8:30am: Decided I was finally awake enough to write FUDCon F11: Day 0 post.

9:00am: Packed everything I needed (or thought I needed) into my backpack.  This took incredibly long.

9:10am: Somewhere around this time, I was expecting the reminder “We’re waiting” SMS from Dave Nalley.  None had arrived.

9:14am: Send SMS to Dave asking if he’s downstairs yet.  Get reply that he has not made it down yet, with a 7 minute ETA.  I chuckle, pack the rest of my audio equipment and head downstairs.

9:20am: Arrive with others for breakfast, many have given up on us, headed over to order food and head out.  Dave arrives approximately 1 minute later, we head to Au Bon Pain and promptly order and eat breakfast.

9:35am: I look up the instructions to the Tang Center for everyone.  None of us had decided it important enough to do this earlier.  Luckily, it’s about one block away.  We head out toward the HackFest.

9:45am: Arrive at Tang Center on MIT’s campus without incident, proceed to the 3rd floor (following well placed signs).  Obtain our badges and head into the main room for a short discussion.

10:05am: Discussion begins.  Approximately 25 projects are placed upon the board.  Names include, AmbassadorKit, Moksha, DevShell, OLPC / Sugar development and many, many others.

11:00am: Head to room 395 for the AmbassadorKit HackFest.

• AmbassadorKits are designed and put in place.  It is determined we need to obtain Tyvek bags to ship them and make the kits disposable and easily distributable.
• Media Boxes are a big hit and everyone is cutting them out and taping them together.  I did a short video presentation on how to fold them (hopefully will have that content really soon) for inclusion in the AmbassadorKit.    Tape is also needed for the Media Boxes.
• Discussion of the many uses of the Media Boxes was held.

11:30am: Decided the printed Fedora Window Posters were great for the Tang Center.    Placed them on the windows wherever good and visible.

12:30pm: Four ambassadors; myself, Ian Weller, Brian Powell and Dave Nalley head out toward Central Square to obtain packaging and tape from the UPS Store.  We had it in our mind this was a good idea now that we have a NA UPS Account.  In reality, after traveling on the train, walking 20 minutes in the windy, brisk cold weather and discovering the lack of true UPS supplies we could purchase on our account, it might have just been as good to head to the nearest shipping store.  Ahh well, lesson learned.

1:15pm: Arrived at a lovely pizzeria recommended by one of the nice UPS Store employees.  We decided to share a pizza.  After ordering, the total came to just over $20.  I reached into my wallet, pulled out a $20 bill and thought, “gee, I need some change”.  Dave promptly swiped the bill from my hand, and nonchalantly handed it to the cashier as if it were payment.  Thus, i was paying for lunch.  Dave promptly got a “waaa!” from me.  I then received a $5 bill for my trouble from Dave, as if that fixed everything.*

2:15pm: Arrived at the hotel, headed up to get the Live Media to bring to the event.  Headed back over to the Tang Center.

2:30pm: The AmbassadorKits were packaged, Brian Powell will be shipping out 2 (or 3) this weekend.  The remainder will be distributed among the Ambassadors to fulfill future requests.

3:00pm: Decided it a was a good time to distribute the rest of the Fedora Window Posters for the hotel.  Ran out of posters with doublestick tape.  Need to buy more.

3:15pm: Set up and tested audio streaming for tomorrow’s FUDCon sessions.  It appears we’ll have enough to do 4 rooms with streaming audio and 3 rooms (I believe) with video to be distributed soon after FUDCon.  Test was quite successful.

3:30pm: Discussed the new CMS with Karsten and others.  Promoted WordPress as a possible CMS platform.  Argued for its stability, value and flexible API.  Not sure I converted anyone, but it was worth a try.

4:30pm: Hung around, discussed media and other Fedoraish topics with others in the room.  All in all a good bit of work was done.  Much to mull around in this brain of mine.

6:00pm: Gathered with Paul, Greg and many others for a round table session about Fedora. This part was the most useful for me so far.  I was quite grateful for the opportunity to come in and discuss all the great things happening in Fedora.  To see the gratitude from these folks was cool.  It really pushed home why I like hanging out with Fedora folks, they are very genuine appreciative people for what we all do.  I learned so much about the contribution benefits and how others contribute.

7:45pm: Met in the lobby of the hotel, then headed over to Cambridge Brewing Company for a nice dinner.  Quite good food and drink.  Good company and gorgeous girlfriend to boot.  What a day!  What a day!

10:30pm: Arrived back at the hotel to hack on Fedora-Event-Splash with the new Moksha functionality.  Essentially, we wanted to get a better feel for Moksha and what it provides after Paul described it earlier in the day.  Thing is, there are a lot of things to getting it working and we could only get so far.

However, while working through this, I was able to discuss plans for tomorrows Audio Streaming and Video Recording of the sessions.   Thus the blog post and some logistics which should make things easier for everyone.

I was also able to discuss the Fedora-Classroom session Kevin Fenzi and I are proposing tomorrow.  We’re looking to have a lively session tomorrow regarding this and see where it might go.

Another discussion that came out of this was the usefulness of EMEA and its non-profit.  Seeing as we’re looking into this for North America.

2:30am (Saturday): In bed.  Zzzzzzz

If you are interested in obtaining some pressed media to distribute at an event or Local User Group (LUG), please make a request on the new FAmNA Resource Request tracker.  (Special thanks to Jon Stanley). Make sure to include the following information (at minimum):

• Name and Address
• The number of LiveCDs you’d like
  • Currently, we only have 32-bit LiveCDs.  The order has been placed for 32-bit and 64-bit install media, delivery is expected around mid-January.  When this media arrives, I will announce the availability.
• A short explanation of your request and how it might promote Fedora
• Phone Number (optional)
• How you would like the shipped (Choose Ground unless you can justify faster shipping)
• Your region (shown as component)
  • Do Not assign the task to anyone, it is automatically assigned to the correct person based upon region.

Check your email, you should  receive a confirmation of the ticket, a great way to track progress.

If you are interested in who is getting your request, you may wish to head on over to the North America regional list: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Ambassadors/NA/Regions.

If you are an Event Owner for Q4 2009, please do not send requests.  Events are handled by the FedoraEvents page. We are aware of the events and will coordinate with you individually.

In addition, at the upcoming FUDCon, we’ll be building an AmbassadorKit.  The AmbassadorKit is designed to be a small package delivered to any Fedora contributor who wishes to spread Fedora.  The AmbassadorKit will include the following (at minimum):

• Between 10 and 20 bits of Media (LiveCDs, DVDs)
• A display box for holding media
• One or Two Fedora t-shirts
• A few sheets of Fedora Stickers
• Fedora Buttons

Other items can be included in the AmbassadorKit, such as:

• Fedora Temporary Tattoos (while supplies last)
• Fedora LiveUSBs (in the future, or if some sponsor would like to donate them hint hint)
• Anything else you can think of that would be useful for promoting Fedora.

Once the AmbassadorKits are designed and can easily be built and delivered, we will add them to the FAmNA Resource Request tracker so they can also be requested.

I look forward to delivering massive amounts of media over the next few months to those who need it.

Cheers,

Clint

It turns out to be a smash hit in North America.  After only visiting 3 events so far, the EventBox is getting all sorts of publicity.  In fact, there’s a serious plan in place to purchase Pelican boxes and get more EventBoxen ready for the coming onslaught of events in 2009.

I also hope the EMEA Ambassadors will also like to follow suit with an EventBox of their own.  It would be really neat to see it in place throughout the world very soon.  The system works pretty well and provides all of the tools necessary to make a Fedora Booth look professional very quickly and easily.

To make this more of a reality, I’ve modified several pages on the wiki to make it easy to request an EventBox (in North America for now) as well as tracking the EventBox.  We’d also like to hear what you liked and disliked about the EventBox as it comes to your event.  Below is a list of pages regarding the wiki and their purpose:

• Ambassadors/EventBox – The main EventBox page, inspired by the GNOME Foundation.
• FedoraEvents#North_America_Q4 – Request your EventBox for Q4 in North America.
• Ambassadors/EventBox/NA/West – A list of the static contents of the EventBox.  This doesn’t include Media or T-shirts, although they may be inside.
• Ambassadors/EventBox/Details – The travel history of the EventBoxen.  Currently, only the box from the West exists.

Cheers,

Herlo

When I arrived downstairs just after 8am, people were setting up for FAD NA.  Jeffrey Tadlock had arrived and was loading the food in from the car.  Bagels, donuts, fruit, coffee and orange juice.  Nice array of foodstuffs for the morning.

My presentation went pretty well, we had fun with it and I really enjoyed the gag about the Ambassador Class Starship.  Unfortunately, I forgot to grab the vga cable for my projector so we couldn’t use it but I did have pdfs of the slides online.

I brought up a lot of thoughts about how we should be ambassadors, how we should act and especially how important it is that we represent ourselves well to the community.  I talked a bit about the message we should spread and ways we can represent Fedora to the community.  I think it was well received by the ambassadors and I hope it made a good impression.

The rest of the day was very well focused, we made some serious progress in areas I wanted to see the progress as well as things I hadn’t even considered.  Pascal was gracious enough to take notes and place them online already.  I learned a ton about how FAmSCo works and what we need to do as ambassadors to make sure they will provide us with the tools we need to spread the word about Fedora.

After a good long day, we cleaned up (most of us anyway) around 2pm and started heading out, though my flight wasn’t until almost 8pm.  Brian Pepple, Jon Stanley and I headed to a coffee shop after dropping John Rose off at the airport and me shipping my projector and phone home.  It was a nice relaxing conversation.

UPDATE: Pictures are being uploaded as we speak to my flickr account

As usual, the biggest hit was the One Laptop per Child (OLPC).  The kids would show up (and many adults) and play for some time.  I really enjoyed showing the kids the cool activities and items on these awesome computers.  I’m really looking forward to the updates coming out in the next update!  The kids loved the camera and voice wave activities and the adults really liked the idea of kids learning to program and do amazing things.

A good friend of mine John Weis, who lives in Columbus was at OLF too and so we met up and hung out a bit at the conference.  Still working on converting him over to Fedora, but at least he’s using Linux.

As for others, we had a run on shirts around noon, I think I gave out about 15 in a span of 10 minutes.  The rule was that they had to put them on right then so people could see the fedora on their person!  It was great fun and we have some fun pictures, which I’ll post with tomorrow’s updates.

At the end of the day, I had attended 3 presentations.  The teenage girl who uses open source, one on alsa, and the closing keynote by Jono Bacon.  I, unfortunately, missed Zonker’s presentation, I hear it was just like the one at UTOSC :)  Good stuff!

We headed out to dinner at this greek restaurant where I was able to enjoy some ‘Flaming Cheese!’  Quite a good restaurant.  Grape leaves are good as well, and I got to mock John Weis with some draft NewCastle ale (since he’s only 20) which was also quite good.

After dinner, we returned to the convention center for the after party.  We had a good time and I did the moonwalk to represent Fedora during the dance competition.  I’m pretty reserved though compared to the other distro dance representatives who shook their butts and removed clothing!  After the first round, I bowed out, but it was funny…

Apparently, there as an after after and an after after after party as well.  I heard rumors of bottles being broken and a fight that almost happened.  Hopefully nothing came out of it as it was great conference and I really enjoyed myself.  Fedora was well represented as well and I look forward to seeing another OLF in the future.

Tomorrow is FAD NA and I need to rewrite my slides again (now that I’ve the thoughts more organized in my head), and I’m really looking forward to working with these guys on some really cool projects coming up.

Cheers,

Herlo

After Scott picked me up, we headed over to downtown Columbus.  I noticed the skyline immediately as we headed into town.  It’s kind of surreal when the art you’ve created is part of what you’ve never seen before.  Columbus is a very nice town.

Once we arrived downtown, we met up with the rest of the Fedora Ambassadors for drinks and dinner, it was great to meet Brian Pepple, Brian Powell, John Rose and Jeffrey Tadlock.  Of course, there were others I had already met before including John Stanley and Paul Frields, great fun.

After dinner, OLF had a Pre-Party bash downstairs and the first drink was free (if you purchased the supporter package).  We decided it a good idea to enjoy another beer and headed down there.  We met quite a few people downstairs, talked Fedora, guns, politics; pretty much anything you wanted was discussed.

Had a great time.  We left fairly early since the conference starts at 8am today.  Off to get breakfast now..

Cheers,

Herlo

If you are coming to FADNA, please take a moment and sign up on the wiki page.  OLF doesn’t have any more rooms at the Drury, where some Ambassadors are staying, so many of us are staying a short while out of town at the Holiday Inn Express in Grove City.  If you haven’t reserved a room, they have pretty good rates, even cheaper than the Drury.

In addition, if you haven’t taken a moment to sign up to help at the Fedora booth, we would like to make a good impression there as well.

Many of us will be carpooling in each day and we’re working to reserve a room at the Holiday Inn Express for Sunday’s Meeting.

See you all at FADNA.  I am very excited to meet many of the North American Ambassadors at OLF.

Cheers,

Herlo

I'm Going to FAD-NA

Recently, I learned that our website doesn’t render well in Internet Exploder, Safari and some older versions of Firefox.  I’m guessing its due to the inability I have to create and maintain css, because well, I’m not a design guy.  Because of this, we’re having a hackfest tonight, both at my house, and online.  Feel free to come by at 8:30 and help out.

Prior to the hackfest, I will be working with Fedora Ambassadors to grow the North American region.  We’ll be discussing such things as AmbassadorKit, EventBox and of course, Fedora’s presence at UTOSC 2008.  This meeting tends to get a lot of good people making the world a better place.  I am interested in making this happen starting with North America.  If you are interested in helping out, or just lurking, feel free to drop by #fedora-meeting on irc.freenode.net at 1:00UTC (9pm EDT).

Prior to the Fedora NA meeting, I’m planning on working on the PCs that we’ll be using for the Utah Open Source Conference.  This will be done over at a friends house, who is loaning the PCs to UTOSC for the week of the conference.

I am attempting to record every presentation this year with either audio or video.  We have been rewarded again this year by having our friends over at KnowledgeBlue come and video record much of the conference, but they don’t have enough staff or equipment to simultaneously record 4-6 rooms.  So the plan went to me to setup recording devices in each room.

The plan is simple setup 6 PCs with Linux, install audacity and darkice.  This way we can stream the keynote audio live over our streaming server and also just record the audio from other presentations to be published at a later date.  I anticipate I’ll be able to install and complete this task pretty quickly.

Well, its now 7:40am here at my desk in my house.  I still have head into the office today for a bit of work, so off I go.  Feel free to come by #utos anytime today and wish me luck (or help if you are so inclined) with anything you can suggest.  Hopefully, today won’t be too long.

Herlo