[Linux-aus] Spaghetti at the wall: LCA thoughts

[Russell Coker]

On Wed, 25 Jan 2012, Mary Gardiner <mary at puzzling.org> wrote:
> I know it's been done on and off, and I know it's partly a cost/venue
> problem, but I continue to wish that the hallway track could become more
> official: seating, power, breakout rooms, unconference and/or sprint or
> hack days, something of that nature. Possibly even at the expense of the
> main event to some degree.

The UPDNS session had quite a nice room that was close to all the dormitary 
accommodation and also close to car parks for people who didn't stay at the 
dorms.

As that room was made available for the UPDNS it seems most likely that it 
could have been made available at other times, it had chairs, tables, and 
power points.  Network access was all that might have been missing (I didn't 
check).

I'm guessing that cost wasn't the issue here as AFAIK the UPDNS organisers 
didn't pay for anything other than food.  But it does take time to organise 
such things.

Also every dorm block had a kitchen table and chairs to seat at least a dozen 
people.  Anyone could have organised a hack day in one of those, I believe 
that such hack days generally don't have that many people.

Maybe the main thing that was missing in this regard is the meme that people 
should run hack days.

I recall that when the miniconfs first started the number of people who 
attended them appeared to be a lot smaller than the attendance at the main 
conference.  But in recent times it seems that almost everyone is attending 
the miniconfs.  It's possible that a hack day before the miniconfs would 
become reasonably popular and well attended over time.

Also the availability of food in the evenings was a real issue.  I would 
rather have attended an event at a dorm block with someone who has a car 
bringing roast chicken (*) or something than going to town by bus for dinner.


(*)  I'm not the biggest fan of roast chicken, but some people apparently 
arranaged something like that after I had departed and I would have been 
involved if I had still been there.

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