lake@alberta.UUCP (Robert Lake) (06/14/89)
/usr/group/edmonton, the UNIX Users' Group of Edmonton, has concluded its operation for the year 1988-89. This year saw the association's membership rise from 50 to 80. /usr/group/edmonton meets once a month. We are very proud of the diverse range of speakers we were able to attract over the past year, and it's our hope that we will be able to continue to provide a wide variety of meeting topics to the membership at our future meetings. JUNE 1: Bill Joy Sun Microsystems, Inc. Mountain View, California Bill Joy, Vice-President of Research and Development at Sun Microsystems, Inc, gave a discussion about Sun's philosophy with regards to developing new technology, as well as some insight into what Sun is planning for the future. MAY 31: Ken Thompson AT&T Bell Laboratories Murray Hill, New Jersey Ken Thompson, the author and designer of the UNIX operating system, talked about "Plan 9" - a distributed architecture currently being developed at AT&T Bell Laboratories. The goal of this project is to develop a distributed system which resembles (to the user) a single mainframe system. This was a rather unique talk in that none of the research group has published yet. MAY 3: Richard Gimbel Sequent Computer Systems, Inc. Portland, Oregon The impact of new, mid-range computer systems based on advanced, parallel computing architectures which offer the performance of large scale mainframes at supermini price tags was discussed. Examples and benchmarks from real- time, software development, 4GL/RDBMS and simulation application areas were given and the presentation concluded with a discussion of future directions and UNIX standards issues. APRIL 5: Martin Kratz Cruickshank Phillips Edmonton, Alberta Martin Kratz, one of Canada's leading 'computer' lawyers and co-author of the recently published book "The Computer Virus Crisis" (Fites, Johnston, and Kratz, New York 1988), talked about some of the current issues of the law as it relates to computing. Some of the areas discussed were the Copyright Law, licenses, how a license differs from a copyright, what is public domain software, what is a compilation copyright, etc. This was a very topical discussion, taking place as the rec.humour.funny compilation copyright flame-fest was just winding down. Martin had some interesting comments on Brad Templeton's position ... MARCH 1: Peter Johnston University of Alberta Computing Services Edmonton, Alberta Steve Sutphen University of Alberta Computing Science Edmonton, Alberta Peter Johnston, co-author of the recently published book "The Computer Virus Crisis" (Fites, Johnston, and Kratz, New York 1988) talked about electronic viruses, worms, how they differ from each other, and how users may avoid them. Steve Sutphen, a long-time UNIX expert, gave an in-depth presentation about the Internet worm that was released on November 3, 1988, a date now regarded by many computer scientists as "Black Thursday." FEBRUARY 15: Bruce Folliott University of Alberta Computing Science Edmonton, Alberta Bruce Folliott gave a tutorial about electronic mail and USENET. Topics covered included sending and receiving electronic mail, posting and reading USENET news articles, and setting up mail and news connections. A few other message handlers (e.g. ELM, EAN) were also briefly mentioned. The tutorial closed with a discussion on the recently created CA (Canada-wide) mail domain and how to register with this domain. JANUARY 4: Ernie Kowalec Western Diversification Government of Canada Ernie Kowalec described the Western Diversification Fund, how it can help business, and how individuals and businesses can apply for government assistance. DECEMBER 7: Ed Cheng Myrias Research Corporation Edmonton, Alberta Barry Hannigan Enersystems Development Ltd. Edmonton, AB Harold Knopke Aspen Computing Solutions Edmonton, AB Neil McCulloch Alberta Public Safety Services Edmonton, Alberta This meeting was a database "bake-off". Each of the above speakers talked about their experiences with Oracle, Sybase, Informix, and Empress. NOVEMBER 17: Brian Reid Digital Equipment Corporation Palo Alto, California Brian Reid, from the Western Research Laboratory of Digital Equipment Corpor- ation, Palo Alto, California, talked about the Open Software Foundation, future trends DEC sees in the computing industry, and the OSF's strategic partnership with IBM. OCTOBER 6: Phillip King Nexus Computing Corporation Edmonton, Alberta Ted Bentley Myrias Research Corporation Edmonton, Alberta Phillip King gave a tutorial about the 'vi' visual text editor and Ted Bentley gave a tutorial the n/troff (and related) text processing tools. SEPTEMBER 7: Dean Frey Alberta Technology, Research, and Telecommunications Edmonton, Alberta Shaun Hammond Alberta Public Safety Services Edmonton, Alberta The September meeting was our traditional wine and cheese "fall kick-off" held at the University of Alberta Faculty Club, with Dean Frey talked about voice/data integration at Alberta TR&T. After the break, Shaun Hammond described how APSS has grown since 1985 from an eight user 68010 based Unix system to a shop running two large Sun servers with a mid-size and a small departmental server providing computing facilities to nearly 100 users spread across two sites. The insight into the problems you can run into when dealing with vendors and government purchasing departments was both horrifying and amusing. Our next year of operation kicks off in early September with a Wine & Cheese social at the Faculty Club, University of Alberta. For more information about /usr/group/edmonton, please address electronic mail to alberta!usrgroup. Robert Lake President, 1988-89 /usr/group/edmonton
lyndon@cs.AthabascaU.CA (Lyndon Nerenberg) (06/14/89)
In article <2317@pembina.UUCP> lake@alberta.UUCP (Robert Lake) writes: >Our next year of operation kicks off in early September with a Wine & Cheese >social at the Faculty Club, University of Alberta. And a well deserved thanks to Rob Lake, Steve Sutphen, the U of Alberta, and Myrias Research, who were kind enough to ensure we had meeting space available to us throughout the year! -- Lyndon Nerenberg / Computing Services / Athabasca University {alberta,decwrl,ncc}!atha!lyndon || lyndon@cs.AthabascaU.CA Trying to manage programmers is like trying to herd cats!
dave@lsuc.on.ca (David Sherman) (06/27/89)
In article <2317@pembina.UUCP> lake@alberta.UUCP (Robert Lake) writes: >/usr/group/edmonton, the UNIX Users' Group of Edmonton, has concluded its >operation for the year 1988-89. >JUNE 1: > Bill Joy > Sun Microsystems, Inc. > Mountain View, California >MAY 31: > Ken Thompson > AT&T Bell Laboratories > Murray Hill, New Jersey >MAY 3: > Richard Gimbel > Sequent Computer Systems, Inc. > Portland, Oregon >APRIL 5: > Martin Kratz > Cruickshank Phillips >MARCH 1: > Peter Johnston > University of Alberta Computing Services > Steve Sutphen > University of Alberta Computing Science >FEBRUARY 15: > Bruce Folliott > University of Alberta Computing Science >JANUARY 4: > Ernie Kowalec > Western Diversification > Government of Canada >DECEMBER 7: > Ed Cheng > Myrias Research Corporation > Barry Hannigan > Enersystems Development Ltd. > Harold Knopke > Aspen Computing Solutions > Neil McCulloch > Alberta Public Safety Services >NOVEMBER 17: > Brian Reid > Digital Equipment Corporation > Palo Alto, California >OCTOBER 6: > Phillip King > Nexus Computing Corporation > Ted Bentley > Myrias Research Corporation >SEPTEMBER 7: > Dean Frey > Alberta Technology, Research, and Telecommunications > Shaun Hammond > Alberta Public Safety Services That's quite a collection of speakers you got over the year. Well done. I think we in Toronto sometimes have a tendency to think of cities like Edmonton as second-class, but your organization is clearly first-class. Keep up the good work, Rob. David Sherman Toronto -- Moderator, mail.yiddish { uunet!attcan att utzoo }!lsuc!dave dave@lsuc.on.ca