Minutes of the SIPB Meeting of 2008-01-28


The meeting was called to order at 19:30 by tabbott.

In attendance were 
	Voting members: andersk arolfe belmonte jbarnold jesstess
		jhawk jwalden mathmike rayhe tabbott wdaher | geofft
		k_lai quentin
	Associate members: asedeno | mitchb
	Prospectives: dnawiq | broder
	Guests: 

Officer Reports:
	jhawk: SIPB member mcmullan passed away in a house fire.  He’s
		survived by his wife and two kids.

	tabbott: We have elections two weeks from today.  You should
		think about whether you want to run for SIPB offices,
		and tell me.

MIT Computing Report:

SIPB Projects Report:
	arolfe: The two AFS servers that we approved two weeks ago
		have been ordered, and I expect them to be here at the
		end of the week or next week.

	tabbott: There was a hackathon Thursday.  We have a fancy new
		Debathena login screen created by geofft.
	jwalden: It’s red.  I’m kind of a fan of nice-looking login
		screens, not Athena-style login screens.
	wdaher: The owl doesn’t flip on full moons.
	asedeno: Does the fuzzball ever blink?

	rayhe: Move to allocate $2500 for two GX755 desktop computers
		to replace zsr and opus; in addition, $500 for a 24
		inch monitor to replace the one on opus.
	jhawk: That’s out of how much we have available?
	tabbott: I would estimate $14000.
	broder: There was a lot of discussion about getting Macs.  Why
		did we decide against that?
	rayhe: It’s a cost issue.  We want to save money to buy a new
		linerva.
	tabbott: Also we just bought a new Mac.
	jbarnold: If the board is going to claim that the linerva team
		wants a new linerva…
	tabbott: That claim is irrelevant.
	rayhe: Originally I was going to get a GX755 and a Mac Pro.
		The difference is price is roughly $2000.
	quentin: What’s the distinction in video card?
	rayhe: The GX755 has a Radeon HD 2400.
	quentin: I have a machine with that card and the driver sucks.
		You can only run it with the vesa driver.
	rayhe: I amend my motion to $1600 for one GX755 and monitor
		and up to $3000 for a Mac Pro.
	jhawk: Do we expect to buy Office and Creative Suite for three
		Macs instead of two?
	tabbott: I don’t see why people can’t use bobbi-harlow for
		that.  We can move the machines around.
	quentin: We could get iWork for like $30.
	<question divided>
	tabbott: First, $1600 for the GX755 with monitor.
	quentin: Like I said, drivers suck.  If you manage to get them
		installed, you get random segfaults when apps try to
		use OpenGL.
	tabbott: It sounds like we should do more technical
		investigation for that.
	tabbott: The second proposal is $3000 for a Mac Pro.
	tabbott: I think it’s silly to spend $3000 for a desktop.
	quentin: The base model is closer to $2000.
	arolfe: What do you get from an office head with 8 cores?
	quentin: A fast machine that can do number crunching and
		multimedia.
	broder: There are reasonably powerful office heads now.  Do
		they get used for that?
	<3-6-5, motion fails>

	broder: MacAthena is having its unveiling presentation on
		Wednesday.
	jhawk: Will you dance the MacArena?

	jesstess: SIPB IAP is still going well; noone’s died.
	jhawk: Not true!
	jesstess: …wow.  Never mind.

Office Report:
	dnawi: If you want PayPal for CokeComm, it’s 3–5% extra.  If
		anyone is interested, I can get it; otherwise I’m just
		going to let it go.
	mitchb: I understand CokeComm’s finances are separate from
		SIPB’s, but I’ve had personal experience with PayPal
		indicating that they’re crooks.  I’m worried you would
		lose some of the money.  I also know plenty of people
		that haven’t gotten screwed by them yet.

	tabbott: There’s some popcorn on the table from the sci fi
		marathon.

	tabbott: It seems there’s been contention over the few Aeron
		chairs in the office.
	jhawk: Is anyone unhappy with they chair they’re sitting in
		right now?
	mitchb: The normal price of Aerons from the place we got them
		is $949.  There was a very convenient $150 rebate
		offer at the time so it was $799.  The Steelcase
		Criterion was cheaper.  The rebate is not still going
		on, but I think I can get them to go lower by at least
		$50.  I continue to be flabbergasted at what a chair
		costs.  I’m happy to make another 5-month loan to SIPB
		for chairs, but I don’t know what people want.
	[wanking about armrests]
	belmonte: Chair preferences have been somewhat cyclical in
		SIPB.  People like different things in different
		years.

Education Report:

Other:

Other Other:

Discussion Report:

The meeting was adjourned at <end-time>.


	Minutes taken and submitted by andersk.