26/01/2018
◎Geshe Lobsang Monlam◎
He was born in Amdo Ngawa , Tibet. He is very fond of drawing and machines when he was a child. After he completed primary school, he was ordained as a monk and lived in a monastery where he studied Buddhist philosophy, ta***ic, and various ritual performances. In his spare time, he studied traditional Tibetan arts and played around with damaged machines and electronic products.
He escaped to India in 1993, relentlessly worked on improving his knowledge of the computer ever since he owned his first personal machine. and was able to work on FM Microphone when he was at age of 15.
After arriving in India, I joined the Sera Mey College (སེ་ར་སྨད་གྲ་ཚང་།) where he studied Buddhist dialectics for 17 years.
He is already a familiar name to most Tibetan computer users, began his journey into the computer geek's world in 2002, when he, out of sheer curiosity, bought his first computer. At that time, there were no ume (dbus med) fonts available. So, he began studying fonts and doing research on developing ume and uchen fonts. He is only able to gather information and materials that are needed for my work, otherwise he does not know anything about computer technical terms. His success on computer program development has been mainly accomplished through independent study and experiments. he had to work really hard and overcome many hardships.
He developed an application on Tibetan Text-To-Speech for windows and also developed an android application called Monlam Dictionary which contains three categories there are Tibetan, Tibetan – English, English –Tibetan.
In 2005, he invented Monlam Bod Yig Version 1, which although similar to the existing Tibetan fonts like TCRC Bod Yig, had the additional U-Mey script version. Many people from Tibet, especially those from his own hometown, Amdo Ngawa, used the font, giving him relevant feedback and suggestions to improve the font.
In 2006 Lobsang launched his latest invention, Monlam Bod Yig Version 2, a Unicode font, [and in 2009, improved it again in Version 3, now completely Unicode and with more fonts]. It is seen as a boon not only for computer professionals but also for ordinary people interested in just emailing and chatting online.
Regarding computers, before he came to India, he had never seen one, let alone touched one before. At Sera Mey College, there was a computer department. He thought a computer was a very strange thing and he became very fond of them. He was able to purchase my own laptop in 2003. The man who sold me the computer showed me how to turn the computer on and off. He played around with it for some time until I was able to use it. He had been thinking a lot about how computer programs and applications were created, and he did a number of experiments with them.
In 2011, he was invited by New York Charitable Foundation for a presentation on Alive & Digital.
In December, 2011 he called up by New York International Tibetan Study center’s 3rd Conference to talk on Tibetan Study and Tibetan Language. After that he paid a visit to Japan with company of the Japan High Study center and was able to display Tibetan Fonts in Apple devices. Tibetan Center Government and TCV invited him to give a workshops and conferences on how to use Tibetan fonts and Dictionaries in Computers to Tibetan schools.
His Holiness the XIV Dalai Lama was very pleased by the work done by the Monlam Tibetan IT research Center. His Holiness gave his kind guidance and advice for the project. His Holiness also advised that a separate Tibetan IT research center need to be established as this work will greatly help to preserve and flourish the Tibetan language and Literature.
Subsequently, on 22nd April 2012, Monlam Tibetan IT Research Centre was founded in Dharamsala. Presently, Monlam IT research Center working on the improvement of the Monlam Tibetan Dictionary and also working on the advance Technology like X-code and Dot Net so on.
In December, 2013 Lobsang Monlam did his Geshe Degree examination at Sera Monastic University.
In 2015, First version of Monlam Grand Tibetan Dictionary has been completed successfully for windows, IOS (iPhone and I-pad) and MAC OS. And Monlam IT center is working on many more areas of literature and technology for the preservation and expansion of the Tibetan culture and Literature.
