[Foss4g2008loc] amended meeting minutes and GanttProject pointer

Mon Oct 15 10:43:57 EDT 2007

Hi all

For those who need to work on the project schedule, you can download
GanttProject from http://ganttproject.biz/ 

Here are the minutes again with an amendment (added Dup's name to
attendees) and in the body of the e-mail, just in case you didn't see
the attached pdf last time. Please check on your roles and tasks.

Minutes

FOSS4G2008 LOC meeting 4 Oct and Budget meeting 5 Oct both held at
Mintek.

Present at LOC meeting on 4 Oct:

*         Inge

*         Carrin

*         Graeme

*         Magda

*         Dup

*         Dewald (telecon)

*         Paul (telecon)

*         Tyler (telecon)

*         Frank (telecon)

*         Gavin

Present at LOC budget meeting on 5 Oct: 

*         Carrin

*         Inge

*         Karryn

*         Petro

*         Gavin 

1.      Most of the LOC meeting was taken up with allocation and
description of roles. Our Gantt chart accompanies this message. Will
each coordinator (= working group chair = subcommittee chair) please get
a copy of GanttProject and edit your section with realistic tasks,
timelines and resources and send it back to Daina for integration by
October 17. Coordinators are as follows:

a.       *Overall project management: Gavin and Daina

b.      *Marketing and PR: Dawn, with Carrin and Jenny 

a.       Logo, colour themes, etc.: Inge, with Dewald. 

c.       *Finances: 

a.       Operational and budgeting: PeopleSA

b.      Oversight: Gavin, Carrin and Paul

d.      *Venue organisation: PeopleSA

e.       *Website: Dewald, with Graeme

f.        *Sponsorship

a.       international: OSGeo

b.      Local: Burnie, with Carrin and Gavin

g.       *Exhibitor liaison: Magda

h.       *Technical (conference) programme: Inge, with Tyler and Jeff

a.       assistance with academic track from Antony Cooper

i.         *Workshops and labs: Dewald, with Jeff and Burnie

j.        *Keynote speakers: Graeme

k.      *Outreach: Cape Town GISSA + Carrin + Gavin + Bridget + Dup

l.         *Registration and conference hosting: PeopleSA

m.     *Virtual market: Cape Town problem, Gavin, Amazon Mechanical Turk

n.       *Demonstration theatre: Dewald, with Burnie

o.      *Integration and interoperability showcase: Graeme, with Terence
from ICT4EO

p.      *Green event: Gavin, with PeopleSA

q.      *Volunteers: Russell Hope

r.        Government liaison: Dup + SITA

s.       GISSA liaison: Carrin

t.        PeopleSA liaison: Gavin

2.      LOC Governance document: approval and publication: Carrin had a
concern over the distinction between material and non-material
decisions. Gavin edited it to reflect current LOC members and adjusted
the 'material decision' clause. Frank has published it
(http://wiki.osgeo.org/index.php/FOSS4G_2008_Governance
<http://wiki.osgeo.org/index.php/FOSS4G_2008_Governance> ). Anyone can
make themselves a member of OSGeo, which entails creating your own wiki
account and adding a row to the membership table
(http://wiki.osgeo.org/index.php/All_Members
<http://wiki.osgeo.org/index.php/All_Members> ). Then you can edit
(responsibly!) the Governance doc and any other OSGeo wiki content. 

3.      LOC and OSGeo agreement: Carrin will circulate a first draft to
the group. When it has matured Gavin will publish it on the wiki. Tyler
will approve on OSGeo's behalf.

4.      Budget: 

a.       workshop teachers to get complementary registration

b.      Several other budget points were discussed - these will be
included in a 'close-to-final' budget by next week, that will be
circulated. We think that will be a budget we can go to sponsors with
and generally start working with. We've asked for variables to be set up
so we can play with scenarios of different numbers of attendees and
different registration fees. 

5.      Sponsorhip and exhibitors: 

a.       Non-SA OSGeo members agreed to assist in approaching
international sponsors

b.      Finalise prospectus: Carrin circulated a draft a while back -
please comment and reply to her so next (final) draft can come out by
15th Oct

c.       Add Novell and IBM to sponsor lists if they're not already
there. They are apparently big sponsors of OS events. Gavin has contact
at Afrilinux (Gary Hodgson) who are Novell associates (?) in SA. 

d.      Push for as much government support as possible as there are
fewer strings attached.

e.       Gavin will set up a database of contact lists for sponsorship
end exhibitor approaches and related. - using those from OSGeo,
FOSS4G2007, GISSA and AfricaGIS as seeding. 

f.        Gavin will write a motivation for workshop, demonstration and
presenters' computers with iBurst boradband to Jerome at PeopleSA on the
basis that they are donated to schools afterwards. 

g.       The prospectus must clearly list spots available for
advertising. Therefore we must have a clear idea early on what these
will be - lanyards, banners, website, programme, etc. 

6.      Get OSGeo and GISSA contact databases: 

a.       Paul provided some OSGeo contact lists.

b.      Burnie to get contact lists (delegates, sponsors, vendors, etc.)
from AfricaGIS from EIS-Africa.

c.       GISSA (Carrin) will communicate directly with all its members.

7.      Floorplan discussion:

a.       small exhibition spaces must be available for those with small
budgets (small companies, NGOs, etc.)

8.      Conference programme: discussion - mainly to confirm rooms and
numbers and the main components and sequence

a.       Starting time each main conference day: 08h30

b.      Should we do a daily newsletter during the conference?

9.      Workshops:

a.       there is huge demand for hands-on workshops. We must cater for
this. 

b.      Linux must be the OS in at least one workshop venue. Consider
carefully how presenters and attendees are going to prepare for this,
and whether we need Windows. 

c.       Consider extra workshop slots in the evenings. The way the
programme is planned at present there are already slots on Monday
morning and Friday morning and afternoon. 

d.      Keep workshops grouped separate from conference for ease of
management and billing. 

e.       Invite plans early for affiliated workshops and courses before
and after the conference, and identify existing courses that complement
our dates. Other interested parties can plan their own courses or
workshops on the weeks or weekends before or after FOSS4G2008 to take
advantage of potential students being in town. They would also make it
more worthwhile to attend FOSS4G2008. e.g. Approach Richard Knight at
UWC, and others. These can potentially be anywhere in southern Africa,
not just CT. 

f.        keep options open for workshops during the week to lower
conflict with workshop presenters who are also needed for outreach.

10.  Website: 

a.       Dewald and Graeme to discuss registration requirements and
hand-off point from FOSS4G site to PeopleSA site, with PeopleSA. 

b.      The website must be ready with user registration by Fri 12th so
that it can be included in FOSS4G2007 follow-up e-mail and other
marketing.

c.       It will continue at Linux Holdings in Drupal for the time
being.

d.      Www.foss4g2008.org <http://Www.foss4g2008.org/> . Please send
input and comments to Dewald via this group.

e.       Make personal contact detail publication an option when
registering.

f.        Capture abstracts etc. so they can be serialised into
programme book

11.  Skin, theme, look 'n feel, logo, for website and conference
generally. Before Inge gets into the technical programme role she will
coordinate this task. 

12.  Integration and interoperability showcase: 

a.       set up early, i.e. soon

b.      consider GEOSS and OGC demos aligned to solving real problems. 

c.       build data repository that can also be used in workshops

d.      Discuss with Humbu Mudau DST + CSIR GEOSS govt pilot with space
programme 

13.  Volunteers:

a.       A local Cape Town LOC person must coordinate sourcing
volunteers to help run the show, from universities. 

b.      Get numbers and ideas from Paul. 

c.       what do they get? Free attendance and meals, plus stipend /
tip?

14.  Assistance for LOC members

a.       Is there a precedent and what do people feel about supporting
LOC members attendance and costs, say if they can't get funding from
their employers?

15.  Accommodation

a.       All official accommodation will be through PeopleSA, who are
doing their best to source substantial budget accommodation. 

16.  Document management. Where and how is the best option to store and
manage documents and files we all need to collaborate on e.g. Budget and
Gantt chart. 

a.       ProjectPlace?

b.      OSGeo's Subversion?

c.       GISSA's website (hosted in US)? - this being Plone is ideally
set up for this. 

d.      Other suggestions?

e.       NOT GoogleDocs - impossible with low bandwidth.

17.  Technical programme:

a.       Regsitration open January, early bird close June

b.      idea: put up big LCD screen like at airport to advertise
upcoming talks.

c.       Inge to coordinate drafting the calls for papers and workshops
asap. Work with Marketing and Workshops teams. 

18.  Registration:

a.       No cheques will be accepted during the conference. Therefore
late-comer or daily registration must be by credit card or cash.

19.  PeopleSA contract with GISSA:

a.       An updated contract should be drafted as agreed upon signing
the first one.

b.      It was proposed that GISSA members get a small discount off
registration. Tie in an option to join GISSA on the website. 

20.  Social: 

a.       At FOSS4G2007 the 'Sticky Wicket' was a central pub for
socialising. Of course people could go anywhere but it was nice to have
one 'conference-endorsed' venue. Anyone have suggestions for Cape Town?
So far Long Street suggested as 'the social street'.

Gavin Fleming MSc

Senior GISc and Sustainable Development Researcher 

Mintek 

w: +27-11-709-4668

c: 0845965680

f: 0866164820

xmpp (Jabber, Google Talk, etc.): gavinjfleming at gmail.com
<mailto:gavinjfleming at gmail.com> 

Skype: phlemingo

postal: P/Bag X3015, Randburg, 2125

physical: 200 Malibongwe Drive, Randburg

South Africa

27.9782E 26.0896S

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