[Newark] Monthly Meet - July

[Steve Caddy]

Chris Hayes wrote:

> Got back around 1am.

So glad you got home, and didn't get lost, and end up sleeping under the stars 
somewhere near Barnby...

> Well, to recap on the meet. Our drinking society
> was rumbled by 3 guys from Mansfield LUG - a rather pleasant surprise,

Indeed, and rather helped to focus our discussion.

> we talked about packages, the joy or art and Vivaldi.

Actually I thought it was Russian composers, not Vivaldi this time?

We talked quite a lot about packages - how to get "restricted" packages for 
Ubuntu (for mp3 support), how packages change or get dropped in the name of 
progress (were as Windows is backwardly compatible, warts and all), package 
management systems on different distributions, and how they differ (or "why I 
hate RPMs").

There was a trip down memory lane, as we discussed game genres. I asked "why 
don't people write isometric layout games any more?". I also briefly talked 
about my experiences trying to write games for Linux. Should more games be 
written for Linux? Wouldn't it be fun to distribute a game on a CD (or DVD), 
and rather than "install" it, you boot from the CD, which happens to be Linux 
based, and then provide an option to save user data to a USB flash stick. I'm 
sure that better games could be written on the Linux platform, than the mess 
that Windows has become.

> The suggestion of having a daytime, weekend, coffeehouse meet was
> made, and sounds good. I'm certainly up for that.

A wonderful idea that we didn't discuss deeply enough (because we were in the 
process of being evicted from the pub!). Maybe somewhere like the King Charles 
coffee rooms, or one of the less busy cafes, so that it's possible to hold some 
sort of conversation.

I think we also expressed a desire to make use of the offer of a larger meeting 
place for demonstrations, etc. But no plans were made. Anyone fancy organising 
a demo?

There were other topics of conversation. Some involving pressure equalisation, 
the physical effects of stress, and dressing up.

> Finally we came for
> a use for the wiki, people can put profiles of themselves up there.
> Any other suggestions are also welcome.

Last night was really the first time we've serious swapped Linux thoughts and 
ideas (possibly under the influence of MLUG). Maybe some of them are worthy of 
a quite wiki write up. Maybe some sort of meeting blog that lists the topics 
discussed would be a good idea?

> Oh, yes - and Newark LUG's official unofficial tag line is, "Whatever
> you do, don't unemerge coreutils."

I thought it was "Renaming glibc is a bad idea"?

Steve

-- 
Steven M Caddy, MEng ------------------------------------------------------
Email: steve.m.caddy at ntlworld.com