[OSGeo-Conf] FOSS4G Cookbook

Fri Oct 14 15:32:45 EDT 2011

Gavin, Peter,
Yes, I agree that providing and standardising of tools for abstract 
management would be a huge value add for future foss4g conferences, and 
something that I wish we had available to us at foss4g 2009.
I have similar war stories to Peter about managing papers, and 
integrating with the proprietary PCO systems. I also think that it will 
take a number of conferences for us to fully streamline our process into 
a simple Open Source solution.

On 15/10/2011 5:07 AM, Gavin wrote:
> The system we used for 2008 (http://pkp.sfu.ca/ocs/) 
> <http://pkp.sfu.ca/ocs/%29> was suggested by Tyler on this same basis 
> - that it would be something to use and build on in future years. It 
> is more geared towards academic conferences but has all the machinery 
> for abstract submission, review, publishing etc.
>
> Whatever is chosen it then needs to be a requirement in RFPs that LOCs 
> commit to using it and not doing their own thing.
>
> Gavin
>
>
> One other semi-related item that has been on my mind is extending the 
> web site we put together this year, based on Drupal, for use in future 
> years. It uses an open source conference management module but we only 
> enabled some parts of that. It wouldn't be too much work to get 
> Jonathan, who did the site for us, to extend the functionality so it 
> could handle the whole abstract submission and selection process (but 
> enough work that we would have to pay him something, as we did for his 
> initial work).
>>
>>
>> Managing abstracts was a real pain for us this year with a lot of 
>> manual work to move them around through the process. They came in 
>> through one system, we did initial sorting in one spreadsheet, they 
>> went to Paul Ramsey's voting system then back into another 
>> spreadsheet which we couldn't easily cross-reference to the previous 
>> one, we did some duplicate checking in a separate database system, 
>> and ended up with two spreadsheets for the academic and main tracks, 
>> then at the end it was a lot of work to schedule the selected papers, 
>> notify people, and put the info on the web site. And then you have to 
>> manage the process of people dropping out and filling those slots. 
>> Having all these manual steps is very error prone too. Finally we now 
>> have the question of getting slides online, which would be much 
>> easier if people could upload their own, which they could if we were 
>> using this module fully. 
>>
>>
>> This whole process would be massively streamlined if we used the 
>> conference management module the whole way through. 
>>
>>
>> So anyway, I'm inclined to take a little money from the FOSS4G 
>> proceeds and get this done for the benefit of future FOSS4Gs. I think 
>> this would also be a tangible benefit that OSGeo could provide for 
>> people doing FOSS4G events (global or local) that would help justify 
>> the event contributing something back to OSGeo from the event 
>> proceeds (though that's a separate topic). 
>>
>>
>> I'm not quite sure who (if anyone) I need to get permission from to 
>> do this. I would certainly welcome thoughts from this group. I can 
>> check with the board if the thought is that I need to do that. Or can 
>> just go ahead - the amount of money involved is small compared to 
>> other budget items I've been dealing with on FOSS4G. But obviously I 
>> only want to do it if others think it's a good idea. 
>>
>>
>> Cheers, 
>>     Peter. 
>>
>> On Fri, Oct 14, 2011 at 4:52 AM, Cameron Shorter 
>> <cameron.shorter at gmail.com <mailto:cameron.shorter at gmail.com>> wrote:
>>
>>     I suggest that we, the conference committee and interested
>>     people, should organically start building a FOSS4G Cookbook.
>>
>>     The Cookbook should cover all the aspects of putting on a FOSS4G
>>     conference, including such things as:
>>
>>     * Schedule coming up to the conference
>>     * Budget
>>     * Program
>>     * Web Site
>>     * Catering
>>     * Venue selection
>>
>>     Initially much of the content for this cookbook can be drawn
>>     directly from Lessons Learned from previous years. As more events
>>     are run, I'd expect ideas to evolve and the Cookbook to grow with it.
>>
>>     I see two key advantages of such a Cookbook:
>>
>>     1. Access to such information will make it much easier for
>>     someone to put on a FOSS4G conference
>>
>>     2. The Cookbook can be used as a baseline to guide deciding
>>     whether a conference may make use of the FOSS4G brand. This will
>>     help maintain the quality associated with the FOSS4G brand.
>>
>>     Do others see value in building such a document?
>>     I'm assuming we should build the Cookbook as a wiki, but am happy
>>     to hear suggestions for other collaborative tools.
>>     If there is sufficient interest, I'll build a skeleton of the
>>     Cookbook, and invite others to contribute content.
>>
>>     -- 
>>     Cameron Shorter
>>     Geospatial Solutions Manager
>>     Tel: +61 (0)2 8570 5050 <tel:%2B61%20%280%292%208570%205050>
>>     Mob: +61 (0)419 142 254 <tel:%2B61%20%280%29419%20142%20254>
>>
>>     Think Globally, Fix Locally
>>     Geospatial Solutions enhanced with Open Standards and Open Source
>>     http://www.lisasoft.com
>>
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>
>
> -- 
> Gavin Fleming
> t: 0218620670
> c: 0845965680
> f: 0866164820
> Paarl
> South Africa
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>
>
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-- 
Cameron Shorter
Geospatial Solutions Manager
Tel: +61 (0)2 8570 5050
Mob: +61 (0)419 142 254

Think Globally, Fix Locally
Geospatial Solutions enhanced with Open Standards and Open Source
http://www.lisasoft.com

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