After the jump, find the transcript of our LOPSA Live session on Thursday, March 5th 2008.

The Board is in the midst of planning monthly LOPSA Live sessions; they'll likely be on early Thursdays of each month, but we'll probably stagger times so those folks with long standing commitments of the timezone or meeting variety can still participate.

Times are US/Central Standard Time.

Conversation with #lopsa-live at 2008-03-06 14:31:26

(14:31:26) : The topic for #lopsa-live is: LOPSA Live! Tonight, 4pm - 5pm EDT(US)!

(15:00:12) pck: Welcome all, I'll give one more minute for possible stragglers

(15:01:17) pck: Welcome back to the first #lopsa-live since December

(15:01:24) HCoyote: slackers. ;-)

(15:01:32) pck: I'm glad to see everyone made it to the new IRC network

(15:01:59) ***jtrucks cheers

(15:02:02) pck: a big thank you for those that worked on that

(15:02:34) pck: Just a few quick short items, then a small direction overview
and then I'll open for questions/etc

(15:02:56) pck: Right now there are multiple new locals trying to form, check
to see if one of them is in your area if you want to help out.

(15:03:21) HCoyote: (where do we check ...)

(15:03:22) pck: As for the board, we have been trying to form some priorities
and we are really close to finalizing some of those ideas. My focus right now
is on member communication, though, and I'll be making sure we have #lopsa-live
events regularly.

(15:04:01) pck: locals: I believe this last month's memo to members listed the
locations

(15:04:17) pck: as for more on discuss@ or mail your friendly neighborhood
board@

(15:04:50) pck: With the other focuses, board-level commitments are still
in-progress, but most of them will be best or possibly even only served if we
have members actively supporting or volunteering for them, so I'll prime some
of the tone for today's #lopsa-live with the over-arching two questions:

(15:05:02) pck: 1: What do you want to see Lopsa doing as an organization
(i.e., how would Lopsa better serve the system administration community)

(15:05:04) pck: 2: How can you help Lopsa (volunteering, etc...)

(15:05:19) pck: With that, I will open todays #lopsa-live for more questions
and let's see where we go

(15:05:45) TreyHarris: pck: who are you?

(15:05:49) pck: oh, duh

(15:05:54) pck: what a great question

(15:06:02) HCoyote: survey says ...?

(15:06:03) HCoyote: :-)

(15:06:15) pck: I'm Philip Kizer, and I'm a board member and Vice President

(15:06:27) ***jtrucks cheers for pck

(15:06:35) pck: which points out why Trey is the one to remind me, he's our
President

(15:06:41) pck: :)

(15:07:12) TreyHarris: yes, that's *my* job--to remind pck what he's supposed
to do.

(15:07:22) TreyHarris: ;)

(15:08:02) pck: so, I'm glad to see a good turnout for today's Live event, does
anyone have a question for the board?

(15:08:31) j_white: What volunteer needs are already known to exist?

(15:08:40) HCoyote: Has it been determined if we're having a sysadmin days this
year?

(15:08:46) TreyHarris: and speaking of introductions, deepasolanki is Deepa
Solanki, LOPSA's new Executive Director. She was promoted to that position
about six weeks ago now.

(15:09:18) HCoyote: (she's still figuring irc out ...)

(15:09:25) ***TreyHarris grins

(15:09:28) mizmoose: nobody understands irc

(15:09:37) pck: volunteer needs: I'll let Dave speak to that one

(15:10:07) dparter: Hi everyone. It is true that we don't have a quick list of
volunteer projects that you can all jump on, and get done this weekend. I wish
it was that easy.

(15:10:47) dparter: Right now, our efforts are in a couple of areas: the tech
team, led by HCoyote, has some general tasks, and some projects. I'll let
HCoyote (Travis) talk about that in a moment.

(15:12:00) dparter: The education and training comittee plans our training
events, and our training at other people's events, like SCALE and OLFU. We are
also (I am on that committee) coordinating booths at other conferences even if
we don't do training. We need people for the committee, and for some booth
opportunities that we will announce soon (as soon as we have the dates and
events set)

(15:12:08) dparter: Local groups always need guest speakers and coordinators

(15:12:54) dparter: I am going to pass the virtual mic to HCoyote to talk about
the tech team, if he is preapred (or nto)

(15:13:03) LuftHans: the edu committee is also trying to start working more
with already established events and will need help from locals near those
events

(15:13:10) HCoyote: You could have warned me earlier. ;-)

(15:13:17) ***mizmoose laughs

(15:13:31) jss_: HCoyote: Hey, dparter's gonna ask you to talk tech-team. Be
prepared.

(15:13:40) LuftHans: HCoyote: we'll open a trouble txt tomorrow

(15:13:41) HCoyote: thanks jss!

(15:13:51) HCoyote: Right now the big project we have on our plate is the
upgrading of the backend web infrastructure around lopsa.org.

(15:14:45) HCoyote: Chris Palmer just recently updated the skin on the website
to be more, uh ... palatable? :-) ... so if anyone has comments or suggestions
on that, feel free to toss them our way (or send an email to
tech-team@lopsa.org).

(15:15:36) HCoyote: Most other stuff we're doing is just behind the scenes work
that members won't directly see (speeding up the mailing list processing for
example)

(15:16:00) HCoyote: that's about it off the top of my head.

(15:16:08) HCoyote: oh!

(15:16:20) pck: thanks, Travis

(15:16:29) HCoyote: I believe we'll soon have paste.lopsa.org for a paste
service.

(15:16:29) pck: something more?

(15:16:45) HCoyote: jessie just asked for that to be configured today, so we
have bitpusher working on some setup.

(15:16:48) HCoyote: and that's it.

(15:16:55) HCoyote: really. honest. scout's honor. *holds up fingers*

(15:16:59) pck: thanks again, Travis!

(15:17:03) HCoyote: np.

(15:17:17) pck: first I'll flush the queue and say about Sysadmin Days:

(15:17:37) pck: No, we do not currently have a decision on that.

(15:17:51) pck: input will be highly welcomed, though

(15:18:09) ***jtrucks notes it's spelled Jesse.

(15:18:11) jtrucks: :)

(15:18:25) pck: While we are between questions, I would like to note a few big
notes of appreciation, though:

(15:18:25) HCoyote: oops

(15:18:28) HCoyote: sorry :-)

(15:18:29) LuftHans: we do have an informal invitation from SCaLE to do a full
Sysadm Days at SCaLE next year

(15:18:34) ***HCoyote blames the lack of caffiene.

(15:19:12) pck: SCaLE this last year had a good Lopsa presence thanks to many
volunteers

(15:19:16) HCoyote: I know bob apthorpe suggest on the lopsa-austin list that
we try and get involved with the texas ruby conference coming up in september.
I don't know if he relayed that on to board@.

(15:19:24) HCoyote: s/suggest/suggested/

(15:19:45) LuftHans: HCoyote: ask him to forward it to the edu committee

(15:19:54) HCoyote: sure thing.

(15:19:57) pck: and a big round of thanks, too, to Greg Rose who has stepped
down from the Leadership Committee

(15:20:01) LuftHans: to public address I'll be asking you to setup :)

(15:20:14) asm2train: Re: Greg, we'll miss that old coot.

(15:20:16) ***jtrucks applauds Greg Rose's tireless work.

(15:20:16) mizmoose: yay greg!

(15:20:27) dparter: I'd like to note that we are looking for events we can
partner with, or have a booth at, and we'd like to get some non-linux events
too

(15:20:27) mizmoose: we've decided to replace him with a robot.

(15:20:47) ***arclight forwarding LSRC stuff to board@

(15:21:14) HCoyote: ahha, there's bob.

(15:22:22) pck: ok,

(15:22:32) pck: do we have any new questions, or new topics?

(15:22:56) HCoyote: what progress is being made on supporting material for
giving to potential new members?

(15:23:00) asm2train: pck, have you already spoken about membership numbers?

(15:23:20) HCoyote: (ie, where's the propoganda?)

(15:23:32) pck: Jesse has those numbers

(15:24:02) pck: so he'll provide that propagana...

(15:24:11) ***Hydroxide waves hi as one of the new members

(15:24:22) TreyHarris: HCoyote: i'll take that

(15:24:34) pck: oops, I missed HCoyote's, we'll come back to that

(15:24:37) asm2train: Has he presented those here and if not does he plan to?
I'd love to hear how we're doing and what we're doing to attract new members

(15:24:55) TreyHarris: Chris Palmer, our Communications Director (a.k.a.
spokesbeast), is preparing an "evangelist's kit". he'll have more to announce
on that later this month.

(15:25:19) jtrucks: RE: membership numbers.

(15:25:31) jtrucks: We are at 945 members in good standing and current right
now.

(15:25:56) jtrucks: we are steadily increasing our numbers, and most people
have renewed at least once.

(15:25:56) HCoyote: Trey: sweet.

(15:26:15) jtrucks: Oh, I am the Membership Committee Chair, which is why I
track these.

(15:26:39) mizmoose: heh. we're all chairs of something.

(15:26:44) asm2train: What's "steadily" in percentage per year or month?

(15:26:47) jtrucks: we average an increase of between 4 and 10 new members each
week, though that is just an average, of course.

(15:27:40) asm2train: Any obvious spikes?

(15:27:57) dparter: one thing to note, it is actually hard to analyze the
membership numbers

(15:28:12) asm2train: Why, dparter?

(15:28:39) jtrucks: Yes. We have a spike around each conference we advertise
our involvement in, and we have a large spike of renewels in late fall due to
our starting in fall and LISA landing near that timeframe.

(15:28:40) dparter: the problem is when trying to picka metric, we are looking
at a sliding data -- do we look at a 30-day average for renewals, do we look at
how many renewed within 10 days of expiring, etc?

(15:28:47) dparter: we have these large spikes too

(15:29:11) dparter: but the #1 thing we do look at right now is the graph, and
it is going steadily up

(15:29:16) jtrucks: Though we are working on better ways to track the
membership number data, especially around major events.

(15:29:36) dparter: we do need to get a better handle on some of the details.
andof course, extracting what we need from the database (whihc has renew/expire
events) is kinda awkward

(15:29:47) asm2train: Yay on that, jtrucks, and yay on our numbers going up no
matter how we measure them.

(15:29:57) LuftHans: and the edu committee is trying to make sure we have ways
for people to sign up at the LOPSA booth at events

(15:30:21) pck: just to check, were there any questions I missed?

(15:30:26) jtrucks: asm2train: That is a good point. No matter how you measure
them, they are increasing. That is true for the number of people who sign up a
web site only account but don't join LOSPA yet.

(15:30:36) ***pck holds off till this one is done

(15:30:49) asm2train: I've got my answer, thanks.

(15:30:51) jtrucks: asm2train: does that answer the question(s)?

(15:30:56) jtrucks: oh, okay, thanks :)

(15:31:05) jtrucks: anyone else on membership?

(15:31:16) ***jtrucks steps back.

(15:31:37) pck: so, repeat any missed queries or please ask something new

(15:31:55) pck: we're here to answer

(15:32:35) asm2train: OK, here's one . . .

(15:32:50) ***Hydroxide gets in line to ask a question after asm2train

(15:33:11) asm2train: I'll yield to Hydroxide.

(15:33:28) ***pck hands the mike to Hydroxide

(15:33:45) dparter: mike? does he want to be handed off like that?

(15:33:56) Hydroxide: ok. what does LOPSA have planned to do in the future that
it hasn't started to do yet? e.g., organizing apprenticeships or more serious
certifications than the industry currently has, possibly requiring education
etc

(15:34:14) Hydroxide: to help build skills and let employers evaluate skills
better

(15:34:38) ***Hydroxide is thinking of the P in LOPSA here

(15:34:57) Hydroxide: other answers of things that LOPSA is planning to do in
the future are also welcome

(15:34:58) pck: ok, so you are thinking big projects

(15:35:02) Hydroxide: yes

(15:35:11) pck: I think Dave has some ideas for this one

(15:35:14) LuftHans: pck: let me know when you want edu committee response on
that

(15:35:29) ***Hydroxide yields the mic to whoever wants to answer

(15:35:30) pck: LuftHans: you're after Dave, then

(15:35:41) LuftHans: pck: OK

(15:35:45) dparter: I think LuftHans wants to give one of my answers -- the edu
committee's work is all about professionalism. I'll let him speak in a sec.

(15:36:00) dparter: this is not yet a project -- this is something I want to do
when we get a chance:

(15:36:26) dparter: I want to partner with the HR professional organizations to
work with them on the issue of how sysadmin skills are evaluated and treated in
companies

(15:36:58) dparter: and to work with them on job descriptions, etc. We as
sysadmins always complain when non-sysadmins try to do our job, I'd like to
work with the HR professionals to do a better job in the HR area for sysadmins

(15:37:21) dparter: and now, LuftHans and the edu committee (he is the chair)

(15:37:47) mizmoose: *drum roll*

(15:37:56) dparter: yo, LuftHans! you're on!

(15:38:05) LuftHans: Hydroxide: I'm going to respond about the professional
training, there is work on other aspects as well

(15:38:40) LuftHans: the education committee has worked out two training models
for now

(15:38:54) LuftHans: both are professional training for sysadmins by sysadmins

(15:39:26) LuftHans: both are essentially the same from a training perspective,
but different ways of delivering to the local audience

(15:39:54) LuftHans: the first is Sysadmin Days where we go in and provide two
days with a variety of tracks

(15:40:16) LuftHans: the training covers the gamut of technical topics and
professional topics

(15:40:48) ***Hydroxide nods

(15:40:51) LuftHans: the second is that we're working with already established
events, such as Ohio Linux Fest and SCaLE

(15:41:10) LuftHans: both of those events should be happening for us again in
the next year

(15:41:12) dparter: If you don't know about Sysadmin days, here is the program
from last summer: http://lopsa.org/SysadminDays/program

(15:41:31) LuftHans: we also have some others in the works, watch the discuss
list for announcements

(15:41:45) pck: Trey has something to add, too

(15:41:58) TreyHarris: We want to restart the resume standards project, which
is a project we actually started on back when we thought we were still going to
be the new SAGE. The organizational change pushed that into the background as
we worked on startup issues.

(15:42:14) Hydroxide: what is that project?

(15:42:22) TreyHarris: But the groundwork for that was solid.

(15:42:28) LuftHans: the goal for the training is to bring it in local to a
region and to also help build local community by using local instructors for
part of the program

(15:42:31) Hydroxide: is that the continuation of SAGE Level I/II/III/IV
classifications into something more comprehensive?

(15:42:37) TreyHarris: Hydroxide: essentially, it's a response from the... oh,
wait, LuftHans is still speaking

(15:42:43) Hydroxide: ok. /me yields

(15:43:03) LuftHans: I was going to ask about the resume project :)

(15:43:28) pck: well, I'm sorry I stepped on you, LuftHans

(15:43:31) LuftHans: Hydroxide: does that cover the training part of your
question?

(15:43:37) pck: please continue on your view of the Resume proj

(15:43:50) LuftHans: pck: no biggie, you're skinny and won't do much damage :)

(15:44:03) TreyHarris: it's a response to the problem that keyword-based
resumes have caused, for both job-seekers and position-posters: that sysadmins
now feel the need to fill their resumes with lists of technology keywords, so
their resumes will be picked up in searches.

(15:44:10) Hydroxide: LuftHans: sort of. I was also wondering about possible
encouragement for apprenticeships or skills training for people who are
currently wannabe sysadmins to help them get better

(15:44:37) Hydroxide: s/skills training/on-the-job or hands-on skills training/

(15:44:45) LuftHans: Hydroxide: apprenticeship is currently beyond the scope of
the edu committee

(15:44:47) Hydroxide: TreyHarris: that is a problem

(15:45:20) LuftHans: Hydroxide: skills training for sysadmins of all levels is
a good portion of what our training events are about

(15:45:22) TreyHarris: the RSP would allow such resumes to be augmented with
competency levels (no level listed at all would say nothing about your
competency, simply that you're interested in being considered for jobs
involving that technology/skill), so that we can restore some usefulness to the
skills sections of resumes

(15:45:49) ***Hydroxide nods

(15:45:55) pck: and did you have any suggestions for helping with that problem?
(Hydroxide or others)

(15:46:04) pck: you don't have to answer now

(15:46:27) pck: but if you do, since you care about it, you can help with the
project

(15:46:32) TreyHarris: the methodology for RSP would likely be a
community-driven wiki process, where folks who are, say, NetApp experts, could
come together to try to figure out what it means to be "familiar" with NetApp
versus "fluent" with NetApp versus "expert" with NetApp, and so on.

(15:46:44) TreyHarris: pck: that's all, unless someone has another question for
me.

(15:46:52) pck: thanks, Trey

(15:47:01) Hydroxide: pck: this sounds like a good thing to continue discussing
outside of this meeting

(15:47:09) Hydroxide: pck: I'll let other questions take up the remaining time

(15:47:10) ***pck agrees

(15:47:23) TreyHarris: oh... resume-interest@lopsa.org is live. you can join
it like any other mailing list through our mailman.

(15:48:09) Hydroxide: ok, good to know. thanks.

(15:48:21) jtrucks: to add to LuftHans comment regards to Hydroxide's questions
about skill training..

(15:49:15) ***Hydroxide goes afk for an unfortunately timed meeting at work,
but will be back after that to read any remaining comments and discuss further

(15:49:29) jtrucks: Our training has a large variance in skill levels it
teaches. For example, we had in depth courses about Perl 6 for advanced
programming admins running along side a course in basic communication skills.

(15:50:14) jtrucks: therefore, our aim is to have courses that allow advanced
experienced system administrators gain new and more skills at the same events
that very new people to our field are getting up to speed.

(15:50:32) pck: thanks, jtrucks

(15:50:34) Hydroxide: never mind, meeting is later.

(15:50:54) pck: excellent, we're up for questions, then

(15:51:24) pck: anyone?

(15:52:26) LuftHans: how's our local chapter count?

(15:52:31) LuftHans: s/how/what/

(15:52:36) HCoyote: what's the state of our budget so far?

(15:53:21) pck: I'm checking on those, one sec

(15:53:33) mizmoose: wooo embezzelment

(15:53:39) pck: Trey, did you have the budget numbers handy?

(15:54:10) TreyHarris: i don't have the *numbers* handy--and in any case, we
don't release interim numbers, only audited numbers. i will say...

(15:54:26) TreyHarris: that our 2007 budget was very good, as I mentioned at
LISA '07

(15:55:05) TreyHarris: and, as we promised, just two years after our founding,
we are no longer increasing our debt.

(15:55:35) TreyHarris: our 2008 budget calls for continuing that positive cash
flow

(15:55:40) TreyHarris: and for servicing our debt.

(15:55:49) LuftHans: LOPSA board for congress :)

(15:55:55) TreyHarris: HCoyote: any specific questions (aside from specific
numbers?)

(15:56:17) HCoyote: Nope. Just curious what the general state is.

(15:56:28) TreyHarris: ok. thanks. pck?

(15:56:43) pck: we do have some bit of info on local chapters

(15:57:08) pck: for current locals, you can check:

(15:57:13) pck: https://lopsa.org/localprogram

(15:57:20) arclight: Also,

(15:57:28) pck: and we have 3 more in the pipeline

(15:57:29) jtrucks: yay arclight

(15:57:34) pck: go bob

(15:57:39) arclight: We're streamlining our chapter process

(15:57:59) arclight: and actively looking for ways to support new chapters

(15:58:41) pck: thanks, bob

(15:59:06) pck: with a few minutes left, we can take another question

(16:00:09) pck: we're winding down, then

(16:00:32) pck: so I want to add in a thank you to all of the members!

(16:00:37) ***jdferm cheers

(16:00:50) pck: please send feedback to board@lopsa.org

(16:01:00) pck: or message us on IRC

(16:01:03) HCoyote: when is the next live meeting?

(16:01:05) HCoyote: :-)

(16:01:10) HCoyote: *hinthint*

(16:01:26) dparter:

(16:01:33) pck: good question, it will be roughly one month on a thursday near
the beginning of the month

(16:01:54) HCoyote: cool.

(16:01:57) pck: that is part of our improvement process, holding them regularly

(16:02:15) pck: we'll be pre-scheduling them for the next few months and making
sure to stick to them

(16:03:06) pck: with that, today's #lopsa-live is at a close, see you back in
#lopsa

(16:03:09) pck: thank you all!

(16:03:22) Hydroxide: thank you!

(16:03:32) ***jtrucks thanks everyone and especially pck

(16:03:36) TreyHarris: thanks all.