SFD Team Christchurch 2008
Chch SFD8 home page: http://www.softwarefreedomday.org/teams/Christchurch
Chch SFD8 event details: http://www.infohelp.co.nz/sfd8 (please print and distribute)
SFD follow-up: come join the Christchurch SFD team, at the Sydenham GLU Free Software Class from 7.30pm to 9.30pm, on the first Wednesday of each month, February to December, at the South Learning Centre, (rear door) South Christchurch Library, 66 Colombo Street, Beckenham; next class is October 1st. See you there!
SFD Team Christchurch 2007 Archive
Here's our team record from last year:
(and the year before - http://softwarefreedomday.org/archives/2006/oceania/nz/christchurch - with links to 2004 and 2005 Team Christchurch archives too)
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Free Software Group & Canterbury Linux Unix & GNU / Canterbury Linux Users Group = CLUG http://www.clug.net.nz
Five SFDs under our belt, before adding two more this year: http://www.infohelp.co.nz/sfd7
An Installfest plus liveCD demo-day was planned to distribute free install CDs, spread over SFDay & Sunday afternoons, using a suburban public library IT learning centre, for SFD7.
SFD7 Team/contributors - thanks, people!: EliotBlennerhassett, VictorDumitras, RobertFisher, ZaneGilmore, DonGould, MatthewGregan, WarwickHay, GraemeKiyotoWard, AdrianMageanu, SueMcGaw, TimothyMusson, KerryNisbet, WesleyParish, NickRout, RogerSearle, SonyaTeague, RikTindall, AndrewTurner,
More team members always welcome.
Some detail - http://clug.net.nz/index.php/PledgeDrive - thanks Nick for organising this SFD support. Two paid newspaper ads in The Press, free ads, & flyers were run out, costing $760.
Shirt-size orders: S S S S M M M L L XL XL XL XL
But we got 4xM & 1xL. As all shirts were undersized we didn't have sufficient adult sizes, so must order more of those next year.
Media coverage
Radio New Zealand National, New Technology x2: 13Sept07 http://www.radionz.co.nz/audio/national/ntn/new_technology on Nine-to-Noon with Kathryn Ryan http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon and Colin Jackson http://podcast.radionz.co.nz/ntn/ntn-20070913-1147-New_Technology-064.mp3 (6.2MB) & 20Sept07 http://podcast.radionz.co.nz/ntn/ntn-20070920-1150-New_Technology-064.mp3 (4.5MB)
http://epochtimes.com/gb/7/9/20/n1840744.htm
Archive: http://softwarefreedomday.org/archives/2006/oceania/nz/christchurch
Contact: i n f o h e l p 1 AT g m a i l DOT c o m ( delete spaces, convert @ & . )
Software Freedom Day draws near
Media Release: Software Freedom Day, Team Christchurch NZ
15 September, 2007
The Canterbury Unix community has its annual technical show this weekend, as part of international Software Freedom Day celebrations. Personal Computer operating systems derived from Unix offer an alternative, to Microsoft (MS) desktop security issues and costs. Main variants of Unix are GNU/Linux and Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD). BSD is the core of Apple Computer's OS-X. Licensed free software installation discs and install help are made available to the public on Software Freedom Day.
Other types of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) can run on top of Windows, providing extra user choice. The Firefox web browser and Open Office suite are popular examples. Firefox has over a quarter of the desktop browser market alone, to which other browsers such as Apple's add to make big competition for Microsoft's Internet Explorer. But the playing field is not level, hence the need for Software Freedom Day, user support, and publicity.
"The main issue is standards," says Richard Tindall, Software Freedom Day's Christchurch team leader. "Monopoly tactics in the PC software market undermine user choice by breaking standards," he says. "The end result is information blockage through proprietary formats and vendor lock-in. Working around these obstacles requires assistance, for less technical users. That kind of work is done on Software Freedom Day."
"But the situation is improving," says Tindall. He cites the NZ Government Web Standards and Recommendations of March 2007. These require crown and public agency adherence to the W3C Web Accessibility Initiatives, from 1 January 2008. "The FOSS user community is eager for inclusion via information presentation standards and browser compatibility," Tindall says.
A good example of the service neglect FOSS users suffer is to be found locally, at Environment Canterbury (Ecan). Ecan's online Metro Real Time Bus Info is not readable without MS Explorer. This means bus stop numbers cannot be extracted and therefore the bus locations can remain hidden to FOSS users, without their going to view the stops.
"Shutting out such a big proportion of potential bus use is no help to the environment," says Tindall. "The problem is sourced to Adobe not sticking to its own standard, for Scalable Vector Graphics" (SVG). "Adobe is discontinuing SVG support from 1 January 2008 too, coincidentally. So Ecan has a major upgrade of its web service ahead. We do recommend Ecan explore standards compliant software, and they could start by accepting this invitation to visit Software Freedom Day this weekend," Tindall concludes.
Software Freedom Day takes place Saturday 15th and Sunday 16th September, from 12pm to 4pm at the South Learning Centre, South Christchurch Library, 66 Colombo Street, in Beckenham.
October 14th is World Standards Day, and New Zealand participation in that too is expected.
ENDS
Further information may be obtained at SFD Christchurch, or from the following.
Contact: Richard Tindall (+064) 027-406-0077
Refer: http://www.SoftwareFreedomDay.org
http://www.infohelp.co.nz/sfd7.html
http://www.xitimonitor.com/en-us/browsers-barometer/firefox-july-2007/index-1-2-3-102.html
http://www.e.govt.nz/standards/web-guidelines/web-standards-v1.0/
http://www.metroinfo.org.nz/realtime_map.html
http://www.w3.org/Graphics/SVG/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scalable_Vector_Graphics
http://www.ansi.org/meetings_events/WSW07/wsd_fact_sheet.aspx?menuid=8
http://www.standards.co.nz/news-and-seminars/current-news/World+Standards+Day.htm
Software Freedom Day 7
Good morning from SFD7, SFD day 7, from the bottom of the world - September 16th.
This second public day for Team Christchurch in 2007 is begun, towards rest. As the only SFD team to have completed their full seventh SFD event - as involved from SFD inception, and amongst the first to see every SFD sunrise - our team hereby stakes it's claim to this title:
"The most advanced Software Freedom Day team on planet Earth, within the most advanced social responsibility project of the known universe."
And we hope those that did receive SFD7 CDs have put them to very good use. Luckily, we had a surplus of SFD6's Ubuntu 6.06 stock to see us through.
A reporter from http://www.epochtimes.co.nz has been in keen attendance at our event, which had 40-50 people on the first day, and 30+ on the next. That is, this year's attendance was down by half upon last year's. We'll look at what, if anything, we can do to turn around the drop-off in interest towards SFD. The good news is that the local LUG participation rate has picked up well, which made for a more relaxed and enjoyable weekend than the under-staffed and over-pressured situation last year.
Happy SFD everyone! See you in 2008, for SFD8.
Cheers, Rik
