meeting in person

[BriZZell]

I understand the group actually meets. Im lookin for help with my system. whole bunch a random stuff in mint. anyway the calendar said online groups. 

When can some pros hang out with some Suto whats?

[Michael L]

online coming up soon, I prefer strictly online for the regular meetups, but I'm up for meeting separately.  I'm not exactly up to expert or pro level, nor did I stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night (joke / commercial), BUT Linux with help from NLUG did save me a quarter million $ and counting.  I did get very successful use from Linux Mint Debian Edition. 

On Thu, Jul 30, 2026 at 10:14 AM BriZZell <thebr...@gmail.com> wrote:

I understand the group actually meets. Im lookin for help with my system. whole bunch a random stuff in mint. anyway the calendar said online groups. 

When can some pros hang out with some Suto whats?

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[Blake McBride]

I'm not in the professional support business, but I am fairly good with Linux. I'd be happy to help if you don't mind coming to Franklin. Just let me know.

Blake McBride

On Thursday, July 30th, 2026 at 10:14 AM, BriZZell <thebr...@gmail.com> wrote:

I understand the group actually meets. Im lookin for help with my system. whole bunch a random stuff in mint. anyway the calendar said online groups.

When can some pros hang out with some Suto whats?

--

[Michael L]

ALSO- one of the many things NLUG helped me with is networking, particularly remote desktop support- I can assist remotely .. this may lead to a (not unwelcome) explosion of comments on network and desktop security from those who know more than I, like our excellent network engineer Greg who works for Cisco.

He set up Tactical RMM for us, which allows me to connect to our systems and fix in a minute what would otherwise take me an hour.  So since I was admittedly somewhat of a leech my first year on this email thread, I'll assist.

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/nlug-talk/msAtxXgo3sryKPgj-ERE8KUtqSgIkPsV4yaLEdHACVzXHq5JRgs1OXoeCKtVgo1Yahy6F0UjhoIt9o0JHk0JDlz3yMcQ2FAVnwub_H-Q4v4%3D%40arahant.com.

[Michael]

Hey, I am interested in a real meeting every now and then too. I need to get an old laptop to get something installed on it. 

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/nlug-talk/msAtxXgo3sryKPgj-ERE8KUtqSgIkPsV4yaLEdHACVzXHq5JRgs1OXoeCKtVgo1Yahy6F0UjhoIt9o0JHk0JDlz3yMcQ2FAVnwub_H-Q4v4%3D%40arahant.com.

--

Michael Butler

Cell: 615-642-8501

[Michael L]

Sounds like it's time for an install fest.

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/nlug-talk/CAO9C0W_pU2ap-e1gdytEZ2dJQoo-Djm0YpM4%2BA7pha-i2mE7sw%40mail.gmail.com.

[Jackie Moore]

I have a Lenovo Thinkpad T430 that needs a home!

Jackie Moore

On Jul 31, 2026, at 2:04 AM, Michael <mbutl...@gmail.com> wrote:



To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/nlug-talk/CAO9C0W_pU2ap-e1gdytEZ2dJQoo-Djm0YpM4%2BA7pha-i2mE7sw%40mail.gmail.com.

[Gibson Prichard]

We used to hold what we called "installfests," where people could bring hardware and we would help them load Linux on it. As one of the list lurkers here, having been involved with NLUG since we started in 1997 when we met at Vanderbilt, it could be fun to hold another Installfest. Here is an email from ten years ago when we held one at Watkins Collge of Art & Design, before it was flattened in the name of "progress." Some of the URLs still work and there could be ideas from them that we could use.

Gibson

--------------<START ORIGINAL POST>---------------------------

NLUG.org <nlug...@gmail.com> Mon, Nov 7, 2016, 11:38 AM to NLUG

Hi folks,
The installfest is set for Saturday, December 3rd at Watkins College of Art, Design & Film:
2298 Rosa L Parks Blvd, Nashville, TN 37228
http://www.watkins.edu/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watkins_College_of_Art,_Design_%26_Film

Meetup post is here:
https://www.meetup.com/Nashville-Linux-Users-Group/events/235418167/

Curt, I needed to select times, so I chose 10:00am to 5:00pm; please let me know if I need to change that (or if we have the option to expand the hours, if there's enough interest in doing so). I assume those of us working the installfest will need to be onsite an hour before the start time for setup, and plan on an additional hour afterwards for teardown/cleanup/loadout.

Howard, if you'll mention this during the Nov 8th NLUG meeting, I'd appreciate it.

Call for volunteers to work the installfest is officially open. Post here and/or email me offlist.

If anyone wants to do a talk, presentation, workshop, or something similar, speak up. Again, post here and/or email me offlist.

Comments/(constructive) criticisms/suggestions are welcome. Yet again, post here and/or email me offlist.

Helpful/inspirational URLs:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_user_group#Installfests

Linux Installfest HOWTO: 2012.01.01, rev 1.6
http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Installfest-HOWTO/index.html

Linux Installfest HOWTO: 2014.08.03, update/addition
http://www.faqlinux.com/?p=230

ALE 2014 Installfest
http://ale.org/?p=552

ALE 2015 Installfest
http://if.jdpfu.com/index.html

Advertising and promotion:
I mentioned http://cal.nashvl.org/ in a previous email, and I'm reasonably sure Vincent will pass the info along to VMUG and help us promote there. Where else? Local tech/IT groups & relevant Meetup groups? Nashville/Mid-TN area colleges & universities (IT departments & relevant student organizations in particular)? _Your_suggestions_here_?

Sponsors:
Curt, what's the deal wrt a possible food sponsor, say for lunch? And/or maybe bringing in something like coffee & bagels for breakfast? Basically, I'm asking if we can bring in free food to further tempt potential attendees, assuming we can find a sponsor or two and behave like responsible adults (ie - no messes & we make sure we clean up at the end)?

That's all I've got for now.

~~Dru

--------------</END ORIGINAL POST>---------------------------

Gibson Prichard

Nashville, TN

gib...@prichard.tv

On Fri, Jul 31, 2026 at 5:12 AM Jackie Moore <sledgeh...@gmail.com> wrote:

I have a Lenovo Thinkpad T430 that needs a home!

Jackie Moore

On Jul 31, 2026, at 2:04 AM, Michael <mbutl...@gmail.com> wrote:



Hey, I am interested in a real meeting every now and then too. I need to get an old laptop to get something installed on it. 

On Thu, Jul 30, 2026 at 10:34 AM 'Blake McBride' via NLUG <nlug...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

I'm not in the professional support business, but I am fairly good with Linux. I'd be happy to help if you don't mind coming to Franklin. Just let me know.

Blake McBride

On Thursday, July 30th, 2026 at 10:14 AM, BriZZell <thebr...@gmail.com> wrote:

I understand the group actually meets. Im lookin for help with my system. whole bunch a random stuff in mint. anyway the calendar said online groups.

When can some pros hang out with some Suto whats?

--
--

[BriZZell]

i dont drive im in nash by the airport. im still new - is there a halfway point?

[BriZZell]

I need the cell'Installfest. i need help with my laptop too. for example: i cant open ungoogled chromium. no error no nothen. work with my cinnamon. 

[BriZZell]

a really want the physical social help 

[BriZZell]

how about tomorrow at the library 

5260 Hickory Hollow Pkwy #201, Antioch, TN 37013

we could all bring a lunch, equipment, and ill see about a room

[Vincent Brown]

Hello BriZZell and welcome to NLUG. I'm the group leader. Here's some background on in-person meetings.
From the late 90s until covid, we met in person. Covid necessitated meeting remotely. After covid, we tried hybrid meetings and it was difficult getting traction on the in-person side. We had a venue that gave us a great room to meet with teleconference equipment. We rarely had more than a few people show up. As the host, there were several months where I was the only one there. I believe that company hosted us went out of business. In any case, after we lost use of that venue there just wasn't enough demand to pursue another location.
Personally, I like the convenience of meeting from the comfort of my own home. I also enjoy occasional facetime in-person. 
As for getting hands on with equipment, particularly for new installation, and particularly for helping new users start their first installs, we used to host Install-Fests dedicated to this purpose. We started having discussions last year to plan one as the Windows 10 End of support was slated for last fall. Microsoft extended that another year so this is the perfect time to resume planning. This fall, there will be many Windows 10 machines that still perform great but don't meet Win 11 requirements and Linux is the perfect solution for those.
We also used to go out for pizza and beer after in-person meetings while we met at Vanderbilt. Then we moved to the Vaco building in Brentwood where Vaco provided free pizza and beer during the meetings. I miss the facetime and fellowship over pizza and beer. 
As for meeting in a library, if people would like to gather in person at a library, friend's house, etc and dial into the zoom meeting, I'll encourage that with the caveat to dial in to the meeting and not have two disconnected meetings. I have occasionally gone to a friend's house and we connected to the meeting together and it was fun.
You can get the zoom meeting link by registering for the event on our meetup. To reduce zoom meeting trolling, we ask that the zoom meeting links never be posted outside of that or direct person-to-person messaging to people you personally know. For example, we don't post the meeting links directly here, but I will post the link to register for the meeting on meetup here.
Once you join a meeting, you may also ask Paul to add you to his direct email announcement of meeting links for people we've personally vetted. You can send him your email in the zoom meeting chat.
For further discussion, does anyone else miss the beer and pizza meetings? Would people be up for meeting quarterly or so to see if it gets traction?
Would anyone be up for planning and volunteering an installfest? Autumn when Windows 10 goes out of support would be great timing but we shouldn't plan one if we don't have enough volunteers and NLUG doesn't have as many active members as we used to.
Lastly, regarding in-person hardware help; since NLUG first started, online resources have grown by leaps and bounds. You can get detailed installation instructions from YouTube, Distro sites, and blogs. If you run into issues, LLMs like Claude or search engines usually give an immediate answer to whatever you run into. Distro-specific user forums are usually the next best place to go. The expectation will be that you have already tried a search engine or searched the forum to see if your question has already been asked before posting. If you do need further help, those forums are great because you can copy and paste code for diagnostics and usually the fix as well. This is also good protocol for asking for help from someone local in-person. Often the members are IT professionals who's consulting time is worth $100/hr and up. Many are available for consulting work. Some may still offer a small amount of assistance for free to help someone local get started but be mindful of what their time is worth. The whole Linux community is based on peer to peer help. People contributing as well as receiving has kept it going since the 90s. 
Our in-person meetings tend to discuss topics more than getting into the weeds on troubleshooting where other tools and distro forums have ended up being better-suited as things have developed. 
I hope to see you tonight on zoom. 

[Blake McBride]

If there is pizza, I'll be there! Quarterly is perfect.

Blake McBride

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[Alex Smith (K4RNT)]

I miss living in the Nashville area. I ESPECIALLY miss Mellow Mushroom in Nashville, Franklin and Murfreesboro.

" 'With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably.' Those words were uttered by Judge Aaron Satie as wisdom and warning... The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we’re all damaged." - Jean-Luc Picard, quoting Judge Aaron Satie, Star Trek: TNG episode "The Drumhead"

- Alex Smith (K4RNT)

- Lacey, Washington (Olympia, WA metropolitan area)

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/nlug-talk/H9X-nBHosbvoybXYj55jbrM_ylFhDzOiTvqXmpNXCkB_L5mwDA00rTauUZcGSlxAlW0FvU7b9XVE_EJ8Wq4JS9DvmhTrenKaZe1dQ4bn654%3D%40arahant.com.

[Blake McBride]

I too like Mellow Mushroom.  I live in Franklin.  Nashville works too.  Murfreeboro is a little far for me.

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/nlug-talk/CAMaOCTJ336zMDR5Hnt%3DnjfzmGWtN4TznpseFFVCYugpkRsT25w%40mail.gmail.com.

[Alex Smith (K4RNT)]

No worries, Blake. Good luck. I used to live in the Boro. :)

" 'With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably.' Those words were uttered by Judge Aaron Satie as wisdom and warning... The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we’re all damaged." - Jean-Luc Picard, quoting Judge Aaron Satie, Star Trek: TNG episode "The Drumhead"

- Alex Smith (K4RNT)

- Lacey, Washington (Olympia, WA metropolitan area)

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/nlug-talk/79swxEf5kcoICNN2i_-EN5bgTOXSbroU9e_gvpppO6NXEgZO04BC7M89DpGe24Mm0F00fFQQ-NKKcsXO3SR23aX9eY9CGxJvVNN2406aSxA%3D%40arahant.com.

[Vincent Brown]

Alex, are you in the Olympia area? I was just in Centralia and Salkum last week. (For the record, I had nothing to do with starting the fire). 
Billy Joel - We Didn't Start The Fire

[Alex Smith (K4RNT)]

I am in Lacey, not too far away. Would love to catch a beer some time. :)

" 'With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably.' Those words were uttered by Judge Aaron Satie as wisdom and warning... The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we’re all damaged." - Jean-Luc Picard, quoting Judge Aaron Satie, Star Trek: TNG episode "The Drumhead"

- Alex Smith (K4RNT)

- Lacey, Washington (Olympia, WA metropolitan area)

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/nlug-talk/6d97ed6e-fd57-4be3-bb19-c8c0af012f36n%40googlegroups.com.

[Vincent Brown]

Alex, I'm back in Nashville now. I have family out there though.

[Alex Smith (K4RNT)]

Cool. Best wishes, still. Give me a shout next time you're in town. Would love to grab a beer or smoke a bowl or something else fun, whatever floats your boat.

Take care.

" 'With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably.' Those words were uttered by Judge Aaron Satie as wisdom and warning... The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we’re all damaged." - Jean-Luc Picard, quoting Judge Aaron Satie, Star Trek: TNG episode "The Drumhead"

- Alex Smith (K4RNT)

- Lacey, Washington (Olympia, WA metropolitan area)

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/nlug-talk/8a0f8449-6ccc-4e1b-ac1a-417d8e9b9233n%40googlegroups.com.

[BriZZell]

dont have a way there

On Thursday, July 30, 2026 at 10:34:29 AM UTC-5 bl...@arahant.com wrote:

[BriZZell]

im currently unemployed. id love to volunteer putting together an event - im rather good at it. if its in Nashville eg davidson county id go to a weekly meeting easy

[Vincent Brown]

Hi BriZZell.

I appreciate your eagerness to get involved and there is a need for event planning. As a starting point, I would encourage you to get involved with our monthly zoom meetings and start getting to know the other regular attendees.

You've already found this mailing list/google group and this is the main place for community interaction between meetings. 

As I mentioned previously, we haven't had much traction on demand for in-person meetings since Covid. Most people seem to prefer the convenience of remote meetings since then.

I personally miss having occasional face time, particularly over beer and pizza which is a long-standing NLUG tradition.

In our last meeting, we discussed feasibility of doing an install-fest. My hope is that the prevalence of computers that still run Windows 10 great but don't meet Windows 11 requirements will be a great opportunity to introduce people to Linux. As our meeting attendance has dwindled over the years and we have less people regularly participating, my first concern is that we get enough volunteers to handle the  installation work for whoever shows up.

Install-fests are a great way of getting new people involved if we can manage to host one.

If we get enough people showing interest in volunteering, then we can move on to finding a venue, scheduling, and promoting. I do not want to promote an event, have a lot of people show up, and not have an adequate representation of volunteers to help the attendees.

As for in-person meeting cadence, weekly is pretty aggressive. I propose we start with quarterly in-person meetings. 

[Howard White]

Allow me to reflect on considerable experience. NLUG has had the
opportunity to gather some times for a collective install session:
first at SE2600 events, then at Bean Central while that was open and
then at Watkins College and lastly at East Nashville Beer works. The
critical path to having an Installfest is having a convenient (not
Murfreesboro) location with supporting infrastructure. Did I mention no
charge?? We open source types find spending money for a gathering to be
antithetical.

If we establish a workable location, we may plan an event. There is a
new open source project name Iventoy that allows the convenient
connection to .ISO boots over PXE. I still need to get this working...
The days of burning countless boot CDs and floppy disks are well past.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to find a suitable
meeting venue and then me might choose a date.

Howard

[Vincent Brown]

Howard, it's great to hear from you. Iventoy sounds cool but even with the standard ventoy bootable USB solution, you can still consolidate several distros to a single a bootable USB. The downside is that some distros fail to install if they aren't burned to a dedicated USB. It still greatly reduces the number of thumb drives needed.

Regarding venues with supporting infrastructure, I recall that having plenty of tables chairs, power outlets, and power capacity for lots of computers to be running simultaneously was a important. A switch with wired Ethernet would be a nice but we could always skip the option to install updates during install and do offline installs.

[Jeff h]

Wow... Installfests... Something I have not thought about in years. Brought me out of the woodwork... I actually hosted 1 or 2 installfests at a building I used to work at. This was like 20+ years ago at this point in time. Does anyone still work at a facility that would actually have the space and allow people to bring in computers to do an installfest? I guess now most would be laptops with some desktops. Still cannot see someone bringing in some curved 40" LCD display with a desktop :) Back in the day I thought it was bad hauling a desktop and a 80 pound CRT like 5 blocks away... Parking next to the venue was always a plus. I remember using the 5 CD burning towers at another place I worked at to burn install CD's for folks to use. Anyway I will go back into my hidey hole. You all have fun. 73 Jeff

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[Michael L]

Back 20+ years ago I taught a few math classes at Nashville State Community College .. I'm guessing there should be a  space available on a Saturday mid morning to mid late afternoon.  And for any veterans on this email thread, the local USMC facility borders the NSCC campus.  Anyone with NSCC connections (more current than mine) or USMC connections raise your hand.

AND, also on the NSCC Campus is the Nashville Education, Community, and Arts Television (NECAT) .. (I'm a member) we could attempt to produce a 28 or 58 minute video on "Why Everyone Needs Linux" and air it on local Nashville cable television promoting NLUG and the Linux install fest.  NECAT needs NLUG's LTO expertise for archiving their footage. .. Howard White saved me and my employer $8000-$14,000 in just a couple hours in getting me from participating NLUG observer to bona fide Linux user (Tape Archive / TAR) pretty good for my first day using Linux .. saved us a quarter million since.

May be good to include the ephemeral Micro$oft BSOD as part of said

Promotional Linux video.  I want to do a promotional Linux video anyway, so go ahead and get all y'alls expert input ready.

What think ye?

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/nlug-talk/CAAMQmFFSL4aMoT4AWsvqdcgmoNNM-T6uBh1-PgxRBytNooPeHQ%40mail.gmail.com.