hpr4742 :: OLF Call for presentations open

Ken interviews Vance and Beth Lynn about OLF been held on 20/21 Nov 2026

Hosted by Ken Fallon on Tuesday, 2026-10-06 is flagged as Clean and is released under a CC-BY-SA license.
Tags: OLF. Comments: (Be the first).

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Duration: 00:53:53
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Part of the series: general.

OLF Conference

The Conference the artist previously known as the Ohio Linux Festival, is returning to it's 2003 beginnings on the campus of Dreese Laboratories at Ohio State University

Starting at noon on Friday Nov 20 and running all day Saturday 21 Nov 2026, during this event, Open Source projects, developers and visitors can exchange ideas and knowledge.

Interviewees

HPR is no stranger to OLF , and we interview the team as a call for presentations is now open.

Vance has been using Linux since 1997 and was active in the Western Pennsylvania Linux Users Group from 2003 to 2017. In addition to general desktop use, he has an interest in system and network administration. Vance currently lives in Pittsburgh and works in quality assurance for safety equipment. Vance first began volunteering with Ohio LinuxFest in 2006. He worked on producing audio recordings of sessions starting in 2009, served as Speaker Chair for the 2014 through 2017 conferences, and was Birds of a Feather Chair from 2018 to 2020. He took on the Conference Chair role from 2021 through 2023, then returned as Speaker Chair starting in 2024.

Beth Lynn currently lives in Pittsburgh and works as Senior System Engineer. She has over twenty years experience in managing, building and collaborating with teams within Free Software Expertise in GNU/Linux distributions such as Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Fedora, Ubuntu, and SUSE. From 2002 to 2011 Beth Lynn led the Western PA Linux Users Group, which began at Carnegie Mellon University.

Beth Lynn first came to OLF as an attendee in 2003. She immediately signed up to help at future conferences. When a mix up occurred in the venue early in the OLF history, Beth contacted Jon “maddog” Hall and others for help, which saved that year’s conference (close to the date of the event). Due to her longevity with OLF over the years she has been a speaker, conference chairperson, and fundraiser. When the original conference chairpersons retired from leadership roles, Beth Lynn stepped up to keep the conference running smoothly as the Director. In 2007 Beth applied and defended 501(c)(3) non-profit status for the organization.

Beth Lynn Eicher is passionate about the ideals of FOSS and in growing community across the country and world in this movement. She attends other Linux- FOSS conferences and is well known across the country. In 2013 she was asked to speak at the Free Software Foundation Conference held at Harvard University on the topic of “Closing the Digital Divide”. There she reported on the successful deployment of 100 Edubuntu PCs to schools in Ghana, Africa that served mostly orphaned children. Beth Lynn went to Ghana with a team from Computereach, training in networking, pc repair, the GNU/Linux command-line, and the Edubuntu desktop environment.

Travel Times

Country	Typical Travel Method	Example Destination	Approx Duration	Typical Budget Cost (One Way)
USA	Car	Cincinnati, Ohio	1h 40m–2h 10m	$20–40
USA	Bus	Cincinnati, Ohio	2h–3h	$20–45
USA	Train	Cincinnati, Ohio	2h–3h	$25–60
USA	Aeroplane	Chicago, Illinois	1h 10m flight	$70–180
USA	Car	Cleveland, Ohio	2h–2h 45m	$25–50
USA	Bus	Cleveland, Ohio	2h 45m–4h	$25–55
USA	Train	Cleveland, Ohio	2h 30m–4h	$25–70
USA	Aeroplane	Detroit, Michigan	1h flight	$70–180
USA	Car	Dayton, Ohio	1h 15m–2h	$15–30
USA	Bus	Dayton, Ohio	1h 30m–2h 30m	$15–35
USA	Train	Toledo, Ohio	2h 30m–3h 30m	$25–60
USA	Aeroplane	Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania	1h flight	$70–180
USA	Car	Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania	3h–3h 30m	$35–65
USA	Bus	Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania	3h 30m–5h	$25–60
USA	Train	Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania	3h 30m–5h	$30–70
USA	Car	Indianapolis, Indiana	2h 45m–3h 15m	$30–55
USA	Bus	Indianapolis, Indiana	3h 30m–5h	$30–65
USA	Train	Indianapolis, Indiana	4h+	$40–80
USA	Aeroplane	Indianapolis, Indiana	~1h flight	$70–180
USA	Car	Fort Wayne, Indiana	2h 30m–3h	$30–50
USA	Bus	Fort Wayne, Indiana	3h 30m–5h	$25–60
USA	Car	Erie, Pennsylvania	2h 30m–3h	$25–50
USA	Bus	Erie, Pennsylvania	3h 30m–5h	$25–60
USA	Train	Erie, Pennsylvania	3h–4h 30m	$25–65
USA	Car	Charleston, West Virginia	2h 45m–3h	$30–55
USA	Bus	Charleston, West Virginia	4h–5h 30m	$30–70
USA	Car	Louisville, Kentucky	3h–3h 30m	$35–60
USA	Bus	Louisville, Kentucky	4h–5h 30m	$30–70
USA	Aeroplane	Louisville, Kentucky	~1h flight	$70–180
Canada	Car	Windsor, Ontario	3h–3h 30m	$35–65
Canada	Bus	Windsor, Ontario	4h–6h	$40–80
Canada	Aeroplane	Toronto, Ontario	~1h 15m flight	$100–250

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