hpr-knowledge-base/hpr_transcripts/hpr0824.txt

Episode: 824
Title: HPR0824: Opentech Conference 2011: Paula Graham, FOSSBox
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr0824/hpr0824.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-08 03:04:21

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The Full Circle Podcast on Hacker Public Radio in this episode, Open Tech and Thoughtsbox.
Hello world, and welcome to the Full Circle Podcast on Hacker Public Radio.
With Mr. Les Pounder, good evening Les, good evening and we are continuing our series
of interviews that Les recorded at the Open Tech Conference which was held in London in May
and this is our second in the series of three interviews.
The Full Circle Podcast is the companion to Full Circle magazine, the independent magazine
for the Ubuntu community. Find us at www.fullcirclemagazine.org forward slash podcast.
Next up, Paula from FOSBOX, a very interesting topic, a conversation.
Paula is passionate about free software and open source Ubuntu. As you hear, they have
FOSBOX Fridays which is one Friday in the month where people can come along with any
problem they've got, talk to someone and get it resolved. Free charge, no pressure, just
turn up and they'll help you as best they can, which I think is really good, it means it's
nice. That's what I didn't know, barriers to entry just turn up and they'll sort you out.
But they also do more bits and pieces such as their projects around the area which help
in local communities with the IT related issues. They mainly favor open source but obviously
they cover a broad spectrum of support. Okay, Les and I are wasting more time, we'll
play that one in and we'll see you on the other side of this one.
Full circle interview. Okay, here I am with Paula Graham from FOSBOX.org.uk and we're
going to be talking about FOSBOX and OpenTech 2011. Hi, Paula. Hi. Start with FOSBOX,
first of all, what is FOSBOX? Well, it came out of a project we were doing some work
with some volunteer sector infrastructure organisations for a couple of years and we
did some pilots with Ubuntu, well we have the time and money and FOSBOX sort of came out
of that. So we found to kick when the original project finished and we carried on working
with infrastructure organisations. It turns to do two things really, partly just straightforward
V2, to move people towards open source, green open source software from the Microsoft
addiction. But also trying to kind of affect a change in the way people deal with information
and knowledge. There's a tendency to hug it to people's chest and we're trying to get
more awareness of things like open culture and open access in that sense.
Brilliant. Is Ubuntu a chosen distribution based on its merits or is it because of
your proximity to canonical perhaps? No, it's really, I mean, it's very difficult, isn't
it? Every distro is good for something in someone. So it's not that it's the best distro.
It's just that it's most acceptable to the people that we work with, really. It has
the best balance because really we're kind of free software. But to do what we're doing
you have to be pragmatic and I've always liked where Ubuntu has trodden that quite
well in my opinion. They can use something free and open they will, but they also have
quite a pragmatic approach to providing a usable experience for non-technical engines
as well as the reason we're really going through Ubuntu.
Right. I notice as well as is there something called FOSBOX Fridays as well that you do?
That's right, yeah. We're kind of over the two. We're running for two years and we've
kind of tried everything to work with quite a few organisations and go as much feedback
as we can and we've ended up with an approach to a mix of training and at the moment
we're in the process of expanding our training we're going to stop providing a basic Ubuntu
maintenance course which is for non-technicals just to get the labels to look after their
own conclusions. So that's to be realistic. They need some kind of resource on going.
So we started with a kind of lug source of arrangement but that really didn't work.
It's just too intimidating for non-technical people. So we do something much more laid back,
volunteers come and hang about, people from the launch sector come and we just sort of
match people up on the spot. So they've got that ongoing resource. We also kind of put people
into the Ubuntu chat channel where we can, that people prefer quite often just to talk
to us. So that's another part of it. So it's kind of a Ubuntu. We teach them how to
install and maintain it and we provide that ongoing resource so they kind of trust and
know that that's there. It's sort of safe to, you know. So that's really what the FOSBOX
Friday is for. And obviously it's an opportunity for us to hang out and sort of bond because
obviously we're quite a volunteer little organisation. So it's FOSBOX just localised to,
is it a London area that you're based in? We're based in East London and we work with
infrastructure organisations mainly in East London but because we're pretty much now the
only organisation in the UK doing this apart from a group in Manchester and there was
a group in Birmingham but they kind of disbanded really. So it's pretty much us and an organisation
run by someone called Anne and Manchester doing this. So we get people calling us from
Wales. Yeah, of course. But obviously the bulk of our work is so that it's on the boroughs
of Ends of the city. Yeah, just a quick aside. The Onin Manchester. That's not done by Anna
Morris, is it? Yeah. Ah, that's okay. Computer. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. I help at that.
Oh, did you? I thought it was wonderful what Anna does. I've really got a lot of sign
for Anna. I think she's great. She's really fantastic. Yeah. I think we're going to try and
work together more in the future. She's done a good event, it's really us. There's another
one for the end of the year as well. Okay, computer too. We were talking a lot before she put
that event on and we're kind of developing together now, you know, like sort of approaches
that kind of, just to be able to work effectively with non-tech years. Yeah. It all helps, doesn't
it really? It helps raise the profile of Linux and Ubuntu. Exactly. Exactly. It's all
good stuff. I think we're talking about doing more stuff with women as well. I think we've
been talking a bit about forming some kind of women's group maybe with the SSD, but I don't
know yet, we'll see. But I think we'll start, we want to develop because we've worked
supporting a lot of women. Yeah. But there's very few women available to kind of help other
women with training and social. So we're going to look at how we can work with that in
future. Yeah. It's interesting. Yeah. There is, I know a little about it. It's the Ada
Love Lace Day, isn't there? Very indeed. Yeah, I need to contact those with them. I don't
actually know those women at all. I don't have a very good link with some Linux checks
because they're much more open source here and kind of corporate. Yeah. So I know the
people from eclectic tech can't have been much better and women who are more free software
oriented. There was a talker. There was a talker open tech regarding Ada Love Lace
Day. Yeah, but I didn't manage to grab the woman. Unfortunately, so I need to contact her.
There's something called eclectic tech carnival in which runs in Europe and we can't
run it in London because we're not in Shankham. I'd quite like to do something else if we
can in the UK. So it'd be based around the gender changes and eclectic tech carnival
all the way there. Yeah. No open event, basically. Yeah. That sounds interesting. On about
events, open tech, what I mentioned a few seconds ago. You were there on the day, weren't
you? Yeah, I was there all day. Were you doing a talk on the day? Yeah, I did a talk
later on in the afternoon. What was your talk all about? It was about the kind of action
research approach that we used to put together a kind of effective way of bringing in non-tech
ism, supporting them in a way that worked for them, basically. We had an action research
approach that we started when I was, because I used to work with a group called Done Technology
and Social Action, which was a ESRC funded project about human computer interactions
of the voluntary sector. So we used those kinds of methodologies to work with our, you
know, we did some work in depth with some groups just to work out what was needed. So I
talked about that. Did you go to any of the talks on the day? Yeah, I saw the guy from
London, his name. I saw the guy from, I think he was UK on Kant, who did a talk in the
morning with Bill Thompson. And the woman, he was talking about Ada Lovelace, who was
the major lover of the talk, as well as I saw that. Were there any talks on the day
that really piqued your interest? That was really made you think about things? Yeah, obviously
the Ada Lovelace talk, I was particularly interested in. Was there anything else about
the event that you liked other than the talks? I mean, the chance to network with other
people? Yeah, that's great. I met a lot of really good
contacts. And I, I, a chat with a guy who was also talking the afternoon in the same
slot as I did. He's doing work with bringing kids into programming and some of the methods
that he is and I really like for kids, but I think they can also be adapted to women.
And I've seen some work in Sweden during the summer. So that was one of the best contacts.
And I also actually finally met, I know there's another group of women doing some staff
around North London, but I didn't know who they were. I actually ran into them there and
made the contacts. That was really good. Has boss box got any events that you want to
talk about that coming up? Any meetings or any outings, anything like that? You want
to mention? Well, at the moment, we're fundraising
like that because we've got hit quite badly by the cuts, but we're also working on developing
the Ubuntu maintenance course, which will make a nominal chargeful. And we're looking
at the women's events. Richard Melville, actually, we've been working with Richard Melville
was developing low power, really small form factor PCs. He's got really some really good
ideas for reducing maintenance, like he's plugging the upgrades. He's sending the operating
system in the day to complete this. The operating system can plug into the, you can actually
plug in on a module. You don't actually have to install it. And various other things
he's looking at, developing a kind of backup system that distributes all the data across
all the nodes on a network so that you can back up about, is a kind of form of, you know,
umber reflexive backup, basically. So he's looking at some of those ideas and he's
got approached back to the box. We're looking at developing that because it was shifting
in quite well with all the other things that we're doing. You know, it would take out
the bad hardware compatibility and that stuff. So we're quite interested in that. Yeah.
But yeah, basically, we're just developing, you know, we'll do software freedom today,
in the summer. And we're going to start another round of training in probably about three
months. And obviously, the software doesn't carry on. But we just done dozens of years. We
had a wheel up between Christmas and March. We did about eight events. We'll do another one
in about three months time. But at the moment, we're concentrating on restructuring, basically,
to deal with the new environment. We've got enough work in there that we know we're okay,
because for a while when the cuts were hitting, the work was drying up and we were really
panicking why the road, but it works because everyone now can see what they've gotten
who's left and what rest of it is starting to move again. And we're getting enough
work in from selling services that we know we're going to be okay. Yeah. But that's obviously
been the last couple of months. It's all kind of kicking in again now and it's just
the future. So we're really exhaling and starting to plan the courses that we're going to run.
That's good to hear. All right. Well, last question. Oddcamp is going to be August this year.
Are you going to Oddcamp? Oddcamp is going to Oddcamp with a camper.
They're promising us they'll be somewhere to camp.
Yeah, there is a campsite, isn't there? I know that one of our friends is camping that.
Can't for life. We're not doing the campsite.
No, I'm going to stay in the hotel.
I love camping. Yeah, I'm not doing camping.
All the questions. Thank you for all that.
And we're back. Paula sounds really, really good to have a chat with actually.
She's very knowledgeable. I mean, she's been doing this sort of work for years now and she knows
this stuff and she's got lots of great ideas. So I mean, if there's anyone in the London area
who can go to postbox on postbox on post Friday's or just in general, go down, have a chat,
visit the website and see what they can do. What part of London do they generally meet in?
I think the nearest tube station is going to be Tower Hill. That's that's that's fairly central.
Yeah, that's very central, in fact.
Yeah, there's not a million miles away. I think it's where the caverns are. It's just a bit further along.
Feedback. You can post comments and feedback on the podcast page at fullcirclemagazine.org
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Please remember this is a family friendly show.
That was Les Pounder speaking to Paul Graham of Frostbox, the second of our three interviews
from the folks of the OpenTech conference. And that's it from this episode.
For our third interview, see us here on the full circle podcast on Hacker Public Radio.
For me, Robin Cattling, it's thank you and goodbye.
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