FOSS4G2008 Workshops

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Introduction

The FOSS4G2008 Workshop Committee is responsible for the organization of both Workshops and Labs. Workshops are 3-hour classroom sessions, and Labs are 90-minute classes. The committee reports to the FOSS4G2008 Conference Committee.

FOSS4G Workshop Committee Members

• Burnie Nawn (Coordinator)
• Gavin Fleming
• Graeme McFerren
• Dave Patton (chair)
• Jeff McKenna

Next Committee Meeting

The date/time for the next meeting is tentative

• date: 2007/09/05
  
• time: To be confirmed[]
  
• meeting will be via [[]]
• Agenda:

List of workshop submissions

[[1]]

Criteria used by the workshop committee to review workshop submissions

1. meets conference mandate:
   1. matches with the themes of the conference
   2. makes use of software that is both "free" and "open source"
2. submission's technical requirements can be met by the conference facilities
3. likelyhood of a quality workshop:
   1. successful workshop presented at prior FOSS4G conference
   2. expertise of the workshop presenter in the workshop subject matter
   3. any relevant input from workshop evaluations collected by FOSS4G2006, or personal experience of workshops presented by the presenter(s) at other conferences
   4. demonstrates practical applications
4. expected level of interest in the workshop topic

Scoring

The range of scores to be used is 0 through 5:

 0 = does not meet any of the criteria
 1 = barely meets some of the criteria, and doesn't meet some of the criteria
 3 = average
 5 = meets or exceeds all of the criteria

The goal is to end up with a score in the range of 0-5 for the workshop. Two ways to do the scoring:

1. Use the provided spreadsheet, which allows for a score for each criterion. Divide the "Total Score" by 4 to get the 'score for the workshop'. Doing it this way makes it easy to see any workshops that received a zero for any criterion. Despite the 'total score', workshops that have a zero score for any criterion deserve further examination as to their suitability for the conference.
2. Use the provided spreadsheet, but just assign an overall score of 0-5 for the workshop. If, as part of doing this, you think a workshop would score zero on any criterion, make a note, and bring it up in the discussions, because workshops that have a zero score for any criterion deserve further examination as to their suitability for the conference.

Workshops Notes

Note: Some of the information below is out of date.

Workshop Duration and Scheduling

http://conference.osgeo.org/index.php/foss4g/2008/schedConf/program

and

http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/FOSS4G_2008_Programme

Workshop and Lab Slots as originally proposed. Venue1 = RoofTerrace (100), Venue2 = Room1.4 (96 or 24,24). Venues are hired for all 5 days.

TIME SLOT	MONDAY Venue1	MONDAY Venue2	TUESDAY Venue1	TUESDAY Venue2	WEDNESDAY Venue1	WEDNESDAY Venue2	THURSDAY Venue1	THURSDAY Venue2	FRIDAY Venue1	FRIDAY Venue2
8am - 10am	ws1	ws2	lab1	lab2	lab9	lab10	lab17	lab18	ws3	ws4
10:30am - 12pm	ws1	ws2	lab3	lab4	lab11	lab12	lab19	lab20	ws3	ws4
1pm - 2:30pm	Plenary	Plenary	lab5	lab5	lab13	lab14	Plenary	Plenary	ws5	ws6
3pm - 4:30pm	Plenary	Plenary	lab7	lab8	lab15	lab16	Plenary	Plenary	ws5	ws6
5:30pm - 8:30pm	Cocktail	Cocktail	maybe	maybe	Gala	Gala	maybe	maybe	OSGEO?	OSGEO?

So, 6 workshops (3-4 hours) and 20 labs (1.5 hours) are planned for. Most submitted proposals are for workshops as opposed to labs (by 27 to 16). FOSS4G2007 had 12 workshops and 16 labs. That seems more sensible. So, what are the options, considering that the conference as a package doesn't really allow for swapping of labs and workshops?

• We can up the workshops to 8 by holding evening sessions (will attendees come? would it be unfair to make these slots for deeply technical content, e.g. coding?), but that may still not be enough.
• We can break up Venue2 into 2 smaller venues and run a workshop parallel to the 2 lab threads. This means that 25% less people can attend. With evening slots, this would bring workshops up to 13
• We can try for offsite venues (maybe without even having to pay for them, though bussing participants would still cost)
  • Centre for High Performance Computing
  • City of Cape Town GIS Lab
  • UCT Geomatics Lab
• We can try to a secure slightly bigger second venue at the CTICC to be split up

Questions for Organising Committee

• Number and dimension of rooms, tables (how many PCs /people can we fit in a room)
  • Venue 1 is Roof Terrace and can hold 100 people
  • Venue 2 is Room 1.40 and can hold 96 people
  • Venue 2 can be split into two rooms holding 24 people each (reduced config apparently due to strict fire and building regulations).

• Can the Workshops and labs be themed?
  • With only two (maybe three venues) it is tricky - perhaps into 1) Desktop GIS and Analysis, 2) Internet GIS

Feedback from Past Conferences (things to note)

• overcrowded workshops are bad
• registrants could possibly list their "top 4" workshop selections
• LiveCD for linux workshops very successful
• grouping workshops by room "theme" successful (MapServer room, GRASS room, ...)
• foss4g2006 workshops wiki : http://wiki.osgeo.org/index.php/Foss4g2006_wks
• foss4g2006 workshops rooms : http://wiki.osgeo.org/index.php/FOSS4G2006#Rooms
• foss4g2006 number of attendees per workshop : http://www.foss4g2006.org/site/pdf/WksNbOfAttendees.pdf