Further Follow-ups

[John Macdonald]

On Thu, May 05, 2005 at 12:37:34PM -0400, Colin McGregor wrote:
> --- William Park <opengeometry-FFYn/CNdgSA at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> > On Thu, May 05, 2005 at 11:47:28AM -0400,
> > billt-lxSQFCZeNF4 at public.gmane.org wrote:
> > > One other place has been thrown around. It is sort
> > of car friendly
> > > (street parking) and TTC friendly (Streetcar).
> > That is the Ralph
> > > Holton Center (sic) at Queen and Broadview.
> > 
> > Let's go with 2 Fests... one at Scarborough
> > UofT/Centennial, and another
> > at Ralph Holton.  This will satisfy those with car
> > and without.
> > 
> > Ed, can you move on this?
> 
> Questions I would want answered before looking at ANY
> location (downtown or elsewhere) include:
> 
> - How much is power is available? If we are talking
> (for the sake of argument) 40 desktop PCs we could be
> talking the need for 20+ 15 amp circuits, this is a
> non-trivial amount of power...
> 
> - What is the internet connectivity in the building?
> We may not need a lot of connectivity (i.e. looking up
> some how-to websites, download some drivers/security
> patches).
> 
> Now, this is a different set of needs from a meeting
> space, where what we need is space for 40+ people, no
> internet, and power to support 1 video projector and
> laptop (yes, some spaces can meet both sets of
> requirements nicely, but I don't know if Ralph Holton
> is one of them). Ed, what more can you tell us about
> the space?

First, that is the Ralph Thornton Community Center
                         ^^^^^^^^

I've been there a number of times, the Ontario Folk Dance
Association has been having dances there about once per month
for a few years.

I haven't been involved with TLUG's negotiations about using
the Center, but I can comment on the facilities to some extent.

Space:

The room on the second floor (where the dancing happens) has
enough space to set up 7 or 8 tables (large enough to 8 people
to have a meal) plus a number of table near the end wall to hold
a buffet, all in one third of the room and keep enough space
for 50-80 people to dance in a circle in the remaining space.
The tables are in the room, as well as lots of stacking chairs.
There is also a third floor, so my comments only are useful
if you are getting the same location as I am used to.

Power:

There are a number of wall outlets around the room for power
(maybe 4 or 5? and I don't know whether they are on separate
circuits).  I don't think you need a separate circuit for
every pair of computers, but this may still be a limitation if
you get 20 or more computers going.

Internet:

I have no idea whether there is Internet access; I would
guess not, but I have seen computers running in other parts
of the building so this is not a certain problem.  If they
do not have Internet available, you could still get by if you
use a digital cell phone interface.  (Shop around carefully,
$10/MB seems to be the going price for "excess" usage, but
Telus at least has an unlimited plan for $100/month and they
may prorate the charge if you cancel again after using it
for a portion of the month.  Rogers, on the other hand, does
not have an unlimited data plan.)  I'm going to be using this
setup for the Perl6/PUGS Hackathon at my cottage just before
the YAPC::NA conference in June, so I'll have exact info,
including the after-the-fact hidden surprises kind of info,
by mid-July.  This connection is rated at 100 Mb/s but I've
been told that works out more like 60 Mb/s in practice -
a bit faster than a dial-up modem.

-- 
--
The Toronto Linux Users Group.      Meetings: http://tlug.ss.org
TLUG requests: Linux topics, No HTML, wrap text below 80 columns
How to UNSUBSCRIBE: http://tlug.ss.org/subscribe.shtml