Hello, I would like to extend the discussion about weekend trials or expositions of various equipment or software. I consider myself to be an ordinary modern linux user that struggles with the most basic problems of everyday useage. I don't want to list the most common difficulties that face the 'ordinary (none technical) user' because I don't know what they might be, but plugins for the very popular browsers konqueror and mozilla 1.7 could possibly be dealt with via the alug mailing list. I don't just mean refering users to a web site, which could be a good thing, but actually creating emails that show 'step by step' how to install a certain plugin or other task. Our top exponents of linux might enjoy writing these postings. Documentation relating to linux across the board is poor, in my opinion. Could we as a user group make a difference to this problem of documentation by helping with a (very loosely) structured education program that is conducted via the alug mailing list? The mailing list serves the really knowledgable linux users quite well in a conversational way, but now that linux is so much more mainstream, it would be nice to punctuate these savvy conversations with (possibly) regular(ish) instruction on the basics of linux. We could focus on the most basic configuration tasks via our mailing list to help NEW users of linux, and still enjoy the very stimulating discussions of experienced users. I would enjoy reading the unsolicited configurational instruction of an experienced user that was posted to the list on more BASIC topics. It could become normal practice. It can't hurt, but would take a little effort admittedly. Kind regards, Bryce.
___________________________________________________________ALL-NEW Yahoo! Messenger - sooooo many all-new ways to express yourself http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com
I would enjoy reading the unsolicited configurational instruction of an experienced user that was posted to the list on more BASIC topics. It could become normal practice. It can't hurt, but would take a little effort admittedly. Kind regards, Bryce.
I like this idea, but I can't help thinking that the mailing list is possibly the wrong place for this information.
Can't we just put some of our own howto's on the Lug site (or perhaps a different site) The mailing list is great for members but the archive is difficult for non members to search.
Internally at work I am currently implementing a system based on wordpress to keep track of tips and tricks we all pick up when working on customers systems, we will also keep it as a central changelog so that everyone is aware as to what has changed at each of our larger customers sites.
If one of us discovers a neat time saving trick then it is dropped into the blog, if a customer reports a strange happening then it goes into the blog. It will used as a sort of technical diary.
I used a blog because there are plenty of streamlined tools for making quick entries, even from my treo phone. So I can get the raw data in as soon as it happens and then flesh up the details when I get back to the office.
On 2004-07-07 00:46:11 +0100 Wayne Stallwood ALUGlist@digimatic.plus.com wrote:
Can't we just put some of our own howto's on the Lug site
I'll mirror or link any member's howto, pretty much. I've been meaning to attack that bit of the site with a big axe for a while now.
The mailing list is great for members but the archive is difficult for non members to search.
Restrict a web search engine search to lists.alug.org.uk and it should work quite well. If someone wants to index the archives better, the full thing is there for download, or you can get a month to test on.
On Tuesday 06 Jul 2004 7:09 pm, Bryce Martin wrote:
I don't want to list the most common difficulties that face the 'ordinary (none technical) user' because I don't know what they might be, but plugins for the very popular browsers konqueror and mozilla 1.7 could possibly be dealt with via the alug mailing list. I don't just mean refering users to a web site, which could be a good thing, but actually creating emails that show 'step by step' how to install a certain plugin or other task. Our top exponents of linux might enjoy writing these postings. Documentation relating to linux across the board is poor, in my opinion.
Bryce, interesting idea but all of these things are completely dependant on which distro a person is using. Installing and configuring things in Suse is done very differently than in Mandrake, differently again in Debian. Etc etc.
Much of the discussion on the ALUG list is for 'hands-on' distros such as Gentoo or Debian. This is not typical of most recent major distros intended for the less-technical user.
For example, addressing two of the specific points you mention, some distros come with excellent documentation for novices (e.g. Suse and Mandrake - probably others). Plug-ins for Konqueror and Mozilla are installed by default in many distros.
FWIW my advice is to do as I have done and find a distro that is easy to install, configure and use and that has a thriving support community. There is more than one.
Also to remember that spending a relatively small amount of money may save a huge amount of time and stress. You'll have to spend something - either time or money. Free speech and free beer, maybe, but there are no free lunches :-)
Best wishes Syd
There seem to be no other meetings planned for July. If that's correct, who would come to a meeting in Lynn or Ely on which Saturday, Sunday afternoon or Monday evening between now and 8 August? Please reply to me off-list indicating when you would attend, what you would show (if anything) or what you want to be shown. If it's already on DemosOfferedDemosWanted, I'll copy it from there. If you know any of the possible venues, comments are welcome. I'll summarise and post back. If there's not clearly demand, I'll shelve it.
On Tuesday 06 Jul 2004 7:09 pm, Bryce Martin wrote:
[...] plugins for the very popular browsers konqueror and mozilla 1.7 could possibly be dealt with via the alug mailing list. [...]
Just as a side comment: I don't use plugins. From what I remember, they are a pain to configure (you want what form of symlink where), slow the browser down or crash it (more common if not compiled for your exact browser/libc combination), and don't seem to add enough to be worth the effort over having the file download and open in a viewer. I'm sure other people have the skills to make them work, but I've not found them worthwhile and I'm a pragmatist.
In general, it seems better for most technical discussion to happen in more targetted places. Where ALUG has worked best for me, is when I don't know what that more targetted place is, or don't even know what software I should be using for a particular task. Sometimes, it even introduces me to things I didn't know that I didn't know. This may be why I've not enjoyed recent meetings as much. You're all nice people, but there are other drinking clubs which I'd join if I wanted.
Apologies for being out-of-thread. I didn't see the original.
On Tue, 2004-07-06 at 19:09, Bryce Martin wrote:
Hello, I would like to extend the discussion about weekend trials or expositions of various equipment or software. I consider myself to be an ordinary modern linux user that struggles with the most basic problems of everyday useage.(cut) The mailing list serves the really knowledgable linux users quite well in a conversational way, but now that linux is so much more mainstream, it would be nice to punctuate these savvy conversations with (possibly) regular(ish) instruction on the basics of linux. We could focus on the most basic configuration tasks via our mailing list to help NEW users of linux, and still enjoy the very stimulating discussions of experienced users.(cut)
TO ALL ADMINISTRATORS AND INFLUENTIAL USERS
Do you think it is possible for you all to agree and define the AIM of ALUG and the PURPOSE of the aim. (best defined by answering, in order to...) So everyone, especially new and un-knowledgable subscribers,(like me) will know where you are going and why you want to go there. Then you will know what needs to be done to achieve the aim. Just as important,you will know when you have arrived. Microsoft had a clear aim and purpose. It did not have the best product.
__________________________________________________________
On 2004-07-12 21:04:31 +0100 R.F.Jarvis robert.jarvis90@ntlworld.com wrote:
Do you think it is possible for you all to agree and define the AIM of ALUG and the PURPOSE of the aim. [...]
From past experience: No.
On 2004-07-12 21:04:31 +0100 R.F.Jarvis robert.jarvis90@ntlworld.com wrote:
Do you think it is possible for you all to agree and define the AIM of ALUG and the PURPOSE of the aim.
In April 1999, I wrote:
The main aim of this group is to provide a physical Linux community for this region.
...and the people were happy. On the second day, I rested. This set a bad example for ALUGgers.
On Mon, Jul 12, 2004 at 10:28:30PM +0100, MJ Ray wrote:
On 2004-07-12 21:04:31 +0100 R.F.Jarvis robert.jarvis90@ntlworld.com wrote:
Do you think it is possible for you all to agree and define the AIM of ALUG and the PURPOSE of the aim.
What do you want Alugs aim to be? and what is the purpose? You are a member, so if you ask the question you should be able to provide the answer, if you can't then how/why should any of the rest of us be able to?
In April 1999, I wrote:
The main aim of this group is to provide a physical Linux community for this region.
...and the people were happy. On the second day, I rested. This set a bad example for ALUGgers.
*shrug* it exists ;) it does stuff. I think perhaps if people want it to do more then we need them to try and manage it and tell people what they want them to do.
I guess that part of the problem is that people see Alug as an entity with a controller, the closest we have to that is me, MJ Ray and BigJohn as we do mailing list admin and have IRC ops, to certain degree others have some control due to providing hosting, domain names and mailing lists etc. Anyhow, of these people none of us want to act as a controller as such we just do it because if we didn't who would? What we really want is other people to step in and fill the gaps in the group, and what we really want is somebody to setup the talks/teaching groups etc. etc. and tell the people who are capable of giving them what to do and when?
Adam
This is going to end up with a comparison to other lug's (again), to places like plug who have more organisation in their events (organised talks etc). Is there a secondary issue with the differences of something like PLUG to ALUG - PLUG is city based. Most the members will be from locality of a small area. When they swap venue's, its to a pub just on theother side of the city (from Forum to City gate for instance), its not thirty miles away in kings lynn and so on.
Sure there are dedicated members who go that far to meetings, and indeed many people who travel a long way to get to PLUG, but it means that there are other issues at stake - The first is that whilst you have a large ish membership (in terms of unique people who are active and attending meetings), you might not get them all at every meeting, you end up with people who cant attend certain meetings ever, which means that if you try to put on special events or have a meeting to arrange "the future of alug for the next month" then you'll probably certainly not have everyone who should be there, actually be there.
the other issue o being so distributed is that if you have a talk aranged, and the weather is shit, and your talk dude cant get in, then you'll have people turn up (potential newcommers to the group) who might decide not to come ever again. With such large distances to travel, especially in the colder months, people don't want to travel that far.
As for doing more - was it true that people complained about not enough kit meets? the last kit meet had no kit (With the exception of adams beautiful (etc) laptop).
The aim of alug from my point of view: A Drinking buddy system for Computer Geeks.
J
On Tue, Jul 13, 2004 at 11:00:54AM +0100, James Taylor wrote:
The aim of alug from my point of view: A Drinking buddy system for Computer Geeks.
Aye, it is definitely that :)
I would also say that it is here to help people who have problems with their Linux machines via the mailing list and on IRC. We do also have a library, but that seems a little underused. Alug is what the members make it, and when I say members I mean /everyone/ it isn't just the people who post lots on the mailing list, of the people who just hangout on IRC, or the people who organise meetings or the mailing list admins it really is all of the members. If you are a member and can see something that needs fixing, improving or creating then do so, if you need help to do it then ask here and be specific with what you need help with and for.
Oh and don't forget people there is a meeting at Syleham on the 22nd of August, there has been talk of having a bbq at this meeting also :) if people want some specific demos or talks etc. now is the time to request them. If people want help with installs or specific problems announce here before the meeting so that people can prepare to deal with them on the day.
Adam
-----Original Message----- From: main-admin@lists.alug.org.uk [mailto:main-admin@lists.alug.org.uk] On Behalf Of adam@thebowery.co.uk Sent: 13 July 2004 11:32 To: alug Subject: Re: [ALUG] Aim & Purpose (v2.0)
Oh and don't forget people there is a meeting at Syleham on the 22nd of August, there has been talk of having a bbq at this meeting also :)
Confirmed the booking, it is definitely on, feel free to discuss bbq arrangements.
Cheers, BJ
On Tue, 2004-07-13 at 14:46, John Woodard wrote:
Confirmed the booking, it is definitely on, feel free to discuss bbq arrangements.
BYOB and small cash contribution towards any expenses incurred by the person setting up the actual cooking arrangements?
/Kirsten
-----Original Message----- From: main-admin@lists.alug.org.uk [mailto:main-admin@lists.alug.org.uk] On Behalf Of Kirsten Naylor Sent: 13 July 2004 18:53 To: alug Subject: Syleham BBQ (was: RE: [ALUG] Aim & Purpose (v2.0))
On Tue, 2004-07-13 at 14:46, John Woodard wrote:
Confirmed the booking, it is definitely on, feel free to discuss bbq arrangements.
BYOB and small cash contribution towards any expenses incurred by the person setting up the actual cooking arrangements?
I can supply charcoal and a very small bbq to cook on and of course I will get the bar opened. I reckon if people bring their own food plus a little extra we will have a successful event. (If Jesus could get away with it with a couple of loaves and a handful of fish with 5k peeps we should breeze it.)
Cheers, BigJohn
On 2004-07-13 11:31:56 +0100 adam@thebowery.co.uk wrote:
Oh and don't forget people there is a meeting at Syleham on the 22nd of August, there has been talk of having a bbq at this meeting also :)
This is close to debian's 11th birthday, IIRC, so how about some cool debian-based things? I'll bring dyne:bolic for people to prod in fear. I'll even try to understand enough of it to demo something fun beforehand.
If wanted, I'll answer questions about debian sysadmin (as in DemosWantedDemosOffered), but I'll only have a short intro prepared (/Kirsten, will you be there?). With any luck, the dyne:bolic system will give me a safe and reasonably debian-like environment to demonstrate it and to demonstrate how well debian recovers from catastrophic user error ;-) I want a walk-through of the new debian-installer, if someone is able to show that. Realistically, I'm not going to get around to looking at it before then. I see Ashley wants to know about upgrading to and using kernel 2.6 in Debian.
Flaming things is also very appropriate for a debian birthday celebration, so what's needed for the BBQ?
Finally, that will be one week before the main Software Freedom Day, so is anyone interested in making it into that? http://www.softwarefreedomday.org/
On Tue, Jul 13, 2004 at 06:54:05PM +0100, MJ Ray wrote:
Flaming things is also very appropriate for a debian birthday celebration, so what's needed for the BBQ?
Windows XP CD-Roms
Adam
On 2004-07-13 11:00:54 +0100 James Taylor j.e.taylor@uea.ac.uk wrote:
[...PLUG...] Most the members will be from locality of a small area. When they swap venue's, its to a pub just on theother side of the city
PLUG seldom meets in a pub, or am I wrong? I've been to their meetings in an office, an old pub and an industrial unit. OK, all in the same city, but then it's a city-based LUG.
[...] your talk dude cant get in, then you'll have people turn up (potential newcommers to the group) who might decide not to come ever again.
Hardly a new problem. The solution: surefire standby talkers not afraid of embarrassment like mChicago. ISTR a midlands LUG having to put a standby on instead of ESR not so long ago.
[...] the last kit meet had no kit [...]
...but nothing was planned/wanted with the kit?
The aim of alug from my point of view: A Drinking buddy system for Computer Geeks.
Yuck! I hear there are "buddies" who enjoy drinking computer geeks, but let's keep the meetings clean! ;-)
On Monday 12 July 2004 20:04, R.F.Jarvis wrote:
TO ALL ADMINISTRATORS AND INFLUENTIAL USERS
Do you think it is possible for you all to agree and define the AIM of ALUG and the PURPOSE of the aim. (best defined by answering, in order to...) So everyone, especially new and un-knowledgable subscribers,(like me) will know where you are going and why you want to go there. Then you will know what needs to be done to achieve the aim. Just as important,you will know when you have arrived. Microsoft had a clear aim and purpose. It did not have the best product.
Can't speak for the rest of the group but.
As part of the group it is my aim to promote the use and understanding of Linux and Open Source software, also to help where possible other Linux users when facing issues I have already encountered.
I can't write decent code, not anything worth contributing to a project anyway, I am no artist. So the only way i feel I can contribute back to the community that enables me to use Linux is by providing support to other users. Previously I did this on Newsgroups, but to be honest the trolls started to get on my nerves.
At 09:04 on Mon, 12 Jul 2004, R.F.Jarvis R.F.Jarvis wrote:
TO ALL ADMINISTRATORS AND INFLUENTIAL USERS
Do you think it is possible for you all to agree and define the AIM of ALUG and the PURPOSE of the aim. (best defined by answering, in order to...) So everyone, especially new and un-knowledgable subscribers,(like me) will know where you are going and why you want to go there. Then you will know what needs to be done to achieve the aim. Just as important,you will know when you have arrived. Microsoft had a clear aim and purpose. It did not have the best product.
Being neither an ADMINISTRATOR or INFLUENTIAL USER I feel I am well qualified to answer this :o)
As far as I'm aware, someone correct me if I'm wrong, in theory all LUGs are (deliberately?) an unstructured leaderless bunch of people who communicate with each other because they share a mutual interest in GNU/Linux and FOSS.
So on this basis there are no administrators as such (I reserve judgement on the term INFLUENTIAL USER :o) ). There are, however, a small bunch of people who (God bless them) can be bothered to get off their arses and organise things like meetings, this mailing list, the website, the library, etc, etc. I don't need to name them, we know who they are and we all should be extremely grateful that they are prepared to donate their valuable time to enable this group to exist.
They aren't elected. They do it either because it pleases them to do so and/or they perceive a need and they are motivated to fulfil that need.
So, on that basis the group has no purpose or aim, like all the most meaningful of human activities it exists because people find it rewarding to participate in its activities. When they no longer do so, it'll cease to exist.
Sometimes the most interesting journeys in life are those where you are not sure of the destination.
Regards, Keith -------------- Questions just avoid the real answer, which we know already. - Zen saying
On 2004-07-13 00:18:54 +0100 Keith Watson kpwatson@ukfsn.org wrote:
As far as I'm aware, someone correct me if I'm wrong, in theory all LUGs are (deliberately?) an unstructured leaderless bunch of people who communicate with each other because they share a mutual interest in GNU/Linux and FOSS.
Other types of LUG exist. Many are dictatorships (varying from very relaxed to very very harsh) and a few are run by committee or cabal (elected or unelected).
You could probably argue that ALUG has a practical committee of the meeting organisers, the list admins and the donors, but "run" is probably too strong a description and I believe useful new members of each of those groups would be very welcome.
-
adam＠thebowery.co.uk -
Bryce Martin -
James Taylor -
John Woodard -
Keith Watson -
Kirsten Naylor -
MJ Ray -
R.F.Jarvis -
Syd Hancock -
Wayne Stallwood