Quick message from Nick:
What-Ho fellow LUGers, ( and a H a P p Y N e W Y e A r )
I’m still looking for a suitable new home (sound like a
broken record) – so, to kick off the new year, this month
we’ll meet again at Cool Beans in Oradell at 7pm.
For full directions and to let us know you’re coming,
click: http://NJLinux.com/CoolBeans
Wednesday, December 28, 2011, 7:00 PM
SELECTED BY: NICKALF…..
Houlihan’s
5 Rte 17 south, Hasbrouck Heights, NJ (detailed directions)
We have the private room reserved for us – The MD will direct you..
This month we’ll celebrate the season by inviting members from the other groups I organize making it an interesting and diverse gathering of various minds and interests …
If you have a computer, laptop or tablet with a problem – bring it along and we’ll help fix it. If you have video or audio equipment with a problem, bring that too and Santa will take a look …
We’ll work, talk and eat, drink* and be merry…
( detailed directions )
* If drinking, bring a designated driver or, better still, come on the bus or train – Nick will pick you up at ‘Wood Ridge’ station (eMail for details). You could also bring your private jet to Teterboro Airport as it’s nearby
–note from murph
If you folks wouldn’t mind, I have a presentation on Cloud computing that I’m working on that I’d like to run by folks and get some feedback. I’ll try to have it ironed out by then. Merry Christmas!
Software Freedom Day swag.
I’m back from Ohio Linux Fest, and I have brought back a whole lot of swag to give away for Software Freedom day. I have 20 Ubuntu discs, 22 Fedora and 28 SuSe based Gnome 3 trial discs. I also have a bunch of stickers from Gnome, the Free Software Foundation, and Fedora. I also have a stack of literature from the EFF. I also have an Ubuntu disc that I won from the Linux Link Tech show crew, and a Fedora book to give away. I also have a large number of Software Freedom Day and Fedora balloons that I have to look into getting helium inflated for Saturday.
I’m working on some copies to “The Open Disc” to give away, and I’m also going to make more copies of the Open Culture Disc that we discussed at the last meeting.
I’m going to head out today to put up some flyers around Montclair. I put some up in Boonton last week, and they are all now gone. I’ll try again, and see how they do.
Anyone else having luck with preparations?
Edit: Here is the link to our page on the Software Freedom Day site: Any suggestions on updates would be welcome.
Jul 24
I just got back from Fosscon last night, it was a great small conference. Very approachable, and a lot of fun.
I’ve also been thinking, Software Freedom Day is approaching fast! We only have two meetings before September 17th. If everyone can put some thought to a location that we can use for a SFD demonstration, we really need to discuss and take action on this FAST!
I started to register, but did not have a location to put in yet.
http://www.softwarefreedomday.org
The two locations that I presented a few months ago turn out to be very expensive, and the deadlines have passed already.
I hope to hear from some of you this Wednesday.
Mar 31
Our meeting last night was a nice change of pace. Not only were we able to offload a bunch of the obsolete books from our library for a good cause, we also heard a great presentation by Evan Koblentz and Jeff Jonas of the Mid Atlantic Retro Computing Hobbyists group. They even brought in an Altair 8800 and started it up for us. Much thanks to them for an interesting evening. Additionally Evan and Jeff would like the NJLinux community to know about the Vintage Computer Fest coming up in May.
Rumor has it that Tory may be coming the the April meeting to do a presentation and I know Reg has been working on some things for us as well, as has Murph. So stay tuned for more details.
njlinuxmike
Well, it’s a day later that I was shooting for, but here’s a draft of the flyer for Software Freedom Day. I’d really like to hear some feedback on the flyer, as well as proposed demonstrations and/or presentations that folks would like to do, so that I can include them. So please let me know what you think.sfd_flyer-1
I was not able to upload the original Scribus desktop publishing file, probably because it looks like straight XML. If anyone wants it to remix and/or make corrections, just let me know.
Addition: I’ve gotten a ton of great suggestions from an Amiga mailing list that I’m a part of, and have the following revision to the flyer: sfd_flyer-3
I personally think that it’s a little information dense, a little too wordy. I welcome suggestions to improve it.
Addition2: Thanks to Zak for some layout suggestions for an alternate, cleaner layout: sfd_flyer-4
People, it’s time to act! Sam has done great work in getting the venue squared away at the Morris County Library, where we have the Meeting Room reserved for the 18th from 1-4:45pm correction: 2:30-4:45.
Take a look at the Software Freedom Day site and think about perhaps a small presentation you might like to do. There are several ways that we can run this, we can have one main presentation going with a variety of speakers, or we can see if we can divide the room up, and run several presentations simultaneously. Think about if you’d like to do a quick one-off presentation, or to talk about a subject on and off all day. We can discuss the logistics of this at the meeting.
I’m going to work up some flyers this week, and put them up here for all to comment on. If they look good, it would be great if everyone printed some, and put them up around.
Think about what you might want to do, we only have one more meeting before Software Freedom Day! Feel free to leave ideas in the comments, or email me.
Aug 5
For those of you that are interested, please get back to me quickly, waiting until the next meeting, on August 25th would seem to be too late. We need for volunteers to find and get detailed information on a venue to hold SFD. A place with a lot of foot traffic that may at least have some interest in technology would be good. We will need power, and prefereably internet access. (this is not essntial) The date is for Septermber 18th, so we need to get moving now if we are to get some publicity for the event. http://softwarefreedomday.org/
UPDATE: Sam has done some great work and found out that we can reserve the meeting room (while it’s still available) up until the 18th of August. We’ll have the room from 1-4:45. So, we have a meeting place, in the Morris County Library, if we have the support of the members to go ahead. So, who is game? We will need people to promote the event, so that we have some traffic this year. Last year we were there, but the public didn’t know about us. Can anyone step forward with some good ideas and action to make Software Freedom Day a success?
Jul 2
Our June meeting was very well attended with some newcomers thanks to Nick’s meetup announcement. It was nice to meet Nando, Joe and Clyde. Murph brought to attention the Hope conference and Software Freedom Day happening later this year. Anyone interested in participating in SFD please let the group know so that we can decide weather we will attempt to do a promotion of our own. Nando offered to look into having some guest speakers attend in the future.
Next month we may have Reg doing a presentation. And I propose we discuss the article by Benjamin Mako Hill titled “Free software needs free tools” in the current issue of the Free Software Foundation Bulletin. It raises some interesting points regarding software freedom.
P.S. I intended to post my Linux bookmarks folder that I have accumulated over the years and did not do it last month. So here it is: Linux bookmarks
Jun 17
Had a great time at Southeast Linux Fest last weekend. Short week of work, and off to Fosscon this coming weekend. I’ll talk a little about the two conventions at the upcoming meeting.
The NJ Linux user’s group would like to announce a brief presentation
of “An Introduction to Free and Open Source Software”
It will be held at the Boonton Holmes Library at 6:30 on Tuesday the 20th.
We’ll spend an hour going through the following: A quick
demonstration of some Free applications for Windows, OpenOffice.org,
and The GNU Image Manipulation Program. Then we’ll take a look at
Linux, a free operating system, as well as a quick overview of some
applications available for Linux. This will be followed by a question
and answer session. Updates and more details can be found at
http://njlinux.org and email questions can be addressed to
linux @ murph.info.
Edit: I’ve included the flyer that I’ve been distributing here: open-3
Edit2: Here are the slides that I’m planning on showing. Suggestions welcome. pres1
Apr 2
This past Wednesday was our screening of “Revolution OS.” To be honest, I was a little worried. I wasn’t getting a whole lot of feedback, and was concerned that I’d be a lonely geek watching a movie (that I already own) in a rented theatre by myself. Turns out my worries were unfounded. Our user’s group, and the local community came out in droves! We had about 4 dozen people in the Darress theatre, with only one walk out. Considering the depth of the movie, I’d say that was a great success. Many people stuck around to ask questions, which I did my best to answer. We then went over to the Boonton Avenue Grille for good food and more good conversation. Overall, it was a great night, a great opportunity to share information about GNU, Linux, Free and Open Source Software.
I have many people to thank,
We raised enough to cover the cost of the theatre, with $101 left over, which will go to the Free Software Foundation, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Stay tuned to the blog, some of the members took pictures, and we’ll update for upcoming events and meetings.
Also, I’ll be running an “Introduction to Free software and Linux” at the Boonton library at 6:30 on April 20th, for anyone who is local and interested. I’ll be showing some current software, and some explanation of what it does, and how you can use it. Details will be posted here soon.
Again, thanks to all of you, and please let me know what was good, what was bad, and if you’d be interested in more events like this, or if you’d be interested in joining us at the North Jersey Linux User’s Group at njlinux.org. I can be reached at linux @ murph.info.
I’ve made arrangements with the Boonton Avenue Grille for us to be able to gather there en masse after the movie. That way we’ll have a place to discuss what everyone thought of the movie, or anything Linux or Free Software related!
It is at 108 Boonton Avenue Boonton, NJ, which is just a block or so away from the theatre.
Hope to see everyone there!
Mar 15
If anyone is going to be the Meadowlands area (I cannot, if was able to make it, I wouldn’t post.) this coming weekend, maybe you can drop off a bunch of flyers. If you’re interested in going, I have a dollar off coupon that I can email to you. Let me know.
Thanks,
–Bob