2003.04.11 Meeting Notes

Officer's Meeting

House Agriculture, Davis

Topics

• Domain Name
  Steve Wormly has transferred the LUGOD.ORG domain name to LUGOD and given us the password. The next step is to transfer it to the registrar GHANDI. Mike will handle the transfer.

• Reminder System
  AT is set up on Rod's server. We will create the reminder system in two phases. Phase 1 is simply a nightly process to send reminder e-mails to the vox-officers mailing list. Phase 2 will be designed to e-mail officers directly, and continue e-mailing them regularly until the item is completed.

  Events we will want reminders about include:

  • Scheduling space at the library (or other venue, if necessary)
  • Elections (twice a year)
  • Scheduling demos
  • Scheduling installfests with the CS Club
  • Obtaining a projector for meetings
  • Organizing events like Picnix, Whole Earth Festival, California 4-H Leadership Conference, Technical Writers Conference, Anniversary meetings, etc.
  • PO Box Renewal
  • Domain name renewal

• Picnic Day
  We will be there from 9:30am to 4:30pm. We should keep track of how many CDs were given out, to gauge how many we'll need for future events. There was a low volunteer turnout, possibly due to people attending the event itself.

• Whole Earth Festival
  Bill sent in the application form and payment (has not cleared yet, per Henry). 3 day event (May 9-11). Mike suggested we postpone the demo for May. We need: volunteers, pamphlets, CD's.

• Projector
  The projectors are going to cost us more than we thought. We'll probably settle for an 800x600 model. The Library mentioned that they may be interested in going in with us on one. There are many issues with doing this. However, Mike was interesting on what, exactly, they wanted to do, so Bill will let Mike know more about it so he can contact them.

• May 19th Meeting
  We do not have the library and have not scheduled a speaker. Idea of maybe a dinner party (e.g., at Symposium) or possibly a LAN party (e.g., at Lamppost). We'll make a deadline of May 10th for organizing a LAN party, otherwise we'll settle for a computerless gathering.

• Linux Terminal Server Project
  There's interest in having LUGOD talk to local schools about setting up Linux-based thin clients for computer labs. (Probably not in Davis proper, since they seem to be well-taken-care-of; more likely places like West Sacramento.)

• Budgetting Program
  Henry is looking for some help with the budgetting program. Data models, Ruby, PostgreSQL, Tk. Preferably an officer.

• CD Burns
  Mike has offered to burn CDs for LUGOD for $0.50 per disc, if noone else (or not enough others) can volunteer for it. This would be mostly to cover the costs for discs. (LUGOD has been providing blanks for volunteers lately, so it's not too much different.)

• Computer Merge
  The new demo computer (donated by Z-World last August) died. We can't tell if it's the RAM, CPU, motherboard, or a combination. Suggestion is to sell off the old pieces with a 30 day money back plan.

• Next Demo
  No Demo in April due to Picnic Day. No Demo in May due to WEF. Henry will schedule a demo for June 14th.

• Next Installfest
  No Installfest in April due to Easter. Kevin said we can have on in May.

• Elections
  Nominations open at the next meeting (April 21st). All current offers have shown interest in remaining in their positions for at least one more term. Voting will occur at the following meeting (May 6th).

• LinuxWord Expo
  August 4th-7th, San Francisco. Bill will look into whether LUGOD can get a booth. Mike is offering crash space in Dublin.

• California 4-H Leadershop Conference
  August, UC Davis. We should be signed up. We need to check the PO Box.

• Govertnment Technology Conference
  Mid-May, Sacramento. We have not heard back from Brian Lavender from SacLUG regarding this. Mike will contact the person at GTC directly, closer to when the event is occuring. The idea is that, right now, we cannot get free space. Closer to the event, however, someone may have had to cancel, so we might be able to get in for free. (Price is ~$1000 for non-profits!)

• CDROMs
  Bill would like to always have a stockpile of CDs to hand out at events. (Knoppix, GNUWinII, distributions, etc.) Mike wants to make sure that our final demo machine will have a reasonably fast CD burner, so that we can make discs on demand, if necessary.

• Fundraiser
  We need to continue thinking about fundraising ideas. PayPal seems unpopular, but Affero may be worth looking into. We could do bakesales, but we'd probably be limited to doing them at our own events (e.g., Installfests).

Attendance

• Bill Kendrick (root)
• Mike Simons (sys)
• Stephen Helms (typescript)
• Henry House (/dev/null)
• Doug Barbieri (Media officer)
• Keven Murakoshi (of CS Club of UC Davis)