BETT had two out-and-out Linux/Open Source companies, Fen and Look Systems, who booked late and didn;t make the brochure. Sorry i didn;t a get chance to talk to Michael Brown, but heard good reports etc, well done Michael.
It appears to be more a case of the plans on the website and in the brochure being out of date. Since Fen Systems were definitly in the index. Michael (and Dan) appeared to have been kept very busy.
Following on from Ian's comments, some form of 'open source village' with Red Hat, Suse, (IBM), etc along with the key developers like Fen Systems, Look, ComputerPark, Ateb, Optimus would be the way forward. It would need the support of the hardware companies,and also the show organisers, EMAP, BESA etc. They would be leant on by RM and Microsoft not to draw attention to it my making it a unified area.
But pefectly ok to draw attention of RM and Microsoft through having huge stands in the centre of the hall :)
However there would be great press and community support. Red Hat (ie me) will be at the NAACE conference in Torquay between 5-8th Feb, a far better networking event which also has some exhibition space for 1 day (i think). This is a key event for LEA IT Advisors, DfES, Becta and the
IMHO you need something which demonstrates educational usage, possibly even some non I(C)T type subjects. Such as modern languages, history, geography, RE, etc. Possibly even some sort of SEN type stuff. Also very nice would be to have things like Linux interactive whiteboards or even the SWGLF website (which was designed only to work with MSIE). But these might be a little too optimistic.
like. if anybody wants to put something into this let me know asap and i'll see if i can get Dell (or someone) to fund some of it.
thoughts on BETT 2003 and NAACE 2002 asap.