old-www/LDP/LG/issue12/expo.html

223 lines
8.8 KiB
HTML

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 3.2//EN">
<HTML>
<HEAD>
<title>Conferences Article Issue 12</title>
</HEAD>
<BODY BGCOLOR=#C0C0C0 TEXT=#000000 LINK=#0000FF VLINK=#0020F0
ALINK=#FF0000 BACKGROUND="../gx/spirbind.gif">
<table width=100%>
<tr><td><img src="../gx/blank.gif" width=50></td>
<td>
<H4>
&quot;Linux Gazette...<I>making Linux just a little more fun!</I>
&quot;</H4>
<P> <HR> <P>
<!--===================================================================-->
<center> <H1> Recent Linux Conferences </H1> </center>
<P> <HR> <P>
<!--===================================================================-->
<H3>Contents:</H3>
<ul>
<li><a HREF="./expo.html#expo">Unix Expo 1996</a>, by Lydia Kinata
<li><a HREF="./expo.html#decus">DECUS in Anaheim</a>, by Phil Hughes
<li><a HREF="./expo.html#open">Open Systems World/FedUNIX</a>, by Gary Moore
</ul>
<P> <HR>
<!--===================================================================-->
</td> </tr> </table>
<a name="expo"><p></a>
<table>
<td><img src="../gx/blank.gif" width=50></td>
<td>
<center>
<H2>Unix Expo 1996, October 8-10 in New York</H2>
<H4>By <a href="mailto:linux@ssc.com">Lydia Kinata</a></H4>
</center>
<P> <HR> <P>
This show was actually billed as Unix Expo Plus I^2--a nod to the
increasing interest in all things NT and Internet. In fact, in
1997 the show will no longer be called Unix Expo at all, it
will be billed as <I>IT Forum 97</I>, Internet and Technology Forum.</P>
<P>
Despite a preponderance of Internet and NT related vendors and
seminars, (and the ubiquitous presence of Bill Gates), the show
went very well for <I>Linux Journal</I> and SSC. Various
disasters struck, notably the loss of half of our booth display
by UPS, but all in all it was quite successful. With the
exception of Caldera, all of us Linux-types were stuck off
in the corner of the show room, but we were still
swamped by happy Linux and Unix users who had specifically
made the trek in support of their favorite OS. The show in general
had a lower attendance than was expected by show management,
but the Linux contingent were doing quite nicely anyway.</P>
<P>
2,500 <I>Linux Journal</I> and 1,600 <I>WEBsmith</I> magazines
were given away. Many people subscribed right there at the show,
many others went away clutching their SSC Unix References or books
with dazed-but-happy expressions. Those of us working the booth
made lots of contacts, and I must say it was a great experience
meeting subscribers and customers who share such enthusiasm
for Unix and Linux. Those NT developers should take note:
Unix users are a dedicated bunch.</P>
<P>
New York was a blast, although I had to laugh when the locals
got panicky when a 'Nor-Easter' blew through. I had to say,
"Come on, guys. It's just raining." They should come to Seattle
some time.</P>
--Lydia Kinata, SSC Products Specialist
<P> <hr> <P>
<!--===================================================================-->
<center><H5>Copyright &copy; 1996, Lydia Kinata <BR>
Published in Issue 12 of the Linux Gazette</H5></center>
<P> <HR>
<!--===================================================================-->
</td> </tr> </table>
<a name="decus"><p></a>
<table>
<td><img src="../gx/blank.gif" width=50></td>
<td>
<center>
<H1>DECUS in Anaheim</H1>
<H4> by Phil Hughes,
<a href="mailto:phil@ssc.com">phil@ssc.com</a></H4>
</center>
<P> <HR> <P>
On November 11 through 13, Carlie Fairchild and I attended the
DECUS show in Anaheim, California. While DECUS has generally been a
good show for SSC, this show was small and we were the only Linux
vendor attending. The best guess why is with UseLinux coming up in
the same place in January, it was an easy show for people--vendors as
well as Linux-heads--to skip.
<P>
There was a series of talks on Linux presented by Jon
&quot;maddog&quot; Hall and myself. Attendance was between 20 and
50, and I think we managed to make some converts.
<P>
Carlie had also arranged for to speak to the local Linux user's
group on Wednesday night. About 25 attended (including
&quot;maddog&quot;). I presented a talk called <I>Looking at
Linux.</I> Much of this talk focused on the commercial viability of
Linux, which was an issue many of the group's members had been
attempting to address on their own. In the talk I stressed four
criteria for commercial viability:
<ul>
<li>reliability,
<li>interoperability,
<li>support
<li>and capabilities.
</ul>
The talk was well received and the meeting turned into a informal
discussion of Linux in general. I look forward to talking with these
people again during the UseLinux show.
<P>
--Phil Hughes, Publisher <I>Linux Journal</I>
<P> <hr> <P>
<!--===================================================================-->
<center><H5>Copyright &copy; 1996, Phil Hughes <BR>
Published in Issue 12 of the Linux Gazette</H5></center>
<P> <HR>
<!--===================================================================-->
</td> </tr> </table>
<a name="open"><p></a>
<table>
<td><img src="../gx/blank.gif" width=50></td>
<td>
<center>
<H1>Open Systems World/FedUNIX</H1>
<H4> by Gary Moore,
<a href="mailto:ljeditor@ssc.com">ljeditor@ssc.com</a></H4>
</center>
<P> <HR> <P>
The first week of November, I went to Washington, D.C. to attend Open
Systems World/FedUNIX. While several dedicated Linux fans came by the
booth, most of the people I talked to knew very little about Linux. Some
were just cruising the booths, collecting whatever anyone was giving away,
but we don't mind--the literature they picked up may spark some real
interest later on. (One show attendee, in addition to taking a few of
whatever we had also took the neat twirly thing we'd acquired from another
exhibitor's booth.)
<P>Linux vendors in attendance were Yggdrasil Computing, InfoMagic,
and Red Hat Software, giving me a chance to meet Adam Richter of
Yggdrasil, Bob Young and Lisa Sullivan of Red Hat, and Henry Pierce
and Greg Deeds of InfoMagic.
<P>Adding credence to Linux's worth in the minds of those with no free
software experience was Digital Equipment's display of a DEC Alpha
running Linux and Maddog's enthusiasm for the operating system. (By
the time I got over to actually see the machine, someone was
demonstrating Quake on it. I sat down and showed him a couple things I
remembered from playing Doom--it was kind of surreal to be
sitting amidst all the professional frumpery of the show while
virtually running around swinging a very large and lethal axe.)
<P>Jeff Leyland of Wolfram Research, the makers of Mathematica, spoke
about Wolfram switching to Linux as their development platform. There
were other speakers I should have made time to hear, but I got caught up
talking to people coming by our booth and asking about Linux. I know
that after a few talks, the Linux booths would get flooded with people
excited to check it out.
<P>I also heard Ernst & Young--well known for their accounting
services among other things--apparently use Red Hat Linux
in-house and asked IBM, with whom they contract for computer services,
to support their Linux machines. (If you're from Ernst & Young,
please send me some mail. We'd like to hear about how you're
using Linux.)
<P>Adam Richter predicted a new version of Yggdrasil's Plug-and-Play
Linux in the first quarter of 1997. At OSW they had pressings of their
new 8-CD Internet Archives set, which includes several distributions,
including a couple I hadn't heard of before.
<P>I would've felt cutoff from the world (yes, even in D.C. on
election night) if it hadn't been for David Lescher, who set me up
with some dial-in PPP access for my laptop, and David Niemi, who made
some necessary tweaks to my chat script. I'm also grateful to Mark
Komarinski, who put together a Linux talk on very short notice when I
found I was dangerously close to having no time whatsoever to prepare
one myself.
<P>The Santa Cruz Operation was there giving away copies of their Free
SCO OpenServer. Someone who'd just acquired one of those gems asked me
why she'd be interested in Linux if she had OpenServer; I noted its
limitations and handed her a copy of Linux Journal, hoping to plant a
seed. Some attendees were being less subtle, affixing prominently to
their big blue IBM literature boxes the Linux bumper stickers we were
giving away.
<P>
--Gary Moore, Editor of <I>Linux Journal</I>
<P> <hr> <P>
<!--===================================================================-->
<center><H5>Copyright &copy; 1996, Gary Moore <BR>
Published in Issue 12 of the Linux Gazette</H5></center>
<!--===================================================================-->
<P> <hr> <P>
<A HREF="./index.html"><IMG ALIGN=BOTTOM SRC="../gx/indexnew.gif"
ALT="[ TABLE OF CONTENTS ]"></A>
<A HREF="../index.html"><IMG ALIGN=BOTTOM SRC="../gx/homenew.gif"
ALT="[ FRONT PAGE ]"></A>
<A HREF="./savage.html"><IMG SRC="../gx/back2.gif"
ALT=" Back "></A>
<A HREF="server.html"><IMG SRC="../gx/fwd.gif" ALT=" Next "></A>
<P> <hr> <P>
</td></tr></table>
</BODY>
</HTML>