![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Linux Conf, Unitarians, Gaming
Feb. 5th, 2008 04:20 pmThe past week and a bit has been dominated by Linux Conf AU where I spent several mornings working as a volunteer on the rego desk. I managed to attend Bruce Schneier's keynote address on 'reconceptualising security', ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
anthonybaxter's keynote on changes to the Python programming language, and two BOF presentations; Anthony David on Linux for High Performance Computing, and Hugh Blemings' presentation introducing a PowerPC box for developers (nice!). Schneier was a bit of a dud; lightweight management speak to a technical crowd, the "reconceptualization" seemed trivial and obvious and the one potentially interesting part of his presentation (asymmetric markets was insufficiently developed. In contrast Baxter's presentation was deeply informative, interesting, and with a requisite quantity of humour. Finally, much kudos are due to kattekrab for organising this internationally significant conference. Well done.
The following day after the conference was Linux Open Day, where I also attended the Joomla Day which was being held concurrently. Apart from being largely unimpressed with the quality and substance of the presentations (Norm Douglas' introductory presentation being an exception), the administration of the event was quite amateur. In summary, I'll be sticking to Drupal, which seems to me to have more features, makes better use of resources and a larger community of active developers.
In Unitarian news I took the opportunity a couple of weeks back to express my concerns at a presentation. To say the least, I have received extremely positive feedback on the presentation (with the exception of one person, who I knew wouldn't be happy anyway). A presentation last Sunday which concurs with the direction I think the church should be heading, Dr. John Perkins of the Secular Party of Australia, on "Atheism and Secularism", was very well attended. Next week I'm giving a presentation to the Philosophy Forum on "Biological Taxonomy: An Example of the Philosophy of Science".
Gaming over the past few weeks has quite fun. D&D Fantasy Australia went very well last week and my Legend of the Five Rings game continues its journey in ghostly island off the coast of Noto Province (now the Ishikawa Prefecture. I've recently had reviews of D3: The Vault of the Drow and Kill Puppies for Satan published. My HeroQuest Glorantha game bubbles along quite nicely with the game reaching the milestone of one year of play with a dramatic scene (in Gloranthan terms anyway).
anthonybaxter's keynote on changes to the Python programming language, and two BOF presentations; Anthony David on Linux for High Performance Computing, and Hugh Blemings' presentation introducing a PowerPC box for developers (nice!). Schneier was a bit of a dud; lightweight management speak to a technical crowd, the "reconceptualization" seemed trivial and obvious and the one potentially interesting part of his presentation (asymmetric markets was insufficiently developed. In contrast Baxter's presentation was deeply informative, interesting, and with a requisite quantity of humour. Finally, much kudos are due to kattekrab for organising this internationally significant conference. Well done.The following day after the conference was Linux Open Day, where I also attended the Joomla Day which was being held concurrently. Apart from being largely unimpressed with the quality and substance of the presentations (Norm Douglas' introductory presentation being an exception), the administration of the event was quite amateur. In summary, I'll be sticking to Drupal, which seems to me to have more features, makes better use of resources and a larger community of active developers.
In Unitarian news I took the opportunity a couple of weeks back to express my concerns at a presentation. To say the least, I have received extremely positive feedback on the presentation (with the exception of one person, who I knew wouldn't be happy anyway). A presentation last Sunday which concurs with the direction I think the church should be heading, Dr. John Perkins of the Secular Party of Australia, on "Atheism and Secularism", was very well attended. Next week I'm giving a presentation to the Philosophy Forum on "Biological Taxonomy: An Example of the Philosophy of Science".
Gaming over the past few weeks has quite fun. D&D Fantasy Australia went very well last week and my Legend of the Five Rings game continues its journey in ghostly island off the coast of Noto Province (now the Ishikawa Prefecture. I've recently had reviews of D3: The Vault of the Drow and Kill Puppies for Satan published. My HeroQuest Glorantha game bubbles along quite nicely with the game reaching the milestone of one year of play with a dramatic scene (in Gloranthan terms anyway).