[LUAU] Hosef

[R. Scott Belford]

On Tuesday 08 November 2005 09:47 pm, Jim Thompson wrote:
> James A. Stroble wrote:
> >On Tue, 2005-11-08 at 19:03 -1000, Jim Thompson wrote:
> >>LUAU (Linux Users AnonymoUs) is mostly (at this point) a mailing list
> >>(hosted on HOSEF's server) for linux, free and open source advocacy in
> >>Hawaii.  There used to be meetings, but these have largely died out.
> >>(Much like many other Linux advocacy groups on the mainland and
> >> elsewhere.)
> >
> >Jim, is that true? Did Netcraft confirm it? Lugs are dead?
>
> I've seen LUGs largely die in Austin, Houston, D/FW and elsewhere.   It
> may not be universal.
>
> Note that I said "many".
>
> Linux is changing.  LUGs used to be able to survive on "install fests"
> and bringing ESR in to speak, they can't now.  The "newness" phase of
> Linux has passed.  Once this raison d'etre is gone, the group's
> membership nosedives.
>
> This is where some of the brilliance of Scott's efforts with HOSEF begin
> to shine.  At first glance, HOSEF's mission is spreading linux via
> installs that will be used where computers didn't exist before (Hawaii's
> schools).  The real mission of HOSEF is to help establish a legacy of
> Hawaii residents who are well-versed in the art and methods of "Open
> Source" (including Free Software) as a way of helping bootstrap Hawaii
> out of the
>
> >>Ubuntu is a nice distro, its everything Debian should have been (and
> >>more).   Too bad the Debian people fell asleep at the wheel.   There is
> >>a lot of local advocacy for Fedora Core, due to some involvement in the
> >>Fedora project by folks at UH.
> >
> >Ah, an opening for a distro war.  I don't  think Debian fell asleep at
> >the wheel, they are just at a differnent wheel.
>
> I too run Debian.  Its the distro run on the machine that allows me to
> live in Hawaii.   Litterally every dollar I make (and a few more) flows
> through a Debian machine.  I'm not anti-debian.
>
> However, Debian failed to stay on the curve for a very long time.  Had
> Debian continued to innovate, then there would have never been an
> opening for distros like Ubuntu.  Even Ian Murdock admits that Debian
> stubbed its toe, though he has hope that 'sarge' will remedy the situation.
>
> I personally run Ubuntu and FreeBSD 6.0 at home, FreeBSD because I
> develop on it, and Ubuntu because the 'next' project is linux based.
> (More about that in the future, I'm sure.)
>
> Josh, I also endorse the idea that you 'show up' to some set of HOSEF
> activities.  There is a calendar of same on http://www.hosef.org

Thanks for the questions, Josh, and thanks for the clarifications, Jim.  It is 
true that our mission to promote and *sustain* the use of OSS (mission soon 
to be amended to state FOSS) is conducted primarily through the collecting, 
recycling, and donating of fully-functional Gnu Linux Edutainment Centers.  
Most of the labs we donate are comprised of thin clients, discarded 
workstations as old as a P100 running diskless over a network and powered by 
an appropriately sized Linux server.  The OS currently in use is the K12LTSP, 
a Fedora based distro customized for this environment.

http://www.hosef.org/gallery/installations

http://www.hosef.org/gallery/freesoftware

With a mission to promote and sustain the use of FOSS, we do hold weekly 
workshops at an adult school in the DOE, The McKinley Community School for 
Adults.  Here there is a computer lab donated by HOSEF that runs multiple 
OS's.  Early this year and *again* next year, John Terpstra conducted a 
multi-day workshop for a group of customers.

This class was in cooperation with TPOSSCON, the Trans-Pacific Open Source 
Software Conference.  You are all encouraged both to attend and to volunteer.  
If you are aware of the whole Open Documents initiative, then you will know 
that it is quite significant that Peter Quinn, CIO from the Commonwealth of 
Massachusetts, will be keynoting.  Honolulu's own pro-active Open Source 
minded CIO, Gordon Bruce, will open the event.

http://www.tposscon.com

Classes and education are areas that we are addressing.  In January a group of 
K12 teachers, American Samoan educators, UH Department of Ed. teachers, and 
more will be attending a Linux+ class given by Novell and offered by HOSEF 
and our DOE.  It is free to educators, and they will in turn teach this 
Linux+ curricula (SUSE based) to their folks.  This is a good thing.

Several folks answered the call for teachers many weeks back.  While pay and 
logistics have been worked out, a mysql class, a K12LTSP class, and an ewaste 
repurposing class have emerged.  There is opportunity here and perhaps at 
other locations to offer other programming classes.  More on this in another 
thread.

>
> jim

--scott