Drupal Discovery

News from Jennifer Hodgdon of Seattle Drupal Users Group (SeaDUG):

Join us for a Day of Drupal Discovery at LinuxFest Northwest. An “un-conference” following the BarCamp [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barcamp] style.

Details of the day depend on you! Bring your ideas and laptop. Be prepared to lead a small group of 2-3 people to work on common Drupal interests. Share a formal presentation. Ask questions about Drupal.

There will be time slots of varying lengths available for sign-up, WiFi, and space to meet or present. Be prepared to participate, learn, and make connections with the West Coast Drupal community.

Drupal [http://drupal.org/] is an open-source content management platform for building web sites. It is maintained by a huge community of talented developers, and used on thousands of web sites…the newly launched Recovery.gov, which supports and documents the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, Mother Jones, Slate, Virgin, Nokia, Oxfam, and a wide variety of other sites.

Drupal provides core web functionality (user accounts, permissions, basic content types). Modules built and maintained by developers in the Drupal community add a well-thought-out system of extensibility. Themes make it possible to match any designer’s vision.

Note: Blug’r Jakob Perry is a former BPS student and is now Drupal-icious. For several years, he tried to get the district interested in open source. Finally, success! Bellingham Public Schools recently chose Drupal for their district-wide content management web platform. A big win for open source in Bellingham.

Unix Holy Wars

It’s March…when a young LFNW organizer’s fancy turns to—OMG, it’s only 32 days to LinuxFest!

Yes, the nightmares dreams have started. The ones where the exhibit hall and the presentation rooms are empty. The only people around are  organizers drinking IPA (I didn’t say it was an altogether pleasant dream). The early panic stage.

Don’t worry, the sign up for exhibits and presentations is going well.

Some time ago, Brian Hatch suggested Unix Holy Wars. The response on the Fest mailing list was supportive of the idea. We want to get something going if there is enough interest.

Two highly qualified, highly opinionated gladiators face off on competing applications:

• perl vs python
• vim vs emacs
• git vs subversion
• postfix vs sendmail
• php vs ruby on rails
• mysql vs postgres
• selinux vs apparmor
• mutt vs (some other mail client)
• java vs (something)
• c vs c++
• html vs html+css
• apache vs IIS (that’s the one I’m waiting for)

A Frankenstein event somewhere between academic debate and WWF match. If you have the chops and know that the application you use is better than the other one, this is the game for you.

Please contact Adrian—aklaverATcomcastDOTnet. Tell him what weapons you bring to the battle. If you can bamboozle Adrian, you might be in for a contest. He wants you to have a worthy opponent. Perhaps no one will have the courage to confront you and your tool. You might prevail; you might get whupped. If there are enough matches, Unix Holy Wars commences.

Mark “No Quarter” Ashworth has already claimed rights to vim. Is there a Mad eMacs who will triumph?

maddog at LFNW09

Jon “maddog” Hall will continue his celebration of 40 years in the computer industry at LinuxFest Northwest 2009.

For 15 years, he has been a champion of Linux and open source. He met Linus at a Digital Equipment Computer User Society (DECUS) gathering in New Orleans in May of 1994. That was when they conceived of the port of Linux to the Alpha, to make Linux a 64-bit OS (and the first port of Linux).

Maddog has the distinction of being the only LFNW speaker threatened to be shut down by the Fire Marshall.

TotemTux

LFNW TotemTux

TotemTux is the last of the Tux take-offs done by Irvin Dorfman, long-time blug’r, as poster art for the Fest. It was chosen to represent LinuxFest Northwest in his memory, and in honor of his years of contribution to LinuxFest Northwest. Irvin never settled for less than what he considered to be perfect.

Irvin gave blug the rights to TotemTux to be used to promote LFNW. You are welcome to use it in this spirit.

Download TotemTux…
here as svg or here as a png. (right-click; “Save Link As…”)

Volunteers

LinuxFest Northwest would not be possible without volunteers. There is no paid staff. Everything from organizing to posting signs is done by people donating their time and effort.

The payback is like that of other open source efforts with the added bonus of having many elements of the Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) community gathered for two days. This sense of community is one of the aims of LinuxFest NW, as it is for the other Fests represented at the LinuxFest news aggregator.

Volunteer jobs include set up, tear down, room monitoring and other tasks to keep the Fest running smoothly. The greatest number of volunteers are needed for room monitoring, as there are up to 90 presentations over the weekend.

Room monitoring is not demanding:

• greet people,
• ensure that room capacity is not exceeded,
• take an audience count,
• and make sure the presentation finishes on time.

To share the opportunity, there are around 45 room monitors. What opportunity? Room monitors have that warm, fuzzy feeling of knowing they have a guaranteed seat in the presentation…in addition to other volunteer perks.

At present 12 people are registered as volunteers, so there are plenty of positions available.

Volunteer perks

• free LFNW Staff T-shirt (for all registered volunteers; “while supplies last” at the Fest);
• your choice of presentations to monitor, and a guaranteed seat;
• resumé material for assisting in the production of one of the top 10 open source events in the world.

LFNW volunteers are actively engaged in moving open source forward. If you want the opportunity to participate in making a difference, please consider volunteering at LinuxFest Northwest. You can help us by signing up.

Thanks and see you at the Fest.

PostgreSQL Day

PostgreSQL Conference, U.S. is having a PgDay at LinuxFest Northwest on Saturday, April 25^th. Short PostgreSQL talks (45 minutes) are requested. Share your experience and knowledge.

LFNW is low key…emphasis on substance, rather than appearance…less hype/more beef. Those attending have a range of experience and interests—from business people exploring open source options to leading edge open source experts.

Please consider sharing your enthusiasm and experience with PostgreSQL and submit your proposal.

LinuxFest Northwest 2009

April 25^th & 26^th—Bellingham Technical College

LinuxFest Northwest website

Big name presenter at LFNW 2009…maybe?

There is a rumor of a major player in the Linux world attending LFNW 2009.  Stay tuned for details.

Here we go again!

For ten years, Bellingham Technical College has hosted LinuxFest Northwest in April, when spring is in full splendor. There’s a good chance of sun and glorious weather.

Inside the exhibit hall in Building G, open source industry leaders, non-profits, colleges and universities, a tech garage sale, The World Famous Raffle Door Prize Giveaway™, friends, enthusiastic conversations.

LFNW moved to a two day, Saturday/Sunday format in 2007 because there were so many first class presentations that one day would not hold them all.

This year, the Fest is happening on April 25^th and 26^th. Calls are out for exhibitors, presenters, volunteers and sponsors.

Please visit the LinuxFest Northwest website.