Fedora Edu Spin Meeting Minutes from 2009-01-14

[Danishka Navin]

21:28:58 <sdziallas>    okay, folks, my watch says it's time... let's 
get this party started!
21:29:34 <sdziallas>    the agenda is here: 
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/SIGs/Education/Meetings/2009-01-14
21:29:46 <sdziallas>    now how about a quick roll call? who's here?
21:29:56 <rdieter>    yo
21:30:20 *    tomeu (n=tomeu at 89-24-113-11.i4g.tmcz.cz) has joined 
#fedora-edu
21:30:40 <sdziallas>    tomeu: :)
21:30:40 *    hanthana here
21:30:49 *    ongolaBoy (n=chatzill at 196.202.239.205) has joined #fedora-edu
21:31:23 <tomeu>    hi all
21:31:36 <sdziallas>    Hi! (just in time for the roll call ;)
21:31:38 <hanthana>    hi tomeu :)
21:32:09 <sdziallas>    well, sounds like we could just move on 
following the agenda...: CURRENT STATUS
21:32:51 <sdziallas>    so let me put it this way: some preliminary work 
on an education spin has been done, here's the wiki page for it: 
https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/SIGs/Education/EducationLive
21:32:59 <hanthana>    appreciate if we can introduce, at list FAS name
21:33:01 <hanthana>    ;)
21:33:42 <rdieter>    good idea, Rex Dieter, rdieter
21:34:02 <tomeu>    I'm a sugar developer, Tomeu Vizoso, tomeu
21:34:10 *    sdziallas was too quick - as usual. ;)
21:34:12 <hanthana>    Danishka Navin, fas: snavin
21:34:21 <hanthana>    sdziallas: no worries ;)
21:34:29 <sdziallas>    you should know me: Sebastian Dziallas, sdz
21:34:35 <hanthana>    ha ha
21:35:06 <sdziallas>    okay?
21:35:07 <hanthana>    any other attendees?
21:35:16 <hanthana>    sdziallas: go ahead
21:35:50 *    ongolaBoy is just a visitor interested in education matters...
21:36:06 <sdziallas>    :)
21:36:14 <rdieter>    ongolaBoy: welcome
21:36:20 <hanthana>    hi ongolaBoy :)
21:36:59 <sdziallas>    there we go! as I said, we've started. there's a 
table in the wiki, listing some applications, I've drafted some 
kickstart files up, and well:
21:37:36 <rdieter>    how'd xcfe vs kde go?  need more beer to decide?
21:37:40 <sdziallas>    I've currently two builds around here, one is 
KDE-based, the other one uses XFCE.
21:38:06 <sdziallas>    I think that's the decision we need to make 
first. and now.
21:38:17 <sdziallas>    To give you a quick overview:
21:39:18 <sdziallas>    The KDE spin currently only includes Qt4-based 
software, since I wouldn't want kdelibs3 being pulled in. It includes a 
number of apps, but not all (yet) - e.g., I didn't add krita (or another 
Gimp alternative), yet.
21:39:27 <sdziallas>    It's size is right now 636 MB.
21:40:28 <sdziallas>    The XFCE one is pretty much complete, includes 
some other apps, due to its GTK-nature. But you get at least kdeedu on 
both. That spin has right now a size of 666 MB, even though I've one or 
two ideas for further apps.
21:40:49 <sdziallas>    I feel it's clear enough that we're not going to 
release both.
21:41:22 <sdziallas>    So what we need is a decision, on how we're 
going to proceed.
21:41:27 <hanthana>    we need at least 20MB for re-spin for other 
locales, so xfce is my choice
21:41:58 <hanthana>    coz, xfce spin contain more apps than kde spin
21:43:27 <sdziallas>    As I said, I can work with both. I just need 
some feedback here. I'm personally using partly XFCE on the OLPC, but 
this doesn't prevent me from using KDE or something else (as Sugar ;).
21:43:52 <ongolaBoy>    for which people do you intend to release this 
spin ?
21:44:49 <rdieter>    ongolaBoy: good question, we don't have a clearly 
targetted audience, mostly for lack of feedback (ie, not sure what 
people want/need).
21:45:14 <sdziallas>    It's for students, but also for teachers, pupils 
and schools - though, we're not going to put gcompris on it, because its 
intended for pupils under our target age. I'd tend to talk about 
something like an age of 12+...
21:45:30 *    rdieter is indifferent wrt xfce vs kde, might be 
interesting to explore something new/different with xfce.
21:46:04 <ongolaBoy>    personaly i prefer xfce because of the low 
machines that i have in my environment...
21:46:06 <sdziallas>    rdieter is right there: in the past, we've been 
doing what we thought would fit people's needs best. but due to a lack 
of feedback, it turned out, that it was not always the best...
21:46:39 <ongolaBoy>    but i suggest you to release what you, the 
developpers, want to do
21:47:43 <sdziallas>    yeah, that's also why I want us to talk about 
it. but the better we can fit people's needs, the better for us, as 
developers, because our stuff becomes - hopefully - more used ;)
21:48:08 <sdziallas>    so I think... we'll have a closer look at the 
xfce spin?!
21:48:18 <hanthana>    so, guys lets fix xfce as the spin
21:48:23 <ongolaBoy>    so, if i was able to vote ;) i prefer xfce
21:48:43 <hanthana>    +1 xfce
21:48:44 <sdziallas>    okay, I'll take a note and update the spin's 
page in the wiki with an updated list.
21:49:45 *    ctyler_ has quit (Read error: 60 (Operation timed out))
21:50:01 <tomeu>    about sugar, better wait until there's better 
support for unmodified apps
21:50:07 <tomeu>    next release, hopefully
21:50:41 <rdieter>    there's already a sugar spin anyway, isn't there?
21:50:42 <sdziallas>    tomeu: yeah, in the meantime, we have the sugar 
spin (which I hope to get approved soonish, too)
21:50:50 <sdziallas>    heh. *hint* :)
21:51:06 <rdieter>    that said, perhaps there could be merging here
21:51:45 <tomeu>    yeah, I guess it will be very difficult to have a 
single spin good for all ages
21:52:10 <sdziallas>    yep, that's true. we can't target everyone 
without... bloating it for someone.
21:52:42 <sdziallas>    (neither sugar nor kdeedu is imo bloat, but I'd 
like to select apps, too)
21:53:02 <tomeu>    you can keep focusing now on 12+ and do something 
else later for <12
21:53:48 <ongolaBoy>    +1 for +12
21:54:22 <sdziallas>    yeah, I feel we should consider something on 
behalf of how those spins will be working together (or who they're 
targetting)...
21:54:56 <sdziallas>    I'll make another note on that in the wiki / 
meeting summary.
21:55:37 <sdziallas>    does anybody want to add something to the 
current state or can we move on?
21:56:24 <sdziallas>    I'll take that as a no ;)
21:56:30 <sdziallas>    Well, what needs to be done?
21:57:06 <sdziallas>    The spin needs some polishing: I'll update the 
kickstart file and will - once it's somehow ready - submit it to the 
Spin SIG for technical approval.
21:57:27 <sdziallas>    Next steps are then approval from the board and 
finally from rel-eng. Those are the steps... concerning policy.
21:57:51 <hanthana>    sdziallas: before that shall we do a small user 
testing?
21:58:03 <sdziallas>    What else do we need? Imo, feedback, feedback, 
and still more feedback...
21:58:12 <hanthana>    by giving the spin to selected people [students 
and teachers]
21:58:27 <sdziallas>    (which brings us also to point 03 on the list - 
they go hand in hand, I think)
21:58:57 <sdziallas>    hanthana: I think it might be a good idea - not 
necessarily before submitting it to Spin SIG, but I think such a testing 
can't be too bad. So a +1 here.
21:59:20 <ongolaBoy>    'hand in hand' should be the fastest way to have 
feedback from users
21:59:29 <hanthana>    i can help for that
21:59:35 <sdziallas>    We might think about a fitting time (frame) 
here, but we can run such a test in parallel.
21:59:43 <hanthana>    as i have contacts with local Edu officials
21:59:44 <sdziallas>    Yeah, ongolaBoy!
21:59:52 <sdziallas>    hanthana: that would be great!
22:00:21 <hanthana>    lets fix a time frame for 1st feedback
22:00:22 *    ongolaBoy has a low internet connection :(
22:00:38 <sdziallas>    Btw: For any inofficial - pre-release spins - we 
need a possibility to host it somewhere. (If you don't want to build it 
everytime on your own)
22:00:44 *    sdziallas checks F11 schedule
22:00:44 <hanthana>    i mean, lets give them one week for testing/playing
22:01:28 <sdziallas>    hanthana: a week or so would be fine with me, 
maybe two, but not more, since we also need some time for the results 
and working on it...
22:01:39 <hanthana>    yeah
22:02:03 <hanthana>    sdziallas: lets ready for one week,
22:02:13 <sdziallas>    okay!
22:02:18 <hanthana>    they might take another week if they want
22:02:24 <sdziallas>    (another note for me and the wiki ;)
22:02:28 <sdziallas>    sounds good to me.
22:02:59 <sdziallas>    next question: when do we want to start this? 
Here's the schedule for F11: 
https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Releases/11/Schedule
22:03:22 <sdziallas>    Feature freeze is at the beginning of march.
22:04:07 <hanthana>    2009-04-14 - Final Development Freeze
22:04:12 <sdziallas>    I need some time for preparing the kickstart, 
then it needs to be built. And then, we let the testing run for a week 
or so, right?
22:04:19 <hanthana>    lets target march
22:04:21 *    heffer (n=felix at fedora/heffer) has joined #fedora-edu
22:04:48 <sdziallas>    for testing? or for having something really 
working ready?
22:05:05 <hanthana>     really working ready
22:05:24 <sdziallas>    (this doesn't prevent us from working on 
pre-release stuff, either.)
22:05:27 <hanthana>    sdziallas: i would like to start testing before 
February
22:06:23 <sdziallas>    any objections or additions here? we might need 
to use a F10 base then for testing; Rawhide might be too buggy.
22:07:35 <ongolaBoy>    the 'final' release should rolled out with f11 
right ?
22:07:45 <rdieter>    I can help host a spin
22:07:47 <hanthana>    yes
22:07:53 <hanthana>    rdieter: cool
22:07:55 <rdieter>    for testing, that is.
22:08:06 <sdziallas>    rdieter: that would be great :)
22:08:25 <hanthana>    i am also trying to locally host
22:08:48 <hanthana>    here we have schooNet, and University Network
22:09:27 <rdieter>    I can be a torrent seed/tracker is what I had in mind.
22:09:44 <rdieter>    hanthana: you?
22:10:57 <rdieter>    as a side note, I finally dropped the f9-edu 
preview spin that had been hosted for quite awhile, nope nobody minds...
22:10:59 <hanthana>    rdieter: i am planning for direct download and 
hand to hand distribution
22:11:25 <rdieter>    hanthana: cool, when/if that's available, let me 
know, and I'll add it as a web seed for the torrent
22:11:49 <sdziallas>    rdieter: nope... that's more than okay ;)
22:12:03 <sdziallas>    okay, this sounds like a good plan (having both)!
22:12:31 <hanthana>    tomorrow i am talking to edu officials, regarding 
hosting and distributing of the test copy
22:12:52 <hanthana>    and we need a creating a bugzilla component - ToDo
22:13:21 <hanthana>    btw, sdziallas when we are going to start the 
testing?
22:13:38 <hanthana>    lets fix a time duration now
22:14:01 *    sdziallas hasn' checked out yet, how to do this; but I'll 
make a note regarding bugzilla, to look into this
22:14:44 <rdieter>    I would venture that spin approval is a prereq for 
any bz component creation, but I could be wrong
22:14:45 <sdziallas>    well... I don't need a long time for preparing 
the kickstart file (so somebody wants further apps on it - *that* is the 
time to suggest them, to get 'em tested) ;)
22:15:09 <sdziallas>    *if somebody wants further apps...
22:16:01 <hanthana>    shall we start from 25th Jan to 7th Feb
22:16:08 <sdziallas>    rdieter: might be true. if necessary, I can ask 
around ;)
22:16:59 <sdziallas>    hanthana: I'm fine with that.
22:17:35 <sdziallas>    leaves us enough time to make sure we're not 
distributing bad stuff to the testers and is still way enough before march.
22:17:36 <sdziallas>    +1
22:18:47 <sdziallas>    any objections? if not, I'll add that to the 
wiki after the meeting, too.
22:19:11 *    ongolaBoy has nothing to add ...
22:19:31 <sdziallas>    okey dokey. (just want to make sure everybody's 
happy)
22:19:39 <hanthana>    heh
22:20:03 <sdziallas>    what else there is left? documentation? an artwork?
22:20:32 <hanthana>    04. Marketting plan for spreading fedora edu spin
22:20:52 <sdziallas>    marketing is good. :)
22:20:59 <hanthana>    Marketting plan for spreading fedora edu spin
22:20:59 <hanthana>    workshops, seminas, installFest, etc
22:20:59 <hanthana>    Fedora edu - tshirt for those who working for the 
project ;)
22:21:17 <sdziallas>    w00t!
22:21:52 <hanthana>    i do ..... workshops, seminas, installFest, etc
22:21:57 <ongolaBoy>    concerning Artwork, is it possible to ask to 
Nicu and his friends to create special stuff off edu
22:22:17 <sdziallas>    I've... submitted a request for artwork some 
time ago:
22:22:24 <ongolaBoy>    but i don't know how you communicate between 
team in general ...
22:22:27 <rdieter>    most definietely possible, couldn't hurt to ask 
the fedora-art team, they're usually quite good at delivering
22:22:33 <sdziallas>   
 https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Artwork/DesignService#Fedora_Education
22:23:04 <sdziallas>    but that was ages ago - I recieved a wiki banner 
from tatica, but I didn't add it yet, since I felt... it would need to 
be discussed with her / the artwork team first.
22:23:12 <hanthana>    sdziallas: we need a poster/ Boucher
22:23:40 <sdziallas>    I also asked for special artwork for our spin, 
such as a wallpaper, but: work in progress, afaik ;)
22:23:42 <sdziallas>    yeah!
22:23:53 <rdieter>    would probably help if someone volunteered to lead 
the art effort, and potentially poke/prod/bribe them
22:25:27 <sdziallas>    yeah, well, I can go and update the request 
quite a bit... I'm a bit lazy about poking 'em, but I could do that. 
(hopefully, I don't forget) ;)
22:25:32 *    sdziallas makes another mental note.
22:26:53 <sdziallas>    okay? anything else on behalf of artwork? nope?...
22:27:13 <ongolaBoy>    sdziallas:at least for artwork, update your 
request by replacing kde by xfce...
22:27:16 <hanthana>    sdziallas: 'adding a wallpaper ' grate idea!!
22:27:39 <sdziallas>    ongolaBoy, yeah; will do. it's quite outdated 
there, I know...
22:27:54 <sdziallas>    okay :)
22:28:01 <hanthana>    do we need CD/DVD cover?
22:28:09 <hanthana>    stickers?
22:28:54 <sdziallas>    maybe later on, yeah. and some flyers couldn't 
hurt either. But partly general Fedora stuff should be fine, too.
22:29:02 *    sdziallas loves our t-shirts :)
22:29:47 <hanthana>    we can add Edu spin promotion with F11 release
22:30:15 <sdziallas>    (for which we need rel-engs approval, but I'll 
take care of that)
22:31:24 <sdziallas>    okay? can we move on here? (sorry if I'm rushing 
a bit)
22:31:34 <ongolaBoy>    .
22:31:40 <hanthana>    ok
22:31:43 <hanthana>    next!
22:31:57 <hanthana>    Documentation:
22:32:05 <hanthana>    HowTos related to the Fedora Education Spin.
22:32:05 <hanthana>    for an example;  
22:32:05 <hanthana>    'How to install Edu Spin to the system?'
22:32:05 <hanthana>    'How to install other software using Fedora repo?'
22:33:18 <sdziallas>    the latter one should be more or less explained 
somewhere (I'd bet there are already howtos for this), but the first or 
'which additional educational software can I get?' or 'what does this 
app offer me?' would be other examples...
22:34:10 *    ctyler (n=chris at global.proximity.on.ca) has joined #fedora-edu
22:35:21 <sdziallas>    this one could be worked out together with 
questions we might recieve from testing...
22:35:36 <hanthana>    yes
22:35:43 <hanthana>    good idea
22:36:23 <ongolaBoy>    'what package can i use for 
algebra,geometry,electronics,...?'
22:36:30 <sdziallas>    exactly!
22:36:38 <hanthana>    ongolaBoy: +1
22:37:11 <sdziallas>    okay... anything else you want to discuss?
22:37:31 <hanthana>    fixing dates for next meeting?
22:37:59 <sdziallas>    well, that's our last task, before adjourning 
the meeting, I think ;)
22:38:18 <sdziallas>    so if there's nothing more to discuss, I thing 
we can head for that, yeah.
22:39:06 <hanthana>    'getting more ppl ' we can achieve this during 
testing period
22:39:23 <sdziallas>    yep, that's marketing, testing, all that...
22:39:47 <hanthana>    we have to meet before starting the testing session
22:39:50 <sdziallas>    honestly, I'm not sure, yet: next week would be 
the 21st. I think we should talk again before beginning the testing, touh.
22:39:56 <sdziallas>    *though
22:39:58 <sdziallas>    yep.
22:40:42 <hanthana>    ok 21st fine for me
22:40:57 <hanthana>    rdieter: ongolaBoy: sdziallas: any idea?
22:41:43 <sdziallas>    well, let's note the 21st for the moment. I 
cannot promise that it will work for me, yet, but I think it should.
22:41:50 <sdziallas>    (if the others agree)
22:42:03 <ongolaBoy>    hum... i can't give a date because i'm not very 
available ;choose date that fit to you
22:42:11 <ongolaBoy>    any date i mean
22:43:39 <sdziallas>    okay? 21st for now?
22:43:53 <ongolaBoy>    .
22:44:34 <sdziallas>    there we go. we might reconsider it again, if it 
doesn't fit for anybody. well... is that it? are we done?
22:45:07 <hanthana>    ok
22:45:31 <sdziallas>    thanks everybody for attending!
22:45:45 <hanthana>    thanks all!
22:45:45 <sdziallas>    :)
22:45:58 <hanthana>    lets make a good spin for the community!!
22:46:03 <ongolaBoy>    i appreciate your efforts
22:46:19 <sdziallas>    yeah! :)
22:46:22 <sdziallas>    so I'd say...
22:46:23 <sdziallas>    5
22:46:23 <sdziallas>    4
22:46:24 <sdziallas>    3
22:46:26 <sdziallas>    2
22:46:27 <sdziallas>    1
22:46:32 <sdziallas>    1/2
22:46:43 <sdziallas>    = meeting adjourned =