Adding to the other reports from NAMES... We had a lot of folks come by the booth on Saturday--probably handed out 200+ flyers and 70+ CDs. Sunday the attendance was perhaps 1/3 of Saturday. In the end we handed out a total of more than 100 CDs and 300-400 flyers.
The folks who actually stopped in the booth ranged from active EMC users to folks just interested in learning about CNC. There were a fair number who mentioned the BDI CD, and a few that had not had great experiences installing EMC in the past (probably Linux installation issues). Heard many folks talk about the machines they had in their basement, or the parts they had been collecting, but they just had not pushed through to finish it up. My impression is that a lot of the people we handed CDs to will actually try it out. Most were very appreciative. We really didn't press CDs into people's hands. The booth looked quite nice (in my opinion)--the photos on the boards are 24" x 36" and are really high quality with informative descriptions. The banner was visible from across the hall. We ran the video of the 5-axis milling machine from Belgium (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjPCEpZybXs&feature=related), and folks who caught on what was happening really enjoyed it. (Their machine was also on one of the photo boards.) Some suggestions: --Don't have tool changes in the demo G-code; interrupts talking with people when there's a tool change (or the machine stops). Or, have a couple of demos (one that is cool, runs largely unattended, and another that has tool changes and the like when you have someone ready for more details) --Find out what the attendance is like, don't assume a uniform distribution of visitors per hour --Get envelopes for the CDs (I dropped that ball) --Have a second machine to show exactly what Live CD will present to the new user so they can be walked through running a simulated machine (this was very useful) --Set up a PMDX-112 Parallel port simulator to show more concretely how one configures EMC for parallel port operation --Clear covers on the motor controller box were a hit--folks could see the various parts, but the plastic kept fingers out --Have a cooler demo piece of G-code (like a 3-d "Chips"), ideally with 4 or 5 axes. Chris Radek and John Kasunich came to the show on Sunday (and were a great help in tear-down--thanks!). Matt Shaver also drove up, and answered a lot of questions from visitors. Steve Stallings lent us a PMDX-112, the idea being that it would be useful to show how one went about configuring EMC for parallel port operation. It was hooked up and I showed the board to people, but didn't use it interactively--thinking about it now, it could have been more useful than my handwaving, though we really didn't a lot of questions about the interfacing issues. The biggest questions surrounded how one generated G-code and how EMC fit into the tool chain. Next year the show moves back to the Detroit area into a somewhat smaller venue. If we want to do a booth next year, we could coordinate it so that PMDX, Pico Systems, and EMC were all together. With more time, we could explore options such as negotiating a more appropriate booth fee, setting up an EMC seminar, CNC demo area, and so on. --Dale ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Stay on top of everything new and different, both inside and around Java (TM) technology - register by April 22, and save $200 on the JavaOne (SM) conference, June 2-5, 2009, San Francisco. 300 plus technical and hands-on sessions. Register today. Use priority code J9JMT32. http://p.sf.net/sfu/p _______________________________________________ Emc-users mailing list Emc-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/emc-users
