Monthly Meeting Tues 14 th August 2007

Monthly Meeting Tuesday 14th August 2007

Present:

Rich H, Woodsy, BenG, Jim F, Lu, Acesabe, Jules, Matt T, Tesfaye

Apologies for absence:

Pete F, Sean K, Everton, Lloyd, Bails, Sam R

Minutes of last meeting

The minutes of the last meeting were approved nem con.

Matters Arising

1. Open Source Consortium: Jules approved payment of annual subscription.
2. Bristol Wireless clothing: BenG has not placed an order with the suppliers yet, although he has some firm orders from BW members. Anyone wanting clothing is asked to contact BenG asap (action - all, BenG).
3. Finance report: Sam did not email Jules re phone co-op monies as funds received from elsewhere.
4. Werburghs Primary LTSP: Ben reported that the Softease simplified office suite will install and run under Wine, although most of its applications can be readily substituted for native (and better) Linux applications.
5. KWW infrastructure: BenG reported that Lloyd has now arranged with Jon Elmes for the infrastructure works to be done next week.
6. net:gain: Sam is away on honeymoon, so cannot be queried whether he attended the event or not!
7. Welsh inquiry: Rich reported that he and Matt Leonard had paid a site visit to Charter Housing Association in Newport. They have 2 estates of some 300 houses in total with 1 AP at present. Rich stated that 5 APs would give their estates appropriate coverage. They have 2 budgets available: one for wireless infrastructure and the other for installing 2 Windows clients in their office. Rich will propose they install a 4 client LTSP suite instead and divert the remaining budget to the wireless project.

Reports

1. Finance report: Jules reported that are finances are looking healthy with the current year showing a surplus on sales to date of some £7K. However, he stressed the need that we need to invoice customers promptly. As regards individual projects, he suggested that £1K of the unspent Workstream 2 monies be allocated to central services. On the Venn project £2K is unspent from the project total of £6K. On Wireless Werburghs, £5K has been received to date and we need to invoice CSV for the next tranche. Turning to expenditure, Jules highlighted the following items to be kept under review: Car Club membership (current usage £100-150/month) and VoIP charges (calls to mobiles are expensive). On the latter item it was noted that Nixcom had agreed to make a contribution to cover the costs of their calls.
2. Big Green Gathering feedback: Rich reported that an 18 client LTSP suite was taken down to the event and was used by some 500 visitors from Wednesday to Sunday and generally achieved 50% occupancy throughout the event. Kids were allowed to use the suite free for the first hour's opening each day. An impromptu cinema was screening of Michael Moore's Sicko also took place. All told, £700 was collected. It was proposed by Rich and seconded by Jules that we use some of the proceeds to purchase outright the tent bought jointly with Psand: this was agreed. Sean is writing a news piece on the event.
3. St Werburghs Primary LTSP: All feedback to date has been positive. There is a further meeting arranged for September to discuss future developments. One unexpected turn is that the school's IT technician (previously firmly wedded to Microsoft) is now running Ubuntu at home! Woodsy and Rich are writing a news piece to be posted later this week (action - Woodsy, Rich).
4. UFI update: BenG stated that the servers are up and running and (mostly) stable. He also reported that the specification for the cabinets for Werburghs needs to go to Josh: he has also started a wiki page on the subject. Ben will be sending proposal to daily list re paying someone to write a cabinet specification (action - BenG). Finally, Lloyd has proposed reorganising the networking at WCC.
5. KWW infrastructure: See Matters Arising above.
6. LTSP goes to Manchester: Substance, a workers' co-op in Manchester, would like to borrow the LTSP suite for 2 days for their annual conference. However, no budget is available to cover the cost of hire or the attendance of an engineer. Delegates will be attending from Bristol, so there is the possibility of transport. It was agreed to resolve this matter on the daily list.
7. Ragged Hedge/Easton Cowboys/girls Alternative World Cup: The Alternative World Cup takes place over the August Bank Holiday weekend at Cullompton, Devon. Bails and Sean will be attending a meeting tomorrow (Wednesday) to discuss final arrangements. Anyone wishing to crew, please add your name to the list on the wiki. The Ragged Hedge is being held the weekend after near Cirencester. So far the crew for this event is Woodsy, Bails, Rich and Mike H. Anyone wishing to crew this event is asked to add their name to the list on the wiki.
8. Tynn Care Services: A letter has been sent re payment of the amount outstanding at the end of June (£560). BenG reported that Tyne's Francis did not show up for a meeting arranged for 5.30 today to resolve the matter. Jules is to send a letter giving 7 days' notice of legal action (action - Jules).

AOB

1. Cube: Jules reported he had seen a report (unconfirmed) on Bristol Indymedia that the owner of the building wants to sell it, even though the current Cube co-op still has 7 years left to run on the lease. It was decided to contact the Cube to ascertain the actual situation.
2. rdesktop: BenG reported, further to his email to the daily list, that rdesktop can now run Windows programs as an application server.

Date of next meeting: Tuesday 4th September 2007 at 6.30 pm