Warpstock 2004

The Differences

I have been attending annual Warpstock meetings for the last 4 years - this year will be my fifth. When I heard in January this year that no group had put in a bid to host Warpstock in 2004, I decided to get involved, form a local team and put in a bid. (It later turned out that a group in another city did turn in a bid.)

Those of you that have attended previous Warpstock's know that at the end of the weekend there is a general session. At that general session the future of Warpstock always comes up, with questions and suggestions about what changes should be made to the event to make it better and more popular. I decided that if I was going to involved this year that I would try and implement as many of those changes as I could get away with. We didn't incorporate all the suggestions that I have heard over the years, but the board was very responsive and this year's event is substantially different, and I hope improved, over previous events.

Now with Class(es)

The biggest change this year is the addition of classes and the resulting increase in the duration of the event. This year Warpstock will be a 4 day event (Thursday Oct 21 - Sunday Oct 24) instead of the traditional weekend event. The additional 2 days are required in order to fit in the classes. The classes are scheduled on Thursday and Friday; the traditional presentations are on Saturday and Sunday as they have been in the past.

The classes provide both an extended time for discussing topics and an opportunity for the attendees/students to learn by "hands-on" exercises - neither of which is really possible with the traditional presentation/lecture format. They also help fulfill one of the objectives of having Warpstock, which is to promote the health of the OS/2 community. One of our goals in having the classes is to try and pass on knowledge necessary for the OS/2 community to be self-sustaining, so we came up with a list of topics that we wanted to see taught in order to accomplish that goal. We didn't find teachers for all of the topics we wanted taught, but we had identified more topics than we had class room space to present anyway.

Some of the classes being presented this year are:

• Installing GCC and Open Watcom compilers. The students will install the compilers and run case studies for how to compile Mozilla, Rdesktop and MrMessage. At the end of the class the students will have working compiler installations and examples of various Unix/Linux applications compiled on OS/2.
• Rexx to C Interface. This class covers calling Rexx from C, and writing C functions to be used in Rexx. The goal is to give students the knowledge needed for them to incorporate Rexx macros into their applications, or extend Rexx for any needs they might have.
• File systems, partition tables, LVM and bootmanager on OS/2. This class gets into the down and dirty of how the stuff is stored on the disk and how it works.
• SQL Fundamentals class - how to create tables, insert data, update data and query data from database tables. While PostgreSQL will be used as the database in the class, the SQL that is taught will be generic SQL.
• Building applications with VisualAge C++ Visual Builder. This class will build a simple application using Visual Builder. Students should be ready to build the next OS/2 killer app by the end of the class.

For the complete list of classes see http://www.warpstock.org.

Longer Presentations

Presentations this year are 90 minutes long instead of the traditional 60 minutes. This provides more time for covering topics in depth. In many of the presentations in previous years discussion was still going on as the next group was entering the room and trying to setup. The longer presentation time should help alleviate that problem.

Some of the presentations this year will be:

• Open Office
• ODIN - using and installing applications
• Demonstrations of DFSee and CssDir.
• News on OS/2 device drivers and software/support.
• PostgreSQL database
• What is happening at Netlabs
• New product announcement from InnoTek

Once again - for the complete list see http://www.warpstock.org.

Cheaper Socials

Warpstock has traditionally had a social event on Saturday night. This is a time for the attendees to get together informally and discuss issues and just meet each other and socialize.

There have been complaints in the past about the price of some social events being too high for what is being delivered. One example I heard was the Austin social where $50 was considered too high for a barbecue dinner. We hope to address these concerns two ways: by offering cheaper socials and by putting more content in the main social event.

Since this year's event is a 4 day affair we are offering socials on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights - with Saturday being the main social event as usual. Thursday evening we are walking next door to a steak house/dance hall restaurant. Everyone will buy their own dinner, which saves money since group rates are almost always more expensive than buying off of the menu; dinner prices range from $15 - $25.

Friday evening Warpstock is providing bus transportation to the 16th Street Mall in downtown Denver, a mile long mall of shops, theaters and restaurants. The cost of the bus trip is included in the 4 day registration, or $10 for those registering for individual days. Free bus service is provided the length of the mall by the city.

Saturday evening is the main social event which is dinner at the Denver Museum of Nature and History after it is closed to the public.
Photo DMNS
Warpstock is renting an area of the museum that looks out over "City Park" to the skyline of Denver. Photo DMNS
The cost ($60 by Aug 15, or $70 after; spouses are $30) includes the bus trip from the hotel and back, dinner, two exhibits in the museum, a show at the IMAX theater and desert afterword.

Reworked Exhibits

One of the goals of Warpstock is to further the OS/2 community, and while Warpstock supports the open source movement, it also recognizes that the availability of commercial software helps OS/2. Therefor we made a few changes to the exhibit area and how exhibits are priced and run this year to help encourage commercial and small OS/2 vendors.

This year we have added new pricing options designed to encourage small and shareware vendors to exhibit at Warpstock. Essentially a small or shareware vendor can exhibit at Warpstock with a half table area by purchasing a 4 day registration and donating some copies of the software they are selling. Warpstock will give away the donated software in the closing session at the end of the event.

The board also decided this year to change the scheduling of the event so that there is a dedicated time slot on Friday, Saturday and Sunday for viewing the exhibits so people can go to the exhibit area without missing any presentations or classes, see the schedule below for the times. This not only makes it easier to take in the exhibits but it also makes it possible for a small vendor to exhibit his products and also attend the presentations and/or classes.

Vendors wanting to exhibit at Warpstock should look at the registration page at http://www.warpstock.org or contact me via e-mail .

We are setting up a couple of internet ports in the exhibit area for use by attendees for checking email or surfing the web so that attendees do not have to purchase internet access in their rooms. (The hotel also has a computer for free use by guests for internet access.) In addition all the snacks will be served in the exhibit area.

I hope that these changes help make this year's event the best in Warpstock's 8 year history.

Location

There is lots to do in Denver and the surrounding areas; everything from riding in a locomotive in the Royal Gorge Dinner train to upscale shopping close by the hotel. This year's brochure has many of the details of different activities available.

October in Denver is very temperate with day time highs averaging 66 F (about 19 C) and nighttime lows around 35 F (about 2 C). It is too early for skiing in the mountains, but it is an ideal time for outdoor activities.

I visited 12 hotels in the Denver and Vail areas before selecting the Sheraton at the Tech Center. The guest rooms are nice and the price is excellent, the meeting space is large and very flexible, and the hotel staff has been excellent to work with. I even took my family over there to spend the night and check out the hotel.

The hotel is at the south end of Denver near an upscale shopping area - the hotel provides a free shuttle anywhere in a 4 mile radius of the hotel. We will probably be the only meeting at the hotel on this weekend. The Warpstock room price is $79 per night, single or double occupancy - suites are also available. The hotel also has some upscale rooms on the top floor available for an additional $25 per night. In these upscale rooms the entire outside wall is a glass wall that curves into the ceiling. The views are spectacular. There are also upgrade rooms available for an additional $15 per night that include a full breakfast buffet for everyone staying in the room. (The $25 upgrade rooms include the breakfast buffet as well.)

Costs and Pricing

Offering classes this year along with a 4 day event complicated pricing. What we came up with was a 4 day event registration price, and a single day registration. This allows people to either purchase all 4 days, or to buy Saturday and Sunday admission as single day registrations. The pricing is:

	Early Price	Price after Aug 15
4 Day Pass	$145	$175
Single Day Pass	$60	$70

There is also a price that bundles the 4 day admission with the Saturday social and saves about $10 off of the total cost; see http://www.warpstock.org - registration for more information.

Warpstock apparently made a lot of money off of the event in Atlanta in 1999 and has been living off of that profit ever since. My goal this year was to make this year's event break even, or turn a very small profit. If we meet our projected attendance and don't exceed our budgeted expenses, and everyone stays in the hotel, we will make about $800 this year.

The registration fees cover the cost for renting video projectors, printing expenses, internet connection charges, transportation costs, insurance, and food. (For example we will spend about $15 per person per day on snacks.) The (inter)national board and the local team are all volunteers; no one gets paid, and all the board members pay their own way to come to the event and stay in the hotel.

Part of the reason we can keep the registration costs so low is that Warpstock is guaranteeing a certain number of guest room nights to the hotel; if we do not meet our guest room commitment Warpstock must purchase the difference at our quoted rate. So it is very important that everyone coming from out of town stay in the hotel and use the Warpstock group rate so that we get credit for your stay. If you miss the group rate (the cutoff for hotel reservations is Sept 30) please let us know so that we can include you in our room count.

Schedule

Please note that this schedule may change as we get closer to the event. Always check the Warpstock site for the latest schedule.

Thursday

Snacks served in exhibit room at 9:30am and 3:00pm (15:00)

Time	Big Room A -	Big Room B -	Small Room C -	Small Room D -
7:30am-8:00am	Registration
8:00am-12:00pm	class	class	class	class
12:00pm-1:30pm (12:00-13:30)	Lunch
1:30pm-5:30pm (13:30-17:30)	class	class	class	class
6:30pm (18:30)	Dinner at Trail Dust

Friday

Snacks served in exhibit room at 9:30am and 3:00pm (15:00)

Time	Big Room A -	Big Room B -	Small Room C -	Small Room D -
7:30am-8:00am	Registration / Mixer
8:00am-12:00pm	class	class	class	class
12:00pm-1:00pm (12:00-13:00)	Lunch
1:00pm-2:00pm (13:00-14:00)	exhibits
2:00pm-6:00pm (13:30-17:30)	class	class	class	class
6:30pm - 11:00pm (18:00-23:00)	Bus to Downtown and back Bus leaves approx every hour
6:30pm - 8:00pm (18:00-20:00)	Registration in exhibit area

Saturday

Sunday

Conclusion

There are exciting things happening in OS/2 community now. New applications are getting released and new device drivers are coming on line. Warpstock is where you find out about the new developments, where you can meet the people that make the software you use, and connect with other OS/2 users around the world. Come and be a part of Warpstock this year.