KDE at SCALE 5x

KDE was once again well represented at the 2007 Southern California Linux Expo (SCALE 5x), demonstrating to show-goers why it is the most popular Linux desktop. There were talks, demonstrations from KDE developers and and thank yous in return. Read on for the full report.

Celeste Paul started the expo off by giving a talk on Usability in Open Source Software Development at the Women in Open Source Mini-conf held on Friday. She and Chris Lee, who flew down at the last minute to help, were the main representatives of KDE, manning the booth on Saturday and Sunday along with the able help of locals Daniel Dotsenko, who was instrumental in organising the booth, Mike Elliott, who agreed to stand in for Daniel on Sunday and Aaron Johnson.

Demonstrations were given to those who stopped by, questions were answered, and CDs were given away. As usual, many stopped by to thank those who worked on KDE for the great work that they have done in creating a great desktop. Humorous lengths were made to convince those using other desktops of the merits of using KDE, including modifying KDE to look like Gnome and Window Maker. Note was made by many attenders of the Gnome booth that was located across the aisle from the KDE booth. Celeste and Chris were even interviewed by the local media that was covering the event. Special thanks goes to Linspire in providing 100 Freespire CDs to give away. Thanks also goes to Shuttle who provided two nice large LCD monitors to use.

Things did not always go so smoothly, with a lot of planning being done at the last minute. Aaron also forgot to retrieve on Sunday after the show the nice KDE banner that Daniel had acquired, and which is either residing in either the trash or in a KDE fan's home at this moment. However, things should be a lot better next time, with planning being done already for next year's show, which will have a checklist (that has, among other things, an item to pack the booth's banner after the show), and a nice large packing box for KDE.