[vcf-midatlantic] Supercomputer is all set!

[Laura S. Reinhard]

All very exciting. I’m game to help in any way I can. May be able to tap into resources and help find funding opportunities/strategies.
On Nov 8, 2018, 10:40 AM -0500, Ethan O'Toole via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic at lists.vcfed.org>, wrote:
> > The former MARCH group spawned into creation around the second half of 2004
> > and joined InfoAge in 2005. IA gave us a single 12x10 room because that's
> > all it had available.
> > Then in 200(6?) we moved into the next building where we had two rooms. In 2008
> > we got the next two rooms in that hallway, making four total.
> > It wasn't until 2015 that we moved buildings again to where we are now,
> > which is more than 2-3x as big as the old four rooms.
>
> Very cool.
>
> > The bigger the space, the more time/money it takes to make it legal and
> > habitable.
>
> Ah so the spaces needed a bunch of prep work and investment.
>
> > What may happen is our current warehouse will become half storage, half
> > display. We wouldn't need as much storage because more things would be on
> > display.
> > Estimates are about $200K to make the warehouse space into a legal
> > habitable building.
>
> Whew! Does VCF go for grants?
>
> > My personal opinion is that VCF will probably have to raise the funds
> > itself, because IA isn't good at it.
>
> Makes senss. The passion for the subject is from those that participate in
> the subject.
>
> > The military vehicles group also raised their own funds to get a
> > certificate of occupancy on their building, but they needed much less
> > (about $40K) because they skipped HVAC, insulation, interior walls, and a
> > floor! They also have bare-bones electrical infrastructure. That's all fine
> > for Jeeps and tanks. Not so fine for computers. :)
>
> Concrete floor wouldn't be that bad I don't think, insulation and hvac
> would be a must though. Electrical -- maybe you all could do it then have
> electrician check off before inspection? Also running large circuits then
> using surplus data center PDUs might keep it cheaper. Surplus parts can
> save a ton.
>
> > VCF is in the extremely early stages of making a development plan for such
> > things, which would also involve renegotiating our lease to be much more
> > VCF-friendly. It would be dumb of us to put $$ into a building if we didn't
> > get much greater guarantees about the space.
>
> Definitely. Don't want to get screwed on that. That happened to the DC
> pinball museum guy. Invested a ton of money on a space and the landlord
> bumped him out.
>
> > So: is it our goal? Yes. It is possible? Probably. Is it easy? No.
> > But consider how we started and where we are now. We've been succeeding at
> > hard things for a long time.
>
> Makes sense! Thanks for sharing.
>