Current music:

Cher - All Or Nothing

MyOss/Redhat Meetup - Feb 3 2005
Venue : Training.Org,My (MUI Plaza)
Attendance : 19 (or more, I lost count)
Time : 7:30pm - 10pm

This time we had 2 of our "members" presenting a few different subjects which is neither too technical nor too boring. I would say it caters for both the "Eye-Candy" people as well as the "Technical" People. In a way, you could say There are 2 Tracks.

Track 1: Eye-Candy
History of MyOSS/Redhat Meetup
Sprucing up your Desktop

Track 2:
The Linux Infra-Red Remote Control
Viagra And You

Track 3:
Training Choice and You!

In the 1st Track, Both Linus Lai and Chin presented a brief history of what happened with respect to the Open Source Community in the form of the MyOSS and RedHat meetup groups. They took us back in time where the pictures shows a younger and lot less wiser ME!

Soon after that, Linus Lai proceeded to show us the wonderful things of Eye-Candy and how the open source community has made it possible to Skin/customise/hack the Gnome/KDE Desktop. (No.. He didn't go into how one can _do_ fluxbox :-) )

He showed up how to change the Login Screen (GDM using gdmsetup to install a new "Theme"), Khairil interjected with a comment on how X can be simply set to serve Remote X terms. (Though it is advisable to _not_ leave this port open to the whole of the Internet!!) I also found out that one can actually tunnel this X connection through Xnest and SSH. Wonderful.

Linus Brought us to sites such as Gnome-look.org and Kde-look.org as well as introduced us to items such as SuperKaramba and gDesklets. Check them out. (while you're at it, you might also be interested in Gkrellm which in addition to providing Eye-Candy, can also act as a sentry into how your remote server is doing)

Refreshments was kindly provided by Ms. Silvia Tham, (Did I mention that she gave me her number? What a Turn Off![1]) in the form of McDonalds, some mandarin oranges, Coke and Packet Drinks.

Track 2 was conducted mainly by Chin, he complains about being inundated with emails that try to sell him Viagra. He presented with a _very_ simple solution which he is currently utilising in his company. He brought our attention to a small little C Application which called QSF. Showing us how it can simply be intergrated into one's Procmail Rules. SK Lim, a Debian Enthusiast was apparently fascinated with this as he asked quite a number of questions. One of which, which I think is most important was that of all the (OSS) SPAM filters which I have seen does not have the ability to actually permit the users to decide if a particular mail was SPAM or HAM. One App which I've seen which I presume to NOT be OSS actually permits the marking of SPAM/HAM via a web-interface.

Track 2 also saw myself "showing Off" so to speak on the LIRC (linux infra Red Remote Control). It was just a brief demonstration.

Track 3 was just a short presentation/talk about Training Choice.

Frankly, I have no problems listening to Them promote Their company. They provide the facilities and it's fair that they be able to "sell" us their product.

In the future, for future events, the below has been (apparently) discussed


1) Refreshment ( Traning Choice will take care of it)
2) Ice-breaking session
3) Business/Personal Opportunity Presentation (if any)
4) Technical Sharing - End User group
5) Techinical Sharing - Corporate Admin group
6) Q & A / Feedback Session

I would personally like to see more participation in these events. Unfortunately most of the time, only a couple of "usual" faces are seen and the rest are bound by other commitments.

Perhaps, once we have a definate agenda, and I believe we will, I will personally write to NST/Computimes or Star/In-Tech and _announce_ the meetup.

Being Free and Open to All, I have no doubt that we will be able to attract more people to come.

PS:
[1]I should clarify that she gave me her card which included her number. Office Number :-)