More discussion: GUI, blogs, and pizza

[Luke]

Just a few thoughts with respect to what we spoke about at the meeting.

GUI for administration: There is still the webmin vs. eBox question. I
honestly haven't used eBox, and it's been a while since I tampered with
webmin (I don't have internet at home for my server...) but the opints made
were:
--Webmin can break config files, and is more low level
--eBox is higher level, and has its own configuration files... I forget the
problem with it.

Some have suggested taking eBox and making a fully customized Ubuntu
version. I'm not into actual development now, so I don't know what kind of
effort this would be. Judging by the screenshots of eBox, this could be a
way to go.

Also, another topic on the mailing list suggests writing a terminal program
that would be an all-in-one management are for server services, I believe
it's tentatively called "u-s-admin". The idea is write that for CLI users,
then develop a GUI frontend for it. Something else to think about.

Timeframe: 9.04 seems reasonable. This is almost a year to get a reasonable
beta product out, whether we're making our own or modifying webmin/eBox.
Intrepid is too close, as people are working on the first "point" for Hardy
as well, and there are only 5 months til release.

One question I have: Is a web interface really the way to go? Will
enterprise users go for having to have a web server to run admin services?
In my personal view, it would be more reasonable to develop a program for
Ubuntu that could have a GUI front made for it. An actual program is more
pro than a web interface.

As far as the blog goes, a direction that might get more users (and actual
system administrators) interested is by writing it like you're writing a
magazine article. Think "Full Circle" for sysadmins. Make the dicussion
high-level, talk about new software, developments on new features, post
useful how-tos, and bring up recurring topics (Which VM is right for me?
*soren*).

This would be a lot of work, I imagine. Start off small, and try to get the
whole server team together on contributing in small ways, such as mailing
the editor-in-chief links to discussions like those suggested above. Again,
this is just an idea from me.

I forgot how pizza tied into this; I think Mathias was going to bring some
to the next server meeting. Finally, a personal question: did the time get
moved to Tuesdays at 15:00 UTC, or are we still on for Wednesdays?

Try to input on everything you feel you can contribute to (suggestions,
help, etc.) Thanks.
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