There was a little more excitement around the Unisys booth today. As I attempted to talk by, I was redirected by security personnel. It seems that somebody had collapsed and EMS was working with them. I guess Linux World is just a little too exciting for some. This time, I did have my camera ready, but decided that it was probably a better idea to not take a picture.

I did take a few pictures of the exhibit hall though. You descend into the exhibit hall from the entrance which makes it really easy to take in the full breadth of it all. There’s a lot going on.

This is just one end of the exhibit hall. I’ve marked the Eclipse booth with the red arrow (it’s booth 321 if you’re looking for us). John Graham from the Data Tools Project worked the booth with me today. We did brisk business; a lot of folks had some great questions about Eclipse.

There are a lot of different types of people at this conference. While most folks were asking questions about Eclipse, a couple where just scouting out all the booths (an advance party working ahead of the armada). Some just wanted to know who the heck we were. Most were looking for literature that described what we do (which we don’t generally have on hand). Surprisingly few folks were after swag (we have none). We talked with the people who wanted to talk and directed the others to have a look at our web site.

It seems that there are a lot of folks in the Linux community using Eclipse. But a very large number are not. I managed to stir up some interest in RCP and Java with my talk, and during my time in the expo, I talked to a lot of people about CDT and support for other languages. Hopefully these folks start to look harder at this stuff and engage with the rest of the community.

My morning started with me stuck in Boston traffic. It got more exciting.

Just minutes after I arrived in the exhibit hall, I nearly got knocked over by a Unisys exhibitor. He was running to see why his booth was on fire. The plumes of smoke where spectacular. Unfortunately, by the time I managed to get my camera, the smoke was gone. Maybe next time…

Inspired by my first attempts at making Eclipse wallpaper, I’ve now created a Callisto one. It’s available in the following sizes: 1400×1050, 1280×1024, and 1024×768. You can download these beauties from the evangelism page.

On the topic of Callisto… our first date in the Callisto “Great Bugs” competition is quickly approaching. If you’re sitting on a great bug, now would be a great time to enter it (as it sits, your chances of winning an iPod are quite good).

Bjorn, Anne, Ward, and I discussed what constitutes a great bug today. Personally, I think a great bug is one that adds value to the product. Bjorn’s initial opinion was that a great bug report had to contain lots of great detail so that the committer could quickly fix it without a lot of back and forth iteration between the reporter and the committer. Being the voice of reason, Ward argued that both opinions are probably correct. Anne–being new–was very patient and didn’t call us names. Not even once.

Become part of what is destined to become the Callisto Legend. Install Callisto today. Report your bugs. Eat your vegetables. Be the ball (I have no idea what this means). Remember that a committer has to nominate your bug; don’t cheat!

I’m on my way to Boston to participate in Linux World. I’ve never been to Linux World, so I’m not quite sure what to expect. I’m hoping that at least a few folks show up for my session, titled “Building Applications for Multiple Platforms Using the Eclipse Rich Client Platform“. It’s a pretty lengthy title; probably my longest title to date. I’m so proud.

I installed SuSE Linux in time for the conference. In the process, I decided that it would be cool to have an Eclipse wallpaper, so I built one based on one of the logos found on the artwork page. I just downloaded the image and stretched it out to 1024×768 and 1400×1050. Since I figured somebody else might like them, I’ve added them to the evangelism page. You can find links on the right side.

Enjoy. I hope to see some of you at the conference. If you miss my talk, I’ll be in the exhibit hall helping to staff the Eclipse booth.