Category: friends

Open Source Software conference

Thursday Michael, Niels and myself represented the Danish Ubuntu community at a conference about open source software in the public sector.
crew
From left to right: Me, Michael, Louis and Niels.

We shared a community booth with the nice people from the Danish OpenOffice.org and Mozilla communities.
community

The conference took place at the historic Børsen.
We handed out all our remaining 8.10 desktop cd’s, got to talk with a lot of people and I believe we managed to convince a few people that Ubuntu (and Linux) has come a long way the last couple of years. Unfortunately I wasn’t quick enough to get a picture when one of the speakers, Christian Lanng, booted his laptop while it was plugged into the projector and revealed that he is in fact running Ubuntu.

You can find resources (presentations etc.) from the conference and discussions of the conference at Digitalisér.dk (in Danish).

Tivoli fredagsrock

Så er det vist på tide at få fornyet mit årskort til Tivoli for jeg har netop set deres Fredagsrock program.

Det ser godt ud! …eller, der er i hvert fald nok navne jeg gerne vil se til at det kan betale sig at købe et årskort.

Læserne af politikens IBYEN er lidt mere bitre, men bare fordi det appellerer bredt behøver det jo ikke være dårligt.

FysikRevyTM

So Esben, how did you enjoy the FysikRevyTM?

I found it very entertaining. It lasted for more than three hours, and was packed with different skits, ranging from the more political with critique of the leadership of the faculty and the minister of science to the more absurd where a scientist presents his theory that everything consists of bananas.

As is tradition with the student revues at the faculty of science at KU the audience participated in the show to a great extend, with shouts, cheers and lots of Skål.

All in all a fun evening.

Pictures from Open Source Days 2008

As promised here are pictures of some members of the Danish Ubuntu LoCo team, at the Open Source Days 2008 in Copenhagen. All pictures by Niels Kjøller Hansen.

gruppe-lille
From left to right: Niels, Elge Sander, Søren (me), Mads, Mark and Sakse.

The moose is named after Helge Sander, our Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation. (Elg means moose in Danish.)

The Software Exchange was running the booth with the fancy setup. They work under the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation and help the public sector in Denmark choose relevant software, in particular open source software.

Below are some pictures of LoCo team members lounging in front of the portrait of the sabdfl.

gnomonicshiyeesbc

Mexibar åbningstider…

Men der er jo lukket…

Min verden faldt sammen et kort øjeblik. Hvad der skulle være en hyggelig mandag ude med min kæreste og nogle venner til drinks (og flere drinks) startede rigtig dårligt, da der var helt mørkt inde i Mexibars lokale i Elemgade på Nørrebro. (Elmegade nr. 27, lige på hjørnet af Elmegade og Sankt Hans Torv).

Mexibar er jo stedet at drikke lækre og farverige drinks med masser af sprut til su venlige priser!

Men de har nu åbenbart lukket om mandagen. Det har de ikke altid haft, men tiderne skifter. Det var et større detektivarbejde faktisk at finde frem til deres nuværende åbningstider – deres side på aok er ikke blevet opdateret i længere tid og de har vist ikke rigtig nogen brugbar hjemmeside.

De har dog et telefonnummer og her kan man komme til at snakke med en telefonsvarer, der oplyser at deres åbningstider er:

Tirsdag – Torsdag: 19 – 02
Fredag og Lørdag: 19-03
Mandag og Søndag: Lukket

Så skulle det være på plads (indtil de ændrer åbningstider igen – vi skriver januar 2009 nu).

… tilbage til drinksene mandag aften. Vi flyttede os hurtigt ind mod Nørreport station og endte på Out of Juice. Nej, deres drinks menu kan ikke konkurrerer med Mexibars, men med godt selskab, hvad gør det så?

How to mirror your blog onto Freenet

I received an email a few days ago asking how I manage to mirror this blog onto Freenet.

For those of you out there who don’t know about Freenet, it is a computer program that aims to provide anonymity for consumers and providers of information, in an effort to secure free speech. The network is decentralized and uses strong encryption to secure anonymity and free speech.

I have been using Freenet, and following its development, on and off over the last couple of years, both because I generally like the idea of free speech and also because I find the technical aspects interesting. The Freenet program is still under heavy development, far from a 1.0 release, and always in need of support. Since I’m not much of a coder I can’t really help The Freenet Project that way, so instead I try to provide something else – content. In other words, I mirror this blog onto Freenet (where a blog is often called a flog).

It is actually quite simple (although a bit time consuming) to insert content into Freenet. Assuming my Freenet node is running, here is what I do:

  1. First I fetch the files locally, using HTTrack (apt install) (I guess wget, puf or similar would work just as well…)
  2. Then I use jSite, to insert onto Freenet.

Quite simple really… If you feel like getting your blog (or other content) on Freenet, I say go for it. If you run into any problems, feel free to contact me.

PS. I’m always looking for friends to connect my Freenet node to, so if you feel like you know and trust me, and that I might now and trust you, feel free to get in touch.

PPS. You can find this blog on Freenet at this key:
USK@nwFgddANy8mudsvcXin~XhPLmiiM8tKG0iYdFRcBgM0,edFuHQpV3fY6eeedhSbfSPpQ9gkBFVwvR~uEzTZiB8k,AQACAAE/blog/74/

No content?!?

Esben complains that my blog (and the internet in general) has no content.

Well, if a box with cute kittens is not entertaining enough for you, you are indeed a cold hearted person.

Oh, and isn’t the internet about communication and information, more than entertainment? I don’t have the answer, but let’s ask these two dogs:

shar_pei_welpen

Dog one: Wroof wroof
Dog two: Oh, I was just about to say that…

Ubuntu Live! and TV appearance

Yesterday was Ubuntu Live! (Ubuntu 8.10 release party) here in Copenhagen and it was great! The talks went according to schedule and we had an entire auditorium at the CBS dedicated to install help all through the day. I didn’t personally take any pictures, but I’m sure others will post snaps of the event at some point.

Of course a big thanks goes to the volunteers, the speakers and everyone else for showing up and participating with such a great spirit, making the day as great as it was.

Among others, Leif Lodahl, was at the event giving a talk about the new OpenOffice.org 3. Leif also had a key role in the tv program ‘Magasinet Penge‘ (a consumer / economy program by DR) for their program about Open Source Software. The program aired last week.
The concept of the program was a typical Danish family of 4 (mother, father and two kids) gets 3 new pc’s with Open Source Software installed. Will they be able to use their new computers, or will they cave in and go back to their Microsoft based computers? Of course they made it, and the family is now switching to Ubuntu for good. Hopefully they will inspire other families around the country to do the same. People from the Danish Loco Team were also involved in the program. Ubuntu had been installed to the computers by members of the team, and Martin and myself made a short (and silent) appearance in the program, handing over the pc’s to the family.
The effect of having Ubuntu mentioned on national television have been quite clear, as the number of users of our forum has increased dramatically.