1. Meeting overview and key information

Present

• Joel Addison (President)
• Wil Brown (Vice-President)
• Sae Ra Germaine  (Council)
• Russell Stuart (Treasurer)
• Jonathan Woithe (Council)

• Neill Cox (Secretary)

Apologies

• None received

Not present

• Marcus Herstik (Council)

Meeting opened at 20:03 AEST by Joel and quorum was achieved.

Minutes taken by Jonathan and Neil.

2. Log of correspondence

• 26 Oct 2023 Christopher Neugebauer re Intent to establish Independent Subcommittee for PyCon AU – Joel has responded
• 28 Oct 2023 Russell Curry re Canberra Linux kernel conference – Joel has responded
• 31 Oct 2023 Andrew Ruthven re NZ GST – Sae Ra has responded
• 31 Oct 2023 Dave Sparks re Physical address in Australia for Visa
• 01 Nov 2023 Kathy Reid re Change to auDA domain name rules – request to make submission under LA banner – Joel has responded
• 01 Nov 2023 Les Kitchen – Possible donation to Linux Australia from disincorporation of Melbourne Functional Programming Association Incorporated
• 6 Nov 2023 Membership enquiry from Julia Topliss via the Linux Australia Website Contact Form – Jonathan has responded

3. Items for discussion

• PyCon AU Steering Committee

Motion: That Linux Australia establish PyCon AU as a Steering Committee subcommittee.

Seconded: Neill Cox

Motion passed unanimously

• Drupal South request for a physical address in Australia for use with visa applications
• Canberra Linux kernel conference

Need to ensure timing fits with other conferences, particularly Everything Open.

• Melbourne Functional Programming Association Incorporated

Jonathan will speak to Les Kitchen to discuss the process. Perhaps we can use the funds for a functional programming award, or some other activity that relates to the work of the association.

4. Items for noting

• Open Source Australia business name renewal

Motion: That the Open Source Australia business name be renewed for 3 years.

Seconded: Russell Stuart

Vote was held on the mailing list. For: 6, No: 0. Motion passed.

Russell will now renew the business name.

• Feedback was provided to auDA on their proposed changes to the .au Domain Administration Rules: Licensing (.au Licensing Rules). Thanks to Kathy Reid for providing feedback to LA and assisting with this process.

• Russell plans to not produce the same glossy annual report as in previous years. Will produce the same reports, but in a simpler format. Sae Ra will apply LA’s corporate branding to the text. Neill will request submissions from the subcommittees.

5. Other business

• Drupal subcommittee update

Canberra Community day in two weeks. Has come together well. 100 delegates attending and 10 on a wait list. Follows on/attached to the GovCMS meetup. Attendance for government employees is free, but 40% of attendees gave purchased tickets and 7 of 6(!) sponsorship slots were taken up and the budget is healthy.

CFP not as strong as they would normally expect, but there are good presenters.

Sydney in March next year. Tickets are on sale and have sold 11 early birds already without much promotion. A track chair is in place. CFP has gone out. Hoping to get the schedule up before Christmas, but people aren’t very focussed on next year.

Sydney sponsorships are selling well, but still early. Hoping to get as much finalised before Christmas as time pressure will be ramping up after the end of the year.

There is a Drupal Asia conference coming up that Drupal South would like to participate in. There are scattered Drupal communities across Asia. It would be good to have an event that they could all participate in. Dates and venue are being considered and discussions with the Drupal Association for support. If the Drupal Association is not available then they will look for help from some other group (probably not LA) How interested would LA be in supporting the conference? Can Drupal South be a sponsor?

LA response: Interested in helping, but we only have insurance in Australia, so would have to look at feasibility and cost. LA has Australian and New Zealand bank accounts, and a Wise account. We would need more information before we could commit anything.

Visa address: Who for? What liability for LA if they overstay their visa? Needs to be a physical address not a PO box. COuld possibly use the LA Secretary’s address or perhaps the conference chair.

• Admin team update

The archives of old PyCon AU websites have been extracted and sent through to the team, so this is now complete.

Planning an update for the LA website, want to have the email migration done before then.

Some thought about policy controls for managing mail under Fastmail for things like Everything Open. 

Existing mail will be moved to an archive namespace as part of the migration.

Shipping of banners and other LA gear to Rob Thomas for Everything Open? Steve can ship a palette to Gladstone if needed.

Steve will submit reimbursement and a budget for next year soon.

Some old servers to sell, but probably won’t get much for them, but Steve will make best effort to get a reasonable return.

Current servers are due for disk replacement. That will be part of next year’s budget, but Steve will provide an estimate so it can be provided as part of the reporting for the upcoming AGM.

• Joomla subcommittee update

No response received.

• PyCon AU subcommittee update

The PyCon AU team are unable to attend in person. Richard Jones has supplied this update:

We’ve met with council, and unanimously decided to form a Steering Committee (rather than Independent), waiting on next steps.

We’ve heard back from MCEC, pending exact quote, and sending a budget to council, for our 2024 event.

We are actively looking for someone to step in to chair the event.

• Flounder subcommittee update

Russell did respond on the night, but we could not get him online in time.

• LUV  subcommittee update

No response received to invitation.

• WordPress subcommittee update

The conference will be called WordCamp Sydney

UTS looks like the best venue.

Trying to form an organising committee. There are 26 volunteers to help with the organising. Roles need to be defined.

• Everything Open 2024

First meeting of the organising committee has happened.

The post Council Meeting November 8, 2023 appeared first on Linux Australia.

1. Meeting overview and key information

Present

• Joel Addison (President)
• Wil Brown (Vice-President)
• Sae Ra Germaine  (Council)
• Russell Stuart (Treasurer)
• Jonathan Woithe (Council)

• Neill Cox (Secretary)
• Marcus Herstik (Council)

Apologies

• None received

Not present

Meeting opened at 20:32 AEST by Joel and quorum was achieved.

Minutes taken by Neill.

2. Log of correspondence

• To Russell Coker: Report for Linux Australia grant: Pinephone development

No response yet.

• To Elena Williams: Report for Linux Australia grant: Girls Canberra #1

Elena has responded and will send in a report.

• ASIC: Successful renewal: OPEN SOURCE AUSTRALIA
• Michael Richardson Re:  Stripe Deposits – Russell responded
• To Russell Coker: Pinephone activity talk submission for EO2024 – Russell promised a submission by 11 Nov
• Katie McLaughlin Re: Intent to establish Independent Subcommittee for PyCon AU – latest response from Jonathan informing PyCon AU of the motion passed at the last council meeting. We’re now waiting on budgets.
• Enquiry from Alex Simmons via the Linux Australia Website Contact Form – Jonathan has responded with the EO dates.
• Drupal South: Payment approval request – Russell has responded and Michael has sorted out his identification issues with Westpac
• Enquiry from Cornelius du Preez via the Linux Australia Website Contact Form – Wil has responded indicating that the account has been deleted as requested.
• EO2024 CFP on lwn
• Enquiry from Lauryn Westwood via the Linux Australia Website Contact Form – Jonathan has responded. Back with Lauryn now. She seems to have had some problems with password reset emails, but Jonathan hasn’t heard back after the last attempt to help.

We may have an issue with the contact form, as emails don’t seem to be reliably received. Sae Ra and Steve will check the server logs for problems, but the last four inquiries have been received.

3. Items for discussion

• Canberra Linux Kernel conference – Russell was invited to attend tonight’s meeting, and was able to attend.

We had a general discussion about the logistics and funding of running an LA auspiced conference.

We can offer support with registration systems, websites, payments and insurance. The usual way of doing this is to form a subcommittee for running the conference and running a financial induction to provide access to Xero and a bank account.

Russell suggested a date later in the year after Everything Open. LA would like a date that does not conflict with other conferences Drupal South  (March),  EverythingOpen (April),  PyCon AU (November) and  Word Camp Sydney (November)

There is a surprisingly large community of kernel developers in Canberra between a number of employers and even government agencies. A Canberra focused event should be able to draw around 50 people, a larger event would be possible if not locally focused, but would be more expensive and complicated to run.

Starting with a smaller event seems like a good idea, and then build up if successful.

The event would be a single day affair for the first one at least.

Still brainstorming names – no decision yet.

Next steps are to find at least one more person on the organising team. Apart from anything else this will make payments/bank account access easier.

Joel will share a sample budget with Russell, which will probably be overkill but at least a good starting point.

Russell will send through a proposal soon.

• We will aim to hold the AGM on 20 Jan 2024. Election dates will be calculated accordingly.

4. Items for noting

• Sae Ra and Kathy Reid will be running a session on Sunday to help with writing Everything  Open proposals.

5. Other business

The post Council Meeting November 22, 2023 – Minutes appeared first on Linux Australia.

1. Meeting overview and key information

Present

• Joel Addison (President)
• Wil Brown (Vice-President)
• Sae Ra Germaine  (Council)
• Russell Stuart (Treasurer)
• Jonathan Woithe (Council)

• Neill Cox (Secretary)

Apologies

• None received

Not present

• Marcus Herstik (Council)

Meeting opened at 20:07 AEST by Joel and quorum was achieved.

Minutes taken by Neill.

2. Log of correspondence

• 2023-11-23 Xero reconciliations
• 2023-11-27 Action needed for your Wise Business account – Russell has responded
  Note: This also required supplying birth dates for various council members.
• 2023-11-24 Linux Australia’s 2022/2023 audit
• 2023-11-24 Activity Statement from ATO Portal for the auditor – From Russell. The required activity statement has now been provided.
• 2023-11-29 Grant Application from Russell Coker for RISC-V, smart-watch, and tablet computing development
• 2023-11-29 Report for Linux Australia grant: Pinephone development
• 2023-11-30 Report for Linux Australia grant: Girls Canberra #1  
• 2023-11-30 Grant Application from Lyndsey Jackson for Hack The Triangle Digital Skills Holiday Workshops
• 2023-11-30 Audit documents
• 2023-12-01 Grant Application from David M Williams for RISC-V hardware
• 2023-12-01  Grant program update

3. Items for discussion

• Kiwi PyCon 2024
  • Application will be forthcoming for Kiwi PyCon 2024 to run under the auspices of Linux Australia

4. Items for noting

• Jonathan now has all the grant reports and will forward them to the appropriate person for inclusion in the LA Annual Report.

5. Other business

• Drupal subcommittee update
  • Canberra Community day
    • good feedback, went well. Had a waiting list. 112 registrations when the target was 80. 86 people actually attended on the day. Post event survey has had limited responses but they were positive.
    • Budget not finalised yet, but looks like break even or perhaps a small profit.
    • Helped that it was held the day after the GovCMS event. Approx 60% government employees and 40% Drupal agencies. Those government attendees indicated that they would attend if it was held in Canberra again, but less likely to travel.
  • Sydney: planning going well about half of the sponsorships are sold. Seems people may be struggling
    • 85/88 talk  submissions which is typical for the larger Australian conferences. Track chairs are happy with quality.
    • Will be unable to bring someone over from the Drupal Association for a keynote. But may be able to do a panel. Still looking for a few more keynote speakers.
  • The Drupal subcommittee is also looking for other conferences to attend to promote Drupal South. 
  • The Drupal South Subcommittee will try and speak at Everything Open. Possibly as a cross promotional effort.
  • Budgets for past events (Wellington and Canberra) will probably not be finalised until January.

• Admin team update
  • Mainly working with Sae Ra on the test upgrade of the website. Have hit a few issues. Will need to reach out to AgileWare. Will probably require building a new VM once the actual software stack can be determined.

• The admin team are also talking to FastMail to iron out the final details. In particular what LA offers to FastMail for their support. Possibly a pair of tickets to LA events per year. Subject to final approval by LA council.
• Slack billing needs to be looked into, they appear to have a slightly odd billing cycle. Will probably be looking for a replacement for Slack or applying for a not-for-profit licence.

• Joomla subcommittee update

Successfully running hybrid meetings

About time to have a face to face so the Joomla subcommittee is planning a mini Joomla day for 24 February. It will be a single day event. 

• Welcome on Friday night. 
• Program on Saturday. 
• Pizza/Code sprint on Sunday

It’s been three years since the last face to face event!

The goal is to keep the ticket price low. 

• Self fund drinks. 
• Not going to look for sponsors.
• Bring your own T-shirt from previous conferences
• Networking focussed event.
• Rough budgets on 20/40/60 attendees. 
• Will also aim to hold Joomla committee elections.
• Venue will be OPN 365’s office space.

• PyCon AU subcommittee update

The PyCon AU team are unable to attend in person. Richard Jones has supplied this update:

Little has happened since the last update. Our focus has been on trying to secure a chair for the next conference, which is ongoing (but far from hopeless, we’re currently talking to a number of people).

• Flounder subcommittee update

Recent meeting about SEL4, expect to have some more meetings on the topic in the future

Also have recently had meetings about Linux phones 

Meetings tend to have about four attendees. Attendees vary with the topic.

Promoted via the Flounder website, matrix and email

Perhaps LA can help promote on other social media platforms (but it would be help if the council was reminded)

Ideal meeting size would be around 10 people. They tend to be focussed on technical work. If more attendees were present the focus could be shifted to more of a lecture style.

• LUV  subcommittee update

• WordPress subcommittee update
  • Organising team formed: 12 members
  • WordCamp Central orientation meeting
  • WordCamp Sydney 2024 approved – in planning stage
  • Website holding page https://sydney.wordcamp.org/2024/ 
  • Next steps: Organising team onboarding, Venue lockin and dates, Apply to LA to form subcommittee

• Everything Open 2024

Call for sessions has closed 101 quality submissions

No free keynotes, some paid keynotes but they are a bit pricey

Several sponsors have signed up . Happy at this point, but need a few more by January.

Not ready to open ticket sales yet, but will hopefully be ready to in January.

The post Council Meeting December 6, 2023 – Minutes appeared first on Linux Australia.

1. Meeting overview and key information

Present

• Joel Addison (President)
• Wil Brown (Vice-President)
• Neill Cox (Secretary)
• Russell Stuart (Treasurer)
• Sae Ra Germaine  (Council)
• Jonathan Woithe (Council)

Apologies 

Not Present

• Marcus Herstik (Council)

Meeting opened at 20:05 AEDT by Joel  and quorum was achieved.

Minutes taken by Neill

2. Log of correspondence

• Steve Walsh: admin team reimbursements
• Russell Stuart: Draft Proposals (Kiwi PyCon XIII)
• Russell Stuart: Supporting documents for Kiwi Pycon 2024
• Meetup: Meetup Invoice AU2023-16828
• Michael Richardson: DrupalSouth Community Day Budget
• Russell Stuart: Linux Australia’s 2022/2023 audit
• Russell Stuart: Tax invoice attached (for audit)

3. Items for discussion

• Motion: The treasurer and president sign the following statement from the auditor:
  • Principal activities
    
    Linux Australia is the peak body for Linux User Groups (LUGs) around Australia, and as such represents approximately 5000 Australian linux users and developers.
    
    There have been no significant changes in the state of affairs of the association during the year.

Operating Result

The profit of the association for the financial year after providing for income tax amounted to $123,426.

Significant changes in state of affairs

There have been no significant changes in the state of affairs of the association during the year.

Events after the reporting date

No matters or circumstances have arisen since the end of the financial year which significantly affected or may significantly affect the operations of the association, the results of those operations or the state of affairs of the association in future

financial years.

Signed in accordance with a resolution of the members of the committee: (president & treasurer).

• MOVED BY: Russell Stuart
• SECONDED: Sae Ra
• Outcome: Passed unanimously

• MOTION: The treasurer signs the engagement letter from our auditor
  • Their cover letter said: It is a best practice in our industry that all work is undertaken is covered by an up-to-date and relevant engagement letter – we always endeavour to operate at the highest standard of doing business. This letter ensures we both have a common understanding of what is required to be delivered, for what charge and also lists our general terms of doing business and also anything specific to the services you have requested.   But perhaps the main reason is they want us to acknowledge the price rise from $5500 to $6050.  The previous price rise was in 2016.
  • MOTION: The treasurer signs the auditors engagement letter.
  • MOVED BY: Russell Stuart
  • SECONDED: Joel
  • Outcome: Passed unanimously

• Grant applications to be discussed
  • RISC-V, smart-watch and tablet computing development, from Russell Coker and Yifei Zhan. Funding applied for: $1600

MOTION: Council approves the grant application from Russell and Yifei to purchase hardware as described in the grant application.

MOVED: Joel

SECONDED: Wil

OUTCOME: Motion failed.

Russell and Yifei are encouraged to provide a more detailed proposal for the consideration of next year’s council.

• RISC-V hardware for FOSS database development, from David Williams. Funding applied for: $2117.40

MOTION: Council approves the grant application from David Williams to purchase hardware as described in the grant application.

MOVED:  Joel

SECONDED: Neill

OUTCOME: Failed with one abstention.

David has provided a detailed proposal. Only one response from the membership has been received and it advocated for the $2,117.40 option. 

Mitigating against this proposal is that there already seems to be work in this area – see https://riscv.org/blog/2023/08/risc-v-public-beta-platform-release-%C2%B7-database-adaptation-evaluation-on-risc-v-server/

David is encouraged to provide a clearer explanation of which databases and what target distribution is intended.

• Hack the Triangle workshops, from Lyndsey Jackson. Funding applied for: $2000

MOTION: Council approves the grant application from Lyndsey Jackson to run the workshops as per the grant application, subject to there being clear application and promotion of open source values and resources.

MOVED:  Joel

SECONDED: Wil

OUTCOME: Motion passed

4. Items for noting

5. Other business

• Call for Nominations

Opening the election will happen on 26 December. Slightly delayed due to technical issues. The announcement email can be sent now to give the members as much notice as possible. 

• AGM

Will be announced in the election email

• EO2024
  • Code of Conduct – Sae Ra will convene the code of conduct team to review and respond to any items raised.
  • The organising team is now operating better, and items are progressing positively.

The post Council Meeting December 20, 2023 – Minutes appeared first on Linux Australia.

Saturday 21 January 2023, 2:35pm AEDT (UTC+11)

Video conference via Zoom.

Attendance record is available upon request.

0. Apologies

Josh Bartlett

Craige McWhirter

Hugh Blemmings

Russell Stuart – arrived 2:50pm, just in time to give his report.

Proxies:

Miles Goodhew for Hugh Blemmings

1. President’s welcome

MR JOEL ADDISON, President

2. Approval of the minutes from the previous Annual General Meeting – 2022

MOTION by MR JOEL ADDISON that the minutes of the Annual General Meeting 2022 of Linux Australia be accepted as complete and accurate.

The minutes are available at:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1aK91S5O_G4eucM-3RRUThED5CYH1kx2PhnyNY8uT01A/edit?usp=sharing

Clinton Roy seconds the motion.

PROVISIONAL, NO PROXY:

24/24 voted

Yea 20 83%

Nay 0 0%

Abstain 4 17%

Motion has passed.

3. To receive the REPORTS of activities of the preceding year from OFFICE BEARERS

MR JOEL ADDISON – President

MR CLINTON ROY – Secretary

MR RUSSELL STUART – Treasurer

Includes presentation of the Auditor’s Report

Question from Miles to Clinton about notifications/emails. Clinton responds that it’s only one or two a day generally, but during times of great upset, it’s a lot of time to deal with complicated questions.

Question from Sae Ra to Russell, is LA going to be able to stick with the 6% LA tax, or are we going to have to raise it. Russell says it’s very hard, this year it was near 7%, and that is without the fairly expensive face-to-face; which is an important event for new council members. Russell would be in favour of raising it to keep such important activities happening.

Question from Katie about the election, the window was only nine days, was quorum achieved. Joel responds that the scrutineers report is at the end of the agenda. We don’t have a high quorum required, so it was easily achieved. End of voting date was earlier this year than when we ran AGM in person, but similar to last year. This was done to give Council time to prepare everything, especially for the returning officer. Joel apologises for not opening and advertising it earlier.

Question from Hamilton: Does Linux Australia still support OpenInfra Foundation? No one on council can remember any interactions this year, Joel will look into it.

Question from Hamilton: Will Linux.org.au Elections extension have [an] option to allow nominees to be emailed to accept nomination? That will be added to a list of things the council wants to update, including mail outs, and making the interface easier.

MOTION by RUSSELL STUART that the Auditor’s Report is a true statement of financial accounts. Seconded by Joel Addison.

26/26 voted

Yea 26 92%

Nay 0 0%

Abstain 2 8%

Motion is passed.

MOTION by JOEL ADDISON that the President’s report is correct. Seconded by Russell Stuart.

26/26 voted

Yea 23 88%

Nay 0 0%

Abstain 3 12%

Motion is passed.

MOTION by CLINTON ROY that the Secretary’s report is correct. Seconded by Jonathan Woithe.

26/26 voted

Yea 23 88%

Nay 0 0%

Abstain 3 12%

Motion is passed.

MOTION by RUSSELL STUART that the Treasurer’s report is correct. Seconded by Wil Brown.

26/26 voted

Yea 23 88%

Nay 0 0%

Abstain 3 12%

Motion is passed.

MOTION by JOEL ADDISON that the actions of Council during 2022 are endorsed by the membership. Seconded by Neill Cox.

24/26 voted

Yea 24 92%

Nay 0 0%

Abstain 2 8%

Motion is passed.

4. To CONSIDER items tabled in the call for agenda items

MOTION by Kathy Reid that the Linux Australia community endorse the actions of Council 2022 and thank them for their valued volunteer service. Sae Ra Germaine seconds the motion.

26/26 voted

Yea 22 85%

Nay 0 0%

Abstain 4 15%

Motion is passed.

MOTION by Craige McWhirter that after discussion of the merits of changing

titles from President / Vice President to Convenor / Co-Convenor that the

meeting chair tests the meeting for consensus that the suggested change is

worth including in the constitutional review, falling back to a vote if

consensus is blocked. Paul Wayper seconds the motion.

As mentioned in the motion, discussion on the merits of changing the name was opened.

Sae Ra comments that having certain role names in the organisation makes us look more professional. Wil comments that these role names are in the constitution, and would require a referendum to change. Jonathan comments that everyone knows what a president of an organisation is, but not a lot of people know what a convenor is, we should stick with the standard terms used elsewhere. Hamilton, used to be president of a musical society, easy to communicate with other entities with a well known role name. Kathy advocates against the motion, LA gives career experience to those that sit on council, and it looks better on the CV as the current role names that people understand, not as useful with the proposed role names. Steve thinks there are defined titles required by the corporations act, such as president, chair etc. and that even if this motion gets through, we might not be able to make such a change to the constitution. The original email with the motion and some motivations gets mentioned, wanting a flatter organisation, which is more in line with FLOSS organisations. Consensus was that a change in the titles is not desired.

A vote on the motion was then held, with people voting on whether they agree with changing the titles.

26/26 voted

Yea 1 4%

Nay 22 85%

Abstain 3 12%

Motion has failed.

5. DECLARATION of Election and WELCOME of incoming Council by the Returning Officer

Returning officer is Julien Goodwin.

See Appendix 1 for the Scrutineers Report. Julien delivers the report verbally to those in attendance.

Hamilton notes that the system is rather complicated to attempt to install, compared to standard wordpress. Why was this system picked? Kathy responds, part one, a number of factors went into the decision, what would the member system sit on top of, at the time there were more skills with wordpress. The second part, the elections module was a commissioned piece of work, a plugin to the system that we had. We decided to use open source solutions to align with LA’s values. Steve responds, this is a module within wordpress, it’s tightly entwined with a particular version of php, and Steve spent a chunk of time porting the module from Agileware hosted website to our own hosting. Steve has a bunch of notes on how this would be done, and is happy to share those with those willing to update the plugin.

Joshua asks what data was left behind, Julien responds it’s metadata of previous votes, with enough data linking, it could be used to determine voters from previous elections. The admin team have been tasked with cleaning it up.

6. NOMINATION and ELECTION of Members to Vacant Council Positions

All positions were filled during the original election, so no nomination or election was held during the meeting.

7. To HEAR and RESPOND to questions from the floor

Jonathan noted that the role name motion was about allowing a discussion on the issue at the meeting. However, when the vote was taken it was treated as a vote on including the role name issue in the constitutional review (the consensus test).  A further discussion makes it clear that the vote was a good enough consensus guage: that the consensus of the meeting was to not include the role names in the constitutional review.

Appendix 1 – Scrutineers report

Julien Goodwin, January 20, 2023

Dear Council,

As Returning Officer for the 2023 Council Election I am taking on a duty to ensure that;

• The Election has been run in line with the Linux Australia Constitution
• That the results of the Election have been scrutinised, and appropriate checks made to satisfy a reasonable person that the integrity of the Election has been upheld
• And to report my findings, adverse or otherwise, to Council, who are responsible to act on those findings

This email serves as a record of the actions taken to ensure the above, and serves as a formal process for Returning Officers to follow in years to come.

In summary my findings are that:

• The election has been run in line with the Linux Australia Inc., Constitution as per the Linux Australia website
• The results of the Election have been scrutinised, and I am satisfied that the integrity of the Election has been upheld
  The results are summarised below
  The recommendation from previous years that the CiviCRM election module eliminate candidates who are elected to lower-ranked positions if they are already elected to a higher ranked position is still required.

Detailed notes follow. These notes include PII references that will need to be redacted if this report is presented to members.

Julien Goodwin

January 20th 2023

Compliance with the Constitution

S(15) of the Constitution stipulates the following requirements, which I have validated:

• Nominations of candidates and their consent to be nominated is handled via the CiviCRM election module; no manual check done
• The number of nominations exceeds the number of positions, and a ballot is being held, via the CiviCRM election module
• The ballot cannot be conducted more than 60 days before an AGM; the AGM is 21 January 2023, the ballot occurred after nominations closed on 8 January 2023. This is in line with the Constitution.
• A person nominated to Council must be a current member of Linux Australia, Inc. This is enforced by the CiviCRM election module; no manual check done

I am satisfied that the Constitution has been complied with.

The post Minutes of Linux Australia – Annual General Meeting 2023 appeared first on Linux Australia.

1. Meeting overview and key information

Present

• Joel Addison (President)
• Wil Brown (Vice-President)
• Neill Cox (Secretary)
• Russell Stuart (Treasurer)
• Sae Ra Germaine  (Council)
• Jonathan Woithe (Council)

Apologies 

Not Present

• Marcus Herstik (Council)

Meeting opened at 20:02 AEDT by Joel  and quorum was achieved.

Minutes taken by Neill

2. Log of correspondence

• RISC-V hardware for software development – grant application decision
• Payment Approval Request – DrupalSouth Community Day
• A couple of website and social updates in preparation for AGM / elections
• Open Source AI Definition: Version 0.0.3 released, planning a global outreach
• Hack the Triangle Workshops – grant application decision
• Application to form a Kiwi PyCon 2024 subcommittee
• BAS Time
• [Linux-aus] contest proposal

3. Items for discussion

• MOTION: Linux Australia accepts the provisional budget for 2024.
  • MOVED BY: Russell Stuart
  • SECONDED: Neill Cox
  • OUTCOME: Motion passed unanimously
• Kiwi PyCon subcommittee for 2024
  • MOTION: Linux Australia accepts Kiwi PyCon XIII (2024) as an event subcommittee, per the proposal provided.
  • MOVED BY: Joel
  • SECONDED: Jonathan
  • OUTCOME: Motion passed unanimously 
• One motion passed in camera, to be released later.
• Programming Contest Proposal – Linux Aus mailing list
  • The council is generally supportive of this, but it is something for the next council to decide the details of, given a proposal is still forthcoming. It has been good to see a discussion of this sort on the mailing list.

4. Items for noting

• Auditors report has been signed by the auditor
• P&L by conference for 2022/2023
• Annual Report

5. Other business

None.

The post Council Meeting January 03, 2024 – Minutes appeared first on Linux Australia.

1. Meeting overview and key information

Present

• Joel Addison (President)
• Wil Brown (Vice-President)
• Neill Cox (Secretary)
• Russell Stuart (Treasurer)
• Sae Ra Germaine  (Council)
• Jonathan Woithe (Council)
• Marcus Herstik (Council)

Apologies 

Not Present

Meeting opened at 20:07 AEDT by Joel  and quorum was achieved.

Minutes taken by Neill

2. Log of correspondence

• Application to form a Kiwi PyCon 2024 subcommittee
• RISC-V hardware for software development – grant application decision
• Annual Report now out on socials
• Linux Australia Sponsorship of NZ Python User Group
• Linux Australia – Subcommittee Update  (Drupal)
• Lodge Linux Australia Activity Statement October..December 2023
• Email issues

Forwarded to admin team for investigation

• WRT Richard Shea/NZPUG LA Membership application

Application was received after the election opened. Put on hold until after voting closed.

• Sponsorship agreement template, Code of Conduct, anything else?
• Fwd: Charity audit
• Details following induction (KiwiPyCon)
• Many AGM registrations 
• Several redbubble sales

3. Items for discussion

• Joomla Event – Reconnect with Joomla 2024
  • Friday 15th to Sunday 17th March

Relatively small event, not many attendees (20 – 60), low budget. Good to see them active again.

The catering costs in the budget seem very optimistic (perhaps because someone is sponsoring in kind?), we will ask for clarification.

• AGM
• Scheduled for this Saturday (20 Jan 2024). We had to make a correction to the time in Zoom because Zoom reported the wrong time.

4. Items for noting

• Council election is now complete. The OCM position declaration will be finalised by the returning officer.

5. Other business

• NZPUG Audit

The cost of providing an audit of NZPUG is estimated at being at least $3,000 and possibly more than $10,000. These costs seem very high in proportion to the benefit that the audit would provide.

Neither organisation has any realistic prospect of recovering funds as a result of the audit. In particular there is no benefit to LA. NZPUG might be able to recover some money.

MOTION: That we approve a grant of a maximum $3,000 to NZPUG to get an audit done.

MOVED: Russell Stuart

SECONDED: Wil Brown

RESULT: Motion Failed

• Guarantor for KiwiPycon

The venue for KiwiPyCon is asking for a guarantor for the event. Hopefully the subcommittee will find a way around this. Russell will ask them to explore other options (references, insurance)

• Everything Open Gladstone

Second keynote announced. Ticket sales are slow, but given they only opened the week before Christmas this is not surprising.

The post Council Meeting January 17, 2024 – Minutes appeared first on Linux Australia.

1. Meeting overview and key information

Present

• Joel Addison (President)
• Sae Ra Germaine (Vice-President)
• Neill Cox (Secretary)
• Russell Stuart (Treasurer)
• Andrew Pam (Council)
• Jennifer Cox (Council)
• Jonathan Woithe (Council)

Apologies 

Not Present

Meeting opened at 20:05 AEDT by Joel  and quorum was achieved.

Minutes taken by Neill and Jonathan

2. Log of correspondence

• Lodge Linux Australia Activity Statement October..December 2023
• Scrutineers report
• Fwd: Charity audit (NZPUG)
• Xero reconciliations
• Linux Australia – Subcommittee Update [actually Reconnect with Joomla Budget]

Council members should have received an email with more details, but basically the previous council had some questions about the budget that had been submitted. A revised budget has now been submitted for the council’s consideration.

The new budget contains no sponsorship and is surprisingly frugal in their estimates of catering expenses. The budget is so small that it is unlikely to be a problem for LA, and Joomla has run previous events that have accumulated a buffer.

Once we accept a budget for an event we take responsibility for the results, including the possibility of a loss.

• Fwd: Third Party Public Liability Insurance [for KiwiPyCon]
• Issue with contact form on LA website – investigations and possible way forward
• Change to auDA domain name rules – request to make submission under LA banner
• May I assign LA as registrant of drupal.org.au?
• pyconau 2024 conference admin
• Fwd: Reconnect with Joomla Event
• Fwd: MHW Best Practice Program- Letter of Consent

3. Items for discussion

• Welcome to new council members

Recap: Fortnightly meetings for council. Ideally no more than an hour. Agenda available to everyone before meeting. Please add items to the agenda before the meeting starts.

Every second meeting is a subcommittee meeting where each of our subcommittees are invited to come along and report on how things are going.

Sometimes we discuss things that are not yet public, which will be minuted in the In Camera section. This may be something like a code of conduct issue or possibly information that a conference has shared with us but is not ready to make public.

Discussion and comments from everyone present are welcome, but please keep in mind that we are trying to be done in less than an hour.

We use Zoom for meetings as it is currently the best option available to us, but we would be happy to use a suitable open source option instead.

Similarly we use Google drive for document storage, but would like to move to an open source equivalent.

Jenny and Andrew will need to supply Joel with their preferred google account so that Joel can share the 2024 council directory.

We have a number of tasks to perform at the start of the new year. One requirement is Director IDs.

Details of committee members need to go into Linux Australia’s register, access to which can be requested by any member. This needs to include name, date of birth and address. There will be a document which shows the required details.

All council members will receive email from the council mailing address. It is sometimes best to allow discussion by the council before firing off a response.

We also have a (matrix) chat channel for quick discussions.

Sae Ra is happy to walk people through the various things that the council works on during the year.

Could everyone come with a few dot points for the next meeting addressing why we have all chosen to be on the council and what we would like to achieve this year?

4. Items for noting

• Would it be possible to get the AGM minutes up soonish rather than just before the AGM?

5. Other business

• Motion that the LA council accepts the proposed budget for the Reconnect with Joomla 2024 event and establishes an event subcommittee for this.

Moved by: Joel

Seconded: Sae Ra

Result: Passed unanimously

• auDA Response

Jonathan will prepare a draft response in consultation with Kathy Reid. To be published on the LA website and posted to email and/or social media.

There was a general discussion between the council with Sae Ra abstaining due to a conflict of interest.

• Contact Form on the Linux Australia website

Joel will discuss this with Wil to get advice on the best way to resolve the problem.

• Drupal.org.au domain name

It seems appropriate to transfer ownership of the domain to Linux Australia. Joel will respond to the email.

• PyconAU
  PyconAU  is now a steering committee. Late today they provided a draft budget for their next pycon conference and have notified us of their core committee membership.

PyconAU would like to lock in their venue for their proposed dates in November 2024.

• Motion by Joel: that the LA Council approve the venue contract for PyCon AU 2024, and pay the associated deposit.
  Moved by: Joel
  Seconded: Sae Ra
  Result: Passed unanimously
• Next steps: budget to be reviewed by LA Council over the next two weeks and be voted on at the next Council meeting.

• MHW Best Practice Program – Letter of Consent requested by the auditor. He would like to pass Linux Australia’s details on to CPA Australia as part of the Best Practice Program.
  • Motion: that LA approve Russell to sign the informed written consent for the MHW participation in the CPA Australia Best Practice Program assessment..
    Moved by Russell

Seconded: Neill
Result: Passed unanimously

• Meeting Times – are we happy to continue with Wednesday evenings at 2000 AEDT

After a brief discussion there was no significant disagreement about running the meetings at the current time. When daylight savings finishes we will move to 1930 AEST.

Meeting closed at 21:08

Next meeting is scheduled for 2024-02-14

The post Council Meeting January 31, 2024 – Minutes appeared first on Linux Australia.

1. Meeting overview and key information

Present

• Joel Addison (President)
• Sae Ra Germaine (Vice-President)
• Neill Cox (Secretary)
• Andrew Pam (Council)
• Russell Stuart (Treasurer)
• Jennifer Cox (Council)
• Jonathan Woithe (Council)

Apologies 

Not Present

Meeting opened at 20:06 AEDT by Joel  and quorum was achieved.

Minutes taken by Neill

2. Log of correspondence

• MHW Best Practice Program- Letter of Consent  [Julie Daly]
•  linux.org.au now has an Everything Open page [Kathy Reid]
• Reconnect with Joomla Event
• Open source Event [Carlos.Noschang Kuhn]
• APNIC Membership Renewal – Invoice Attached [Steve Walsh]
• other issue re: past member ROHAN McLEOD [Russell Coker]
• Undelivered Mail Returned to Sender [Russell Coker] – Sae Ra has responded
• Stripe account [Danny W. Adair] – Russell has responded
• How to document budget adjustments [Danny W. Adair] – Russell has responded
• May I assign LA as registrant of drupal.org.au? [Si Hobbs] – Neill sent the requested letter
• joomla event / induction [Stuart Robertson] – Russell has responded
• pyconau 2024 sub-committee request [Christopher Neugebauer]
• Call for OSI board nomination [OSI Elections team]
• bitwarden.com verification emails have gone AWOL [Steve Walsh]
• Issue with contact form on LA website – investigations and possible way forward [Kathy Reid] – Joel has responded
• Change to auDA domain name rules – request to make submission under LA banner [Kathy Reid] – Jonathan has responded
• DrupalSouth coming up, and a few other proposals [David Sparks]
• KPC 24 / Payment in excess of NZD5000 [Richard Shea] – Russell has responded
• Possible donation to Linux Australia from disincorporation of Melbourne Functional Programming Association Incorporated [Les Kitchen] – Joel has responded
• Approval for Xero invoice template [Nathan Morrow]

3. Items for discussion

• Drupal South

May not make as much money as initially hoped. David would like to speak to the council about a few things. It would probably help if the Drupal South website had some text explaining why it would be good to attend the conference. An example from Everything Open: https://2024.everythingopen.au/attend/why-should-employees-attend/

• PyConAU

Joel is a signatory for the contract. Chris is discussing one of the points in the contract, which may impact the budget.. We’re waiting for resolution of that before signing the contract.

The budget looks reasonable.

Russell has reviewed the budget. It seems conservative in regards to ticket sales and sponsorship, so the expected result will probably be better than what is outlined in the budget.

Motion: To establish PyConAU2024 as an event subcommittee in line with the budget provided

Moved: Joel

Seconded: Russell

Passed unanimously

• OSI board nomination

We have been offered a chance to nominate for their board. Sadly, there is no one on the council who has enough time to take up the offer.

• Open source Event (EO in Canberra)

Sae Ra will discuss this with Chris when possible. It’s from the … 2025 is not possible, but maybe they would like to bid for 2026.

• Goals:
  • Neill: Improve communication with subcommittees. Support and encourage more in person activities.
  • Russell: Sorting out the New Zealand situation. Helping with EO.
  • Jonathan: Keep working on the grants program and related activities. Encourage community participation and the next generation of community members.
  • Andrew: Joined to provide some choice of council members and felt that I had something to offer at a national level. Goals: Capitalise on the new Everything Open name/brand. Use it to engage new people, expand the reach of the community and broaden our remit. Also, a focus on COVID safety at our events, including hybrid and remote attendance.
  • Jenny: Keen to put forward the point of a view of the less technical members. Explain what open source offers to people who are in the non-tech community. Encourage participation from women in our community. Engage with government agencies using open source as part of their programmes.
  • Sae Ra: Document Everything Open so she can just be an attendee one year. Begin a discussion of what needs to be done in the way of updating our constitution. Look at how we do awards to recognise effort done by people in support of our community.
  • Joel: Focus on portfolios for council members, picking up on the work done by Sae Ra two years ago (https://linux.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/Council-Portfolios-2021.pdf) . Do a “stocktake” of our subcommittees. Fix some problems with the website (especially the election system). Updating the constitution. Start working on a five year strategic plan in consultation with the other council members.
• Sorting out NZ banking

We need some more people who can authorise payments in New Zealand. We also have some historical signatories that need to be rationalised. These are suspended signatories, who can be reactivated in the future if needed.

4. Items for noting

• NSW Fair Trading return submitted
• ASIC FORM 490 Change of Directors submitted
• Stuart Robertson Financial (Joomla Reconnect 24) induction done.

5. Other business

6. In camera

7. Action items

• Calendar invites for subcommittee meetings – Neill Cox

7.1 Completed Items

7.2 Carried Forward

Meeting closed at 20:51

Next meeting is scheduled for 2024-02-28

The post 2024-02-14 Council Meeting Minutes appeared first on Linux Australia.

1. Meeting overview and key information

Present

• Sae Ra Germaine (Vice-President)
• Neill Cox (Secretary)
• Andrew Pam (Council)
• Russell Stuart (Treasurer)
• Jennifer Cox (Council)
• Jonathan Woithe (Council)

Apologies 

• Joel Addison (President)

Not Present

Meeting opened at 20:00 AEDT by Sae Ra  and quorum was achieved.

Minutes taken by Neill

2. Log of correspondence

• Add Authoriser to ANZ Direct Online – 417289 Linux Australia (Incorporated)

Ideally all council members would be authorised. To be authroised they will need copies/scans of a passport and a utility bill with an address. Take them to a JP to certify. Then scan and email to ANZ NZ. Russell will email instructions to the council members.

• Possible donation to Linux Australia from disincorporation of Melbourne Functional Programming Association Incorporated

The money has been deposited. Linux Australia will consider an appropriate recognition.

• Inquiry: running an information security conference (Purplecon)

The organisers are invited to submit a proposal and budget. Russell will email them.

• OSI at FOSDEM, Open Source AI draft 0.5
• URGENT Re: pyconau 2024 sub-committee request

The urgent PyConAU matter has been dealt with (it was about signing the venue contract).

• New MoU with WordCamp Central

Sae Ra will sign the new MoU. It is functionally identical to the existing contract and makes no new commitments.

• Please authorise my request for ANZ mobile app
• WordCamp Sydney 2024 – Request to form a LA subcommittee

Proposal is still being discussed. One surprise is that the expected number of attendees is higher than the previous pre-covid conference.

• Trialling Wise
• DrupalAsia / DrupalCon Asia
• Issue with contact form on LA website – investigations and possible way forward
• Seeking Kiwi PyCon and NZ PUG information for the Linux Aus website
• The current process needed for ANZ
• Payment requests for DrupalSouth

3. Items for discussion

• OSI board nomination

Miles Goodhew has agreed to be nominated. A draft candidacy statement was provided to the council.

Motion: That Linux Australia accept and recommend Miles Goodhew as our nominee for the OSI board elections
Moved: Sae Ra Germaine
Seconded: Russell Stuart
Result: Passed unanimously

• WordCamp Subcommittee

Motion: That Linux Australia approves the formation of a WordCamp Subcommittee to run WordCamp 2024 with the following members:

• Wil Brown – Lead Organiser (Chair)
• Jordan Gillman – Organiser/Treasurer ( Treasurer)
• Dee Teal – Organiser/Program Manager
• Jo Minney – Organiser/Speaker Lead
• Eva Devos – Organiser/Swag & Merch/WPSyd Community Rep
• Sam Toohey  – Organiser/After Party/WPSyd Community Rep

Moved: Sae Ra Germaine
Seconded: Andrew Pam
Result: Passed unanimously

4. Items for noting

5. Other business

• Drupal sub committee update

Drupal South in three weeks! Good keynotes lined up. Second keynote is a Girls In Tech panel. Ticket sales are still coming in. Currently at 190 attendees. The expectation is  to end up somewhere over 200. Have hit revenue targets for tickets, but sponsorship is down. It’s particularly difficult for NZ companies this year, and there are headwinds for tech in general. Currently looks like a 25k loss for the conference. Twice as many entries for the awards show. Many first time attendees, more clients than developers which has been a goal.

One proposal for future conferences is to consider  ways to promote Drupal outside of the existing community by having a Drupal booth at other conferences e.g. FST Government Summits, Everything Open, Tech in Gov, EduTECH

Drupal Asia – Mike has been working with the Drupal Association to use the DrupalCon brand for the Asian Drupal conference. The Drupalm Association does not want to be the financial sponsor. Their preference would be to work with Linux Australia and licence the brand to Linux Australia. Licensing the brand would increase the chances of a successful conference. Mike would like to start a conversation with him, Linux Australia and the Drupal Association. From Linux Australia’s perspective this should basically fit into the template that we currently use for running conferences. We would need a budget that would account for the licensing fees, and some way of dealing with payments in whatever country/currency the conference is run in. Linux Australia will also need to make sure we can comply with any legal or taxation requirements. The first conference will most likely be in Singapore.

• Admin team update

Working on the new list server. Seeing weird stuff with Fastmail, but it can’t be definitively blamed on Fastmail. Something seems to be happening before the mail gets to Fastmail. The new listserver will go live this weekend. The new server will have a much cleaner config and will be easier to troubleshoot the problems.

The admin team have also been working on the web server upgrade.

Next in the queue is looking at the VM servers.

Also need to make sure we have correct contact details for any subcommittee servers running on Linux Australia infrastructure.

• Joomla sub committee update

THe conference is going well. Should make the minimum attendance budget, but may not get much more than that. Currently there are 14 confirmed attendees out of 20. There is an unexpected bonus sponsor. Several panel talks are planned as well as straight presentations.

The conference is now about two and a half weeks away.

• PyCon AU sub committee update

Contract with MCEC has been signed by Joel, and payment has been made. The financial induction still needs to be done. Clinton will chase people up for that. There is some wriggle room in the contract for catering. A decision on that will be held until the number of attendees is known.

• Flounder sub committee update

Has been meeting monthly. Low turnout, but different people and topics. People from both Australia and New Zealand, and even China. Mostly focussed on phones and mobile devices.

• LUV  sub committee update

Going quite well.  Two online meetings and one physical meeting each month. One social meeting, the regular LUV meetings and an in person technical support meeting. Generally around six people at each meeting.

LUV still doesn’t have a definite plan for holding an election, but is aware that it should happen soon. Andrew will poke Alexar about this.

• WordPress sub committee update

An invitation was not sent to the WordCamp organisers because of an oversight by the Secretary

6. In camera

• One item was discussed in camera

7. Action items

• Setup WordCamp Subcommittee Invite – Neill Cox

7.1 Completed Items

• Calendar invites for subcommittee meetings – Neill Cox

7.2 Carried Forward

Meeting closed at 21:37

Next meeting is scheduled for 2024-03-13

The post 2024-02-28 Council Meeting Minutes appeared first on Linux Australia.