[plug] Hacker Nights (was ** July Workshop Notice **)

[Cameron Patrick]

Tim White wrote:

> [Adrian: let's have Hacker Nights]
> I like this idea.

I like it too!

> Possibly HOW-TO do some cool hacker/programming tricks and people
> share their cool and funky projects and ideas around. It could be a
> good plug for some people and possible get others intrested in
> others projects.

Yes.  One problem about PLUG is that there aren't /that/ many people
who are actively involved in open source development -- but there are
certainly a few, and it would be great to get more involved.

You mentioned getting more involved in Debian... well, perhaps we
could hold a PLUG Debian bug-squashing party some time.  If that went
well, it could give people some experience of how things happen in the
Debian world, how to dive into a Debian package and do stuff to it.
(I find that seeing how other people do things is a great way to learn
how to do something similar yourself.)

> This would have to be open source projects more than personal/work
> related things

There may even be scope for, once in a while, showing off personal or
work accomplishments somewhere; or perhaps drumming up interest for
everyone's pet interesting but lesser known open source projects.
e.g. Craig Ringer's "This is how I put together an office network with
$SPIFFY_STUFF using a lot of open source technology" which has kind of
been coming through as digested anecdotes on this list for a while
now.  Other examples include my repeated subtle plugging of the
Ratpoison window manager (which I started as a user of, and then dived
in and started submitting patches to) or even the Arch revision
control system on this list.

The next seminar is a "newbie" introduction to Linux... perhaps we
could have another seminar later for more "advanced" or command line
oriented tips and tricks?  I've picked up quite a few things from
other PLUGgers, such as the use and abuse of GNU screen, Vim, zsh and
a whole bunch of other tools which I don't know what I'd do without.
Maybe a "Shell scripting for masochists" or the like, too.

> I would love to learn a little kernel programming for example and
> I'm sure that some people out there would love to give CSS a go.

Actually, I would too.  We have a couple of kernel hackers on the
list:  Brad Campbell (sadly not in Perth) and Bernard B spring to mind.
Perhaps there are more who I've forgotten or haven't spoken up?

Cheers,

Cameron.

(Now afraid that since I've thrown up all these ideas, people will
expect me to be the one to do something about them :-/)