Over 30,000 people attended the combined IT 2000 & Linux Open Source Expo. The large number of exhibitors ranged from big corporations to local special interest groups; router manufacturers to software resellers; Linux service providers to Linux promoters. All were there with a common theme: showing off Linux to the public.
A conference dinner marked the start of the event, with Jon Mad Dog' Hall of Linux International and VA Linux as the keynote speaker. Hall's speech focused on the future for Linux, and discussed how the open source and community nature of Linux can work in a corporate environment anywhere in the world, stating that this, in fact, is the best way for people to help people.
There was also an awards cere-mony at the dinner, to recognise the effort many of the exhibitors had put into their products and services. Ben Gerholt (Editorial Director for IDG's PC Division) and Gavin Sherry judged the awards.
The awards went to: SGI, for Open Source XFS (best product of the show) with finalists TurboLinux for the Turbo Cluster Server, Debian for the Debian release, and SuSe for SuSe Linux 6.3; Computer Associates, for ArcServeIT for Linux (best application of the show) with finalists Computer Associates for Unicenter TNG, and TCP Networks for NetMax Firewall; LinuxPlaza, for Raq3 (most innovative product) with finalists SGI for its Internet Server, and Moreton Bay for its NetTel VPN router; LinuxCare (best services pro-vider) with finalists SGI for education, support and professional services, and Caldera for Linux education.
Overall, the show greatly assisted in raising Linux's mainstream public profile, and highlighted the growing support it has in the industry.
