Group: LibrePlanet Ontario

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About Us

The group has been formed to promote the use of Free Software in the communities of Ontario and to support individuals who wish to use or create Free Software. The goals are similar to those of the Free Software Foundation.

Join us

To become a member of the LibrePlanet Ontario Chapter, please

Contact

You may reach the team via IRC (see above) or by emailing the discussion list:

  • LibrePlanet-CA-ON@libreplanet.org

You may also contact the team leaders via email:

  • LibrePlanet-CA-ON-owner@libreplanet.org

Meetings

We plan to meet at 9:00pm Eastern Time on the 24th of every month, so that the meeting falls on a different weekday from month to month. Add this event to your calendar

Next Meeting

When: Friday, 24 June 2016 at 9:00pm EDT
Where: on Mumble: libreplanetbr.org, default port 64738, once connected double-click on "LibrePlanet Ontario" room.

Agenda

Upcoming Events

Previous Meetings

Meeting Resources

Projects

  • LibrePlanet ON Canada server, to show off federation and build a common resource for others (server is IPv4 + IPv6, need to suitable domain name):
    • GNU Social: need to install web server + database
    • Jabber/XMPP server: Prosody: need let's encrypt cert for encryption, update config to enable encryption, right now accounts can only be added manually
    • Let's Encrypt for HTTPS: need to create certificate
    • Murmer, a Mumble server
    • OwnCloud: installed, definitely needs HTTPS :'(
    • Fundraising!!! We need some money to put into the Gandi account for a domain name and for the server itself. $15.30 USD buys us about a month of server time. More money, more CPU, RAM, bandwidth we can afford!
  • Software Freedom Day in Toronto
    • Hosted in 2015
    • Planning to host for 2016?
  • Hardware Freedom Day in Toronto
    • Planning to host for January 2017?
  • Developing free software tools for working with Canadian Tax data from an XML file and being able to send that tax file directly to the CRA using their protocol

http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/esrvc-srvce/tx/ndvdls/netfile-impotnet/crtfdsftwr/menu-eng.html

    • Suggest that the tax specification files and the protocol for sending tax files become another open data set: http://open.canada.ca/en/suggested-datasets
    • Need to create a dummy/test .tax file for developers to use

Strategy

This is a draft strategy -- feel free to edit!

We have three main areas of focus:

  1. Education/Activism/Advocacy
  2. Community
  3. Services/Support

In all that we do, we need to consider how we are unique from:

  • National/Global groups (e.g. FSF, CLUECAN, etc.) -- our focus is more local
  • Other local groups (e.g. GTALUG, local language/project groups, etc.) -- our focus is on software freedom

Education/Activism/Advocacy

Education can be...

  1. Community-focused, inward-facing -- educating ourselves and our community;
    1. There are many people open to the message of software freedom (e.g. developers, people who are already familiar with the open source movement but maybe haven't yet heard about the free software movement, etc.) who need to hear it.
    2. There is much to learn about software freedom for those people already familiar with the movement (e.g. licensing, making a living, privacy/encryption, finding hardware that respects your freedom, etc.)
  2. Public-facing, more outward-facing activism -- educating the public, educating institutions (universities, governments), etc.

Ideas

  • Presentations at other meetups/ally groups:
    • Licensing and practical implications of it on work or hobby projects
    • Why GPL or AGPL for your next project at work
    • How we used GPL/AGPL on some code and things went well
    • Why licensing matters for software
    • Why free documentation matters
    • Why free software needs free tools
  • Resources (links) on our website
    • easy to access for new members
    • good starting point to important essays, useful software, practical tutorials, licensing tools, etc.
  • Activism around big proprietary software launches, e.g. presenting the case for software freedom at an Apple/Samsung launch
  • Privacy / Surveillance issues
  • Open Data, e.g. City of Toronto, Province of Ontario?
  • Op. Ed. pieces / letters to the editor to newspapers on current affairs related to software freedom


Community

  • Monthly meeting / social
  • Mailing list
  • Visit ally group meetups to have a presence and find like-minded people who might be interested in joining LibrePlanet
  • Booth at conferences, e.g. FSOSS, DrupalCamp, PyCon Canada, etc.
  • Hackathons using open data and free software serivce APIs/protocols
    • Partner with ally groups (e.g. local OpenStreetMap or open data groups) and organize hackathons
    • Mentorship from those with more experience in a project to newcomers
  • Local teams (e.g. Toronto Team, Kitchener/Waterloo team, Ottawa team, etc.)
  • Enable and equip campus groups (e.g. University of Toronto, University of Waterloo)
    • If we can enable them with our own materials (mailing list, website, services, resources, etc.), they can focus on getting local club status, having a local presence on campus, and campus-specific issues
    • Free software tools for university life (e.g. LibreOffice, buying hardware that respects your freedom for residence, etc.)
    • GNU/Linux tutors/mentors, e.g. for computer science students
    • Google Summer of Code / Libre Code mentorship/support
    • Advocacy within the university
      • Use of freedom-friendly open standards in courses (e.g. being able to submit assignments in open formats)
      • Resisting proprietary software requirements in courses

Services/Support

Server with hosted free software services for members:

  • Jabber accounts
  • Email
  • pump.io / GNU Social
  • Mirror of free-software-only Linux distros like Trisquel or gNewSense
  • ownCloud? (would require a lot of storage space, but could provide support for calendars, file sharing, etc., could use storage quotas, encryption is also possible)
  • tt-rss: RSS reader?
  • basic git hosting (with Gitorious or Gitlab or straight SSH)?
  • web hosting?

The idea would not be to devote a ton of time and resources to become a hosting provider, but to offer libre network services to members which might not otherwise be accessible to non-sysadmins.

Roadmap

Phase 0: Bootstrapping / Build a Working Prototype

  1. Begin regular monthly meetings
  2. Sketch strategy for the group moving forward
  3. Build up some basic materials (website, mailing list, business cards or postcards, etc.) to use for recruitment

Phase 1: Recruitment

  • After Phase 0, we could use the recruitment materials and strategy/plans for the group to build up the membership
    • by visiting ally group events looking for like-minded people
    • by reaching out to University of Toronto contacts for a campus group
    • by preparing to have a presence at conferences with like-minded people

Phase 2: Expansion / Implementation of Other Features

  • After phase 1, depending on numbers, strengths, and interest of the membership, we could start pulling other activities off the strategy "wishlist" and begin to implement them.
  • Different members would ideally take the lead of difference projects, e.g. Blaise could take a lead on campus groups, etc.

Phase 3: Other Regional Teams

  • If we can get this working with the Toronto team/chapter, and we can find people interested in other regions (e.g. KW, Ottawa), we can equip them to implement similar ideas in their cities
  • This could happen sooner or later, depending on when we can recruit members from these regions to lead local teams/chapters


Other Resources

Local Organizations

Conferences

Information Sites/Global Organizations

"issue" is not in the list (interest, location, project, school) of allowed values for the "Organized around" property.

This page was a featured resource in March 2016.


LibrePlanet Ontario
Note ONtario group for free software activists
Region North America
Area Canada
Mailing list http://lists.libreplanet.org/mailman/listinfo/libreplanet-ca-on
Available language(s) English
Contact Sergio Durigan Junior
Members Rudolf O.
Sergio Durigan Junior
Blaise Alleyne
Bob Jonkman
Greg Knittl
Stewart C. Russell
Greg Wright
Daniel Villarreal
Stephen Paul Weber
Reid Ellis
Current status Active
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