July 2004 - main - earth.li

Meetings, Talks, Demonstrations and Kit
by Brett Parker 03 Jul '04

03 Jul '04

Right, here goes nothing... We've never really had a good result as far as talks/demonstrations run, there's either generally not the turnout, or the interest in the talks, or enough spare time in the world. What I'd like to see, sometime, (and this goes doubly for the lurkers on the list) is some suggestions for talks, what you want to learn about, etc. It'd be good to see more of the hundreds of subscribers to the list turn up to meetings, if only to say hello. Is the problem that the meetings are on the wrong days? or in the wrong places? I'm sure there are many of us willing to travel to other places if there's a meeting held there. Basically, I think what I'm trying to say is this: * We can't do talks without topics * We can't do talks without people interested in the talk (i.e. turning up to said talks) * ALUG is a community, we have no real "leadership", the decisions to do things are made by the members. So, maybe it's time to find out what people want out of the group? Do we want a full from scratch to desktop linux install demonstration? If so, which distribution? Certainly we have quite a few debian developers in the group, maybe we should go right through an install from the beginning to having X running, with KDE/Gnome/XFCE4? Do we want a demonstration on reuse of old kit for small servers, samba, LDAP, HTTP, FTP, etc? How about someone talking on how to give talks, maybe that'd be useful? Maybe demonstrations of what other Free operating systems can do? Do people want to know about specific topics, like 3d, DVB, graphics, DTP, Office applications? Without a starting point we'll never get any talks written. Do we actually want talks, or a quick guide on the website for how things work? should we be using the ALUG wiki more? should there be more technical documentation/recommendations available from the site? Maybe we should start with a set of subjects, perhaps as part of the ALUG wiki, and go from there? Thoughts, suggestions, and anything else to the list. :) Thanks, -- Brett Parker

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Software patents
by Nick Daniels 03 Jul '04

03 Jul '04

I thought somebody maybe interested in this:- "On May 18th, by a thin majority, the European Council of Ministers voted in favor of throwing out the European Parliament's efforts to keep software patents out of Europe. According to an FFII press release, the Dutch Parliament yesterday voted to change its Minister's vote, which was in favor, to an abstension. This is an unprecidented move and a great coup for those fighting against software patents, never before has a country reversed a vote in this manner. While this is not sufficient to reverse the decision of the Council of Ministers, it does pave the way for other countries, many of which were pressured into an affirmative vote, to do the same. Now is the time for citizens of the EU to put pressure on their national governments to follow the Dutch lead. " http://slashdot.org/articles/04/07/02/1318220.shtml?tid=155&tid=185&tid=99 Regards Nick Daniels

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RE: [ALUG] EASF, Ipswich Tomorrow
by Elisabeth 03 Jul '04

03 Jul '04

MJ Ray <mjr(a)dsl.pipex.com> wrote: > > It could be anything from a meeting of civil society groups to >the local branch of fruitcakes anonymous. Knowing several of the organisers and attendees from various backgrounds, I'd say it's all of the above. Eli (sunflowerinrain)

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Anarchist Bookfair report / Linux propaganda
by Joe Button 03 Jul '04

03 Jul '04

Hi. Sorry for delay in sending this, I've been away. To be honest I'm only getting around to it now in response to MJ Ray's welcome prompting off the list (cheers MJ). I took some Alug / Linux stuff to the Anarchist Bookfair on June 12th. I was helping out on a stall that was already shared between two other organisations, so the Linux bit was constrained to a small corner of a small desk. I brought a box of Knoppix CDs and a couple of leaflets. I had a couple of chats about Linuxy things but most people seemed more interested in the struggles of indigenous West Papuans and the like (probably quite rightly). Anyway, I gave away about 15 CDs and a few dozen leaflets so it was certainly worth doing, especially as I was going to be there anyway. You can see the stuff I distributed at http://joebutton.co.uk/alug/ if you're interested - there's the Knoppix wallets, an Alug leaflet and an intro to Gnu/Linux aimed at non-geeks. I did the latter two very late the night before the bookfair, hence the slight incoherence. Constructive criticism is welcome of course, and anyone's welcome to do whatever they want with the stuff at the above url. I should probably work out what the appropriate licence would be but it's gone midnight and I have to be up early tomorrow so consider them in the public domain. Joe x ----- Would anyone like any Zapatista coffee? Just got 25 packets to sell @£2.50 each. http://www.wombles.org.uk/zap/zap.php. Coming soon: Pesticide-free fair-trade Palestinian Olive oil from the first pressing, http://www.zaytoun.co.uk. On Monday 28 Jun 2004 18:16, you wrote: > On 2004-06-25 21:45:39 +0100 Joe Button <alug(a)joebutton.co.uk> wrote: > > Syd and I did a bunch of Knoppix CDs for the Anarchist bookfair the > > other > > How did that go? No-one's told the list anything yet, have they?

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EASF, Ipswich Tomorrow
by MJ Ray 03 Jul '04

03 Jul '04

Anyone going to be near Ipswich tomorrow? I'm pondering a visit to http://www.easf.org.uk/ -- MJR/slef My Opinion Only and not of any group I know

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DemosWanted - 8. Upgrading to and using kernel 2.6 in Debian
by kpwatson＠pop3.ukfsn.org 03 Jul '04

03 Jul '04

I use Debian and have done this so I'd be happy to talk about how easy/dificult it was and the kludges I had to do to get it working. But I'm sure there's others on the list who have also. Can we have a quick show of hands; 1) who else would be interested in a talk on this subject? 2) who else has done this and would be willing to participate in leading a disscussion on it? Keith

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Slackware vs Mandrake boot times
by IanBell 02 Jul '04

02 Jul '04

There has been some recent discussion about how much faster Slackware seems to boot than other 'mainstream' distros. So I have installed Slack 9.1 alongside my current Mandrake 9.2 and compared boot times. This is on a Dell 2650 laptop with 384M RAM. Boot to Login: Slackware 45 secs Mandrake 52 secs Note Mandrake has more services running e.g. CUPS and kudzu Login to GUI up: Slackware 25 secs Mandrake 40 secs The main difference here is that Mandrake runs the NVidia driver which adds about 10 seconds. Overall I conclude there is very little difference between them. If you subtract the 10 secs for NVidia from the Mandrake figures then the totals are: Slackware 70 secs Mandrake 80 secs Ian

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Spare/Loan Kit
by kpwatson＠pop3.ukfsn.org 01 Jul '04

01 Jul '04

Can I ask anyone who has kit they are willing to loan for the purposes of demos etc. to add it to the "Kit Available" section of the "DemosOfferedDemosWanted" wiki page? <http://www.alug.org.uk/contrib/?DemosOfferedDemosWanted> (by kit i'd also include cables, multiway mains adaptoers, extension leads, etc) That way anyone who wants to organise something can see what's available. At the moment anything loaned for a demo is implicitly at your own risk but should the group imdemnify people loaning kit in some way? and if so how? (short term insurance?) Also, in addition to H/W, does anyone have any whiteboards, flipcharts, pens, projects, etc. we can borrow for the purpose of running a demo? if so please add them to the list. Cheers :o) Keith

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Suse 9.1 disappointment
by Robert Frusher 01 Jul '04

01 Jul '04

Not really a question, but a little insight. I am an avid Slackware Linux user, but on seeing Suse 9.1 available for download I thought I would give it a go. The install is flawless, with its auto-configuration, although I see nothing wrong with Slackwares curses install. A little while later it was installed. I couldnt get grub boot loader to play nicely with XP so it went in the MBR. I reboot and this is the disappointment... it is REALLY slow, granted nice, but nothing really new. I have a pretty good spec machine and Slack flies compared with Suse. DMA was on but it just seemed to take forever to boot, and sluggish when it gets there. Do you reckon it was the new kernel? I tried 2.6 with Slack and it seemed even faster. SO on seeing 10.0 Slackware out I got rid of Suse, and am back at home. Rob

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