Advanced

LinuxWorld 2008: News, Notes and a Rant

Posted by Scott_Ruecker on · 37 comments
LXer Linux News; By Scott Ruecker (Phoenix, U.S.) 		Mail this story
Print this story


LXer Feature: 06-Aug-2008

More news, notes and a well deserved rant from LinuxWorld 08', the .org Pavillion booths, installfest and proof of my actual physical presence at the show. :-)

I got in early today because I wanted to help out with installing Linux onto computers for some local schools here in the bay area and to take a long slow walk through the .org pavillion, meet some people I had made arrangements to meet and also to get the scoop on things before the crowds hit. I was successful at installing Linux on two out of three machines, those old Dell machines are a bear to do anything with.

I got to talk to Sachin Bansal from Tetra a Linux and Open Source consulting firm based out of New Delhi India. I thought it very cool that they would make the effort to have a booth at LinuxWorld in San Francisco. I also got to meet Scott Dowdle of OpenVZ and montanalinux.org fame. I stopped by the Autotest booth, got to watch several computers being put through their paces and found out that Goole uses this to test the server farms.

I came across this car called "Junior" that is computer driven. I don't mean to be a stickler but the video showing the car driving around a controlled course and such being shown on the huge monitor to one side of the car, is being played in Windows Media Player of all things which means that the laptop the video is coming from is running Windows. I'm sorry, but if I was an exhibitor at a Linux Expo (say LinuxWorld for example) I would at least take the time to get the video about my product to be shown in something, anything other than WMP. I try not to be easily offended by such things but come on! I am at LinuxWorld, at least show me the video in Kaffeine, VLC, Xine or any other of a dozen video players that are accessible in Linux! Sorry for the rant.

OpenSuSE was there and showing off OpenSuSE 11.0 on a few machines. The Linux Foundation was giving away free t-shirts when singing up to join. The OPLC people that were at SCaLE in February were there. The Free Software Foundation was giving away stickers and selling t-shirts for fund raising. I got a chance to talk to Robert of The Open Source Census who told me about there software program that can scan your systems and show you what FOSS software is on them.

I stopped by the gOS booth and got to play with the newest version of gOS on a bunch of different tiny laptops. I got to see it run on one of those Everex mini laptops too. There were people from the University of California, Santa Cruz Extension campus there talking about the Linux Programming and Administration classes they now offer as a part of their Software Development Certificates program.

I got a chance to listen to a presentation on Lotus Symphony by an IBM representative at the Canonical booth area. Very cool stuff. It seems that IBM is really serious about it. Symphony is automatically included with Lotus Notes 8 and they are actively working on extensions and plugins for Symphony as well. I learned something I didn't know, Lotus Symphony is based on OpenOffice.org 1.0 and forked from there, interesting no? I also found out that IBM will be supporting Symphony under Ubuntu as of the end of August and that a Mac version is in the works for release sometime in October. That being said, Cononical was also pushing their support offerings and options for Ubuntu in a big way.

Oh, and to all you LXer's who had the gall to insinuate that I would say I attended and not actually show up at LinuxWorld, I give you irrefutable proof. LOL!! http://i55.photobucket.com/albums/g154/sharkscott/100_0190.j...

  Nav
» Read more about: Story Type: LXer Features, Roundups; Groups: Community, GNU, IBM, Kernel, Linux, LXer, Microsoft, OLPC, OpenOffice.org, Ubuntu

» Get new stories by e-mail: nightly or as they are published

« Return to the newswire homepage

  Related stories
» More like this

Comments (37)

Why am I reminded of another famous picture?

jdixon ·
What is it about LXer editors and short pants anyway?

At least this one doesn't have a pig. :)
Scott_Ruecker Story submitter ·
The pig? I have no idea what your talking about but for my part, being from Phoenix, no matter how cold it gets I am still sweating like a pig that's for sure. There was no way I was going to sweat the whole time on the floor as hot as it was out there.
jdixon ·
> The pig? I have no idea what your talking about...

See http://lxer.com/module/newswire/view/66217/index.html for all the gory details. :)
nicsmr ·
That picture has been GIMPed ... Everyone else is wearing long pants and you look like you came straight from a Bar BQ somewhere ;-}

Peace, Stay cool man anyway you can.
Scott_Ruecker Story submitter ·
Ok ok ok, a stuck pig, is that better? LOL!!!

okcomputer ·
wow scott, you really blend in well at the geek expo.

Any Ubuntu T-shirts there?

ms602 ·
Dude, grab any Ubuntu gear ya see!
azerthoth ·
easy, grab a plain t-shirt a marker and write "NOOB" in big bold letters.
tuxchick ·
Be precise when with the N- don't want it to look like a B.
tracyanne ·
Wouldn't an L be simpler
Sander_Marechal ·
Quoting:Wouldn't an L be simpler


"BOOL"? That's a bit too techie a word for Ubuntu folk.
tuxchick ·
Oh, I thought she meant LOOB, but I didn't want to look stupid by asking WTF is that :)
tracyanne ·
I was thinking more along the line of leaving out the other 3 letters.
tracyanne ·
and maybe putting it on a cap
rijelkentaurus ·
Hopefully nobody at the Ubuntu forums gets ahold of this...... ;p
jdixon ·
> Hopefully nobody at the Ubuntu forums gets ahold of this...... ;p

There's an old saying about people who can't take a joke, which I won't repeat in this family accessible forum. :)
Scott_Ruecker Story submitter ·
How can I possibly contribute this thread without making things worse? Oh wait...

Untitled

tuxchick ·
Quoting: if I was an exhibitor at a Linux Expo (say LinuxWorld for example) I would at least take the time to get the video about my product to be shown in something, anything other than WMP. I try not to be easily offended by such things but come on! I am at LinuxWorld, at least show me the video in Kaffeine, VLC, Xine or any other of a dozen video players that are accessible in Linux! Sorry for the rant.


Let me ask you this, Scott- does Microsoft do its demos on Apple or Linux? Does Oracle run demos on MySQL? Does GM proudly show off sleek shiny Toyotas? It's 2008 for gosh sake! So-called Linux vendors ought to be using Linux, and if they're not able to get it together for a trade show, I'd say they're not together with regards to their Linux business at all. It's easy to make video demos that don't require horrid old WMP or Quicktime, and it's even easier to play those nasty formats, if you must use them, in a Linux player. Maybe you could get a photo of the demo BSOD-ing? *mean giggle*
Scott_Ruecker Story submitter ·
BSOD'ing? I wish, I did look at it long enough though...

I can't believe how much it really irked me to see that..
hkwint ·
I say: Ban them! However, Microsoft once did its demos on Apple (because they were only provided with a Mac for their presentation; so that's what they used). And when Volkswagen once showed some new car they used a Mercedes truck to transport their 'booth', because Volkswagen doesn't build trucks. However, they were so smart to glue a VW-sign over the Mercedes-star.
NoDough ·
Hans,

That reminds me of the late 90s when MS was pushing Visual Studio (or whatever they called it then.) They mailed out a bunch of promo CDs which ran what amounted to an interactive video commercial. When the binary app was viewed, it revealed that it was written in Borland's Delphi.

Scott is a nerd

okcomputer ·
Scott is a nerd. And going to linux world is only going to enhance his wardrobe of geek t shirts like "fear me, I am root". I fear the dire consequences which will be coming in the near future
NoDough ·
>> ...geek t shirts like "fear me, I am root".

Heh. I had that shirt 9 years ago. I didn't buy it, it was a gift. Honest!
Scott_Ruecker Story submitter ·
Hey! I resemble that remark! I happen to like my " Bow before me, for I am root" t-shirt.

Your all nerds for knowing what it means!!
tracyanne ·
what does it mean?
Scott_Ruecker Story submitter ·
Root, being the user you cannot say "no" too..

If root commands you, you must..
azerthoth ·
whachoo talkin bout Willis?
tracyanne ·
the fishin is good

Does that make me a nerd, now you've told me?
Scott_Ruecker Story submitter ·
Of course!..

We all Like Linux and probably even know how to say it right..unlike my Father..LOL!!!

After 6 years, I still have to be there to correct him. :-)
Sander_Marechal ·
Quoting:If root commands you, you must..


Which reminds me of: http://xkcd.com/149/
NoDough ·
The shirt is here. http://www.thinkgeek.com/tshirts/frustrations/58f5/

In the old days, it had the thinkgeek logo and tagline on it. My relatives took much more notice of (and delight in) the tagline which read, "Stuff for smart masses."
Sander_Marechal ·
Quoting:The shirt is here. [HYPERLINK@www.thinkgeek.com]


Hehehe.... Guess which shirt I'm wearing today :-)
lcafiero ·
While shirts and LinuxWorld go hand in hand, probably the best shirt I saw there (and I've seen it before, and it's a mystery why I don't have one) is the one where one stick figure says to the other, "Make me a sandwich," and the other says, "Make it yourself." Then the first stick figure says, "Sudo make me a sandwich" and the other says "Okay."

But, of course, Sander beat me to it, had I looked at his link.

Post a comment

A free account is needed to post. Write your comment here first: your text is kept in this browser while you sign up or log in, and is waiting for you when you come back.

Your message:
|||||
10
Markdown: **bold**, *italic*, [text](https://link), - lists, > quotes, $x^2$ for math. Formatting help

Sign up and post (it is free)  or  Log in and post