Softpro Books Grand Opening

Date and Time

Saturday, February 19, 2000 from 10:00 am to 5:30 pm

Location

SoftPro Books

Boston Post Rd.(Route 20) in Marlborough. From I495, take exit 24B (the sign says Northboro). Follow Rt. 20 west for about 1/2 Mile, there will be a shopping center on your right with a Victory Supermarket and Office Max. SoftPro is in that center between the market and Office Max. There is a Boston Market and MacDonalds in fromn of the shopping center.

Presenters

Charles C. Bennett Jr. - ccb valinux com

Summary

Promoting Linux and BLU at the grand opening of the SoftPro bookstore

Abstract

(Charles Bennet's email)

Softpro Books is holding a grand opening for the Marlboro store on Saturday, Feb 19. Rick and Bob (the proprietors) approached me (Charles) and Andy Stewart (Worcester LUG) about doing a day of Linux information, demos and installs at the store as part of the festivities.

Being more than willing to sponsor this kind of thing, I've committed some VA Linux Systems resources to this project - a couple of hubs, a couple of workstations, an install server, some T-shirts, my time, etc. The plan is for me to dump a load of gear at the Marlboro store on Friday, 2/18 with staging instructions for a volunteer from WLUG to start setup prior to Softpro opening at 10am on 2/19.

I should be able to get there shortly after opening. I've attached a tentative battle plan. We're basically planning to be all over the place - a discussion area in the front corner of the store with a hub and power for laptops, a demo area in the back of the store with a couple a decent workstations for static demos and canned talks and a mini installfest in the back room where we can process machines an hour for the brave.

I think I'm going to need about half a dozen committed volunteers that can be circulating among the unwashed at any given time. I could also use a couple of 15" tubes for use in the installfest. I'm also eager to see anybody from the LUGs that wants to drop by and visit and circulate, show off unique platforms, etc.

The things we'll do will be largely dependent on who volunteers and which skills they bring to the table. I'd be very happy if someone with serious Debian and SuSE experience stepped forward to add Debian and SuSE to the list of things we're installing.

If you think you want to do a shift helping us pull this off, drop me a line. There will be more mail with directions and promo info as soon as the promo guys from the various sponsors get their act together.

This event is sponsored by SoftPro Books and VA Linux.