Fun, games, and serious funding
DrupalCon Washington, D.C. 2009
Drupal community leaves its semi-annual conference more than US$ 650,000 richer.
This community report starts with a disclaimer. I am a Drupal nerd. This FOSS community looks inward at its own code as much as it looks outward to the clients it serves. Conversations at Drupal events range from database APIs to plotting crime statistics using geomapping tools to help people get home safely. This mix of code and humanity makes it easy to see why so many people are drawn to Drupal.
Dubbed "the event for Drupal developers," DrupalCon DC [1] was an overwhelming success. More than 1,400 Drupal fanatics gathered in Washington, D.C. to learn and share and have some fun. The organizing committee, led by Bonnie Bogle, did an outstanding job securing sponsors and turned a profit of nearly US$ 180,000. Yes, profit.
During the three-day conference, there were puppets (Figure 1), tree houses, [2] and fuse ball [3]. The usual suspects fired up ye olde Git vs. Bazaar debate. Sam Boyer and I had some newcomers this time, with author Victor Kane [4] weighing in, too. It wasn't all fun and games, though.
During the three-day conference, the community made a formal commitment to improve the visual design of Drupal. In his presentation on Drupal 7 themes, John Albin Wilkins talked about the need for Drupal to speak to designers in their own language. He gave the analogy of a middle school dance with everyone standing awkwardly around the outer edges of the room. Drupal needs to learn how to engage designers using language they understand instead of trying to force its own vocabulary on designers. A new group is now looking at ways to attract professional designers without succumbing to amateur tactics, such as design competitions. Morten.dk has taken on the challenge of organizing an attractive package for designers at DrupalCon Paris (September 2009).
Knighted
At DrupalCon DC it was announced that Knight Drupal Initiative (KDI) granted almost US$ 500,000 to six Drupal community projects. These projects include documentation sprints, microblogging, Facebook integration, shared community news, and geotagging [5]. The Knight Foundation looks to support projects that are making online publishing easier. These grants are in addition to the US$ 5 million the Knight Foundation distributes annually through its Knight News Challenge [6].
Documentation continues to shine in the Drupal community. The KDI awarded the community's efforts, led by Addison Berry, with more than US$ 50,000 to support documentation sprints around the world. In addition to the sprints, Addison is preparing a best practices guide on how to run a documentation sprint. At DrupalCon DC more than 70 participants sprinted to improve the style guide and reduce the number of identified documentation-related bugs on Drupal.org.
Self-selected cat herders [7] at the doc sprint made sure everyone had something to work on. One of the neatest code-related additions that came out of the sprint is a context-sensitive CVS tab for project web pages. This tab is now available on the Drupal.org website and offers module-specific instructions on how to use the Drupal CVS system for each project hosted by Drupal.org.
Videos for all sessions are available through the DrupalCon website. More than half were available by the end of the third and final day of the conference. Check out the DrupalCon website session pages for a comment leading to the uploaded videos.
Infos
- DrupalCon DC: http://dc2009.drupalcon.org
- Tree houses: http://www.flickr.com/photos/emmajane/3352391569
- Fuse ball: http://www.flickr.com/photos/emmajane/3352391251
- Victor Kane: http://awebfactory.com.ar/
- KDI projects: http://drupal.org/node/393554
- Knight News Challenge: http://www.newschallenge.org
- Cat herder buttons: http://www.flickr.com/photos/add1sun/3338990689
Buy this article as PDF
(incl. VAT)
Buy Linux Magazine
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Find SysAdmin Jobs
News
-
KDE Plasma 5.27 Beta is Ready for Testing
The latest beta iteration of the KDE Plasma desktop is now available and includes some important additions and fixes.
-
Netrunner OS 23 Is Now Available
The latest version of this Linux distribution is now based on Debian Bullseye and is ready for installation and finally hits the KDE 5.20 branch of the desktop.
-
New Linux Distribution Built for Gamers
With a Gnome desktop that offers different layouts and a custom kernel, PikaOS is a great option for gamers of all types.
-
System76 Beefs Up Popular Pangolin Laptop
The darling of open-source-powered laptops and desktops will soon drop a new AMD Ryzen 7-powered version of their popular Pangolin laptop.
-
Nobara Project Is a Modified Version of Fedora with User-Friendly Fixes
If you're looking for a version of Fedora that includes third-party and proprietary packages, look no further than the Nobara Project.
-
Gnome 44 Now Has a Release Date
Gnome 44 will be officially released on March 22, 2023.
-
Nitrux 2.6 Available with Kernel 6.1 and a Major Change
The developers of Nitrux have officially released version 2.6 of their Linux distribution with plenty of new features to excite users.
-
Vanilla OS Initial Release Is Now Available
A stock GNOME experience with on-demand immutability finally sees its first production release.
-
Critical Linux Vulnerability Found to Impact SMB Servers
A Linux vulnerability with a CVSS score of 10 has been found to affect SMB servers and can lead to remote code execution.
-
Linux Mint 21.1 Now Available with Plenty of Look and Feel Changes
Vera has arrived and although it is still using kernel 5.15, there are plenty of improvements sure to please everyone.