Hi guys 👋

Today, I want to share something unexpected. To be honest, if someone had told me a month ago that I could do this, I wouldn’t have believed them. But here we are — I’ve finally released a Python package and dataset called TamilKavi. I still can’t believe I pulled it off, but it’s real!

I’d love to share the whole story with you. Many of you already know me — I write Tamil poetry and have even published two books. However, I faced font issues when trying to release them on Amazon and Kindle. Frustrated, I reached out to my community friend, Hari, and I asked them:
“Bro, I want to release my Tamil poetry book on Amazon, but I’m stuck with font issues. Do you know anyone who can solve it?”

Hari referred me to Ayyanar Bro, and to me it’s a surprise, he was from Madurai — what a coincidence! We spoke almost four times a week for different reasons. I had already written about him and his portfolio website, which he built using Emacs & Org, so I won’t go into more details — you guys might find it repetitive.

Through Ayyanar Bro, I learned about the Tamil Kanchilung community and FreeTamilBooks, where I finally found a solution to my font issue. But here’s another twist — FreeTamilBooks required more poetry for my book release. Because I like to release that in FreeTamilBooks.Then another book on Amazon. That was another headache because, with my tight schedule, I barely had time to write.

While navigating all this, I discovered Tamilrulepy, a Python package with Tamil grammar rules. I was eager to learn more, and unexpectedly, I got an opportunity to contribute to it! That’s when I met Boopalan — another passionate tech enthusiast like me. He helped me write code for TamilRulePy and even invited me to contribute to TamilString, a Python package for documentation. I accepted his invitation and started working on it.

Then, during one of our conversations, I got an idea: why not develop my own Python package? And that’s how TamilKavi was born.

I shared my idea with Boopalan and invited him to build it as a team because, honestly, I’m no expert. But it wasn’t easy — we had to overcome countless challenges, especially since we were both preparing for our model exams and semester exams (he’s an MSc student, and I’m a BSc student). It was a tough time, but I didn’t give up. I studied, understood, and gradually started coding — not entirely on my own, of course.

Now, you might wonder — why build a website? Simple: to collect data from authors. But due to financial constraints, the data collected through the website idea transformed into a Google Form, and now it is a navigation button. It’s another story altogether. Since I had no time, I built a basic structure using Lovable.dev and handed it over to my juniors, Gagan & Rohith, who took care of the website.

The final result? Release of the Python package & website!

I must especially thank Praveen Bro — my community brother and mentor. Without hesitation, he offered me a subdomain. For me, that’s a huge deal, and I’m incredibly grateful!

“Okay thambi, enough of this English talk — why did you release the dataset?” When you ask me likewise.

Well, there’s a reason for that, too. I’ve seen Selvakumar Duraipandian Bro on LinkedIn about their post of numerous Tamil datasets on Hugging Face, including Thirukkural, Tholkappiyam, and more. I was truly inspired by his work. So, I release that as a Dataset.

Now, you might ask, “So, thambi, after all this talk, what does your package actually do?”

It’s simple — TamilKavi helps discover new Tamil poems. That’s all. Now your mind is

“Edhuka evalo seenu?”

Well, I’m not just a developer. The person who is are Tamil poet & tech enthusiast, it’s a crazy project. Through this journey, I’ve learned so much, especially about GitHub workflows.

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Connect with Me:

• LinkedIn: Anand Sundaramoorthy
• Instagram: @anandsundaramoorthysa
• Email: sanand03072005@gmail.com