual and group excercises, assessments, lectures by experts, certification, etc. The first courses have started in January. Students come from all over the world: Holland, Germany, Austria, Spain, Portugal, Brasil, Mexico and the US. Soon more courses on open source and open standaards will be offered. Students at the Dutch Open University can use the courses within the programme of the School of Informatics.
More information: http://www.ftacademy.org
Contact information: contact@ftacademy.org
