Re: sponsoring a GNOME developer training session at Fedora Action Day Ghana

[Ben Konrath <ben bagu org>]

Hi Brian,

Sorry for the late response. The message was inadvertently filtered
out of my Inbox and I only stumbled upon recently. I know this sounds
like a 'dog ate my homework' kinda thing but sometimes the dog does
eat your homework. :-)

On Thu, Jan 20, 2011 at 10:16 PM, Brian Cameron
<brian cameron oracle com> wrote:
>
> Ben:
>
> This sounds like a wonderful opportunity.  Thanks for continuing to
> help us in this valuable way.  Some questions:
>
> - When is the date?

I'm not sure. I'll ask Isaac and get back to you.

> - Considering it doesn't make sense to travel to someplace like Ghana
>  for just 1 day, how many days lodging do you think is reasonable to
>  motivate volunteers to consider helping us in this way?

It really depends on where the person is coming from and how much jet
lag they need to deal with. I could see 3 or 4 days being a reasonable
minimum. But that's probably not for everyone.

> - What language is the conference held in?  Should this affect who goes?

FAD Ghana will be held in English. There are several local languages
in Ghana but, as former British colony, English is the national
language.

> - Are there any concerns about getting visas?

Yes, whoever goes will need to get a visa before they go. The actual
visa isn't cheap - I think it was about $65 CAD when I went but that
depends which passport you hold. Whoever goes will need a letter of
invitation. That could probably come from Isaac as he's organizing FAD
Ghana.

> - Does the event need to be focused on Fedora?  If The GNOME Foundation
>  were sending people, could we get "GNOME" or "Free Software" in the
>  event title?

It's possible but I'd have to chat with Isaac and get his thoughts.
More on this below.

> - What visibility do you expect The GNOME Foundation will get from this?

That's a good question and not something that really put much thought
into yet. Off the top of my head, this is good opportunity to show
that the GNOME Foundation wants to continue promoting GNOME and F/OSS
in the region. Whoever ends up going can do the regular blogging and
email report. I can also promote the event to my contacts who work at
ICT related international development organizations.

> - Could you provide more details about the budget?

I haven't really thought too much about this yet but I can put
something together based on my expenses from my trip there last May.
I'll get back to you.

> - Could the GNOME training sessions be held on other days than the
>  conference, so that the volunteer would need to be there for more
>  than 1 day?  Or does it make sense to discuss with the event
>  organizers making it a 2-day event or something?

I've been in regular contact with Gaël Hernández from IICD, an
international development non-profit that focuses on ICTs, about
things that we can do promote GNOME and F/OSS in general in developing
counties. Since I'm particularly interested in Sub-Saharan Africa,
Gaël pointed me to Google developer days in Kenya and Uganda as a
model that F/OSS can be promoted in the region:

http://sitescontent.google.com/guganda/
http://sitescontent.google.com/gkenya/

Before I get carried away with grand visions of a "Free Software Days
Ghana", I want to make sure that I don't derail the work that Isaac is
doing with FAD Ghana - which is totally awesome by the way. It would
be a shame to turn FAD Ghana, which seems to be a grass roots, self
organized mini-conference, to something that seems to be organized by
people in the North (developed countries). I'll have a chat with Isaac
and get his thoughts on at least adding a day for GNOME training in
which case we could go shoot for something like "FAD & GNOME Ghana
2011". Just a thought.

> We'd have to see a more detailed budget and plan to make a decision,
> but it sounds very reasonable.  It is important to the GNOME Foundation
> to reach out to the developing world.

Great! I'm glad to hear that the GNOME Foundation is interested in
this kinda thing.

> Are there other conferences in Africa that you think we should be
> planning to send people?

Yes. I think somebody should go down to Idlelo again this year. We
should try to encourage a more serious technical track from the
conference organizers and try to get other F/OSS communities there.
The website doesn't seem to be updated for this year's conference yet:

http://www.idlelo.net/

There's also eLearning Africa which might be a good conference to have
some Sugar developers attend:

http://www.elearning-africa.com/

> I do think that there should be an announcement on the developing-world
> list.  I think we could be better about posting updates to that list,
> and notification about possibly interesting events like this.

Good idea. I'll make an announcement.

Thanks for responding. I'll get back to you with the information that
you requested.

Cheers, Ben