Democratizing Linux & Open Source Education.

The Penguins Club is a charity and non-profit community initiative running from 2020. We host community Linux mirrors, distribute free educational booklets, leaflets & stickers, and deliver valuable practical lessons and monthly workshops.

Non-Profit Charity Network/Run entirely by volunteers/Free for every student/26/18 Gulshan Badda Link Road

What’s coming up

Monthly meetups, workshops and special events. Free for everyone, in Dhaka and online.

  1. Linux Command Line, Shell Automation & System Internals

    Hands-on lab walking through terminal navigation, automation pipelines with bash, systemd services, and Linux kernel fundamentals. Master process management, I/O redirection, and building resilient shell utilities.

    • Third Saturday • 15:00 - 18:00 BST
    • The Penguins Club Classroom Lab
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  2. Hacktoberfest 2026: Open Source Contribution Marathon & PR Sprint

    Celebrate the world's largest open source festival with The Penguins Club! Join a high-energy, full-day sprint where mentors help you find beginner-friendly issues, master Git branching and conventional commits, submit meaningful Pull Requests to Linux and FOSS projects, and earn exclusive stickers, badges, and booklets.

    • Saturday • 11:00 - 18:00 BST
    • The Penguins Club Hacker Space & Lab
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  3. Contributing to Open Source Software & Git Best Practices

    Hands-on guidance through cloning repositories, fixing good first issues, writing tests, and opening upstream pull requests. Learn how to communicate effectively with maintainers and write clean atomic commits.

    • Third Saturday • 15:00 - 18:00 BST
    • Campus Lab Space & Media Center
    Starts in
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  4. Self-Hosting, Local Privacy & Digital Sovereignty

    Learn how to take control of personal data by hosting your own open-source services on refurbished hardware or inexpensive home servers. Discover Docker, Podman, Nextcloud, Pi-hole, and Tailscale private overlays.

    • Third Saturday • 15:00 - 18:00 BST
    • The Penguins Club Dhaka Hacker Space
    Starts in
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What the community has built since 2020

The Penguins Club measures success not by vanity metrics or sponsorship fees, but by genuine community longevity, software shipped, and students empowered with free computing literacy.

4+Years RunningMonthly meetups kept continuously since 2020
34+Meetups HostedIn-person workshops in Dhaka & interactive live streams
30+Open RepositoriesPublic tools, datasets, guides & bots on GitHub
100%Free • Zero PaywallsRun by volunteers with zero corporate lock-in
CHARITY INFRASTRUCTURE

High-Speed Local Linux Mirror

Hosting community cache mirrors for Debian, Arch Linux, and Ubuntu packages to ensure fast, low-latency downloads for local students and developers across Bangladesh.

PRINTED EDUCATIONAL MATERIAL

Free Booklets, Leaflets & Stickers

Designing, printing, and distributing physical command-line cheat sheets, Linux installation guides, and Tux stickers at meetups and universities across the country.

OPEN DATA DIRECTORY

bd-startups Ecosystem Index

Curated crowdsourced database documenting tech companies in Bangladesh, providing global visibility to local innovators and student researchers.

Our community members work at

What we run

Clubs meet monthly year-round. Campus workshops, installation fests, and upstream sprints run when a university department or partner signs on.

Ongoing • Year-RoundGNU/Linux & Systems

Linux Systems & CLI Club

Paper reading, live terminal challenges, and monthly hands-on workshops — the habit this community started with in 2020.

From desktop installations (Debian, Arch, Fedora) to headless server administration, shell scripting, package management, and systemd services.

ScheduleEvery 3rd Saturday at 26/18 Gulshan Badda Link Road & online→
Ongoing • Open SourceToolchain & Git

Open Source Toolchain & Upstream PRs

Show what you are building with FOSS tools, get code reviews, and learn the collaborative skills required for upstream contributions.

Mastering Git branching workflows, writing tests, reviewing PRs, and contributing to public repositories under copyleft and permissive licenses.

ScheduleBi-weekly async code review sprints & GitHub discussions→
When Hosted • On DemandCampus Outreach

Campus Install-Fests & Workshops

One-day hands-on bootcamps at universities. Free for students. Runs when a university club, department, or partner signs on.

We bring seasoned mentors, live bootable USB drives, printed cheat-sheets, and lab rubrics. You bring the lab room and eager students.

ScheduleUniversity campuses across Bangladesh (Daffodil, HSTU, etc.)→
Specialized TrackDefense & Privacy

Cybersecurity & Digital Sovereignty

Teaching defensive computing, network auditing, server hardening, and self-hosted cloud alternatives.

Configuring firewalls (UFW, nftables), SSH keys, private local LLMs without telemetry, disk encryption, and verifiable security practices.

ScheduleQuarterly deep-dive lab intensives→
Charity InitiativePublic Commons

Local Linux Mirror & Educational Kits

Free community infrastructure: high-speed package mirrors, printed booklets, leaflets, and Linux stickers.

Operating community package mirrors for Debian, Arch, and Ubuntu. Printing and handing out physical reference leaflets and booklets at zero cost.

Schedule24/7 Server Mirror + Event Distribution→

Four ways to take part

Speak, host a campus stop, contribute code, or support the logistics that keep workshops and educational materials free for every student in Bangladesh.

Free for students & universities

Host a campus workshop

Bring a Linux install-fest or workshop to your university. You bring the lab room and students; we bring the bootable USBs, printed booklets, stickers, and experienced mentors.

Request a Campus Stop
First-time speakers welcomed & mentored

Speak or demo a tool

Teach the tool or workflow you wish someone had shown you. Whether you built a Rust CLI, configured a home server, or mastered Vim, our meetup stage is open to you.

Offer a Session
All code copyleft & open source

Contribute to open repositories

Submit pull requests to bd-startups, Awesome-Cybersecurity, or uradhura. Help translate documentation, fix issues, and improve community infrastructure.

Explore GitHub Repos
100% transparent non-profit allocation

Support mirrors & hardware

Fund high-bandwidth Linux mirror servers, provide refurbished laptops for student labs, or support printing free booklets and stickers — never a paywall.

Support The Initiative

Support rooms that are already hacking & building

Supporters help cover physical meetup spaces, high-bandwidth mirror servers, travel to universities across Bangladesh, and printing free booklets & stickers — never a registration fee. You get direct connection to passionate systems engineers, student builders, and a community that remembers who made the workshops possible.

Talk Collaboration / Support →

Connect with The Penguins Club

Our community operates primarily on Telegram, where we coordinate monthly meetups, answer Linux and open-source questions, and share project updates. Everyone is welcome.

PRIMARY ACTIVE COMMUNITY HUB

Join our Telegram: @penguinsclubnetwork

This is where our day-to-day community coordinates. Connect with students, sysadmins, software engineers, and FOSS advocates. Ask Linux troubleshooting questions, get guidance installing a distro, and receive monthly meetup alerts.

Monthly meetup dates & stream linksFriendly Linux troubleshootingOpen source collaboration
Open Telegram Group →Direct handle: t.me/penguinsclubnetwork

Communication Channels & Roadmap

We keep daily discussions focused on Telegram while configuring additional decentralized protocols.

OFFICIAL & ACTIVE

Telegram Community

@penguinsclubnetwork

Our primary live community hub. Join for monthly meetup notifications, Linux troubleshooting, distro install help, and community discussions.

PLANNED

Matrix Space

#thepenguinsclub:matrix.org

Federated, end-to-end encrypted chat on the open Matrix protocol. Setup in progress to bridge with our main community rooms.

LIVE

Discord Community

discord.gg/BRPWt6fXRH

Voice lounges, audio rooms, and screen-sharing channels for hands-on workshop pair programming and community streams.

PLANNED

Discourse Forum

forum.thepenguins.club

Long-form async forum for distro documentation, in-depth tutorials, system architecture RFCs, and permanent knowledge archiving.

Need to reach the organizers directly?

If you are an academic institution, community space, volunteer speaker, or open-source foundation interested in collaborating with The Penguins Club, send us an email or visit our physical lab.

Why Software Freedom Matters

Founded in 2020, The Penguins Club operates on the conviction that computing knowledge should never be hoarded behind paywalls or proprietary lock-ins. By teaching GNU/Linux and open tools, we help individuals take ownership of their technology.

  • SOVEREIGNTY

    Digital Sovereignty

    Personal workstations and servers should be under the full control of their owners — free from involuntary data extraction, mandatory telemetry, and artificial lock-ins.

  • SUSTAINABILITY

    Hardware Longevity

    GNU/Linux breathes decades of useful life into older computers, actively combating planned obsolescence and reducing electronic waste in universities and homes.

  • AUDITABILITY

    Verifiable Security

    Open source software enables independent peer audits and threat modeling. Security must be rooted in transparent architectural design, never secrecy.

  • COMMONS

    Digital Public Commons

    Foundational software technologies — from the Internet to the Linux kernel — were built as shared public commons. We defend and expand that heritage.

  • CHARITY

    Free Educational Resources

    As an open charity initiative, we host community Linux mirrors, publish guides, distribute free booklets & leaflets, and deliver practical lessons.