LUG Meet 16th August 2013

When we started IITR Linux Group a few years back there were about 5 people in it. Yes you read that right. The situation was pretty sad. All systems in Institute Computer Center run Windows, even most of the iMac’s in IITR’s library run Windows.

The numbers didn’t really faze us though. We kept at it and now we are very happy to report a turnout of over 100 people for the first LUG meetup of this semester, conducted on 16th August. While the iMacs and other systems are still running Windows, we are sure we’ll get there eventually and make our campus Linux friendly soon.

While we have pretty grand plans for LUG and the whole developer environment in IITR in general, we are aware that we’ll have to take things slowly. Hence, the first meetup, which was targeted towards freshers, was mostly an introduction to the world of Linux. Abhay Rana of SDSLabs, popularly known as Capt. Nemo, gave a talk on who uses linux and why ‘You’ should use linux. The talk was well received, or so we hope!

The idea for a Linux User Group was given by Shobhit Singh, founder of SDSLabs. The idea was to promote the use of open source softwares and open source development in the campus. The meeting was about introducing IITR developers to the Linux universe. Much of the technological progress in the last decade has been brought about by Linux in various sectors; despite its small market share in the desktop market. (It rules in other markets, including Super Computers, Servers, and Mobile Devices)

Since the agenda was introduction to Linux, the meet wouldn’t really have lived up to that if we had not introduced the saintly, the almighty, the great, TERMINAL! A team from IMG (Pramod & Pawan) went through the basic commands and tried to give an idea of what all can be done via the terminal (basically everything). Then Abhishek Das of SDSLabs showed off his command line-fu. He ‘cut’ and ‘grep’ped through a huge file containing all JEE ranks demonstrating the speed and ease of command line.

The talk and demonstration were followed by a small question answer session. SDSLabs members fielded a variety of “I can do this on windows too” questions. We are sure we managed to convince most of the people to atleast give Linux try.

If you have any doubts about using Linux, please join us on our Google Group, where we will

be more than happy to help you out with your issues. Also, feedback is always welcome. Drop us a mail on [email protected] or just post it in the LUG google group.

What’s next? Linux Installation Party! Join us on 4th September at Hobbies club, between 5 PM to 7 PM.

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Team SDSLabs