Utah Open Source Blog

So the challenge begins, UTOS-ConMan is in good shape from last year’s HackNights, but it does need a bit of a clean up and some new features as noted in a previous post.

The problem is that the Utah Open Source Conference 2009 needs a registration system.  Recently released from the guys over at the Southern California Linux Expo is some good code in the ScaleReg system.  We’re going to update and improve it over the next few months.  Hopefully, by mid-July, we’ll have it up and running with Django 1.0, and have it ready to roll for folks to start registration.

Now the real question is why are we blogging about all this stuff recently.  Well, the reason is, we need your help.  We’re looking for folks who are interested in learning or improving their Python/Django skills, helping with css and graphic design, testing and any other intangibles we haven’t thought about yet.  We’re looking for you and we’re looking to start this coming Tuesday.  So come on over and join the HackNight!

You might ask yourself, why would I help out?  And that’s a really good question, so let’s provide some good answers.  If you participate and provide some good feedback, code or contribute in some other way, you’ll get free admission the to UTOSC 2009 (a $70 value).  In addition, you’ll learn a valuable skill or improve upon your skill set as this project introduces some interesting and fun challenges.  There’s also pride.  This project will be used by many of the community tech conferences around the nation and world and your name will be among the contributors.  I’m sure there will be some conferences we haven’t even considered who will be using your code or design.  We’re also working on getting a couple good mentors who are expert Python and Django developers.  They’ll be on hand to help you with troubleshooting, common issues, etc.

I think we may have your attention now, so let’s talk about the details.  We know you want to come an help, so here’s how:

When: Tuesday, June 2, 2009 from 6:30pm – 11pm.  We encourage you to come for as many hours of this as you can and you can come anytime during these hours.

Where:  Clint Savage’s home; 5225 Gravenstein Park, Murray, Utah 84123

This information is available on the Utah Tech Events Calendar as well — http://sn.im/ute-calendar (iCal: http://sn.im/ute-calendar-ics)

If you are unable to join us physically, we’re going to be working in #utos-dev on irc.freenode.net so please feel free to join us there as well.  We’ll have some folks hanging out there as well to include you in the development project.  They’ll try to describe the goals and get you started as well.

We’re planning on making this an every other week HackNight for a while, so come on by on the first and third Tuesdays from 6:30-11pm.  We hope to see you all at the first UTOS-Conman/Scalereg HackNight of 2009 on June 2.

Cheers,

Clint

Mark your calendars!  It’s cue time!

The annual Provo Linux User Group (PLUG) Barbecue is upon us again.  This year it will be spectacular!  The Utah Open Source Foundation is excited to be a part of this event.  Because of this, UTOS will provide some soda, water and approximately 50 hamburgers.

This event is potluck so bring something everyone can enjoy.  Chips, salad, vegetables, fruit, etc., just don’t come empty handed.

Party Information

Where:  Scera Park, Red Pavilion.  This is on the east side of the park. (map)

When:  Saturday, June 20, 2009 – 12pm – 2pm

Why:  To allow the geek’s significant others to socialize, sympathize and find ways to cope with their geek’s habits.  Or maybe it’s just to bring the kids to the park, and free food.  Either way, it’ll be fun!

Hardware Exchange

As normal, please feel free to bring any spare computer parts to trade or exchange.  There will be people there looking for something useful and you might just have what they need.  Anything left over will be recycled by Orem City*.

We hope to see you all there!

Cheers,

Clint

* – This is not recycling really.  If someone would like to recycle the left over computer parts, feel free to speak up at the BBQ.

Greets all,

This month’s UTOS Geek Lunch will be held in three locations at once.  In other words, a new way of enjoying lunch with geeks in your area.  We thought it’d be nice to hang out with everyone in one place, but it’s so hard to do during the lunch hour.  Instead, the idea of having a Geek Lunch in each of the three main valleys along the Wasatch Front.

This month’s theme: Thai

Salt Lake County

Fri, May 29, 12:30pm – 2pm
My Thai, 1425 S 300 W, SLC, UT (map)

Davis/Weber County

Fri, May 29, 12:30pm – 2pm
Pad Thai, 1986 N Hill Field Rd #8, Layton, UT (map)

Utah County

Fri, May 29, 12:30pm – 2pm
Thai Chili Gardens, 430 West 800 North, Orem, Ut (map)

If you have any questions, please contact Victor Villa (vvilla At gmail.com) for more information.

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Utah Tech Events Calendar – Google Calendar: http://sn.im/ute-calendar
Utah Tech Events Calendar – iCal Feed: http://sn.im/ute-calendar-ics
Utah Open Source Podcasts – http://podcast.utos.org
Utah Open Source Foundation – http://utos.org
Utah Open Source Conference – http://utosc.com

So, you don’t have enough on your plate already? As an open source / Linux festival organizer, I would suspect that your lives are pretty normal for about 9 months of the year.  You work your job, go to school and do the normal thing.  But about 3 months (usually spread out over 6 months and an intense 2 weeks right before, during and after your fest) is spent planning, organizing and running an amazing festival.

Now there are some things that are running very smoothly, and others that could be improved.  One of those things that can always use improvement is a conference management system.  You know, that thing that would make life simpler, easier and better organized overall, but just takes a lot of time to write and maintain?

Well, no longer!  The Utah Open Source Foundation and Conference (UTOSC) and the Southern California Linux Exposition (SCaLE) have created two tools to help with this process.  The utos-conman and scalereg projects have been open sourced and are available for consumption.  This is exciting news!

If you are interested in registration, including kiosk setup, check-in, badge printing and online registration, scalereg has many features to help you along.  For management of sponsors, speakers, or with a call for papers approval processes, utos-conman is your tool.

But that’s only the beginning of the process!  We’re looking to improve these two tools into an integrated all-in-one solution. Because scalereg and utos-conman are both written in Django with Python, we’ll be updating and integrating these two services to provide an overall solution for any conference organizers.  What we
need is volunteers to help us create this solution.

With the idea of reusable apps within the Django Project, these two applications will likely be able to be used standalone.  If we define some good standards (which are probably already in place), we can help these two systems share login data, registration information and provide roles for particular users, etc.  There’s a lot to be done in both of these applications.

This email is intended to start out with the conference organizers of such community conferences as Ohio Linux Fest, Ontario Linux Fest, Open Source Bridge, Linuxfest NorthWest, New Mexico Linux Fest and SouthEast Linux Fest.  I’m sure there are many others out there, so I apologize if I missed your community conference.  Anyway, the plan is to get you all involved in this process, to help us plan and grow these two bits of software with what you already have, or to help
create something new that will help your conference.

I have been talking with several of the organizers around the country and know there is much common ground.  And I’m sure there are features some will want and others not, but that’s what is great about free and open source software.  Especially with the reusable app concept, we should be able to add all the pieces, letting each group pick and choose the tools they need.

There was a suggestion that before each conference/fest, we have a day long hackfest on a new feature for this project.  I think that’s a great idea.  In addition, I know that UTOS plans to hold hacknights (once or twice a month) from now until October to improve utos-conman, as well as integrate the scalereg code into a reusable app and port it to Django 1.0.

So let’s start this conversation and see where it leads as I’d like to see some really cool progress.  Something that can rival any proprietary offering available.

Thank you for your time and efforts putting on your events.  I look forward to meeting with all of you, my friends, again and again.

Cheers,

Clint

This morning, many of us were informed of the story of Julie Stout.  She was diagnosed with brain cancer a couple of years ago.  This, in and of itself isn’t abnormal, but what is not normal is that this woman is the wife of one of Utah’s geek’s, Brandon Stout.  He’s been around this community for some time, contributed plenty and regularly participated in the Utah PHP User Group (UPHPU).

As of this morning, I was informed about their situation and wanted to do something for the family.  Thus, we’ve adopted the ‘Help a Geek Family’ mantra and opened an account on chipin.com.  We’re shooting for $1500 in donations and are already well on our way.  These donations will be sent to the account at Deseret First Credit Union and Utah Open Source will cover the paypal fees to make the amount complete.

If you are interested in helping out a geek family, please consider donating on our main page at http://utos.org.  In addition, if you are interested in learning more about Brandon and Julie, you can watch the story on ksl.com.

Cheers,

Clint

The Utah Open Source Foundation, in its goal to promote Open Source throughout Utah and beyond, is proud to promote the following events.  These events are generally related to Open Source and Technology in Utah.  If your event is not listed below, please contact clint@utos.org to get it added.  In addition, each of the events below was pulled from the Utah Tech Events calendar, feel free to subscribe by clicking the link below (or adding the following feed to your calendaring program)

Utah Technology Community Announcements

• Utah Open Source 2009 conference dates / venue / theme – http://2009.utosc.com

If you have announcements or events that do not happen on a regular monthly basis which you would like included, please contact clint@utos.org
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Upcoming Activities for May 2009

Sat, May 9th, 12pm
Utah CodeAway
Link: http://codeaway.org/
Where: Rocky Mountain Pizza Company, 3977 Wasatch Boulevard, Holladay, Utah 84124
Contact: Laura Moncur, laura @ moncur.biz

Sat, May 9, 6pm – 8pm
Ubuntu-Utah Meeting
Link: http://utah.ubuntu-us.org
Where: University of Utah – Merrill Engineering Building (MEB) Comp-Sci Labs Rm 2555
Contact: Aaron Toponce, aarontoponce@ gmail.com

Wed, May 13, 11:30pm – 1:00pm
SLLUG: Daytime SIG Meeting
Where: Salt Lake Public Library – Conference Room A Lower Level
Contact: Clint Savage, herlo1 @gmail.com

Wed, May 13, 7:30pm – 9:00pm
Provo Linux Users Group
Link: http://plug.org
Where: Omniture
Contact: Ryan Simpkins, simpkins.ryan @gmail.com

Thu, May 14, 6pm – 9pm
Utah Mobile Developers Group
Where: STG Dev Center, 555 South 300 East, Salt Lake City, Utah
Contact: Glen Lewis, glen @ glenlewis.com

Thu, May 14, 7:00pm – 8:30pm
Utah Python User Group Meeting
Link: http://utahpython.org
Topic: GUI Toolkit Extravaganza
Where: University of Utah, Emma Eccles Jones Medical Research Building, Room 1200
Contact: Dave, tonedevf AT gmail.com

Wed, May 20, 7:10pm – 8:40pm
Salt Lake Linux User Group (SLLUG)
Link: http://sllug.org
Where: University of Utah, Warnock Engineering Building (WEB) room 101/103 (Previously known as EMCB)
Contact: Marc Christensen marc aT mecworks.com

Thu, May 21, 6pm – 9pm
Utah Java User’s Group (ujug.org)
Link: http://ujug.org
Where: SelectHealth (IHC), 4646 West Lake Park Blvd., West Valley City
Contact: Chris Maki, chrismaki AT me.com

Thu, May 21, 7:00pm – 8:30pm
Utah PHP User Group (UPHPU)
Topic: Security + PHP by Erik Johnson
Link: http://uphpu.org
Where: Bill Good Marketing, Draper, Utah
Contact: Victor Villa, vvilla @ gmail.com

Tue, May 26, 6:30pm – 8:00pm
SLC Ruby (slc.rb)
Link: http://groups-beta.google.com/group/urug
Where: Neumont University Room #300
Contact: Jake Mallory, tinomen @gmail.com

Tue, April 28, 7:30pm – 9:00pm
Ogden Area Linux User Group
Link: http://oalug.com
Where: Weber County Main Library, Board Room
Contact: Seth House, whiteinge@ gmail.com

Thu, May 28, 8:00am – 9:30am
CTO Breakfast
Link: http://www.windley.com/cto_forum
Where: Novell Cafeteria
Contact: Phil Windley, phil At windley.org

Thu, May 28, 6pm – 8pm
Logan Dev Group
Where: Room 208 (Faculty Seminar Lounge), Merrill-Cazier Library, Utah State University, Logan, UT
Contact: Matthew Reinbold, matthew.reinbold At voxpopdesign.com

Fri, May 29, 12:30pm – 2pm
UTOS/UPHPU Geek Lunch
Link: http://utos.org/geek-lunch
Contact: Victor Villa, vvilla AT gmail.com

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Utah Tech Events Calendar – Google Calendar: http://sn.im/ute-calendar
Utah Tech Events Calendar – iCal Feed: http://sn.im/ute-calendar-ics
Utah Open Source Podcasts – http://podcast.utos.org
Utah Open Source Foundation – http://utos.org
Utah Open Source Conference – http://utosc.com