[pydata-outreach-staff] Laptop setup guide, and questions

[Asheesh Laroia]

I'm working on preparing a laptop setup guide for the event, and I wanted 
to run a few ideas by y'all.

First of all, other events I've organized, we try to dedicate some time 
before the event for laptop setup. That way, everyone can totally hit the 
ground running when things start. Here are two samples:

* 2-3 hours, the night before: 
https://openhatch.org/wiki/Boston_Python_Workshop_7/Friday

* 15-45 min, as people roll in: 
https://openhatch.org/wiki/Open_Source_Comes_to_Campus/JHU/Laptop_setup

I think something short should be fine for us, but I definitely do want 
people to be fully prepared by the time lecture starts. That way, we 
minimize the number of environment-related questions that the lecturer 
gets, and let him focus on the core teaching he wanted to do.

So here's an outline for what I think we'd need before the lecture:

* Make sure the computer has Python installed

* Make sure you know how to get into a Python interpreter 
prompt

* A text editor installed that they know how to use

* Pandas installed locally

For the group collaboration section, people will need:

* A github account

* Git installed and configured on their laptops

* An IRC client (probably? seems like a good idea to me)

I like the idea of separating "Morning laptop setup" and "Afternoon laptop 
setup" so that we can delay the lecture as little as possible.

I think dedicating 10-15 minutes in the morning to it (10:15 to 10:30?), 
and telling people there are 10-15 minutes after lunch dedicated to it, 
seem like a good idea to me.

Curious what other people think. I'm very flexible on the precise timing, 
and very open to others' ideas. (Am I missing anything? Is there part of 
the above that's unnecessary?)

If the above outline seems reasonable, I will get working on it tomorrow 
morning, and should have a draft of the above instructions ready by 
tomorrow around this time, with support for Windows, Mac OS, and Linux 
(Debian+Ubuntu) machines.

vid, maybe what I'll do is put the draft into your 
https://github.com/svaksha/PyData-Workshop-Sprint/wiki/2012-NYC wiki, 
under a page called "Laptop setup (DRAFT)" and then if you approve, I can 
rename it to "Laptop setup"? Otherwise I can just submit the draft files 
here to the email list for review.

-- Asheesh.

P.S. Didn't want to start yet *another* Asheesh thread on this list, but I 
did book my travel, and I'll be arriving by train on Fri 4:25 PM, so if 
Pivotal Labs is still open, great, and if not, then so be it. Departing 
Monday morning.