Document Freedom Day - March 31st, 2010
Mar 31, 2010 GMT
Today (March 31st) is Document Freedom Day, and I encourage everyone to talk about Document Freedom with all of your friends, and even your enemies.
In 1973 I worked for Aetna Life and Casualty, at that time the “largest commercial user of IBM equipment in the Free World”. We did not know what the government was using, and we did not know what the Russians were using, but other than that, Aetna was the largest.
Aetna had an on-site tape library of 500,000 12 inch diameter magnetic tapes, with another 100,000 stored in... more »
Quality In High School Students and Their Teachers
Mar 30, 2010 GMT
A couple of weeks ago I went to Souhegan High School in Amherst, New Hampshire to vote, and while there talked with their computer technical person (they are mostly a windows shop, but also have MACs) and offered to do a presentation to the students and faculty on FOSS and free culture.
They asked their Community Service Coordinator, Ms. Maggie Paul to arrange it.
Ms. Paul arranged for 16 students, selected by their teachers, to come to a classroom at lunch time and hear my 45 minute talk. Also attending were Ms. Paul, the Community Service... more »
Quality, Not Quantity
Mar 29, 2010 GMT
Many years ago I was working for Digital Equipment Corporation as a software engineer in New Hampshire.
The marketing people and product managers liked taking me to customer presentations because I could often take very technical subjects and explain them in terms the customers (and the marketing people and the product managers) could understand. I was gifted.
One particular time Digital's sales people on the west coast had put together an “event”, and we were told that there would be “over 300 Unix customers” to listen to the presentation.
So three people (one... more »
A 60-year love affair: Model Railroading, Hackers and Free Software
Mar 22, 2010 GMT
It was a love affair that started over sixty years ago between technology and model railroading.
In 1946 a group of students at MIT banded together to form the “Tech Model Railroad Club” (TMRC) in a gigantic old “temporary” building which itself became famous for the large number of projects started there, “Building 20”.
For TMRC, model railroading was more than... more »
In the Hearts of the South - Two great conferences
Mar 16, 2010 GMT
Extreme Austin! - The Texas Linux Fest!
Austin, Texas! Home to live music, great food, a world-class University (U of T) and the longhorns!) and more »
An Open Letter to The United States Trade Representative
Mar 02, 2010 GMT
Dear Ambassador Kirk,
Recently it was reported in the Guardian, an on-line newspaper, that the International Intellectual Property Alliance (IIPA) is requesting that the United States Trade Representative put Indonesia, Brazil and India on the "Special 301 Watchlist" specifically because those countries advocate the use of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) in their economies.
I have been in the software industry for over forty years, as a programmer, businessman, educator, author and entrepreneur. I have worked in some of the... more »
Input requested on thin clients for Project Caua
Feb 28, 2010 GMT
Project Cauã (www.projectcaua.org) is starting to evaluate configurations for a Thin Client. Actually we have been thinking about thin clients for some time, and trying to find a good design to meet all the needs of the project. Although we have some general ideas, a long time ago I realized I was not omnipotent, and that the best way of finding good information was to pose the question to the FOSS community and let them help you solve the problem.....
First, some design considerations for the thin client. The design considerations below are purposely a... more »
