An Install Fest and The Three Workshops

First time in Birla Institute of Technology, we had an Linux Install Fest and that too featuring "Ubuntu 9.04 BIT-LUG Edition" modified for better user experience by ME :)
We also distributed Fedora11 original DVDs on install fest. We did more than 80 installations that day. A fair price to sacrifice a Sunday.



Workshop 1 & 2 : Date 10 Aug 2009.
This workshop was organized for newbies and especially for the fresher batch of our college. We started off by showing some cool compiz effects on fedora11 gnome. Even after attending the classes from 8:00 to 5:00, more than 60 people turned up, some out of enthusiasm others out of curiosity. We had some slides prepared by our volunteers. We showed them the alternatives of windows applications available for linux, like for media player we have rhythmbox. We also had some "Tux v/s Windows" fight videos. We told them about benefits of installing fedora (A distro which comprises every latest stuff and yet it is highly stable). All this made up an environment for the install fest which was scheduled the next day. We also invited feedbacks in the nd. Most of them were positive though some were a bit disappointed that we didn't bashed windows to a greater extent.


Install Fest : Date 11 August 2009
It was a holiday and yet one of the busiest day for us. We had permission to use the college lab. As we reached there, we found a couple of enthusiast already waiting for installation eagerly. We had a total of 7 volunteers and slightly above 80 installations. Fedora11 DVDs were also distributed for free. Since we have a local repository in our campus we thought it to be wise if we write a script for the installation of some common softwares and to add the local repositories. For desktops Debjit had arranged for network boot. The fest was a huge success as till date we have people who are approaching us after seeing the laptops on which we installed fedora on install fest.



Workshop 3 : Date 16 August 2009
This workshop was organized for more advanced users. We expected about 80-100 participants but we were astonished to see the rush. We had about 200 participants! So we decided to take the same workshop twice. We started off by telling basics of shell scripting and then made our way towards "Virtualization on Fedora". We had a little Question-Answer session after that. We also invited users to share their experiences with fedora. At the end we had a small slide show about "How to Contribute to Fedora Project". We had the sides made with the help of "join Fedora" page on wiki.