[vox] Installfest?

[Timothy D Thatcher]

Haha, yeah, I guess that's the flipside of it, huh? I've never really done
an installfest before, so I fully admit that may have misperceptions as to
the reality of it. :) I'm sure there's somewhat of a line between "i have
this older machine I'd like to resurrect and I would like some help" and
"this needs professional help and/or tossed in the bin."  Nobody wants to
get caught up in a case of the latter, certainly. That's not only
unproductive, but unfun, too.

I super love the idea of the installfest server. That's much, much tidier
than messing with a stock of physical media. Think a raspi would be up for
the challenge? I've got one or two laying around not doing too much...

That being said, personally I do like giving things away, too. :) Having a
stack of physical media on the side seems like it at least could be helpful
to have on hand. Maybe have some of those aforementioned cheap USB drives
also, even if only as on-site loaners. Generally speaking, I just think it
seems nice to send at least some people away with something tangible, be it
a CD, USB drive, or even just a sticker or two, along with some useful
print info.

What I was really trying to think of was a way to maybe make the whole idea
of an installfest a little more relevant, since many people have broadband
and can just download a distro pretty easily at home. The thought I had was
to make it into a sort of sneakernet hub where people come and either try
some out on-site, or quickly pick up a whole pile of distros in at least
marginally less time/hassle than it would take to download every single one
at home. They maybe try one or two on-site, talk to other people who have
tried at least some of those distros, and go home with one or more to try
at their leisure. I especially like the idea of having some options that
aren't just redhat/debian/ubuntu available. But again, I haven't done an
installfest before, so maybe I'm a bit off-base. It's certainly more work
and adds expense, too, which are both definitely valid concerns.

Just thinking about it out loud, at any rate. Don't take me too seriously.
:)


Tim

On Fri, Oct 7, 2016 at 1:44 AM, Rick Moen <rick at linuxmafia.com> wrote:

> Quoting Timothy D Thatcher (daniel.thatcher at gmail.com):
>
> > > They heard that Linux runs on old hardware and they have nothing to
> > > lose bringing their old junky hardware with the hopes we might be
> > > able to spin up something interesting.
> >
> > Errr, I always thought that was kind of the point of an installfest?
>
> I believe you may have just volunteered to be the person at the
> installfest who handles all broken PCs.  ;->
>
> Personally at the CABAL/BALUG installfests, I found I had to be very
> up-front about 'No, we're not a free-of-charge computer repair shop.'
> Otherwise, you spend all your time doing that, _and_ you end up trying
> to limp back into operation the most dismal components that really ought
> to achieve their best and highest purpoee as landfill.
>
> And these are _exactly_ the sorts of situation where such users don't
> value your time and trouble, because they're getting for free what
> they'd have to pay real money for at the local whitebox vendor.
>
> > I've been thinking about installfests since they keep getting brought up,
> > too, and having one as a "physical media distribution fest" actually
> > doesn't sound like a terrible idea. Maybe prep some isos of a variety of
> > more- and lesser-known distributions, bring a machine with a CD/DVD
> burner
> > and fire them off made-to-order, and/or make a DVD with a variety of isos
> > that people can take home and burn off onto their own media.
>
> I'd suggest going totally the other way.  Have an installfest server
> with a Web daemon, dhcpd, pxelinux (kickstart server), connected up to a
> local wifi network and ethernet.  Stock the server's Web pages with some
> informational pages, and offer download of distro ISOs _and_ also
> over-the-network installation or running of those same distros.  (When I
> say 'running', I mean like netbooting a live-CD distro via PXEboot.)
>
> This way, the LUG can scale the installfest up to helping large numbers
> of people simultaneously, the LUG doesn't need to provide visitors with
> any supplies whatsoever (not even CDRs/DVD-Rs or flash drives), there's
> absolutely no contention over resources, _and_ everything runs at
> network speeds, _and_ you furnish a prime real-world demonstration of
> what Linux can do.
>
> For extra points, make the installfest server a ludicrously small one,
> like maybe an Intel NUC.
>
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