Hi,
With 2007 now upon us - a new year, new start etc., I've been thinking about starting up an Ipswich Linux User Group.
I found ALUG in my web research, and attempted to email Tony Dietrich who is listed as a contact for Ipswich, but the email bounced.
Soo ... does anyone have thoughts they'd like to share?
I'm particularly interested in what the benefits are of piggy-backing on the ALUG, in terms of mailing list and website hosting are ...
I've had an initial planning meet-up with some of the people I hope to get involved, and the general consensus was that we may well prefer to take advantage of our own site/mailing list, like a number of the other Anglian LUGs.
Anyone I should get in contact with to chat about this?
Peter.
samwise wrote:
Hi,
With 2007 now upon us - a new year, new start etc., I've been thinking about starting up an Ipswich Linux User Group.
I found ALUG in my web research, and attempted to email Tony Dietrich who is listed as a contact for Ipswich, but the email bounced.
Soo ... does anyone have thoughts they'd like to share?
I'm particularly interested in what the benefits are of piggy-backing on the ALUG, in terms of mailing list and website hosting are ...
I've had an initial planning meet-up with some of the people I hope to get involved, and the general consensus was that we may well prefer to take advantage of our own site/mailing list, like a number of the other Anglian LUGs.
Anyone I should get in contact with to chat about this?
Peter.
I realise I'm a bit quiet on the list these days, but I've been in ALUG since day 1 (I hosted the inaugural meeting, in fact). My experience is that there are too few people in Ipswich and environs to sustain a LUG. I may be wrong, of course! It has been known...
On the other hand, it's a real fag trekking up to Norwich for meets and having to not drink because of the drive back.
Let's set a meeting up and see who turns up.
My vote's for the Dove Street Inn (in the last four of CAMRA's national real ale pub of the year 2007). I can square it with the landlord if you like.
Cheers, Laurie.
On Fri, Feb 02, 2007 at 03:14:49PM +0000, samwise wrote:
Hi,
With 2007 now upon us - a new year, new start etc., I've been thinking about starting up an Ipswich Linux User Group.
I found ALUG in my web research, and attempted to email Tony Dietrich who is listed as a contact for Ipswich, but the email bounced.
Soo ... does anyone have thoughts they'd like to share?
I'm particularly interested in what the benefits are of piggy-backing on the ALUG, in terms of mailing list and website hosting are ...
I've had an initial planning meet-up with some of the people I hope to get involved, and the general consensus was that we may well prefer to take advantage of our own site/mailing list, like a number of the other Anglian LUGs.
Anyone I should get in contact with to chat about this?
You can count me in if this gets going, I'm at Newbourne just outside Ipswich. I might be able to offer some hosting of website and/or mailing list too. I have a decidely underused account at Gradwell and they offer mailing lists as well as conventinal web hosting.
I think my (very small) business could run to the cost of paying for a domain name if someone can suggest a good one to register.
Hi,
Well, wrt attendance, I think two responses in less than an hour is pretty good ... ;)
I have about six or seven people interested so far ... so counting yourselves, that would nearly break us into double figures. I think there are plenty of linux dabblers who are based at BT's Adastral Park research site so I'm hopeful we shouldn't have a problem getting enough together to at least get some social meets going ... I'm not looking any further than that and a mailing list/site at the moment, until I get a feel for the number of people attending.
We were thinking of the Milestone as a pub - third Monday of every month, mainly because this place is fairly roomy (should accommodate quite a few) and also has free wi-fi which might also prove handy for PDA/mobile/laptop access.
Plan is to have the first meet on th 19th Feb, but I haven't publicised it yet whilst I get the mailing list and web sorted out. Hence the question about whether to piggyback on ALUG or to roll our own.
Thoughts?
Sam.
On 02-Feb-07 samwise wrote:
Hence the question about whether to piggyback on ALUG or to roll our own.
Thoughts?
Sam.
I'd second Brett on this. ALUG is well used to piggybacking. In fact ALUG was designed for piggybacking. Hardly any of us are anywhere in particular. ALUG is the closest approximation to organised cohesion likely to be found for scores of miles in any direction. For us denizens of the Dead Marshes, from the Wetwang to the Eastfarthing, ALUG is the One Ring to find them all, and in the darkness bind them.
-------------------------------------------------------------------- E-Mail: (Ted Harding) ted.harding@nessie.mcc.ac.uk Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 02-Feb-07 Time: 16:57:23 ------------------------------ XFMail ------------------------------
I'd vote for using the main alug list, social list, and the site (with an IPLUG area).
Not sure I can make Mondays in the next 2 months, it being a rehearsal night. And soon I'll be moving out of Belstead...
I'll try, though, because it'd be great to see some of the Martlemites again.
On Fri, Feb 02, 2007 at 03:14:49PM +0000, samwise wrote:
Hi,
With 2007 now upon us - a new year, new start etc., I've been thinking about starting up an Ipswich Linux User Group.
I'd skip that part - forming lugs is just boring ;)
I found ALUG in my web research, and attempted to email Tony Dietrich who is listed as a contact for Ipswich, but the email bounced.
Soo ... does anyone have thoughts they'd like to share?
I'm particularly interested in what the benefits are of piggy-backing on the ALUG, in terms of mailing list and website hosting are ...
Why piggy back? Assuming the general nature of topics for the mailing list would be linux related, there's no reason that you couldn't just use the main@lists.alug.org.uk list for that. For social events, there's nothing wrong with using social@lists.alug.org.uk and joining that (and, you know, occasionally there might be events on those 2 lists that you might want to go to, or know someone that might be interested in going).
WRT the website, I believe that David and Simon are currently working on making that more community based, with that in mind there may be a possibility of your own section of the site, maybe (I don't know, but hey, worth putting it out there now ;)
Your Ipswich meetings are now officially the closest meetings that I could get to! (But living in Brighton, it's fairly unlikely that I'll make 'em, don't be offended, though - I'm fairly useless at turning up to most things. Before you ask, I've been an ALUG member for a fair number of years, since somewhere around 99 or 98 or, oh, sometime, and even though I've moved out of East Angular, ALUG is still the right LUG! Though, it's probably time for another BLUG meeting soon... hmmm... must be getting on for a couple of months).
Right, err, so that's absolutely none of your questions answered and a random amount of stuff written. I'll shut up and get back to playing with workflows in APLAWS.
Cheers,
Why piggy back? Assuming the general nature of topics for the mailing list would be linux related, there's no reason that you couldn't just use the main@lists.alug.org.uk list for that. For social events, there's nothing wrong with using social@lists.alug.org.uk and joining that (and, you know, occasionally there might be events on those 2 lists that you might want to go to, or know someone that might be interested in going).
Sorry, maybe I wasn't clear - that's exactly what I meant by piggy-backing. The reasons for not doing so are basically to do with traffic. There's quite a few posts to the ALUG mailing list so that's a lot busier than an Ipswich-centric one. If I setup an Ipswich-only one then people have the choice of subscribing to both, whereas if we only use the ALUG one then it's required that all new Ipswich members sign up to what might end up being quite a busy list which contains news for the whole of East Anglia (not much fun for those who can't travel) . I know using ALUG would mean that there will be more people on the list to answer, say, tech questions but there are plenty of other lists online for specific tech. discussion, plus there is always the option for members to subscribe to both. Basically, the feeling was we may not want to force new users to being inundated with mails about things that may not be "local". The primary advantage of a local LUG is the contact with other local Linux users and basically to facilitate local meets - and Norwich, ain't local ... :)
Ooops ... I think I may have come across as rather The League of Gentlemen-ish for a bit there... :)
Anyway, I was asking the question to see if anyone had any other reasons why not starting a new list might be better ...
WRT the website, I believe that David and Simon are currently working on making that more community based, with that in mind there may be a possibility of your own section of the site, maybe (I don't know, but hey, worth putting it out there now ;)
Indeed, a simple wiki-style which could be expanded is what's called for, I think. Though if we could also reach it through a domain name of it's own that might be preferable for publicising it (have no problem with prominent links to ALUG).
Which David and Simon are you specifically referring to and how best to contact them ... do they read this list?
Peter.
On Fri, 2007-02-02 at 17:00 +0000, samwise wrote:
If I setup an Ipswich-only one then people have the choice of subscribing to both, whereas if we only use the ALUG one then it's required that all new Ipswich members sign up to what might end up being quite a busy list which contains news for the whole of East Anglia (not much fun for those who can't travel) .
I feel that the main list could do with being busier, I can't see the extra traffic from Ipswich members being anything other than a good thing.
I mean perhaps later if the traffic got so high that it was impossible to follow a particular discussion thread then it could be revisited and a split considered.
I can't see why Ipswich specific news would be an annoyance to those from Norfolk who can't travel (or haven't got the papers to pass the Suffolk border patrol :-) ) I mean if there is a thread relating to an Ipswich kit meet they can't make then they only have to ignore those messages, it's not like you are forced to read each one.
I think I am gonna start an Acle splinter group! Any one with me?
As someone who works in Suffolk and lives in Norfolk, and who has to pass the border guards twice a day, I would be able to travel either meets but would only like to subscribe to one list, have enough email rules to deal with, sorry to be a spanner in the works.
Thanks
Michael
-----Original Message----- From: main-bounces@lists.alug.org.uk [mailto:main-bounces@lists.alug.org.uk] On Behalf Of Wayne Stallwood Sent: 02 February 2007 23:46 To: ALUG Subject: Re: [ALUG] Ipswich LUG
On Fri, 2007-02-02 at 17:00 +0000, samwise wrote:
If I setup an Ipswich-only one then people have the choice of subscribing to both, whereas if we only use the ALUG one then it's required that all new Ipswich members sign up to what might end up being quite a busy list which contains news for the whole of East Anglia (not much fun for those who can't travel) .
I feel that the main list could do with being busier, I can't see the extra traffic from Ipswich members being anything other than a good thing.
I mean perhaps later if the traffic got so high that it was impossible to follow a particular discussion thread then it could be revisited and a split considered.
I can't see why Ipswich specific news would be an annoyance to those from Norfolk who can't travel (or haven't got the papers to pass the Suffolk border patrol :-) ) I mean if there is a thread relating to an Ipswich kit meet they can't make then they only have to ignore those messages, it's not like you are forced to read each one.
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On Fri, Feb 02, 2007 at 11:45:52PM +0000, Wayne Stallwood wrote:
On Fri, 2007-02-02 at 17:00 +0000, samwise wrote:
If I setup an Ipswich-only one then people have the choice of subscribing to both, whereas if we only use the ALUG one then it's required that all new Ipswich members sign up to what might end up being quite a busy list which contains news for the whole of East Anglia (not much fun for those who can't travel) .
I feel that the main list could do with being busier, I can't see the extra traffic from Ipswich members being anything other than a good thing.
Yes, while it's a very 'responsive' list it has been quite quiet recently.
samwise samwise@bagshot-row.org wrote:
I found ALUG in my web research, and attempted to email Tony Dietrich who is listed as a contact for Ipswich, but the email bounced.
Soo ... does anyone have thoughts they'd like to share?
If it's OK by the people on this list, go to the page that lists Tony Dietrich, click "Edit Page" delete Tony and put yourself as the contact. When you hit Save, it will send the changes to a webmaster (spammers make running unmoderated too much 'fun'). (The javascript-based rich editor seems to be offline just now - anyone know why?)
I'm particularly interested in what the benefits are of piggy-backing on the ALUG, in terms of mailing list and website hosting are ...
The benefits are that great people are already managing them (I'm not involved in it any more!), so you can concentrate on organising great meetings - and you have a ready audience for those meetings. If there are Ipswich hands available to help run the websites and mailing lists, then offer on this list and see what happens.
ALUG started in Woodbridge near Ipswich in 1999 (thanks Laurie). It would be disappointing to see Ipswich fork just because the Suffolk haven't got a meeting together recently. Please fix that ALUG bug before forking the project...
Stay in ALUG and help run one of the oldest and largest LUGs in the country. Oh, and you also get one of the best logo *ideas* ever (which I just added to the FAQ, although reading back in my notes, I see me blame Adam for it, while James and Keith blame me for it).
I've had an initial planning meet-up with some of the people I hope to get involved, and the general consensus was that we may well prefer to take advantage of our own site/mailing list, like a number of the other Anglian LUGs.
I can see some argument for running several sites linked from the one hub, for marketing and management reasons (I've suggested this in the past, but I think only the library and two planets ever got online on their own), but I don't see a benefit in split mailing lists yet. Are you planning to host porn and spam or something else we wouldn't want?
Regards,
On 02/02/07, Ted Harding ted.harding@nessie.mcc.ac.uk wrote:
Hardly any of us are anywhere in particular. ALUG is the closest approximation to organised cohesion likely to be found for scores of miles in any direction.
Ah, interesting point. If there were only LUGs for Norwich/Ipswich/Colchester, I can see how that might discriminate a bit, given the large number of little places there are in East Anglia.
If it's OK by the people on this list, go to the page that lists Tony Dietrich,
I'll wait until I've finalised the plan, but I'll be happy to do that if we join the collective. :)
The benefits are that great people are already managing them (I'm not involved in it any more!), so you can concentrate on organising great meetings
well, yes, but lug.org.uk would offer the same sort of thing and once a mailing list and wiki has been configured, I don't think there'd be much maintenance hassle.
- and you have a ready audience for those meetings. If there
are Ipswich hands available to help run the websites and mailing lists, then offer on this list and see what happens.
I'm not sure how much pressure I want to put on others to play with the websites and stuff so I thought I'd leave that a while - I'll let ppl volunteer as they want. For a start, I just want to arrange a mailing list and a wiki page we can publicise and build on. I'm not adverse to integration with the ALUG but I want to make sure our focus remains fairly local ...
ALUG started in Woodbridge near Ipswich in 1999 (thanks Laurie). It would be disappointing to see Ipswich fork just because the Suffolk haven't got a meeting together recently. Please fix that ALUG bug before forking the project...
A fair point. If there were regular meets locally, I wouldn't have posted! :) That said, I know most of the people I have bullied into attending for the next 3 meets aren't that interested in Norfolk and further-afield based events, so I don't want to put them off by making them receive notifications for events they're not interested in attending.
Stay in ALUG and help run one of the oldest and largest LUGs in the country. Oh, and you also get one of the best logo *ideas* ever (which I just added to the FAQ, although reading back in my notes, I see me blame Adam for it, while James and Keith blame me for it).
Hah, well ... after a suitable voting period, we've come up with:
iPlug
which jumps on the IPcity and Apple iPod bandwagons at the same time AND could well result in some fantastic logo designs if we find a suitable artist. :) I'm not convinced a penguin on a horse beats that ... hehe
I can see some argument for running several sites linked from the one hub, for marketing and management reasons (I've suggested this in the past, but I think only the library and two planets ever got online on their own), but I don't see a benefit in split mailing lists yet.
Well, after what I've read so far, I'd be happy if it were possible for us have a sub-page in an ALUG wiki* which we could perhaps point to using a CNAME DNS record (probably from lug.org.uk) so that we could publicise it locally. The only point I'm not sure on is the list - I need to go back and ask those who've shown an interest already and see what they'd prefer. If they're happy using the ALUG mailing list, that's fine ... but I don't want to make that decision without consulting them.
* Though I haven't investigated, is the current wiki as flexible as say MediaWiki? It seems quite slim at first glance.
Are you planning to host porn and spam or something else we wouldn't want?
Sure, isn't that the reason everyone runs linux? To get better performance for shovelling out their pr0n spam? :)
Peter.
On Fri, Feb 02, 2007 at 03:14:49PM +0000, samwise wrote:
I'm particularly interested in what the benefits are of piggy-backing on the ALUG, in terms of mailing list and website hosting are ...
Hi,
Even if you go for your own site/list etc. etc. then please post meeting announcements for your meetings here so you get more exposure! Other than that, do whatever is easiest for you as it is your time/effort being expended.
Thanks Adam
I will second MJR's comments
Why not just add Ipswich meets to ALUG ?
I'd happily attend Ipswich meets because they are nearer for me than Norwich and if I had the time I'd actually organise a meet myself. But I'd rather be a member of one LUG than two and given that it is the Anglian LUG it doesn't have to be Norfolk centric (even though at this point in time the Norfolk members are the most active)
For me the mailing list/kit meets/IRC gain value through more members and therefore from this lowly members perspective one bigger Lug is better than two smaller ones.
On Fri, Feb 02, 2007 at 11:34:35PM +0000, Wayne Stallwood wrote:
I'd happily attend Ipswich meets because they are nearer for me than Norwich and if I had the time I'd actually organise a meet myself. But I'd rather be a member of one LUG than two and given that it is the Anglian LUG it doesn't have to be Norfolk centric (even though at this point in time the Norfolk members are the most active)
Also, take into account that all our recent kits meets have been in Syleham which is in Suffolk and halfway between Ipswich and Norwich (ish) I'm sure that if we have future meets there than we'd perhaps find more people coming from both areas.
Adam
On 03/02/07, Adam Bower adam@thebowery.co.uk wrote:
On Fri, Feb 02, 2007 at 11:34:35PM +0000, Wayne Stallwood wrote:
I'd happily attend Ipswich meets because they are nearer for me than Norwich and if I had the time I'd actually organise a meet myself. But I'd rather be a member of one LUG than two and given that it is the Anglian LUG it doesn't have to be Norfolk centric (even though at this point in time the Norfolk members are the most active)
Also, take into account that all our recent kits meets have been in Syleham which is in Suffolk and halfway between Ipswich and Norwich (ish) I'm sure that if we have future meets there than we'd perhaps find more people coming from both areas.
If I could inject my 2p worth, I think its best to make the new iplug thing a sub sect if you were of the alug thing. Alug is a large and disparate community which has members scattered all around the region. Some of those members will travel far and wide to attend meetings others find it more difficult. Hosting meetings in Ipswich is a great idea especially for those unable or unwilling to travel and it gives those of us who will travel to meets another venue to add to the cannon. Meetings I have hosted in the middle of nowhere at Syleham have always been pretty well attended and I see no reason why the same happening in Ipswich should not be the case. Bring it on I will do my damnedest to attend as I'm sure will many other members. If you need any assistance in running a meeting ask on the list I'm sure one of the experienced meeting hosts will be glad to help, I know I would. As for forking the project I firmly believe it's a bad idea, come into the fold as a meeting coordinator/contact for the Ipswich/south suffolk area and keep the resources of alug intact. Pointing the domain of your choice to an alug page for Ipswich would make sense. I'm not sure who is the web master for the alug site at present but I expect they will come forward and assist if that is what you choose to do.
Cheers, BJ (Mid Suffolk ALUG contact, list admin and proud to be member since day 1)
samwise wrote:
Hi,
With 2007 now upon us - a new year, new start etc., I've been thinking about starting up an Ipswich Linux User Group.
The more I think about this, the less I think it's a good idea. I don't believe there are enough of us in either Suffolk OR Norfolk to justify either county going it alone. The benefits from pooling resources are too great to throw away.
That said, I'm looking forward to a meet in Ipswich.
Cheers, Laurie.
On Mon, 5 Feb 2007, Laurie Brown wrote:
samwise wrote:
Hi,
With 2007 now upon us - a new year, new start etc., I've been thinking about starting up an Ipswich Linux User Group.
The more I think about this, the less I think it's a good idea. I don't believe there are enough of us in either Suffolk OR Norfolk to justify either county going it alone. The benefits from pooling resources are too great to throw away.
That said, I'm looking forward to a meet in Ipswich.
Agreed, I'll come along for beer if I don't have to travel too far! :)
-Mark
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On 05-Feb-07 Laurie Brown wrote:
samwise wrote:
Hi,
With 2007 now upon us - a new year, new start etc., I've been thinking about starting up an Ipswich Linux User Group.
The more I think about this, the less I think it's a good idea. I don't believe there are enough of us in either Suffolk OR Norfolk to justify either county going it alone. The benefits from pooling resources are too great to throw away.
Not forgetting Cambridgeshire (not that it changes the argument, indeed it tends to reinforce it).
That said, I'm looking forward to a meet in Ipswich.
Or Ely or Kings Lynn or ...
Cheers, Laurie.
I think the earlier suggestion of maintaining the presence of "local groups" of ALUG on the website is the positive response to this issue. Those of us who can identify near neighbours (i.e. within 20 miles or so) through the mists can then get in touch with each other if they'd like to get together out of the chill.
At present, the access to details of "local groups" is at
http://www.alug.org.uk/venues/
where you can find the name and email for the "Contact" at each of our 8 metropolises, but not about who else may be within range.
I think it would be useful, and tend to encourage local get-togthers, if there was provision for a "local members" link on each of these locality pages, which people who were open to being contacted by any of each other on the lines of "How about meeting up at ... on ... ?" could refer to to get in touch with each other. Being entered on a "local denizens" list wold of course be voluntary.
Coments? Ted.
-------------------------------------------------------------------- E-Mail: (Ted Harding) ted.harding@nessie.mcc.ac.uk Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 05-Feb-07 Time: 16:49:21 ------------------------------ XFMail ------------------------------
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Adam Bower -
Brett Parker -
cl＠isbd.net -
John Woodard -
Laurie Brown -
Mark Ridley -
Michael -
MJ Ray -
samwise -
sfr -
ted.harding＠nessie.mcc.ac.uk -
Wayne Stallwood