[PLUG-TALK] Notes from Hackers trip

[Keith Lofstrom]

I spent the last 6 days down in the bay area, and made five
presentations.  I presented Server Sky on Wednesday night at 
Techshop in Menlo Park, and Thursday at Noisebridge in San
Francisco.  Noisebridge is a "hacker space" - a club in a big
loft where members make and program stuff.

Friday to Sunday was the invite-only Hacker's Conference, where
I presented Server Sky and Launch Loop.  "Hacker" in the "tweak
stuff and see what happens" sense, not the system vandalism sense.
Lots of bizarre artifacts, such as a USB controlled steam calliope
and "doilies gone bad".  There was a ten-thousand-frame-per-second
camera, which we used to make a great video of a fellow stabbing a
soda can and getting sprayed.  It recorded a mosquito killed by a
high power laser.  Lots of other fine stuff and interesting people.
Don Knuth borrowed my laptop for a while.  I palled around with
Kirk McKusick (BSD) and Steve Roberts (1980's nomadic computer
bike) and bunches of other interesting people.  Mostly "old white
programmers", but they are working hard to diversify.

I presented Server Sky and Launch Loop at Hackers.

I Learned about interesting people that I didn't know lived in
Portland.  Ivan Sutherland retired here.  Jeri "Circuit Girl"
Ellsworth hacks retro hardware and makes ICs in her kitchen in
NE Portland.  Tsutomu "Mitnick takedown" Shimomura is home in
NV but is running a chip startup in Tigard.  Lots of potential
speakers for our meetings.  

Monday I presented Server Sky at NASA Ames to the small satellite
group, then went out to dinner with a bunch of them.  Lots of
good ideas exchanged.

All in all, interesting and exhausting.  4 hours of sleep per night
during Hackers.  Perhaps I can share some lessons learned with 
OS Bridge, which has some of the same vibe.

Keith

-- 
Keith Lofstrom          keithl at keithl.com         Voice (503)-520-1993
KLIC --- Keith Lofstrom Integrated Circuits --- "Your Ideas in Silicon"
Design Contracting in Bipolar and CMOS - Analog, Digital, and Scan ICs