On Saturday 10 March 2001 10:31 am, Dave Daniels wrote:
> In article <01030922491503.00671@pinky.paradox.demon.co.uk>,
>
>    Chris Gilbert <chris@paradox.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> > Things I've thought of:
> > demoing an install (perhaps isn't that interesting?)
>
> I do not think demo'ing an install would be that useful. You could
> probably take up all the time allocated for the talk doing it, and
> I do not think that people will take it in. I think it might be
> more constructive if it was demo'ed on the stand.

Indeed, what we've done at past shows is demo doing an install and it takes 
nearly 3/4 of an hour to do.  Perhaps it'd be best to show how it works once 
it's all configured up, some nice demos of stuff, gnumeric (other office 
apps?)  Perhaps use magicpoint to do slides for the show, and then breakout 
of it to demo stuff (they're a projector screen for it :)

> > talk about future directions, eg smp? xscale etc.
>
> Also I would describe the background to NetBSD with a little of
> its history and the aims of the project. I would mention that
> NetBSD has been around on the RiscPC since 1996 and thank Mark
> Brinicombe, Neil Carson and the other earlier developers for all
> their work.

Good idea (Although it actually goes back to 1994, it's older than most 
people think  :)

> > Answer questions
> > Why unix, possibly why bsd over linux...
>
> I think I would position NetBSD as an alternative to Linux that
> some people might prefer. They are different sides of the same
> coin. It might be worth explaining the difference between
> Unix-like operating systems and RISC OS, for example, Unix
> provides a robust, flexible programming environment for many users
> whereas RISC OS is a light weight client OS for a single user.
> I think describing how pre-emptive multitasking works compared to
> the cooperative task switching of RISC OS might be too technical,
> but I think it would be needed to say why Unix is a much more
> general purpose OS than RISC OS. On the other hand, you would
> probably need to say that RISC OS is easier to use and Unix
> presents a formidible challenge to the non-technical user. In
> short, I would go down the 'alternative' route comparing it to
> Linux and RISC OS rather than the 'better than'.

Perhaps I should have worded that differently, certainly it'd be good to be 
able to say something about these.  I'll try to knock up a more definitive 
list of things to talk about.

> > Has anyone got any advice/ideas?  Mainly because for this I want to at
> > least be prepared.
>
> Just a few thoughts.

Thanks,
Chris