Re: [guadec-list] conference software

[Alexandre Franke <afranke gnome org>]

On Fri, Oct 20, 2017 at 10:54 AM, Tobias Mueller <muelli cryptobitch de> wrote:
> Hi.

Hello,

> What software are you talking about?

He was talking about Pentabarf.

> Frab? I don't have the impression that it's neither unmaintained nor not
> supported. In fact, it sets standards when it comes to an open format
> for the conference's schedules.
> https://github.com/frab/frab

The good thing about standards is that it doesn’t matter what software
sets them. What matters is that they are used.

As far as I know, the schedule format was defined by Pentabarf and
nowadays many other applications implement it

> >   There is 5-6 dedicated people for OSEM.
> But is anybody actually using it? Besides the people themselves for
> openSuSE Conference.

Yes. GNOME.Asia as Sri said earlier, but also a few others (FOSSETCON,
PGConfUS, SeaGL,Open Government Partnership Summit…). I’m not sure
this criterion is that important too. If the software does what we
need it to, and if the developers are active and implementing the
features that are lacking, I’d say that is more important.

> >   So, I'm hoping to make an executive decision and move to OSEM.
> What's your reasoning so far?

First of all, the main motivation is to move away from regcfp. While
it has served us well so far, it has a single developer who said
himself that it should be rewritten. It would be better to move to
something that is better supported and is actively developed.

There are a few alternatives on the market and we could bikeshed for a
while without reaching an agreement. I investigated OSEM and it does
what we need, looks good and easy to use. It fits our requirements and
the developers are listening to user feedback. I heartily recommend
switching to it.

> > Secondly, GNOME.Asia has already used OSEM for the past couple of
> > years.
> wait, what?  This is plain wrong.

How so?

-- 
Alexandre Franke
GNOME Hacker & Foundation Director