VanLUG Monthly General Meetings

Typically, VanLUG General Meetings are held on the third Monday evening of the month at SFU Harbour Centre, 515 West Hasting Street. Statutory holidays are exceptions. Additional details will be made available as dates and speakers are confirmed.

Meetings usually feature guest speakers or group discussions, and opportunities for networking and socializing before and after the meeting. Come on out, meet some new people and join the community.

How Linux and BSD Are Similar and How Linux Helps in Learning BSD.

Presented by: John J. Weintraub

Our next monthly general meeting will take place on Monday night, August 21, 2017, from 7:00-9:00pm, in Room HC-7000, at SFU Harbour Centre, 515 West Hastings Street in Vancouver.

Our presenter will be John Weintraub, current Past-President and Treasurer of VanLUG. John is a network administrator and entrepreneur, well certified, and very knowledgeable about any number of operating systems.

He’ll be sharing that expertise with us on Monday night. His presentation is entitled “How Linux and BSD are similar and how Linux helps in learning BSD”. What he has in mind is to compare the similarities between the file system hierarchies, the C-Shell and Bash and, then look at some of the things he did to get a web server and ftp server up and running on BSD. So a definite cross-over presentation.

Hope to see you there.

Security and Privacy on the Web in 2015 (Monthly Technical Meeting)

Presented by: François Marier (from Mozilla)

Where: Room 1530 at SFU Harbour Centre, 515 West Hastings Street.

When: Monday September 21st, 2015

Time: 7:00PM

In the last few years, a number of new security features have become available to web developers (e.g. Content Security Policy, Strict Transport Security) and a few more are coming up this year (e.g.
Referrer Policy, Subresource Integrity).

As a browser vendor and a member of the W3C WebAppSec working group,Mozilla is busy extending the web platform to provide the tools andfeatures that developers and users need in 2015. In addition to that,the non-profit behind Firefox is experimenting with new ways to protect its users, building on Google’s Safe Browsing technology to defend users against tracking.

About François

François is a software engineer working on the Security &Privacy team at Mozilla. He works on security features like subresource integrity and Safe Browsing, as well as privacy features like tracking protection. Aside from Mozilla work, he blogs about Linux-related things, runs a free software alternative to Gravatar, called Libravatar, and maintains several Debian packages.

We’ll have a book raffle to raise funds for VanLug, and then adjourn to a local establishment for refreshments and networking. So come on out, learn something new, win a book, meet some friends, and support VanLUG!

NOTICE: NEXT LINUXFAIRE MEETING:
Monday, July 20, 2015, 7:00pm, Room 7000,
SFU Harbour Centre, 515 West Hastings Street.

Our next regular monthly meeting will be a LinuxFaire meeting on Monday, July 20, 2015, 7:00pm, Room 7000, SFU, Harbour Centre, 515 West Hastings Street.

Our presenter this month will be Joshua Drake from Bellingham. Joshua presented to us earlier this year on PostGreSQL. He also has considerable experience with conferences, having run and organized about ten, and having assisted with a number of others. Some have been single day events, and some three day events with multiple tracks. He also has experience with growing small community style events.

Joshua’s talk will be titled “So You Want To Run A Conference?” He will discuss the nuances of running a conference for the Open Source / Free Software world. He will cover budgeting, fund raising, sponsorships, different conference types, choosing a venue and properly communicating your purpose and intent. This talk is especially useful for organizations who have never run a conference.

As we head towards booking a venue and making plans, this is exactly the kind of speaker we need to listen to. So far it has seemed that for each and every opinion, there has been a equal and opposite opinion. Facts and experience will be very helpful to us in separating the wheat from the chaff, and formulating our own vision.

As is our usual practice, we’ll have a book raffle to raise funds for VanLug, and then adjourn to a local establishment for refreshments and networking.

So come on out, win a book, meet some friends, support VanLug and learn something new about running a conference.

Note that the room will be open at 6:00pm for early arrivals and networking.

NOTICE: Vancouver Linux User Group, Monthly General Meeting,
Monday June 15, 2015, 7:00pm, Room 7000, SFU Harbour Center,
515 West Hastings Street, Vancouver.

The next meeting of the Vancouver Linux User Group will be held on Monday, June 15, 2015, at 7:00pm, in Room 7000, at SFU Harbour Centre, 515 West Hastings Street, Vancouver.
Our topic this month will be systemd. systemd is the new method of system management and configuration for GNU/Linux. So love it, hate it, or don’t know what it is – chances are it’s coming to your favourite distribution, now or in the near future.
Our presenter will be Kim Kulak, currently Treasurer and former Past-President of VanLUG. Kim has been a member and involved with the running of VanLUG since the beginning. He has used and written code on almost all of the major UNIX systems of the 80’s and became smitten with Linux in 1992 (SLS, kernel 1.0.13). Kim says he’s no expert but he’ll try and give a brief overview of what systemd is, why it’s controversial, and where to learn more about it.
As is our usual practice, we’ll have a book raffle to raise funds for VanLug, and then adjourn to a local establishment for refreshments and networking.
So come on out, win a book, meet some friends, support VanLug and learn something new about systemd.
Note that the room will be open at 6:00pm for early arrivals and networking.

Bill McGrath
President

FORMAL NOTICE: Vancouver Linux User Group 2015 AGM,
Monday May 25, 7:00pm, Room 7000, SFU Harbour Centre,
515 West Hastings Street, Vancouver.

The Vancouver Linux User Group Society would like to invite you to its Annual General Meeting for 2015. This will take place on Monday, May 25, 2015 at 7:00pm, in Room 7000, SFU Harbour Centre, 515 West Hastings Street, Vancouver, B.C.

Our AGM is open to members as well as the general public, however only members, (having a current paid membership), may vote on matters before the society. Our AGM is the end of one fiscal year and the beginning of another, and is an excellent time to purchase or renew your membership in VanLug. Chequebook charity is also welcome and donations from individuals or corporations in support of our endeavours, will be greatly appreciated. Donations, membership fees and book raffle profits are our only sources of revenue, and our budget limits how much VanLug can accomplish. Please attend our AGM and buy a membership.

By the time the AGM arrives we hope to have SSL and PayPal enabled on our revitalized website. Perhaps you’d like to test that for us and purchase or renew your membership online.

Finally, please consider joining our Board of Directors or one of our subcommittees. We have exciting new initiatives upcoming regarding LinuxFaire Vancouver and our website and it’s a great chance to get involved at the ground level. Many hands make light work, and VanLug depends entirely upon its volunteers. Remember, this is the engine room, and that’s another reason to buy a membership.

Our Preliminary Agenda is as follows: (Additional detail will follow.)

1. Call to Order and Establishment of quorum based upon the number of current members in VanLug and additional new and renewed memberships.

2. Presentation and acceptance of Minutes from the 2014 AGM (Kim Kulak).

3. Acceptance of 2015 Agenda.

4. The Year in Review (John Weintraub October-January, Bill McGrath February-May).

5. Financial Reports (Kim Kulak).

6. Membership dues review.

7. VanLug Dave Michelson Award Presentation.

8. Special resolutions:

A. To Create three classes of membership in VanLUG. Membership
will have its privileges.

B. To “roll over” all previous motions and resolutions adopted
by the Vancouver Linux Users Group, so that they continue to
be binding for the new electoral mandate.

C. Call for Resolutions from the floor.

9. Elections to the Board of Directors.

10. Set the date and time of the first meeting of the new Board of Directors.

11. Motion to Adjourn.

12. Year end celebration at Steamworks.

Bill McGrath
President (Pro Tempore), Vancouver Linux Users Group


Call for nominations for the 2015 VanLUG Dave Michelson Award

The Dave Michelson Award for 2015 will be awarded at our upcoming AGM on May 25. The recipient will be presented with a small art object, have his or her name engraved on the Dave Michelson plaque and deliver a short speech to the assembled members of VanLUG.

The Dave Michelson Award was established by the Vancouver Linux Users Group in 2006 to recognize the contributions of local individuals, who work quietly, behind the scenes, to advance, develop and utilize Free, Libré and Open Source Software and enrich our community. Dave Michelson, VanLUG’s founding Chair, was the first recipient. Since then there have been six winners:
2007 Bruno Vernier
2008 Luca Filipozzia
2009 Robert Arkelitian
2011 Kim Kulak
2012 Georg Rodier
2013 Brian Edmonds and Ryan Land

Do you know of any local individuals who fit the above description? With the widespread success of Linux, there are many such people in Vancouver. Perhaps they’ve started a group, organized a conference, written some software? Only those nominated will be considered for this years award. Nominations should include the name of your nominee and a paragraph detailing their contributions to the local FLOSS community, as well as your own contact data. Forward this information to Kim Kulak <[email protected]>.

Should there be multiple nominations, this years recipient will be selected by a committee composed of the VanLUG Board of Directors and former winners of the award. VanLUG also reserves the right to choose no recipient in any given year.

Bill McGrath
President