Board Meeting Summary

by Gale Berkowitz

& Ellie Young

Here is a summary of some of the actions taken at two of the regular meetings of the USENIX Board of Directors, held in August and November 1999.

Draft Budget 2000
A First Draft Budget for 2000 was presented and approved. The assumptions behind it were discussed, and it was decided to continue to budget conservatively for conference attendance. Any unspent funds in the 1999 Good Works budget will be rolled over to 2000.

Promotion
There was interest in conducting an expanded image marketing and public relations program for USENIX and SAGE. A marketing plan will be presented to the Board at a future meeting.

Proceedings on the Web
It was decided that 12 months after an event, the USENIX conference proceedings will be available on the Web to everyone.

Proposals for Funding
International Research and Development Programme (IRDP). A proposal jointly submitted by USENIX and the NLnet Foundation for $200,000 for an international research exchange program was approved. The program was launched in January 2000. Its goal is to build relationships internationally between research institutions. An advisory committee is being formed with representatives from both institutions. In the first year it will be funded with $100,000 grants from USENIX and the NLnet Foundation.

Support of the Bernstein Case. A proposal from the Electronic Frontier Foundation requesting $100,000 for the support of legal work to pursue a Federal case to protect the Constitutional right to publish encryption software was approved.

International Software Consortium (ISC) BINDv9. A proposal by the ISC to provide funds to complete the BINDv9 project in the amount of $100,000 was approved.

SOS Children's Village Illinois. A proposal by the SOS Children's Village Illinois for $40,000 for the purchase of computers, hardware and software for this non-profit foster care agency was approved. Computer instruction will be provided by SAGE members who live in the area.

Standards. A proposal by Nick Stoughton for $80,400 to continue standards activities in 2000 was approved. In the coming year, USENIX will continue to have a presence in the Open Group, POSIX and POSIX Revision groups, and will continue to provide updates to the membership of these activities.

USA Computing Olympiad (USACO). A proposal was approved to continue funding the USACO team at the International Olympiad in Informatics that will be held in Beijing, China, in 2000, in the amount of $52,000.

Software Patent Institute. A proposal from the SPI for a grant of $55,000 was approved. This funding will also allow SPI to improve its computer hardware and software, to continue to process design and administration, and to provide more technical assistance.

Computers, Freedom and Privacy Conference Student Stipends. A proposal for USENIX to provide $20,000 for student stipends for travel and accommodations at this conference was approved.

Sponsorship of the Grace Hopper Women in Computing Conference. The proposal for Gold Sponsorship of the Grace Hopper Conference in the amount of $25,000 was approved. Funds will be used for travel expenses for students to attend the conference.

Fast Software Encryption Workshop Stipends. A request for $10,000 to sponsor the Fast Software Encryption 2000 Workshop was approved. These funds will be used for stipends.

Sponsorship of the African Network Infrastructure Meeting. A proposal from the Network Startup Resource Network for $20,000 for sponsorship of the African Network Infrastructure Meeting in Cape Town in May 2000 was approved. This meeting will promote international networking and train network engineers. The funds will be used to support travel, room and board for engineers coming from African countries.

Conference Registration Fees
It was agreed to increase registration fees for tutorials and technical sessions by $10 per day per event in 2000 (student fees are exempt), with the objective of reducing the projected budget deficit, and providing net connectivity and giveaways (i.e., t-shirts) at all conferences.

Conferences
Atlanta Linux Showcase and Conference (ALS). Young reported that negotiations for USENIX partnering with the volunteer groups (ALS Inc.) of this conference were progressing and an agreement and call for papers would be out soon.

Embedded Systems. It was decided to postpone the workshop that was scheduled for March 1999 by 3-5 months.

Java Virtual Machine Workshop. A proposal from Saul Wold to sponsor a workshop on this topic was approved.

Computing Research Association. USENIX and SAGE will submit two abstracts for two sessions at the upcoming Snowbird conference this summer. They would address system administration and open source topics.

Next Board of Directors Meeting
The next meeting will be held on February 17-18, 2000, in Austin, TX.