Re: [Debconf-team] DC13.ch - Local Team Meeting Minutes - 2012-06-18
Ana Guerrero a...@debian.org writes: On Tue, Jun 19, 2012 at 06:54:16PM +0200, Didier 'OdyX' Raboud wrote: * DECISION: Wed. 5 September 2012, 18:45, Bern. * INFO: Romands would appreciate more meetings in Lausanne. * INFO: Philipp would appreciate more meetings in St-Gall. Hey, Just for curiosity, have you considered trying to have the meetings by IRC? They don't need to be public if you still want to talk some details privately. This also might allow some people who can not afford going to the meetings to join and help. As non Swiss probably are unable to guess this last comments lacks some partly joking tags. The discussion was more about Fribourg or Bern, which is much less of a difference in traveling distance. Not having the meetings on IRC is not about private/public but about communication bandwidth. To discuss the same amount of stuff the same meetings on IRC would take ages. IMO in person meetings also create a higher comitment than more anonymous forms of meetings. But we are considering doing some meetings over a mumble voice chat, but decided against it for the next meeting. Gaudenz ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
[Debconf-team] DebConf travel sponsorship (was: Re: Budget status - travel sponsorship)
[ Background for -project readers: debconf-team was discussing travel sponsorship money this year, and how it was sent so late, and how extremely non-ideal that is, considering when it is given so late prices are so much higher that the money can't go as far. ] On Sat, Jun 16, 2012 at 04:58:03PM -0500, Gunnar Wolf wrote: Moray Allan dijo [Sat, Jun 16, 2012 at 11:00:42AM +0100]: (...) Prices will often have gone up since the questions were asked, so whatever we do at this stage will tend to help people who inflated their initial answers more than those who tried to list a minimum price. In a future improved system this issue could be reduced by starting much earlier (as previously discussed), but might it also be worth implementing the system with some allowance for individuals to get permission to increase the requirements (up to some percentage?) after being granted sponsorship? As every year, I doubt we will ever¹ reach a perfect system for expressing who needs to be rated higher and when to communicate the decision. In order to plan with 3 months time sponsorship allocation, so that people can count on a ticket to stay at the level it was quoted, we need a funds acquisition logistics quite far from our current reach. While I recognize many people see a big failure point our way of handling travel sponsorship, I sincerely cannot imagine a realistic way to improve it much. Yes, we have done several improvements over the years, and I hope to keep making small steps for the better, but sorry - Answering in what I'd consider to be a nice timeframe is outside our possibilities. It is hard to improve things. The order we spend money is: venue rental, accom, food, a few other nice things, travel. If travel is prioritized low, and we always are short of money, travel will keep being last. This year, even if we had know of the surplus months before, it would have first been allocated to venue rental and accom, leaving none for travel until a week ago, *still* (I think). However, DebConf is always in a panic in March (as we are getting ready), and seems to always have a surplus in September (after DebConf) [debconf-surplus]. This is because we (our local teams!) keep finding cheaper options last-minute ways to do things, or more direct local support. We could decide to allocate travel early, before we knew we'd have a surplus, and have confidence we'd eventually reduce costs. However, we are too conservative (=responsible) to want to risk having a deficit. Thus, the travel-last system remains. But there is something we could do: Summon Bigger Bank. We would basically want something to even out the year to year uncertainty, and average out the travel sponsorship over years. And we do have a bigger bank: Debian. Imagine a system where Debian would guarantee an amount of travel sponsorship in March/April, it would be allocated to attendees early, and people would immediately buy tickets when costs were actually low. Also, people wouldn't have to game the system so much. After DebConf, we would have the surplus to give to Debian to pay the costs [accounting-details]. In the event that DebConf did not have enough surplus, Debian would assume those costs. Debian has enough cash reserves to fully absorb all of our travel sponsorship for any one year, not that I'd expect it to ever come to that [debian-money]. In the event that DebConf can only partially pay travel sponsorship, it gets absorbed by Debian (the bigger bank) and recouped in future years, or from past surpluses. Naturally, it's not as simple as it sounds above. Past DebConf surpluses, the expected DebConf budget, Debian budget, all interact very intricately. Debian would want careful advice from DebConf to not overspend. DebConf would want advice as to Debian's situation. DebConf would still consider that travel money as part of its budget. This actually goes right along with (and inspired by) an idea Moray has had, having some sort of standing Debian committee to allocate travel money to people, for example, for sprints. Since Debian is guaranteeing the money, it would make sense for a Debian committee to be able to decide the allocations. (Also, in general, DebConf would welcome any help like this in general). Of course, there would be a lot of implementation details to work out. I've watched four DebConf budgets now, and I think this would be workable. Historical travel costs are: dc9 - 27 kUSD dc10 - 23 kUSD dc11 - 40 kUSD dc12 - 18 kUSD which is much less than Debian's reserves, even subtracting a year's worth of new hardware according to the plan. So, there's a better plan than the current travel sponsorship system [travel-system]. Fiscally speaking, it could work. I know Debian and DebConf can work together to share their expertise in the related areas to make sure to avoid major disasters. We just need people to stand up and say if DebConf is part of Debian, then
Re: [Debconf-team] DebConf travel sponsorship
Hello, Note: We will have an additional BoF at this DebConf. We will try to broadcast live that session and to take live comments from IRC, so that also the not sponsored people (and all interested people) could discuss. It is hard to improve things. The order we spend money is: venue rental, accom, food, a few other nice things, travel. If travel is prioritized low, and we always are short of money, travel will keep being last. We could improve ranking. IMHO we should not do travel sponsorship in penta or any web based tools. I think we should write a detailed page on wiki (with requirement, what we things are the criteria to ask for sponsorship and so on...), and provide a email interface (ticket system or a private mailing list), so that people should read instruction and be more verbose on why they ask sponsorship. ciao cate ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
Re: [Debconf-team] DebConf travel sponsorship
On Wed, Jun 20, 2012 at 09:55:17AM +0200, Giacomo Catenazzi wrote: I think we should write a detailed page on wiki (with requirement, what we things are the criteria to ask for sponsorship and so on...), and provide a email interface (ticket system or a private mailing list), so that people should read instruction and be more verbose on why they ask sponsorship. This is true, and could be tried. Phil Hands is a good one to talk to about this. Other people in the past have tried to work up similar schemes. However, the allocation procedure is a bit tangential to this thread. *I think we should keep this thread to money issues, and a later thread can discuss how to evaluate people.* ( Otherwise, we'll get distracted, not have money early, so once we get around to we have money to allocate, it is so late, and we are so rushed we just use the old system. Yes, that's about the status quo. (Of course, if DC13 has oodles of money very early on, it's a different situation, but then you really will have no problems.) ) - Richard -- | Richard Darst - rkd@ - boltzmann: up 1065 days, 5:51 |http://rkd.zgib.net - pgp 0xBD356740 | Ye shall know the truth and -- the truth shall make you free ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
Re: [Debconf-team] DebConf12: Payment information
On 19/06/12 09:51, DebConf Registration Team wrote: Jonathan Bustillos Osornio, According to our records, you registered for DebConf12 as a corporate or professional attendee, so we are expecting a payment from you. ** Please pay as soon as possible, or inform us about delays. If you would like your attendee fee to be pro-rated, or a sponsored or discount DebCamp, please contact the registration team. The Professional fee is designed to be the actual cost per week, and we are happy to reduce the fee if you will stay for fewer days. For payment information, please see http://debconf12.debconf.org/payments.xhtml Payment items: USD 650 DebCamp registration (without workplan) Total amount to pay: USD 650 Amount paid so far: USD 0 == The registration system URL is https://penta.debconf.org/penta/submission/dc12/person If you have any questions or concerns, please contact us via IRC: #debconf-team @ irc.oftc.net (real-time questions) or mailing list: debconf-team@lists.debconf.org (publicly archived) or non-public email: registrat...@debconf.org Thank you, -- The DebConf team (person_id: 2379) Greetings team, I wonder if I can sponsor DebConf the week with room and food without having to pay $650 and without the week of DebCamp please. I managed to stay with someone from Nicaragua for the first week, so I would ask support with food and lodging only for DebConf. I have the intention of my research on Debian serve primarily to make a contribution to the community (Debian), with useful knowledge from a sociological perspective to show the world and other Free Software projects many of the virtues that exist within our community and the pleasure to share and socialize knowledge, technique and symbolic meanings as elements that make up the existence of Debian based collaboration and volunteerism and self-management, training and practice as this is something that constantly brings good things both the computing world and society outside that are not necessarily from other sectors of society and focus on a look and draw the attention of all interested persons as possible to the importance of all the work do programmers and thousands of people work at great unknown number of times regardless of the computing world and Free Software and the great contribution that all this means for society, this research methodologically defined in Debian. On the other hand, I have been using Debian for almost three years and some months I have begun to engage enthusiastically to participate in its development, working by the time translations of some templates po.debconf and from approximately May 15 in the Spanish translation of The Debian Administrator's Handbook ', under the pseudonym jathan. I know that my contributions have not been many, but I have the interest to be involved more fully in Debian to work on more things and so my desire to participate in this DebConf advantage that is more accessible now go from Mexico to be in Nicaragua. I live with my grandma since 7 years and she helps me financially with her pension board, working when there is a chance I doing some instalations, repairs and optimizations of computers with Free Software, but as friends usually do not earn much money ha. The money I had to buy the plane ticket and passport was because I had saved from previous jobs as a seller of costumes in a market, technical and general office assistant digital solutions for three years before entering University at alternate times in high school. That's why the support of sponsorship ;). I hope this can be resolved in the manner most favorable to reduce costs of my stay in DebCamp and DebConf. Likewise, I ask you please help me with the information I asked about the number of attendees so far have confirmed the DebCamp and DebConf going to do my sampling of interviews and questionnaires. Thanks team, I hope your answer. -- Una licencia permisiva solo sería más «libre» que una licencia como la GPL, cuando un sociedad que permita la esclavitud sea considerada más libre que otra sociedad que no la permite. Cambiate a GNU/Linux! http://getgnulinux.org/es ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
Re: [Debconf-team] DebConf travel sponsorship (was: Re: Budget status - travel sponsorship)
On Wed, 2012-06-20 at 03:35 -0400, Richard Darst wrote: We could decide to allocate travel early, before we knew we'd have a surplus, and have confidence we'd eventually reduce costs. However, we are too conservative (=responsible) to want to risk having a deficit. Thus, the travel-last system remains. But there is something we could do: Summon Bigger Bank. We would basically want something to even out the year to year uncertainty, and average out the travel sponsorship over years. And we do have a bigger bank: Debian. Yes, I tend to think that travel sponsorship (or at least an initial batch) should be somewhat separated from other DebConf costs and dealt with early on. I don't think it's even a question of a bigger bank and absorbing costs, as DebConf is part of Debian. Equally, I don't think there's any very good reason why travel sponsorship should be managed by the same people who are focused on organising a conference venue etc. Of course, there would be a lot of implementation details to work out. I've watched four DebConf budgets now, and I think this would be workable. Historical travel costs are: dc9 - 27 kUSD dc10 - 23 kUSD dc11 - 40 kUSD dc12 - 18 kUSD which is much less than Debian's reserves, even subtracting a year's worth of new hardware according to the plan. Yes. If this approach were taken, we might envisage allocating even 20 kUSD of travel funding early on. (At the implementation level, this would then be treated as a fixed cost in the DebConf budget. In years where there is spare money later, a second set of grants could be made.) Making travel grants earlier would mean, among other things: - The same amount of money would be able to fund significantly more people's travel. - We would avoid the current uncertainty in whether people allocated travel grants can actually come any more or not. - There would be more time to use a better (potentially fairer) travel grant allocation process (e.g. the one fil has designed). Gunnar wrote: And correspondingly, were we not to get some of our sponsors, we _were_ ready not to have travel sponsorship at all, if we needed our DC11 surplus to pay for the facilities, hotel and things. This year I was perhaps the person most against allocating amounts to travel grants while there was budget uncertainty, within the current system. However, I would see doing early allocation, and losing some budget flexibility, as having enough advantages that I would favour the trade-off. Equally I am perhaps the person in the team most in favour of trying to make every DebConf end neutral or positive for overall Debian funds. But if early travel grants were made with the cooperation of the wider Debian project, then I would see the possibility of a small net expense for Debian as a risk worth taking if an appropriate scheme were set up. (From my point of view, the ideal scheme for deciding DebConf travel grant allocation might remember not only the comparative utility for Debian of taking different people to DebConf, but of spending money on DebConf travel versus other Debian travel costs.) -- Moray ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
Re: [Debconf-team] DebConf travel sponsorship (was: Re: Budget status - travel sponsorship)
On Wed, Jun 20, 2012 at 3:35 PM, Richard Darst wrote: If people are interested, I can research more details and present a better report on the practicality of this scheme, and of course, to help make it so next year. As someone who missed out on DebConf6 in Mexico due to travel sponsorship timing and who watches flight prices go up lots every year, I would encourage a move in this direction. -- bye, pabs http://wiki.debian.org/PaulWise ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
Re: [Debconf-team] DebConf12: Payment information
I followed up off-this-list (but including registration@ ) d ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
Re: [Debconf-team] Travel sponsorship team
* Norman García Aguilar nor...@riseup.net [2012-05-28 23:20]: We are creating the travel sponsorship team and we are looking for volunteers. Cate and I are the only members of this group at the moment, and we are trying to arrange a meeting with the team once is created. Cate made a poll on doodle so you can choose your prefered date+hours for the meeting. Take note that this team has a lot of work, so we need to make this meeting ASAP so we can start to work. If you want to be part of this team, plasee add yourself in the wikipage [0] or reply this email and pick a prefered date/hour on this doodle poll [1] I'm ready to take the blame once again... Yours Martin maxx ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
Re: [Debconf-team] Accommodation costs: Hotel Seminole
On Tue, Jun 19, 2012 at 6:51 PM, Leandro Gómez leo.tel...@gmail.com wrote: Hello, We got a first quote from Hotel Seminole. Please note that we haven't negotiated yet a discount with them, so these price might go down a bit. All prices are in US dollars. Update on Hotel Seminole: I just finished a phone conversation with the people at Seminole and we managed to get the discount we asked for. Hopefully, today afternoon or tomorrow we (ISIC, actually) will be signing the contract with them. The final numbers/costs for accommodation are: First week (6 nights, paid by govt): 348 nights (77 people, arriving at different dates according to penta) - $12957.75 (incl. sales tax) = $37.23/pp Second week (8 nights, paid by us) 616 nights (77*8) - $18474.89 = $29.99/pp Total accommodation costs at Seminole Hotel: $31432.64 Payment: We can pay the amount we have atm (or in a few days), could be 10% or more They're more interested in signing the contract than receiving any payment in advance Bonus: They'll provide free shuttle service (airport-hotel-airport) We need to prepare a wiki for people to sign up and send them the info I'm going to the shirt provider in an hour or so, but can answer any questions you have in the meanwhile. Cheers, Single room: $75 + 17% sales tax = $87.75/pp Double room: $80 + 17% sales tax = $93.60 ($46.80/pp) Triple room: $90 + 17% sales tax = $105.30 ($35.10/pp) Quadruple room: $100 + 17% sales tax = $117 ($29.25/pp) Note: The quadruple rooms are with two king size beds, or one queen size and two small beds, so I don't think we have some use for them. As a bonus, they offer us a free room for every 15 rooms we use. I quoted the following: Reservation for 77 people 40 people from 1st. to 7th July 8 people from 2nd. to 7th July 4 people from 3rd. to 7th July 11 people from 4th. to 7th July 5 people from 5th. to 7th July 9 people from 6th. to 7th July Total: 348 nights accommodation ((40*6)+(8*5)+(4*4)+(11*3)+(5*2)+(9*1)) The cheapest quote they gave us was for $12957.75 ($36.20/pp), distributed in 2 single rooms, 3 double rooms and 7 triple rooms. I'm going to write to them later tonight and start negotiating prices in order to see if we can lower it from $36 to $30 or less. Questions? Comments? Cheers, ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
Re: [Debconf-team] Transfering DC12 funds to Nicaragua
Hi Norman! * Norman García Aguilar nor...@riseup.net [2012-06-13 17:32]: Right, what I know organizations does in those case, is to exchange dollars to cordobas in a bank, so you will have a official support of the exchange rate. I think that will be ok for you. Long story short: If they want USD the need to put USD on the invoice. If the invoice is in cordobas they will get cordobas transferred. Martin ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
Re: [Debconf-team] Some assumptions about the DC11 accounting
Hi Richard! * Richard Darst r...@zgib.net [2012-06-09 03:16]: For the final report, I am using USD/EUR exchange rates of 2012 December 31. Should that be 2011? Otherwise how much for your crystal ball? :) yours Martin ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
Re: [Debconf-team] DebConf11 financial report
Hi Richard! Thanks a lot for your afford! Yours Martin ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
Re: [Debconf-team] Accommodation costs: Hotel Seminole
On Wed, Jun 20, 2012 at 9:26 AM, Leandro Gómez leo.tel...@gmail.com wrote: On Tue, Jun 19, 2012 at 6:51 PM, Leandro Gómez leo.tel...@gmail.comwrote: Hello, We got a first quote from Hotel Seminole. Please note that we haven't negotiated yet a discount with them, so these price might go down a bit. All prices are in US dollars. Update on Hotel Seminole: Just two more things: I just finished a phone conversation with the people at Seminole and we managed to get the discount we asked for. Hopefully, today afternoon or tomorrow we (ISIC, actually) will be signing the contract with them. Talking with Norman, I think it would be best to have two separate contracts; one signed by govt for the first week they're sponsoring, and the other signed by ISIC for the second week. The final numbers/costs for accommodation are: First week (6 nights, paid by govt): 348 nights (77 people, arriving at different dates according to penta) - $12957.75 (incl. sales tax) = $37.23/pp There was a miscalculation on accommodation costs of ~$1K. I asked the hotel people to charge that amount to the first week so our price per person/night of $29.99 remains the same. Second week (8 nights, paid by us) 616 nights (77*8) - $18474.89 = $29.99/pp Total accommodation costs at Seminole Hotel: $31432.64 Payment: We can pay the amount we have atm (or in a few days), could be 10% or more They're more interested in signing the contract than receiving any payment in advance Bonus: They'll provide free shuttle service (airport-hotel-airport) We need to prepare a wiki for people to sign up and send them the info I'm going to the shirt provider in an hour or so, but can answer any questions you have in the meanwhile. Cheers, Single room: $75 + 17% sales tax = $87.75/pp Double room: $80 + 17% sales tax = $93.60 ($46.80/pp) Triple room: $90 + 17% sales tax = $105.30 ($35.10/pp) Quadruple room: $100 + 17% sales tax = $117 ($29.25/pp) Note: The quadruple rooms are with two king size beds, or one queen size and two small beds, so I don't think we have some use for them. As a bonus, they offer us a free room for every 15 rooms we use. I quoted the following: Reservation for 77 people 40 people from 1st. to 7th July 8 people from 2nd. to 7th July 4 people from 3rd. to 7th July 11 people from 4th. to 7th July 5 people from 5th. to 7th July 9 people from 6th. to 7th July Total: 348 nights accommodation ((40*6)+(8*5)+(4*4)+(11*3)+(5*2)+(9*1)) The cheapest quote they gave us was for $12957.75 ($36.20/pp), distributed in 2 single rooms, 3 double rooms and 7 triple rooms. I'm going to write to them later tonight and start negotiating prices in order to see if we can lower it from $36 to $30 or less. Questions? Comments? Cheers, ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
[Debconf-team] End of confirmation period
At the end of the (re)(re)confirmation period, we need to make sure that our numbers become a bit more stable. Gunnar will hopefully have time to do this, though it might be good if someone could volunteer to be a backup penta-locker-down. I think the lockdown normally includes: - Stop people changing dates themselves. What we most want is to prevent people with accommodation from expanding their dates directly in Penta, as from now on we usually start having a forked copy of the data used directly by room allocation people etc. - Downgrade sponsorship and accommodation fields for anyone who hasn't confirmed. This is so that we can leave the confirm option open, but stop the number of sponsored+confirmed people from increasing, and stop the number of accommodation+confirmed people from increasing without the right people knowing about it. Richard may know more (and the 'without noticing' bits are slightly less of an issue if his daily diff script goes to the right people, but requiring team intervention probably makes sense so close to DebConf). -- Moray ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
Re: [Debconf-team] Accommodation costs: Hotel Seminole
How flexible are Semiole about few people more or less? ciao cate On 20.06.2012 17:38, Leandro Gómez wrote: On Wed, Jun 20, 2012 at 9:26 AM, Leandro Gómez leo.tel...@gmail.com mailto:leo.tel...@gmail.com wrote: On Tue, Jun 19, 2012 at 6:51 PM, Leandro Gómez leo.tel...@gmail.com mailto:leo.tel...@gmail.com wrote: Hello, We got a first quote from Hotel Seminole. Please note that we haven't negotiated yet a discount with them, so these price might go down a bit. All prices are in US dollars. Update on Hotel Seminole: Just two more things: I just finished a phone conversation with the people at Seminole and we managed to get the discount we asked for. Hopefully, today afternoon or tomorrow we (ISIC, actually) will be signing the contract with them. Talking with Norman, I think it would be best to have two separate contracts; one signed by govt for the first week they're sponsoring, and the other signed by ISIC for the second week. The final numbers/costs for accommodation are: First week (6 nights, paid by govt): 348 nights (77 people, arriving at different dates according to penta) - $12957.75 (incl. sales tax) = $37.23/pp There was a miscalculation on accommodation costs of ~$1K. I asked the hotel people to charge that amount to the first week so our price per person/night of $29.99 remains the same. Second week (8 nights, paid by us) 616 nights (77*8) - $18474.89 = $29.99/pp Total accommodation costs at Seminole Hotel: $31432.64 Payment: We can pay the amount we have atm (or in a few days), could be 10% or more They're more interested in signing the contract than receiving any payment in advance Bonus: They'll provide free shuttle service (airport-hotel-airport) We need to prepare a wiki for people to sign up and send them the info I'm going to the shirt provider in an hour or so, but can answer any questions you have in the meanwhile. Cheers, Single room: $75 + 17% sales tax = $87.75/pp Double room: $80 + 17% sales tax = $93.60 ($46.80/pp) Triple room: $90 + 17% sales tax = $105.30 ($35.10/pp) Quadruple room: $100 + 17% sales tax = $117 ($29.25/pp) Note: The quadruple rooms are with two king size beds, or one queen size and two small beds, so I don't think we have some use for them. As a bonus, they offer us a free room for every 15 rooms we use. I quoted the following: Reservation for 77 people 40 people from 1st. to 7th July 8 people from 2nd. to 7th July 4 people from 3rd. to 7th July 11 people from 4th. to 7th July 5 people from 5th. to 7th July 9 people from 6th. to 7th July Total: 348 nights accommodation ((40*6)+(8*5)+(4*4)+(11*3)+(5*2)+(9*1)) The cheapest quote they gave us was for $12957.75 ($36.20/pp), distributed in 2 single rooms, 3 double rooms and 7 triple rooms. I'm going to write to them later tonight and start negotiating prices in order to see if we can lower it from $36 to $30 or less. Questions? Comments? Cheers, ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
Re: [Debconf-team] Accommodation costs: Hotel Seminole
On Wed, Jun 20, 2012 at 10:01 AM, Giacomo Catenazzi c...@debian.org wrote: How flexible are Semiole about few people more or less? Less people is not a problem since govt is paying first week. More people (and the costs for those extra people) is something we have to negotiate tomorrow during the meeting with hotel staff. ciao cate On 20.06.2012 17:38, Leandro Gómez wrote: On Wed, Jun 20, 2012 at 9:26 AM, Leandro Gómez leo.tel...@gmail.com mailto:leo.tel...@gmail.com wrote: On Tue, Jun 19, 2012 at 6:51 PM, Leandro Gómez leo.tel...@gmail.com mailto:leo.tel...@gmail.com wrote: Hello, We got a first quote from Hotel Seminole. Please note that we haven't negotiated yet a discount with them, so these price might go down a bit. All prices are in US dollars. Update on Hotel Seminole: Just two more things: I just finished a phone conversation with the people at Seminole and we managed to get the discount we asked for. Hopefully, today afternoon or tomorrow we (ISIC, actually) will be signing the contract with them. Talking with Norman, I think it would be best to have two separate contracts; one signed by govt for the first week they're sponsoring, and the other signed by ISIC for the second week. The final numbers/costs for accommodation are: First week (6 nights, paid by govt): 348 nights (77 people, arriving at different dates according to penta) - $12957.75 (incl. sales tax) = $37.23/pp There was a miscalculation on accommodation costs of ~$1K. I asked the hotel people to charge that amount to the first week so our price per person/night of $29.99 remains the same. Second week (8 nights, paid by us) 616 nights (77*8) - $18474.89 = $29.99/pp Total accommodation costs at Seminole Hotel: $31432.64 Payment: We can pay the amount we have atm (or in a few days), could be 10% or more They're more interested in signing the contract than receiving any payment in advance Bonus: They'll provide free shuttle service (airport-hotel-airport) We need to prepare a wiki for people to sign up and send them the info I'm going to the shirt provider in an hour or so, but can answer any questions you have in the meanwhile. Cheers, Single room: $75 + 17% sales tax = $87.75/pp Double room: $80 + 17% sales tax = $93.60 ($46.80/pp) Triple room: $90 + 17% sales tax = $105.30 ($35.10/pp) Quadruple room: $100 + 17% sales tax = $117 ($29.25/pp) Note: The quadruple rooms are with two king size beds, or one queen size and two small beds, so I don't think we have some use for them. As a bonus, they offer us a free room for every 15 rooms we use. I quoted the following: Reservation for 77 people 40 people from 1st. to 7th July 8 people from 2nd. to 7th July 4 people from 3rd. to 7th July 11 people from 4th. to 7th July 5 people from 5th. to 7th July 9 people from 6th. to 7th July Total: 348 nights accommodation ((40*6)+(8*5)+(4*4)+(11*3)+(5***2)+(9*1)) The cheapest quote they gave us was for $12957.75 ($36.20/pp), distributed in 2 single rooms, 3 double rooms and 7 triple rooms. I'm going to write to them later tonight and start negotiating prices in order to see if we can lower it from $36 to $30 or less. Questions? Comments? Cheers, __**_ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/**mailman/listinfo/debconf-teamhttp://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team __**_ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/**mailman/listinfo/debconf-teamhttp://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
Re: [Debconf-team] End of confirmation period
Moray Allan dijo [Wed, Jun 20, 2012 at 04:47:00PM +0100]: - Stop people changing dates themselves. What we most want is to prevent people with accommodation from expanding their dates directly in Penta, as from now on we usually start having a forked copy of the data used directly by room allocation people etc. This is done, effective since tomorrow (server-time). - Downgrade sponsorship and accommodation fields for anyone who hasn't confirmed. This is so that we can leave the confirm option open, but stop the number of sponsored+confirmed people from increasing, and stop the number of accommodation+confirmed people from increasing without the right people knowing about it. This should be the result of a simple SQL query, and I'm sure the affected people list can be retrieved via the darst-scripts. I have to leave now, but please, get the list of IDs and ask anybody with SQL-access to do it. ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
Re: [Debconf-team] Transfering DC12 funds to Nicaragua
On Wed, 20 Jun 2012 17:30:30 +0200 Martin Wuertele m...@debian.org wrote: Hi Norman! * Norman García Aguilar nor...@riseup.net [2012-06-13 17:32]: Right, what I know organizations does in those case, is to exchange dollars to cordobas in a bank, so you will have a official support of the exchange rate. I think that will be ok for you. Long story short: If they want USD the need to put USD on the invoice. If the invoice is in cordobas they will get cordobas transferred. Ok martin, thanks Regards, -- Norman García Aguilar nor...@riseup.net ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
Re: [Debconf-team] DebConf travel sponsorship (was: Re: Budget status - travel sponsorship)
On Wed, Jun 20, 2012 at 03:03:46PM +0100, Ian Jackson wrote:
Richard Darst writes (DebConf travel sponsorship):
But there is something we could do: Summon Bigger Bank. We would
basically want something to even out the year to year uncertainty,
and average out the travel sponsorship over years. And we do have a
bigger bank: Debian.
It is astonishing to me that we have this problem every year. And
every year people (me included) make the same suggestion.
But for some reason it doesn't happen
Well, that probably means that making the suggestion is not enough
to make it happen, someone actually need to make it happen :-) Irony
aside, part of the problem is that a lot of people outside the DebConf
orga team --- quite naturally, for sure --- remember about this problem
when it touches all of us, i.e. yearly at the time of travel sponsorship
(late) confirmation. And at that time we have all the nice and useful
discussions that are needed to solve the problem. But then --- quite
naturally again, but not really usefully --- everybody except the
DebConf orga team forget about the issue until the next year.
The DebConf orga team has *a lot* to do and is improving steadily every
single aspect of DebConf, year after year. But maybe that's not yet
enough to make this specific problem disappear.
So, first obvious suggestion, if you are not in the DebConf orga team
and if you haven't worked to solve this specific problem, please at
least remember about this issue *after* this DebConf cycle. Everything
we are going to say *right now* has no chance to get implemented this
year. Partly because it's late and partly because the DebConf orga team
will likely be very busy with DebConf12 until mid-July.
The money problem is not the real problem here. The real problem is
organization [1]. I'm by no means opposed to the idea of advancing money
to grant travel sponsorship. It is just that no one have ever asked for
that until it's already too late, at least for the past 3 years. Which
brings us back to the topic of helping with the organization. The only
monetary constraint we have agreed with the DebConf team, is the general
goal of having DebConf be an amortized zero cost event. But that totally
allows to have one year deficit and one year surplus, as Ian observed.
As already discussed on debconf-team, the ideas of promoting some
specific DebConf activities as more general Debian services (e.g. travel
sponsorship assignment, that could be useful also to sprint, if they
grow in volume) are perfectly fine. And there is people working on
implementing those ideas. Join them! [2]
Cheers.
PS setting M-F-T: debconf-team, as this discussion really belongs there
[1] I posit that thing are a bit more complicate than people seem to
believe, because to grant travel sponsorship much earlier you need
deadlines much earlier --- as in 3-4 months earlier. And those
deadlines will be too soon for at least some people. So now you've
to split an early and late deadline, as most conferences do. Which
is fine, but goes a bit against fairness as the two bunch of people
will be evaluated separately rather than in a big bucket, etc. I see
nothing insurmountable and unsolvable given good will and enough
volunteers, but I don't think it's as easy as it seems either.
[2] all the encouragements contained in this mail are not specific to
Ian, of course, but general to the lurker public as a whole
--
Stefano Zacchiroli zack@{upsilon.cc,pps.jussieu.fr,debian.org} . o .
Maître de conférences .. http://upsilon.cc/zack .. . . o
Debian Project Leader... @zack on identi.ca ...o o o
« the first rule of tautology club is the first rule of tautology club »
signature.asc
Description: Digital signature
___
Debconf-team mailing list
Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org
http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
[Debconf-team] DebConf travel sponsorship (was: Re: Budget status - travel sponsorship)
Richard Darst writes (DebConf travel sponsorship (was: Re: [Debconf-team] Budget status - travel sponsorship)): But there is something we could do: Summon Bigger Bank. We would basically want something to even out the year to year uncertainty, and average out the travel sponsorship over years. And we do have a bigger bank: Debian. It is astonishing to me that we have this problem every year. And every year people (me included) make the same suggestion. But for some reason it doesn't happen. Debian have a huge amount of money in the bank. We could easily underwrite the Debconf travel sponsorship budget. If at the end of Debconf there's a deficit we could afford to make it up, and just be more cautious next year; correspondingly, if there's a surplus we could be less cautious next year. This is the way that any normal or sane organisation would do things. So, there's a better plan than the current travel sponsorship system [travel-system]. Fiscally speaking, it could work. I know Debian and DebConf can work together to share their expertise in the related areas to make sure to avoid major disasters. We just need people to stand up and say if DebConf is part of Debian, then Debian should be part of DebConf. Yes, please. If people are interested, I can research more details and present a better report on the practicality of this scheme, and of course, to help make it so next year. Please. I'm sure our DPL would be very happy to make the relevant authorisations, assuming the arrangements are reasonable, and SPI would be very happy to implement whatever is decided on. The current travel sponsorship system is not fit for purpose. Someone who can't go unless they get travel sponsorship can't book their travel unless either they get the sponsorship in time to do so, or they find someone to underwrite it. Not just to keep costs down, but also to allow potential sponsorees to plan their lives without having to decide at zero notice whether to fly to Nicaragua for a week and a half, almost all of these decisions should be made 4-6 months in advance. Ian. ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
Re: [Debconf-team] DebConf travel sponsorship (was: Re: Budget status - travel sponsorship)
Hi, On Mittwoch, 20. Juni 2012, Richard Darst wrote: It is hard to improve things. The order we spend money is: venue rental, accom, food, a few other nice things, travel. If travel is prioritized low, and we always are short of money, travel will keep being last. Yup. And from a conference organizer POV, this order is right. We need to make this conference happen in the first place... On Mittwoch, 20. Juni 2012, Moray Allan wrote: Yes, I tend to think that travel sponsorship (or at least an initial batch) should be somewhat separated from other DebConf costs and dealt with early on. I don't think it's even a question of a bigger bank and absorbing costs, as DebConf is part of Debian. Equally, I don't think there's any very good reason why travel sponsorship should be managed by the same people who are focused on organising a conference venue etc. /me fully agrees with Moray here. And/but as zack said, *now* is _not_ the time... but just wait 6 weeks, dc13 is eager to improve things! ;-) But their prios are the conf itself as well... cheers, Holger ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
[Debconf-team] Final hotel numbers
Hello -team, We have a meeting with Seminole Hotel tomorrow at 1pm (17UTC) and I wanted to check with you the final numbers for govt sponsored DebCamp accomodation so we can make the reservation. According to [0] we have 84 people (67 sponsored accommodation+17 pro/corporate): Date of arrival/Nights 2012-07-01(Sun)466 2012-07-02(Mon) 95 2012-07-03(Tue) 34 2012-07-04(Wed)113 2012-07-05(Thu) 62 2012-07-06(Fri) 91 Total person-room-nights covered by govt sponsorship: 387 Reservation for DebConf: 84 people*8 nights = 672 nights payed by us at Seminole Hotel In USD dollars: 672*29.99 = $20513.28 In addition to this, we have 80 people arriving the 7th. and 8th. (46 sponsored accommodation+34 pro/corporate): Date of arrival/Nights 2012-07-07(Sat) 408 2012-07-08(Sun) 407 (40*8)+(40*7) = 600 person-room-nights payed by us at $hotel_of_our_choice The total number is a bit overestimated as I'm assuming that *everybody* is staying until the 15th. Actually, the total number of accommodated people starts going down on the 9th. People leaving hotels 2012-07-09(Mon)2 2012-07-10(Tue)1 2012-07-11(Wed)3 2012-07-12(Thu)3 2012-07-13(Fri)3 2012-07-14(Sat) 27 2012-07-15(Sun) 123 So, I have two very important questions for you: 1. How many rooms are you comfortable with booking at Seminole and how many at other $hotels for both DebCamp/DebConf? 2. If Seminole give us the same $29.99/pp rate for people coming on the 7th. (or after), should we make the reservation/try to fit as many people as we can in that hotel and the rest in the smaller ones? Cheers, [0] - http://debconf-data.alioth.debian.org/stats/rooms-by-date-2.txt ___ Debconf-team mailing list Debconf-team@lists.debconf.org http://lists.debconf.org/mailman/listinfo/debconf-team
