Table of Contents

• Calendar of Events
• Next General Meeting -- November 14
  • Tutorial: Network Security
  • Presentation: Microsoft .NET by Steve Loethen, Microsoft
  • Book Specials
• Next Linux Meeting -- November 15
  • Presentation: Microsoft .NET by Scott Suhy, Microsoft
• Meeting Locations
• Articles
• Microsoft? What the Heck?
• Newsletter Changes
• Wireless SIG
• Note on BBS Payments
• Quotes
• Sponsors
• Special Interest Groups (SIGs)
• Volunteering
• Contacts
• Submitting Articles

Calendar of Events

NOTE: More information on these groups, including locations and web sites, can be found in the "Meeting Locations" section below.

Next General Meeting is Wednesday, November 14, 2001

Presentation

Abstract:
In this presentation, Steve will speak on the .NET vision, how it will effect our architectures and how it will specifically aid developers and the development of enterprise-wide applications.

His talk will involve both high-level information about Microsoft's ideas about the future of application development and how they are creating tools and technologies to aid in the rapid and feature-rich creation of those applications.

Bio:
Steve Loethen is Developer Evangelist for Microsoft's Mid-America District, covering Missouri, Kansas, and Tennessee. He travels the district, helping deliver the latest updates on developer topics as it relates to Microsoft's tools, both now and in the future.

Steve's background is in engineering, with a degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Missouri at Rolla. He spent the last 7 years consulting and teaching developer topics (C++ and Visual Basic) before coming to work for Microsoft almost 2 years ago.

Ideas, questions and suggestions are welcome; please contact Christine Wanta (presentations@sluug.org).

Book Sales

Next St. Louis Linux Users Group Meeting Is November 15

Abstract:
In this presentation, Scott will speak on the .NET vision, how it will effect our architectures and how it will specifically aid developers and the development of enterprise-wide applications.

His talk will involve both high-level information about Microsoft's ideas about the future of application development and how they are creating tools and technologies to aid in the rapid and feature-rich creation of those applications.

Bio:
Scott Suhy is General Manager of the Mid-America District for the Microsoft Corporation and is based in St. Louis. In this role, Suhy manages the company's sales, marketing, and consulting groups across the district, which includes Missouri, Kansas and Tennessee. Specifically, he is responsible for both large and small corporate account sales in the Mid-America district, which has branch offices in St. Louis, Kansas City, and Nashville.

Prior to his current position, Suhy was Regional Technology Director for the Central Region, and led a team of architectural engineers who counseled high-impact customers, strategic partners, and internal staff regarding Microsoft's advanced technology and strategic direction.

Other positions Suhy has held with Microsoft include Managing Consultant, responsible for managing the pre- and post-sales consulting organization in Texas, Oklahoma, and Arkansas; and Consultant, Microsoft Consulting Services, responsible for designing Wide Area Network architectures for large corporate accounts and specializing in supportability design and capacity planning.

Before joining Microsoft in 1992, Suhy held positions with other organizations, including Computer Task Group and Texas Instruments.

Suhy received a Bachelor of Science degree in Industrial Engineering from the University of Pittsburgh in 1987. He and his wife, Nancy, live in University City.

Comments, questions, and ideas for the St. Louis Linux Users Group are welcome; please send email to linux@sluug.org.

Meets the 2nd Wednesday of the month, 6:30pm to 9:00pm. Free and open to the public.

Sunnen Products
7910 Manchester (at Hanley)
St. Louis, MO

Directions: Take I-64 (US 40) to the Hanley exit south. Turn left at Manchester, then an immediate right into Sunnen driveway.

Map:   http://www.sluug.org/info/map_sunnen.html

(NOTE: A security guard from Sunnen is scheduled to be at the door from 6:20pm to 7:20pm to allow entry. After 7:20, the door will be unattended and you may not be able to enter.)

SLUUG - St. Louis UNIX Users Group (http://www.sluug.org)
Steering Committee

Meets the Monday following the 2nd Wednesday of the month, 6:30pm to 8:30pm. Open to the public. This is where we make decisions on what topics to cover and other administration of the group. If you want to get involved, this is a good place to start.

Daugherty Systems
One City Place, 2nd floor
Creve Coeur, MO

St. Louis Linux Users Group (STLLUG) (http://www.stllinux.org)

Meets the 3rd Thursday of each month, 7:00pm to 9:00pm. Free and open to the public. (Formerly known as the Linux SIG.)

Indian Trails Library
8400 Delport Drive (at Midland)
St. Louis, MO

Directions:   Take I-170 to Page east. Turn left at North-South. Turn left at Midland. Drive 2 blocks and turn left on Delport. The library is on your left.

Map:   http://www.stllinux.org/directions/

Hazelwood LUG (http://www.sluug.org/~hzlug)

Generally meets the 4th Tuesday of each month, 7:00pm to 9:00pm. Free and open to the public. This is a SIG of SLUUG, intended for Linux newbies.

Prairie Commons Library
915 Utz Lane (between Howdershell and Dunn)
Hazelwood, MO

MOSLUG - MO Open Source LUG (http://paradoxical.nbtsc.org/~iguanacog)

Meets on the 1st Tuesday of the month, from 7:00pm to 11:00pm.

Culpepper's Restaurant (basement)
312 South Kirkwood Road
Kirkwood, MO

STLBSD - St. Louis BSD Users (http://www.stlbsd.org)

Does not have any official meetings, but they often gather informally at SLUUG meetings.

SLACC - St. Louis Area Computer Club (http://www.galilei.com/bbs.htm)

Meets the 1st Thursday of every month, from 7:00pm to 9:00pm.

Thornhill Library
12863 Willowyk Drive (off Fee Fee)
Creve Coeur, MO

PerlMongers (http://stlouis.pm.org)

Meets the 1st Thursday of every month, from 7:00pm to 9:00pm.

CAIT
5 North Jackson at Forsyth
Clayton, MO

St. Louis Java Users Group (http://www.ociweb.com/javasig/)

Meets the 2nd Thursday of every month, 6:30pm to 8:00pm.

CityPlace One Auditorium
One City Place
Creve Coeur, MO

Wireless SIG (http://www.stlwebdev.org/sigs/wireless)

Meets the 4th Tuesday of the month, from 6:30pm to 9:00pm. Meetings are free and open to everyone. This group is a cooperative effort of both the St. Louis Web Developers and the St. Louis Java Users Group.

CityPlace One Auditorium
One City Place
Creve Coeur, MO

CCSL - Computer Consultants of St. Louis (http://www.ccsl.org)
Monthly Dinner Meeting

RESERVATIONS ARE REQUIRED. Call Susan Pope, 314-995-4652. Social hour starts at 5:30pm, meeting starts at 6:30pm.

Cheshire Inn
7036 Clayton Avenue
St. Louis, MO

SILUG - Southern Illinois LUG (http://www.silug.org)
O'Fallon meeting

The SILUG O'Fallon meeting is generally on the first Tuesday of the month. It runs from 7:00pm to 9:00pm.

O'Fallon Public Library
120 Civic Plaza
O'Fallon, IL

SILUG - Southern Illinois LUG (http://www.silug.org)
Carbondale meeting

The SILUG Carbondale meeting is the 1st Monday of the month, from 7:00pm to 9:00pm.

Life Sciences III
1059 Auditorium
SIU-Carbondale
Carbondale, IL

LUCI - Linux Users of Central Illinois (http://www.luci.org)

All LUCI meetings are held at the same location, from 7:00pm to 9:00pm. General meetings are on the 4th Tuesday of the month, and Newbie night is held on the 2nd Tuesday of the month.

Springfield, IL

Mizzou LUG (http://mlug.missouri.edu)

The Mizzou LUG has an active web site, but does not appear to hold regular meetings. For information, check their web site.

Columbia, MO

We publish meeting schedules of groups in the St. Louis region that may be of interest to our members. If you would like to have info added about your group, please mail the newsletter editor (editor@sluug.org) or call any of the SLUUG officers.

NOTE: These articles may express personal opinions and SLUUG exerts no more editorial control over such content than does a public library, bookstore, or newsstand. Any opinions, advice, statements, services, offers, or other information or content expressed herein are those of the respective authors and not necessarily supported by SLUUG. SLUUG does not guarantee the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any content, nor its merchantability or fitness for any particular purpose.

Microsoft? What the Heck?

Presentations on Microsoft .NET? Are you sure we're in the right place?

While most of us in the UNIX community consider Microsoft to be the competition, the "enemy", or even the "Evil Empire", it is good to be aware of what is going on in the industry. We hope that you will attend these presentations with an open mind. (Open is what we're all about, right?)

Microsoft .NET seems to be composed of four overlapping pieces:

• A new development platform.
• A way of creating web-based "services".
• A set of Microsoft-provided web services.
• A high-level strategy of Microsoft's future plans.

Much of what you've heard about .NET is probably centered around the Microsoft-provided web-based services, more properly referred to as Hailstorm. This is something we need to be aware of, as it has the potential of co-opting the web as we know it, and requiring our personal information to be stored on Microsoft-owned systems. Learning about this initiative is essential if we are to protect our privacy and the openness of the Internet.

On the other hand, the .NET development platform provides the Open Source community with an interesting opportunity. There are at least 2 Open Source projects attempting to create a compatible platform -- dotGNU and Mono. The interesting part is that Microsoft is creating a new platform which could potentially replace the Win32 platform. Only this time, Open Source will not be very far behind in creating a compatible system. Microsoft says that it will release the technical specifications to the world -- it's possible that Microsoft may be providing the seeds for the replacement of its monopoly as the dominant platform.

We hope that you'll be able to attend these presentations, to learn what the "competition" is up to, and what the industry is up to. You can keep some of your skepticism, but also keep an eye out for good ideas that you can learn from Microsoft. Hopefully, Microsoft will provide the technical details that technical folks like us thrive on, and we can put those ideas to some use, whether cooperative or competitive.

Newsletter Changes

You've probably already noticed that this month's Cronicle looks quite a bit different than last month's. The calendar of events has been reformatted and moved near the top, to provide a summary of the upcoming meetings of interest in the area. In order to make this change, we also moved the information on the various groups into a separate section. For each group, we list the web site URL, meeting schedule, location, and any other info.

The general idea is to reduce the size of the newsletter while still providing the information you need, in a more accessible format. (This issue is about 20% smaller than previous issues.) We hope these changes will make your reading experience more enjoyable. We will continue to make changes (probably not so big) over the coming months. If you have any comments or suggestions on the format, please send them to editor@sluug.org.

Another change in the newsletter is the addition of Brandon Erhart to our editorial staff. He will be contributing articles, editing, and and helping to prepare the newsletter for distribution. You'll see his contributions increasing over the coming months. Thanks for the help, Brandon!

Wireless SIG

The St. Louis Web Developer's Wireless SIG is a special interest group dedicated to wireless technologies. It is a cooperative effort of both the St. Louis Web Developers Organization (http://www.stlwebdev.org) and the St. Louis Java User Group (http://www.ociweb.com/javasig).

Our group meets on the fourth Tuesday of the month at One City Place in the auditorium. Meetings begin at 6:30 pm with a social half hour and refreshments. The program begins at 7:00 pm with a Q&A session and a technical presentation. Our web site contains an archive of previous talks. Meetings are free and open to everyone. Discussion tends to be lively. We have a good mix of beginner and experienced developers as well as marketing/sales people who provide a different perspective on the wireless technologies.

The next meeting will be Tuesday, November 27, 2001. Joe Brennan will be discussing the Wireless Developer Trail - Wireless LANs (http://www.stlwebdev.org/membership/sigs/wireless/#Anchor-The-49575).

For more details on the Wireless SIG and instructions on how to sign up for our announcement and discussion email lists, see our website (http://www.stlwebdev.org/sigs/wireless) or contact Mark Balbes (mark@balbes.com).

Note on BBS Payments

If you have an account on our BBS system, payments are due soon. Look for an email from our treasurer, Mike Kriz, soon. The BBS rate is $60 per year. You can pay by check or credit card at the general SLUUG meeting -- talk to the book sales folks. You can also pay by check to PO Box 411302, St. Louis, MO 63141.

Sponsors

• Analysts International - http://www.analysts.com/
• Accenture (formerly Andersen Consulting) - http://www.accenture.com/
• Bradford & Galt - http://www.bradfordandgalt.com/
• CIBER, Inc. - http://www.ciber.com/
• Cybercon - http://www.cybercon.com/
• Cypress Systems, Ltd. - http://www.cypress-systems.com/
• Daugherty Systems - http://www.daugherty.com/
• Graybar Electric - http://www.graybar.com/
• Informix Corporation - http://www.informix.com/
• Maryville Data Systems, Inc. - http://www.maryville.com/
• Maverick Tube Corporation - http://www.maverick-tube.com/
• O'Reilly & Associates - http://www.ora.com/
• Renaissance Worldwide, Inc. - http://www.rens.com/
• Sacerdoti Linux Machines - http://www.slinuxmachines.com/ {link may be down}
• Sun Microsystems - http://www.sun.com/
• Stopka & Associates - http://www.stopka.com/
• Sunnen Products - http://www.sunnen.com/
• Sykes Enterprises, Inc. - http://www.sykes.com/
• Technisource Inc. - http://www.tsrc.net/
• Triple-I Corporation - http://www.triplei.com/
• Venmar Systems, Inc. - http://www.venmar.com/
• The Law Offices of Rich McLennan - mclennan@sluug.org

For more information about sponsoring the St. Louis UNIX Users Group, contact Dave Mills (sponsorship@sluug.org).

Special Interest Groups (SIGs)

Volunteering

Contacts

Submitting Articles to the SLUUG Cronicle