Publicity

Increasing momentum?

IMHO, the development work being done by ROOL staff and other voluntarily collaborators has gained significant momentum in the last 12 months – thanks in no small part to the work of Jeffrey Lee (and others), initially documented in the ...Pandora port thread.

Consequently, online news on sites such as riscos.info and The Icon Bar may now have an increased readership. (If someone’s able to confirm this, please do so.)

Publicity

Existing publicity

• About us
• Press material
• Photo galleries
• Merchandise ideas

(Please post a follow-up if I’ve missed anything.)

Further publicity

In a discussion relating to the scope for starting a new Bristol RISC OS user group , the subject of technology companies has arisen. As with many sectors, industry organisations exist to disseminate information to the membership and the wider business community. Could it be that individuals involved in such organisations may have an interest in the ROOL project? If so, then would it be beneficial to bring to their attention (or remind them of) ROOL’s existence?

This may have already been done, of course. But if not (or not recently), I wonder what sort of information is available to promote ROOL’s existence and aims. Obviously this website is the main resource but what other promotion could be done?

Subject to this not being dealt with elsewhere, I propose that an ‘info sheet’ or similar (if not already in existence) may be helpful. What do people think? Such a document could be issued to target organisations to increase awareness. The logical evolution could be a regular (3- or 6-monthly?) newsletter or similar. Such things would take time to prepare but there are bound to be willing volunteers (myself included) able to assist.

Edit: ‘House style’ and exact text would, naturally, need agreeing with ROOL staff.

Target organisations

[Working UK list – possibly to be migrated to a wiki page for development if appropriate]

• IEEE Engineering, computing and technology professional association (National)
• BCS Chartered institute for IT (National)
• Cambridge Technopole (Greater Cambridge)
• Silicon Fen Business Report (Greater Cambridge)
• SiliconSouthWest Microelectronics (South west)

Consequently, online news on sites such as riscos.info and The Icon Bar may now have an increased readership. (If someone’s able to confirm this, please do so.)

TIB’s stats show that the number of hits has increased quite steadily over the past year. In fact the number of visits for this January is twice that of last March. Unfortunately the web interface for the stats only goes back one year, so I can’t tell what our traffic was like before then. It doesn’t look like any ROOL-related news articles have resulted in sudden spikes in visitor numbers, so I’m not sure where they’re all coming from (and neither was there a significant spike when Drobe closed).

No, I wouldn’t have expected a spike at TIB, but drobe’s closing did play a part, I think. Note that TIB has had both some detailed articles since then, as well as many more forum threads (never mind revival of old ones). Don’t forget also that riscos.org has not been maintained in the last year, and people are looking elsewhere.

As for riscos.info, if I may say so, its considerable increase in traffic is no accident. It has news articles nearly every day, where as before drobe, it had none, and most of those pick up 200+ readers. Also, sizable downloads like the GCC release and misc Firefox releases. Also, at a certain point, the wiki can take on a life of its own, with people increasingly refereeing to riscos.info for general RISC OS information. Also, I’d like to specifically mention the contribution of Eric Rucker, an enthusiastic RISC OS new comer.

Yes, of course the BB port played a role here increasing interest, but there have been significant and sometimes largely invisible things taking place also. Not a renaissance as such, but a turn around from say, 2007-2008.

In fact the number of visits for this January is twice that of last March.

Not a renaissance as such, but a turn around from say, 2007-2008.

Thanks for sharing this. Any comments on publicity gratefully received.

FWIW:

Month   Year     Hits   Bandwidth
=================================
 Jan  | 2007 |   95167 |   0.5 GB
  -   | 2007 | 1086404 | 23.32 GB
 Jan  | 2008 |   79964 |  1.70 GB
  -   | 2008 | 1496510 | 35.38 GB
 Jan  | 2009 |  135950 |  2.88 GB
  -   | 2009 | 3080193 | 69.39 GB
 Jan  | 2010 |  553966 | 10.57 GB
  -   | 2010 |     N/A |      N/A

Stats history starts in December 2006, so the slightly higher hits in January 2007 over 2008 would be presumably down to initial interest. The overall bandwidth is much lower because there were no components or sources to download in 2007, but more interesting content was becoming available a year later.

In terms of hits and bandwidth, January this year is by some distance a record of any month in the recorded statistics history of the site. We’re already at 0.7 G / 55K hits for February and it’s only the 4th.

Thanks. Sounds like a record breaker .

Dedication. That’s what we need.

After just reading a post about the Mandriva Mini OS on the AI forum I see that the link to its ARM Connected page lists the Cortex-A8.

Is it too early for ROOL to submit an updated profile for its own ARM Connected page ? (Apparently the Connected Community chap, Alban Rampon followed the RISC OS – Brothers in ARM article last month.)

Maybe Jason Kridner’s #beagle IRC comment¹ was facetious but all the same, does anyone fancy inviting him to the RISC OS London Show 2010 (with ROUGOL’s approval)?

He did create this RISC OS for BeagleBoard page, after all! If given enough notice and he genuinely is curious then a TI business visit could perhaps be scheduled to coincide with the show.

Is there any support here for this suggestion?

¹ 2010-03-15 [17:04:43] jkridner has been waiting to meet the enthusiastic RiscOS crowd as to understand what is it that gets people hooked on it.

If he goes to a RISC OS show, then maybe someone can ask him what a ‘catalog processors business open platforms ecosystem’ is ;)

Only problem with inviting Jason Kridner is that he is in Houston! But feel free to ask him if you are chatting on IRC. Either at the show or any 3rd Monday of the month at ROUGOL. Hopefully he likes curries :-)

Another person it would be good to get is Jeffrey Lee. I’m sure I’ve seen him mentioned around these pages somewhere… ;-)

Bryan (ROUGOL chairman apparently, although it was news to me).

...chatting on IRC…

plasmab : are you here?

What’s the chance of ROOL considering an effort to present something at TI’s next Community Lightning Talk on 29 Sept? (I think BST is 5 hours ahead of CST.)

• Symbian Platform and Beagle Board
• Windows CE on Beagle Board
• Android on OMAP35xx (Rowboat)
• Theora decoding on DSP
• Always Innovating Touch Book
• Ubuntu on Beagleboard

"the lightning talks are intended to be a way for more people to get their work spoken about, instead of just what TI puts on the agenda..."

[Edit: ALso note that ARM have space for Guest Partner Blogs.]

A book on the BeagleBoard is being planned for 2011

"...I am currently working on a book on the BeagleBoard that should be available toward the middle of next year."

Does anyone in an official capacity fancy sending the author an SD card and USB stick with the HardDisc4 image and some goodies on before it’s too late? Acknowledged that an entire chapter on RISC OS might be just a little too much to expect ;-)

Beagleboard.org/TI have been discussing putting together a "student kit" (and "lab kit"). If the RISC OS community could be involved in this for the UK (e.g. CJE’s BB accessory pack) then RISC OS could be included along with Ubuntu, Android, Angstrom… licensing conditions permitting.

1. Catchy title/intro words (probably simply a voiceover unless I delve into video editing, or enlist the help of someone who’ll do so) – a previously suggested title which could be used is ‘ARM reunited with its twin: the OS it grew up with’, although this may be better reserved for an offical ROOL effort, e.g. a Community Lightning Talk
2. Main hardware for download/preparation of SD card etc. will be a BB-xM (although not needing to be explicitly obvious to the viewer)
3. Reference to be made to creating/writing the SD image under alternative OSes (as mentioned on the wiki and described in the SDCreate documentation)
4. Completely unnecessary, but I’m thinking that a backdrop photo of Cambridge wouldn’t be inappropriate on this main hardware – any suggested images I should search for? Otherwise, a dual RISC OS/BeagleBoard logo (not tiled, perhaps just both logos in a top corner) is something I could include.
5. Include a few extra files in install/setup procedure, for reference by users unfamiliar with RISC OS
   • e.g. ARMv7-safe Unzip, PDF, AWViewer, SwiftJPEG… plus the OPP prog (not the non-advised 1GHz version), CPUTmpMon, CubeDemo… any other suggestions?
   • Should EtherUSB, NetSurf, NetTime also be included, or reserved for a follow-up video? (Due to wanting to keep this video brief, and the relative complexity of setup.)
6. On target machine (the same BB-xM in this case) after install, demonstrate MDF file usage by dragging to Display manager icon
7. Is it important to include the opening of a PDF licence file, or leave that for the user to do independently?
8. Consider promoting existence of the compatability lists for hardware / software for reference (previous main hardware setup would need reverting to… or otherwise include this earlier in video before doing install, unless the network setup is included… alternatively an offline version of these files could be included for viewing on the target machine at the end)
9. Some sort of closing comment/encouragement about joining the development effort to be included… any ideas for words there, please?

All comments/suggestions very welcome in this thread¹. Thanks.

¹ It’s currently rather a monologue, and I’m sure would benefit from more input by those with further ideas.

A book on the BeagleBoard is being planned for 2011

Summarised below (in a rather lengthy fashion with sparse snipping) is a recent email conversation I’ve had with the book’s author, Jeffrey Osier-Mixon

Re: Minutes from 11/16/2010 BeagleBoard Linux Education Project

I understand that the above is strictly Linux focused. I also understand that you’re preparing a book: http://groups.google.com/group/beagleboard/msg/64d13e7cbe724d40

I wonder how interested you are in making reference to alternative OSes in the book. I believe [the Cortex-A8 port of RISC OS] would be of interest to students keen to experiment with different ways of using new technology.

I know that Jason Kridner has shown some interest in the project, and can probably share his opinions with you on this.

For further information, refer to: http://www.riscosopen.org/wiki/documentation/pages/Cortex-A8+port

I expect that any questions you may have about this can be answered on the forums (or elsewhere) if you wish.

[The book] will be specifically about the BeagleBoard, not Linux, and while Linux will feature prominently I don’t intend for it to be a manifesto. :) I definitely plan to have a section on operating system alternatives and to feature [the] RISCOS port. I anticipate getting to that point in January or February.

As for BLEP, it is turning out to be more focused on embedded systems programming and best practices than Linux specifically, which I think is a good thing. Maybe we should change its name to the BeagleBoard Education & Evaluation Project and call it BEEP. :)

[...] Your BEEP idea is an interesting one if it’s not specifically Linux… I wonder what the others in the group would think.

I would be surprised if the group was unreceptive. If you have time, we meet on Tuesday mornings (US time), feel free to stop in¹.

[...] I intend to have a video up and running by January, showing RISC OS installation, etc.

excellent! I look forward to seeing it

Regarding your section on operating system alternatives, do you expect this to be a self-contained chapter with sub-sections on each OS? Or more generally a run-down of OSes and where further information can be obtained, listing uses/strengths/weaknesses of these OSes? (Or perhaps the format is yet to be decided.) In any case, I’m sure that I and others from the RISC OS community will be more than happy to clarify things for you, if you wish, when the time is right.

Format is yet to be decided. I plan to produce the book using “radical transparency”, so the TOC will be posted at least semi-publicly in the near future. Most likely there will be a large subsection on each OS, at the very least detailing how to obtain and install it on the BeagleBoard², with a format similar to what I use for the developerWorks articles (rev C: http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/library/l-beagle-board/index.html rev xM coming soon)

[...] Finally, how would you feel about our email conversation being posted/summarised on the RISC OS Open forum?

No problem at all! Tell ‘em I said hi and will stop in as soon as I get a chance. I have a strong fondness for RISC in general – I was responsible for all external documentation at Transmeta for about 5 years.

This is a great opportunity to promote RISC OS further afield. I suggest discussion of our draft contribution after Christmas (or sooner, if anyone wants to).

¹ This group is open to anyone

² (My emphasis)

Trevor, this is a great opportunity you’ve helped develop for RISC OS. Nice going!

. . . who’s going to port RISC OS to it? :)

Some students? I’m planning to take my BeagleBoard to the local uni some time…

Anyway, I’ll aim for something in Feb/Mar 2011, subject to fitting in with their timetable/avoiding major coursework submission deadlines etc.

If anyone has any ideas/suggestions they wish to throw in here, then please do. If not, I’ll probably start a specific thread later – at an appropriate time in the planning stage. This could be a general discussion for others wishing to try the same sort of thing.

This is one for ROOL.

It’s a request for an official page (or section) about the current status of the Cortex-A8 port on the site. Such information would be useful in improving the Wikipedia RISC OS article for the following reasons:

1. The Cortex-A8 port status unprotected wiki page could be viewed by some as being potentially unreliable (although everyone here of course knows that not to be the case).
2. The ROOL home page makes no mention of the current status – perhaps a ”How can I run RISC OS?” section would be appropriate here.
   • Doing so would attach more importance to the port, for new visitors to the site.
   • It could also further acknowledge the 2009 award and possibly even make reference to the beginnings of the project.

Also for ROOL: Would it be possible to put some obvious link to “How to install RISC OS on the BeagleBoard” or similar from the front page? I’ve pointed various people to the site when they’ve asked me about the BeagleBoard, but it’s hard to find the info you want as a newbie coming to the site for the first time.

Does anyone please know which (if any) of the ROOL news items have been reported in the mainstream press? I know that Drobe and others have, of course, variously reported on events.

The reason I ask is in connection with Wikipedia’s preferred types of reliable sources, i.e.

In general, the best sources have a professional structure in place for checking or analyzing facts, legal issues, evidence, and arguments; as a rule of thumb, the greater the degree of scrutiny given to these issues, the more reliable the source.

[...]

Material from reliable non-academic sources may also be used, particularly if it appears in respected mainstream publications. Other reliable sources include university-level textbooks, books published by respected publishing houses, magazines, journals, and mainstream newspapers. Electronic media may also be used, subject to the same criteria.

I’ve done some searching and, while there are occasional references to “RISC OS” in the mainstream media, “RISC OS Open” is a little more elusive. This is all in connection with the (currently a stub under review) article on “RISC OS Open”, so anything about the beginnings in 2006-07 would be a good starting point. (For reference, here’s the stub I’m talking about – obviously if nothing turns up soon then I’ll try explaining to the reviewer the specialist nature and lack of interest by the mainstream press due to RISC OS being a minority platform etc. etc. but I thought I’d come here first.)

Other reliable sources include university-level textbooks, books published by respected publishing houses, magazines, journals, and mainstream newspapers.

Qercus to the rescue!

• Issue 277 (from sometime in 2006) has a newsflash about the announcement of ROOL (although they give the URL as riscos.info!), along with a (pre-ROOL announcement) interview with Andrew Hodgkinson.
• Issue 278 has a proper news arcticle about ROOL
• Issue 283 (‘summer 2007’) has an interview with Steve

Unfortunately I don’t have a scanner, but could probably post them to you or try and take some pics with a webcam if you can’t get hold of your own copies.

I’m sure that if you did some digging then you’d be able to find relevant bits from some other magazines too (Archive?)

That’s great. Thanks :-) Will put out the feelers for suitable article quotes, as I never graduated from Acorn Computing to Qercus and wasn’t an Archive subscriber around that time either. (Fortunately, Qercus is referred to on Wikipedia, although there’s (currently) no reference for it.)

And thanks for the update offer – scans shouldn’t be necessary but if you some time feel like adding the details to the References section (plain text would do, as I can reformat using the citation generator) that’d be wonderful. Otherwise, posting photocopies would be fine too – I’ll happily email you my postal address.