Recent blog entries for Roxo

gee !! Almost one year without a single post here. :((

What happened along this time ?

Well, I've moved to a new position at Conectiva. I'm now working as a consultant of the business departament. It is a nice place to work, although there are a lot to do.

In this new position, beside other duties, I present some lectures about Linux. This is mostly to introduce people to Linux ( and Linux business ). Techies and their managers are being more and more curious about Linux, it's history, projects, evolution and (obvious) the gains it can bring to their business.

I'm up to present a lecture about Linux history and I went to Linux Doc projects development page to harvest some information about the project histories. Unfortunatelly most of them does not have a single page about their history. I think it would be very nice to have some historical info about those projects, alongwith some milestones reached. Pehaps this is due to the fact that my mother was a Social Scientist and History teacher.

I will try to send some emails suggesting them to create such page. The text should be something like :

======================8<------------------------------------
To: <some project email>
Subject: XXXXXXXXXXXX project.

Hi,

Sorry if this is not the correct email to get in touch with XXXXXXXXXXXX project.

I work at Conectiva, a major distributor of Linux in Brazil and Latin America, and eventually I have the opportunity to present a lecture about Linux.

One of the aspects I like to present is the amazing number of plataforms Linux was ported for. I'm up to present a lecture here in a brazillian event and I would like to present the linux port projects in a timeline. I could get some project history to support my presentation, but others projects don't have an (obvious) link to the project history and, pehaps, some milestones reached.

May I suggest you, or some project member, to provide this kind of information ? It doesn't need to be a very extensive text (can be if desired :)), but the startup date, some milestone date and, if easy or feasible, the number of project members at some time (e.g.: project aniversary). I guess it would be nice to have this info for Linux advocates like myself.

Cheers !

======================8<------------------------------------

I hope this could help to get some history documentation.

I've presented that case at Brasília. When I was there I found that others companies representatives are introducing their companies. Ooops !! Time to change my presentation, but I was up to present the case, how can I ? No pain, no gain ? I don't know, but it was pain for sure. Any way I tryed to use the cas a an example of well succeeded effort of Conectiva to help big companies to solve their problems.

People are very curious about what Linux, or Free Sofware for that matter, can do for them. They listen things about wonders of Free Software that (they think) are not compatible with the possible price tag. But is seems (to me at least;)) that those guys are starting to acquire confidence. It is clear to me the fast increase of interest and adoption of solutions based in FreeSoftware.

...............

There was the case of the (new) first virus for Linux. All started with a message of a friend pointing to an arcticle (in portuguese) published by IDG NOW!. He asked me if it was possible. Well my answer was published by Linux Aliança and by .BR, both in portuguese. What amazes me more is the fact that people still think that Linux should be used and treated as Windows. It is funny ! And more, there are still people that think tha having it's source code open for anyone is a security threat. Ha ! Can anyone point to me where to get the source code of the more infected operating system ?

...............

I was invited to present a chat conference about "Ethics on the Net". Some ideas about the new social contract we're building in our new comunity. It was at UMeet 2000. It was an interesting experience. I learned with it, and next time I will reduce my presentation to provide more time for discussions.

  Phew !!

These have been very busy months. I'm still trying to keep pace with the huge change in my life. Being a geophysicist at a governamental company made me not prepared for the demands of this new life. Obviously most of my time is applied in learning new things about Linux and about a Linux company. Being one of the biggest Linux company in the world, Conectiva has many challenges to face, and this is a new and exciting experience to me.

Besides that there is a new experience in talk to people in congresses and shows about Linux. It is amazing how big is the ignorance of people about Linux, and I'm not talking about laypeople, I'm talking about very experienced IT guys ! They know a lot about what those big vendors brochures say. They know every single buzzword that the biggies print there, although most of them seems to have no idea about what they mean. :) Ok, I agree that many times those buzzwords doesn't have no new technical meaning, but they use them as an IT top tech frontier. 8b>

It is very funny to listen them repeating the same kind of FUD that was showed many times that no more applies to Linux world. Can you figure people still saying that Linux has no support ? Or that, provided that Linux is Open Source and anyone can hack it, you have thousands of different and incompatible versions of it ? I could imagine this kind of stuff some time ago, but today we are being the "hype of the jour", and so many things are being written about Linux that I can hardly understand this. I use to say that these people become up to date through those press releases from big vendors.

I'm up to present a case in an event of governamental agencies and companies. Being this case a governamental petroleum company ( Yeap ! That same one where I used to be a geophysicist ;)) experience, I hope people get a bit interested.

Cheers !

Non luctari, ludare !