Meeting: Utilizing Open Source Technologies to Build Enterprise Class Organizations

Shopatron talked about their use of open source technologies. It was interesting that they not only used open source technologies in their server LAMP (Linux, Apache, mySQL, PHP) configuration but they also took it to the desktop. They chose to standardize on Open Office and Kubuntu as their desktop systems.

Here is the video in case you missed it:


Some benefits they cited:

• Saved ~$400 per machine in licensing costs


• Ability to tweak their software to meet their special needs


• Ability to scale their DB without having to resort to buying more expensive DB hardware


• Transparency into their software providers, access to key architects and developers of MySQL

Some challenges they cited:

• New tools do have a ramp-up time, they included training


• Just because it's open source it doesn't mean you don't pay for premium support


• Cutting edge software can cut


• Going from proprietary solutions to open source solutions can be a significant effort and should be planned carefully.

Overall they were very pleased with their choice to go open source across the board and they recommend that others take the leap.

Recommended reading/viewing:
I would also highly recommend reading Wikinomics. It has a very good overview of how the open source philosophies have affected business in the last 10 years. It has some great examples ranging from IBM to motorcycle manufacturers in china.

If you still want more this TED talks also hints at what open sourcing other areas of life can mean. Video embed below but you can also watch it on the TED website



The open source model has proven as an effective method of tackling large common problems. Various areas are looking to this type of collaboration model and reinventing themselves.

NOTE: I chose Jonathan Coulton's "Code Monkey" as the sound track because he's opening up some new ground in open source music. He gives Creative Commons licensing to his music so I could use it without calling his licensing agent. I did however pay the $1 for the song out of respect for the fact that he has to make a living. The ccMixter site allows users to share their samples in this open source way.

2nd life for a Laptop

No, this has nothing to do with Second Life, the online phenomena and everything to do with re-purposing an old piece of hardware.

I am currently working on several projects that involve team members that work in different parts of the county. I work out of my home office in Atascadero but I spend quite a bit of time meeting with clients and colleagues in the SLO and AG areas. A lot of meetings are held at coffee shops, the home-office worker’s conference room. Silly me, the last time I bought a new computer I put together a rockin’ work station rather than buying myself a laptop. At the time I didn’t really need to travel or work away from my office and opted for the high powered server.

So here I am today in need of a laptop but I don’t want to plunk down any amount of money right now. However I have an old 3rd or 4th hand Dell Inspiron 7500 PentiumIII. Last year I reformatted the hard drive and loaded Windows XP on it – originally it came with WindowsNT or Windows98. I loaded XP because I needed to run a demo application for sales calls and it was all I had. XP loaded and I got it up and running no problem. But I had no apps on it and it ran the demo app very sluggishly.

The laptop sat on a shelf for over a year. It was not quite at door stop status but it was getting close. However I have always advocated that with the advent of web apps and remote admin software any old PC or laptop that can run a current version of a web browser still has life as long as the hard drive holds out. Now I have an opportunity to heed my own advocacy and I am going to resurrect the Inspiron 7500 to help me be mobile as I work on my various projects and spend little or no money in the process.

I followed Roberto Monge’s lead and set up one of my projects on BaseCamphq.com. BaseCamp is a web based project management tool. I am testing out the free version that allows you to work on one project. I am setting up the URL for the project on Google’s business apps and will run my spreadsheet and documents through there along with setting up Gmail on my domain.

Next I loaded Skype on the laptop and plugged my VoIP headset in and made a high quality call without a hitch. Finally I loaded Radmin Viewer on the laptop and set up Radmin server on my PC. Now through the web browser on the laptop I can run any app and access any data on my home server.

Other than the cost of the Radmin Viewer license (which I already had) it took no money for me to turn a rather old laptop into a very usable machine by limiting the software on it to the OS, Internet Explorer, Skype, and Radmin.

With this configuration I can almost divorce myself of a piece of hardware whether it be a PC or laptop. If all my apps and data are online, then all I need is access to machine with a web browser and I have all my tools and resources at my disposal – as long as I have an Internet connection.

June Meeting: End-to-End Software Integration and Implementation

Justin Couto was the presenter at last night's softec meeting. He had a record 3 projectors for his presentation. He walked through how a business would go about deciding whether to hire a custom solution provider. One of the key decision points was if a business had very repetitive tasks that could be programmed. He suggested that businesses should think of a custom software solution as a "Software Employee".

He also gave a great demo of an on going project his company created for Spalding Labs, a Beneficial Insect provider. The application was very impressive in the scope of the overall system systems (online orders, fullfilment, billing, VOIP CSR, shipping systems, weather systems, CRM,...etc) and depth of custom features (marketing code tied to call numbers, call logs tied to customer records, google maps integration). My favorite feature was the weather systems integration to help dynamically predict when customers would need to purchase more or less insects. The UI and usability of the system showed the love that Couto Solutions puts into their work.

If you missed the presentation check it out video here:

Web 2.0 and Beyond Softec talk

Thanks the fifty or so of you that came out last night for my "Web 2.0 and beyond" talk. I really enjoyed meeting everyone and I hope to see you at future softec events. We had some technical difficulties with the video capture so I can't upload the presentation video but I've uploaded my presentation slides to:

The softec website: softec-web20.ppt

There was much interest about that Web 2.0 video so I'll embed it here:

Web 2.0 ... The Machine is Us/ing Us



If you feel like you understand the fundamentals of Web 2.0 this is a funny video to test your skills Super Market 2.0

.NET user group for the greater San Luis Obispo area and Central Coast of California.

Justin Couto has informed us of a .NET user group that meets every 2nd Tuesday of the month. Everyone is encouraged to attend, including those who are new to the .NET world.

Check out their website at http://www.slodotnet.org/. If you would like to present at or sponsor one of their meetings, please contact the administrator at info@slodotnet.org for more information.

Bill Moyers "The Net at Risk"

Bill Moyers has a website dedicated to issues in America. He picked three topics and one of them is a technology related topic. The Net at Risk series delves into the importance of the Net on our society.

COMMUNITY CONNECTIONS
"The Net @ Risk" takes viewers to Lafayette, Louisiana, where residents and officials took on their phone company, BellSouth, and their cable company, Cox Communications, and built their own high-speed fiber network after the firms refused to bring true broadband connections to their community. Both telcom giants lobbied the state legislature to block Lafayette's plan, citing unfair competition. Ultimately, lawmakers put it to a vote to let residents decide. The measure allowing the community-built network passed overwhelmingly. BellSouth then filed suit, delaying construction by more than a year, before losing their case in court.

The Community Connections section resonates with Ken Dozier's presentation (skip to slide 31) at the Softec Symposium. Ken talked about a small community that decided to bring fiber to their homes as a community project. Bill Moyers also highlights a small town that decided to take on broadbad access as a public utility. He talks about how the economic and political vitality of small towns is greatly affected by their broadband penetration. Thomas Friedman in the "World is Flat" also talks about how we are far behind in our Broadband penetration compared to the rest of the industrialized world and how this will affect our competitiveness in the information age. As a remote technology worker this issue hits home. My ability to work effectively is directly proportional to by bandwidth (both down and up). I'm also in the gaming industry and it's amazing to see the breakthough's in the Korean and Japanese markets due to broadband and wireless penetration.

Should the Information Super Highway be a public utility like the commerce highways are? What role if any should associations like softec play in bringing up these topics into the local politics?