News & Notes 619:Auroville Connected to Pan-India National Knowledge Network
Auroville Connected to Pan-India National Knowledge Network
Educational and research institutions are equipped with a campus-wide network to economically share information and enable effective collaboration within the campus. Government of India (GoI) has started implementation of a Entity::National Knowledge Network (NKN) in 2012 and already connected the campus networks of 1438 educational and research institutions across India. NKN is a state-of-the-art, multi-gigabit, pan-India network provisioned by GoI to enable scientists, researchers and students from different backgrounds and diverse geographies to work closely for advancing human development in critical and emerging areas.
Auroville is listed amongst the Institutes of Higher Education of Ministry of Human Resource Development, GoI. However, we have lagged behind in setting up a campus network and were left out of NKN, which is a network of campus networks. In August 2014, an initiative was launched to begin work on campus network. The part of this initiative is to set up a network centre and connect the Educational, and Research units of Auroville and interconnect with NKN. In this process an Optical Fibre Cable (OFC) backbone would also be implemented for Auroville-wide campus network from which all other units and residences would be connected in subsequent steps.
On behalf of Auroville, Auroville Foundation requested GoI for connectivity to NKN in order to enable the community to partake in the researches envisaged under NKN and catalyze wider collaboration within India and abroad. GoI approved a100 Mbps connection to NKN on a trial basis for 2 years.
Since August 2014, Entity::Aurinoco Systems (a proposed unit under SAIIER) is engaged in setting up the network center and implementing the Educational and Research Network (ERN). NKN laid OFC from the Secretariat Building in Puducherry to the Network Center in the Auroville Foundation Bhavan and activated the link in September 2015. AV Foundation, SAIIER, ACI, CSR, Future School, Transition School, Last School and Deha Shakti are already connected to the Network Center. These entities will be shifted, in a phased manner, to NKN. Connectivity to BlueLight and the Town Hall complex has been tested to be ready for connection to NKN. As on end September 2015, AV Foundation, SAIIER, BlueLight, Town Hall, CSR, Future School, Transition School, Last School and Deha Shakti have been connected to the network center with a backbone spanning 75% of the crown road. NKN laid a OFC form the Secretariat Building in Puducherry and activated the link in September. After initial testing of the link, Auroville Foundation has been connected to NKN.
NKN provides reliable, higher speed internet with unlimited data volume and access to NKN services and applications such as
- Nationwide class room
- .edu /.ernet email
- File server and VPN
- Video and Audio conferencing
- Virtual (digital) library
- Collaborative research applications and services
- Collaborative diagnosis and tele-medicine
For details, click on: http://nkn.in/services.php
On 3rd October 2015, Dr. Karan Singh, Chairman of the Governing Board cyber-inaugurated the link by directly sending the following message to all Aurovilians and Working Groups with cc to AVI.
“I am happy to herewith inaugurate the Educational and Research Network of Auroville, connected to the National Knowledge Network of India. This facility enables Aurovilians to collaborate with people from different backgrounds and diverse geographies in the pursuit of ‘Unending Education. I wish you all the very best in making full use of this facility in manifesting The Dream.”
Work is in progress to connect Lila Loka, Cripa, Kala Bhumi, Sente, Arka, Auroville Water Service, Auroville Libray, Deepanam School, Solar Kitchen, Bharat Nivas and especially the Sri Aurobindo Auditorium. Also, Savitri Bhavan, Unity Pavilion, Tibetan Pavilion, US Pavilion, Auroville Language Lab, will be hooked up in a phased manner. This work is expected to be completed by December 2015.
In the Industrial Zone, the OFC will be brought to the Auroville Earth Institute, Auroville Energy Products, Verite Learning Center, SaraCon Campus, Svaram, KOFPU etc. This OFC backbone rollout will span 75% of the crown road. Presentations covering the goals, work done so far, potential benefits and future plans were made to the community on 27th September 2015 and to the Governing board and IAC on 3rd October 2015. If you missed the community presentation and would like to catch up, click on http://www.aurovilleradio.org/auroville-community-network
JV on behalf of Network Team - Anand Prasad, Chandresh, Dyuman, JV (Remote Participation), Manu and Ramakrishna