Summary
- interesting information about open source and O'Reilly and the people involved
- fun information about the animals on O'Reilly books
- good for keeping track of appointments, events
Recommendation
If you are a supporter of open source and O'Reilly, this calendar is worth getting (even if you don't plan to use it to keep track of dates).
animals
Some animals you'll see pictures of on the calendar are:
- Arabian horse
- bottlenose dolphin
- camel
- koala
- meerkat
- surinam toad
- tarsier
Contents
About the Reviewer
I'm a long time developer of software and websites. I'm a Perl lover (since 1994) and recently started a Perl group in Oakland, California. I am an advocate of open source. I think O'Reilly books rock.
At home I have SuSE Linux running on two PCs (and I have an old MAC). I have too many O'Reilly books to count.
Clearly I'm not an objective reviewer of this calendar. Nor do I wish to be.
Who Is the Calendar For?
If you want a girlie calendar, this is the wrong calendar for you. There's very little skin here. Oh, well! If you want a scenic calendar this is the wrong calendar for you. There are no magical snow scenes here. Damn!
If you want a calendar to keep track of appointments and events, you would likely find this calendar more than acceptable. I'm using it for that.
But who this calendar is really excellent for is supporters of open source and O'Reilly. You'll find all sorts of interesting and fun information here about open source and O'Reilly presented in a friendly, easily absorbed way. I found it enaging enough that I read like a book.
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Why a Review?
Well, why not a review?
If it comes to reasons, how about the following:
- I think there is something amusing about authoring a review of a calendar. The idea that someone will read this review also amuses me. Thanks.
- I think it's an interesting and fun calendar. I actually want to encourage people to get the calendar.
- Doing the review gave me a chance to read the calendar like a book, which I enjoyed.
- I wanted to get a first review of some kind onto the Oakland.pm site fast.
Size
- page sides: 26 (excluding covers)
- dimensions: 9.5"x10" approximately
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Calendar Contents
The calendar is divided into, duh, 12 sections, plus a final section. Each section includes a lead article plus other stuff. The first 12 sections each contain the calendar for the appropriate month. The sections, along with the titles of their lead articles [plus annotations by me in square brackets for clarification], are:
- January: How O'Reilly Met Perl
- February: Love and Unix
- March: Thinking About Technology
- April: Internet Everywhere
- May: Mac Attack
- June: .NET: Microsoft Bets on the Internet
- July: Open Source: Community, Creativity, Collaboration
- August: There's a New Operating System in Town [Linux]
- September: Early Days of the Web
- October: Getting Under the Hood [System Administration]
- November: In a Nutshells, In a Nutshell
- December: Java Gets Real
- Final: Reflections on the Last 25 Years
But there's much more than that. See Themes below for a hint of what else.
Themes
Certain themes recur in the calendar. Some of them are:
- animals [of the O'Reilly books: images, facts about, communications about; even animal magnetism]
- books [by O'Reilly: images, releases]
- events [O'Reilly conferences, etc.; technology timeline starting from 1983]
- people [open source and O'Reilly people: images, facts about]
- quotes [especially by Tim O'Reilly; also by Linus Torvalds and others]
© Copyright George Woolley 2003
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