Re: Desktop Summit Planning

[Luc Pionchon <pionchon luc gmail com>]

On Mon, Dec 19, 2011 at 08:49, Andrew Cowie <andrew operationaldynamics com> wrote:

On Wed, 2011-12-14 at 20:25 +0100, Olav Vitters wrote:
> I likely going to GUADEC as I can meet *only* GNOME

> focused people. With not having a GUADEC each year, I only meet GNOME
> people every other year

I must admit this sentiment resonated. I have nothing at all against KDE
people — I've met plenty of them over the years at other conferences —
but my enthusiasm is for GNOME and the idea of going to a "GNOME
conference" that is not mostly people concerned (at whatever level of
the stack) with making GTK and GNOME awesome does not hold much appeal.

Being able to make the assumption that everyone in the hallways is, one
way or another, involved with GNOME has led to meeting all sorts of
people that I had something in common with. Which is why I've enjoyed
GUADECs and why some other F/OSS conferences have fallen short in this
respect [nothing against those events, just that it's much harder to
meet people who turn out to be relevant].

+1


Would it be beneficial to have (yearly) GUADEC with a collaboration & freedesktop track? Where various external people would be invited to show their technology, their perspectives and their current challenges.

For example KDE people, but also freedesktop, unity, android, whatever. Why not also proprietary solutions - and give them an opportunity to discover the potential benefits of Free Software and public collaborative projects.

The focus shall be on discovery - for the audience, that is GNOME people. The discussions shall be targeted on possible collaborations and convergence : "this is what we have, this is how with solved that, this is our plans, this is our challenges. Are there any benefits in future collaboration?"

It could of course already include GNOME matters that are reused elsewhere. Did last year (I was not here) ubuntu presented their own view on some matters and it was positively received (yes?).

In practice, it might be at first limited, but if only one collaboration emerges, or even if we just get good inspiration, it's already a win. And it may grow in the future.


I see that a yearly track, focused on collaboration & freedesktop, would stimulate collaboration and constructive competition.


What do you think?


Luc