The Seattle group is 10 years old and meets monthly at a local community center. But the two-hour meetings are always followed by an informal gathering at a nearby tavern and pizza establishment, The Islander, says Ray Jones, a member of the group's board of directors. The board's meetings are always well attended because board members get to take turns picking the restaurant where they'll meet. "We get to sample different restaurants all over the Seattle area," Jones reports. "It turns out to be a good social thing for the members of the board of directors."
The regular membership meetings usually feature a tutorial at the new-user level, in addition to a guest speaker from a vendor company or a presentation by a local guru on a technical topic. Another popular feature of the meetings, held the second Tuesday of each month from 7 to 9 p.m., is a verbal exchange of information on jobs available and positions wanted. "People who have positions that they would like to have filled by UNIX experts come to the meeting. They explain what the job is. Then people stand up and say what they're looking for. We've made several cross-matches that way."
The meeting presentations tend to be a mix of technical topics and "what's new and what's going on," Jones says. "If you have it all one way or all the other, you lose half the group," Jones notes.
Another way the group serves its membership is by giving each paid member an e-mail account and a connection to the Internet via the group's own dedicated server. The group also maintains a jobs mailing list on the Internet, which advertises available jobs for those with UNIX experience.
The Seattle affiliate was one of the first to join UniForum's joint membership program and finds that a good way of getting new members, along with its monthly ad in the Puget Sound Computer User newspaper.
For additional information on the Seattle UNIX Group, contact Jones or Bill Campbell at (206) 236-1676 or at the group's Internet address, slug@seaslug.org.
Glenn Schulke, founder and president of the six-year-old group, says the group recently received a machine donated by Sun Microsystems to handle the e-mail accounts and its BBS.
Southwest!UniForum meetings are in recess for the summer but will be starting again this fall, Schulke reports. Meetings are usually attended by about 35 persons, and the group has a mailing list of 330. A vendor or technical presentation is usually the main event of each meeting. Past speakers have represented Sun Microsystems, The Santa Cruz Operation, Veritas, Tandem, and Stratus, among others. A general question-and-answer session is usually included, when members can ask "how-to" questions about specific technical topics.
Meetings are usually announced in the Arizona Computer User publication. For further information, contact Schulke at (602) 756-2806 or via e-mail at glenn@unizone.com.