Usenix vs. Uniforum

Ron Natalie <ron> ron at brl-sem.ARPA
Tue Jan 6 19:06:50 AEST 1987


In article <2833 at osu-eddie.UUCP>, mdf at osu-eddie.UUCP (Mark D. Freeman) writes:
> I have been on the net for over a
> year, but I am unfamiliar with the distinctions between DECUS and
> /usr/group, and lately with the Usenix vs.  Uniforum concept.

Societies
---------
DECUS - DEC User Society.  They run there own conventions and other
  activities.  While they have UNIX special interest groups, they are
  DEC Hardware rather than UNIX software oriented.

USENIX - an outgrowth of the Unix Users Group is a Unix User's Group.

/usr/group - The commercial UNIX user group.  Formed probably from the
   fact that USENIX was dominated by a bunch of Universities that were
   very anti-commercial product.  They tried to change their name to
   something that non-UNIX people could spell but it didn't catch on.

Conferences
-----------

DECUS - Lots of things going on at once for VAX, PDP-11's, DEC-20's,
   etc... including sessions for nearly every DEC Operating System.
   In addition some non-DEC specific panels on things like networking
   are also scheduled.

USENIX - Twice a year USENIX puts on a technical conference.  For a long
   time the Summer was the East Coast and the Winter was the west coast
   but that has been messed up in recent years.  Usually accompanied by
   decent tutorials for both the beginner and the in depth UNIX hacker.
   The format of this conference switches between a traditional presented
   papers format and Workshops (like Denver) and Forum (like the upcoming
   D.C.).  I think that most technical get more out of the traditional
   style, but that is my opinion.

UNIFORUM - Originally the name given to the combined /usr/group and USENIX
   show, I think this name is actually owned by /usr/group.  Anyhow the
   twice a year /usr/group /vendr/show has the spiffiest Exhibition Floor
   but the talks and the tutorials seem to hit things like how to raise
   venture capital and the like which may or may not interest you.

Over the past few years USENIX and /vendor/show have tried to at least
partially arrive in the same cities at the same time.  Washington, D.C.
two years ago was the first.  Dallas was the second, and now it returns
to Washington.

-Ron



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