Experts of Ufa have discussed development of Bashkir components in internet

The conference “Development of IT resources RB on the way to open state and public society”, organized by World Bashkir Congress (Kurultay) executive committee and with participation of Republican state and public activists and scientists, has taken place in Ufa yesterday.

Participants of the conference were considering the problems in development of internet portals in Bashkir language in global web, inclusion of articles in Bashkir language in Wikipedia and adoption of the unified Bashkir script, which different operation systems would be able to indentify. They’ve also discussed the staff of the delegation RB to the forthcoming conference of Turk Wikimedia.

The deputy head of the Territorial Federal Statistics Service Dept RB Rustam Gataullin reported that Bashkir language was one of the first aboriginal languages, appearing in internet. In the course of several years publications in Bashkir started to appear in Wikimedia projects; in Wikipedia, wiki-books and wiki-dictionaries. At present time Bashkir Wikipedia includes more than 15 thousand articles and is considered the second by the number of articles, published in internet in aboriginal languages.

“At the same time we may say that Bashkir Wikipedia is based just on sheer enthusiasm” – he mentioned – “Our Wikipedia needs corresponding support”.

As for the forthcoming conference of Turk Wikimedia, which is to be held on April 20-21 in Alma-Ata (Kazakhstan), Bashkiria intends to send two persons there – Zufar Salikhov and Azat Khalilov.

Comparing the presence of Bashkir content with Kazakh one in Wikimedia space the administrator of Bashkir Wikipedia Zufar Salikhov has underscored that the leadership of Kazakhstan takes care of the image of its country, supporting such projects in every possible way. Thus, youth is actively involved in work with Wikipedia. The first 100 students, who wrote articles for Kazakh Wikipedia, have been rewarded with notebooks.

Besides, the participants of the conference have noted the necessity of increase of articles about Bashkortostan in internet in English, Russian and Bashkir languages.

The problem of Bashkir script in Unicode is a separate question. Texts in Bashkirs, having different Unicode, are often can’t be recognized by users. Besides, the carriers of Bashkir language have to use Russian letters, working in social networks.

After long debates participants of the conference have approved the petition to the republican leadership. They suggest that the state concept for development of Bashkir internet resources should be worked up within the frames of the project “Open Republic”. They also propose to render assistance to development of Bashkir Wikipedia, to establish the state-public fund for IT development in our Republic and to solve the problem with Bashkir scripts in Unicode.