Re: report & action plan

[Charles Musisi <cmusisi@uol.co.ug>]

At 02:09 PM 2/10/2002 +0300, ksemat@wawa.eahd.or.ug wrote:
>it was agreed in technical meetings before that we would do this ourselves
>as no company will be able to build a LAN to the exact specifications we
>agreed. We already have a switch as you noted earlier so NCR has no need
>to supply us with a switch.

thanks to the folks who gave this to us. however I don't have it -- don't 
know where
this is switch. so, I'm planning for the purchase of one with the funds we 
have.

>We may be able to get a donation for the
>backup switch. There has been an offer which will be announced as soon as
>there is final confirmation on this. This should help us cut some costs.

I rather deal with it when we get it. If its not here we don't have it...
when it comes we'll welcome it, but now that's too ambiguous.

I think we get too excited about donations -- the beggar syndrome is deep in
us. Donations, and indeed like the Dfid grant are for kick starting  -- 
very help but
not the most important piece. its us who will make it work with support of 
friends
like the folks who give us donations. let us get too excited and forget the 
goal.

> > - Supply of 2 PCs will be tendered again.
>We agreed to build these ourselves in order to cut costs and also to
>guarantee quality. This I can do voluntarily.

I don't agree. .. what's the saving in cost? and who agreed? and what's the 
quality
of the workmanship?

those were thoughts expressed at one of the Coffee Terace meetings..

>Otherwise I do think that we need to meet and set up a steering committee
>for the UIXP quickly. AT this moment the term management is ambiguous as
>we haven't actually met since incorporation to elect a director and other
>people who make approvals concerning major decisions involving the UIXP.

read the articles and if you want constitute yourself into a company or signup
as an individual and then become one. we have a company limited by guarantee
without shares with clear rules on how we change directors etc... there is no
provision for what you're talking about... a steering committee?

As soon as is practical we'll have an AGM -- the correct timing for this
might be sometime in the April/May period or before that.

>Not that I disagree with this but I prefer to have a completely
>transparent process as far as such things are concerned to make sure that
>no future queries about how all this was handled can cause any
>misunderstanding!!

you have to be clear who you represent..but I suppose Sanyutel in this case.

as you saw I already proposed your name as an Interim staff at the IXP.
this might be time for you say publicly if you want this role, and if not we'll
have recruit someone else. from what you have told me in the past
and -- true -- the very recent past you wanted to play this role, so that's
what I based suggestion on.

true, proposing you wasn't done in the most transparent of ways and that's
why I'm doing this an initial period of 3 months during which we'll put place
a more formal mechanism i.e advertise, set qulification(if that helps?)
and so forth.

>I also encourage many of us to please raise your comments more on the
>list. More people read the lsit than attend meetings such that this is
>cetainly a very good forum for airing your views.

agreed. I have argued endless that frequent  face-to-face meetings simply
aren't practical. your org. wanted one so we'll have one on Thursday.
I truly don't know the "true" agenda -- beyond what I was asked to put together
but we'll deal with this when we get there.

Whereas I don't agree with most of what you said in your post I concur
we should use this list to get on with the job.

-- Thanks

>We are not on the lsit to flame each other or hurl insults but simply to
>have a good dialogue. Like all metings there inevitable some disagreements
>on points of view but this should not make some members refrain from
>posting in fear of having their views rejected or being flamed by others.

I don't think this is what you intended in your post -- but if so then
let it be.

>I am very happy that many of us are now speaking out on the lsit which was
>dominated by only a few voices in the past. We need to iron out all these
>things before we are running to avoid crashing soon after starting.