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160 lines
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<title>The Fifth International Linux Congress LG #33</title>
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<H4>
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"Linux Gazette...<I>making Linux just a little more fun!</I>"
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<P> <HR> <P>
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<center>
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<h1><font color="maroon">The Fifth International Linux Congress</font></h1>
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<H4>By <a href="mailto:jkacur@vaxxine.com">John Kacur</a></H4>
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<P> <HR> <P>
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<A HREF="./photos.html">Photo Album</A>
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<P> <HR> <P>
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The fifth International Linux Congress was held June 3-5, 1998,
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at Cologne University in Germany. This was only a few days after the
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Linux Expo held at Duke University in North Carolina, U.S.A. (May
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28-30), which made for a few tired participants including some of the
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speakers who attended both events. On the first day of the Congress,
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intensive tutorials on various subjects were offered in both English and
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German. These included ``Becoming a Debian Developer'' by Bruce
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Perens, ``KDE Programming'' by Kalle Dallheimer and Matthias
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Ettrich, and ``ISDN4 for Users'' by Klaus Franken.
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<p>
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The talks began the next day, opening with the keynote speaker, Jon
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``maddog'' Hall. Jon's talk, entitled ``Economics of
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Computing for the 21st Century'', began with a historical survey of
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computers. He talked about early computer systems, which cost three times more
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than what his parents paid for a house and were much less powerful
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than modern home systems which are now inexpensive enough to buy with
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credit cards. He predicted that in the near future, one will be
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able to buy a computer in the check-out line at the local supermarket.
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Indeed, at least two grocery stores in Germany already sell inexpensive
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PCs. He ended his talk by expressing the need for Linux
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to reach the ``Moms and Pops'' of this world and with a plea to lobby
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not just for Open Source software but for open hardware standards.
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<p>
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After the keynote speech, participants got to choose between two talks
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running in parallel. The format was forty-five minutes per speaker,
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with breaks every ninety minutes. The majority of the talks were held
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in English, to accommodate guests from the United States, Canada,
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England and the Netherlands, with a few held in German. Although it was
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possible to attend up to six talks a day, some participants expressed
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regret that they couldn't attend all the interesting talks due to
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simultaneous scheduling.
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<p>
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During the breaks, participants had an opportunity to
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explore the various booth displays. S.u.S.E., a company which makes a popular
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German Linux distribution, offered free demo CDs with their newest 5.2
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version. O'Reilly had a nice book display with offerings in both English
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and German. The KDE group had a very popular display showing off their
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attractive desktop environment. John Storrs, who also presented a talk,
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had a display demonstrating the use of Real Time Linux for the purpose
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of CAD/CAM design.
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<p>
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The University also provided the Congress with a
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small number of Linux computers connected to the Internet for those
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participants who found it hard to be away from the keyboard for
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too long. Among the many interesting talks presented on the first day was one entitled
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``Designing an Ext2fs Resizer'', given by Theodore Y. Ts'o. Theodore
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has made contributions to the development of the Ext2fs system in the past
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and is presently working on a method for enlarging and reducing the size
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of an Ext2 file system and adding B-tree support.
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<p>
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Christian Gafton, one of the programmers from Red Hat, gave a talk entitled ``Migration
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to glibc''. He said the use of glibc is no longer as controversial in
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the fast-moving Linux world as it was when Red Hat first adopted
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it. With the latest versions of glibc available on the Internet,
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the most common problems with porting code to the library occur when
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programmers write code which is dependent on bugs which exist in the old
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libc libraries, or when programmers use bad programming practices such as the
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use of <tt>#include<linux/foo.h></tt> instead of the recommended
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<tt>#include<sys.foo.h></tt>.
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<p>
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A few sessions were purposely left open. The organizers called
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these ``Birds of a Feather Sessions'' where the congress attendees
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could get together for ``spontaneous and informal meetings for
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presentation or discussion of any interesting subject''. Some
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people from Debian took advantage of this opportunity to discuss various
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issues concerning their Linux distribution.
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<p>
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That evening, participants
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got a chance to socialize and experience a bit of German culture. The
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social event was held at a local pub reserved for the Linux Congress. There
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was a wonderful smorgasbord and the waiters were very quick to fill our beer
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glasses with Cologne's famous kölsch. Everyone enjoyed themselves
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and hopefully some long term computer friendships were formed.
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<p>
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The talks continued on the third day with interesting topics such as
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IEEE-1394 (also known by the commercial name Fire Wire) by Emanuel Pirker.
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Emanuel designed support for this technology as part of his work as a
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university student in Austria. Warwick Allison gave an interesting account of
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the QtScape Hack, in which a small group of programmers created a port of
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Netscape to Qt in a five-day programming spree while on vacation in Norway.
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<p>
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The final panel board discussion was perhaps the most interesting, and
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certainly the most contentious topic of the congress. The subject was
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GNOME vs. KDE. (See <i>Linux Journal</i>, May 1998.)
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Participants included Miguel de Icaza of the Gnome Project, Kalle
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Dalheimer of the KDE project and Bruce Perens who helped to define the
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Open Source License. The people from the KDE project,
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which is already in its second year, felt that Linux was in need of a
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comfortable desktop environment. Linux has already captured the server
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market, but has not reached the desktop widely because the technical
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capabilities required are beyond that of the average user. They also felt that
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Linux is about choice, and that since the GNOME project is now being
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financed by Red Hat, people would be unduly influenced to use GNOME.
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<p>
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The people from GNOME countered that Red Hat had no influence on the direction
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of their project, and the reason KDE is not included in the Red Hat
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distribution is because of its use of the Qt-toolkit. Many people were
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of the opinion that although the KDE project is further ahead than the
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GNOME project, its use couldn't be wholeheartedly embraced by the Linux
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community because of the non-GNU license of the Qt-toolkit. They fear a
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similar situation to the Open Group who recently changed the licensing
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policy of the X server. Some members of the audience informed
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the Congress that a project to make a GNU clone of the Qt-toolkit was
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underway, and other audience members expressed the opinion that the two
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KDE and GNOME groups should work more closely, but still acknowledge the
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positive creative push of healthy competition. Any hurt feelings were laid to
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rest and all friendships renewed as we said our goodbyes at the O'Reilly
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Publishing House.
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<p>
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The O'Reilly team invited participants of the
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Linux Congress ``zum Klönen bei Kölsch'' or for a chat
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and beer. Participants agreed the fifth annual Linux Congress was
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a success and look forward to next year's Congress, which the
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organizers promised us would not be quite so soon after next year's
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Linux Expo!
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<!--===================================================================-->
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<P> <hr> <P>
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<center><H5>Copyright © 1998, John Kacur <BR>
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Published in Issue 33 of <i>Linux Gazette</i>, October 1998</H5></center>
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