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The Debian Project https://www.debian.org/
DebConf15 — Debian Conference in Heidelberg press@debconf.org
August 5th, 2015 https://www.debian.org/News/2015/20150805
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5 August 2015
* 16th Debian conference, first time in Germany, 15–22 August 2015,
Heidelberg
* Largest DebConf so far with more than 550 participants from 53
countries expected
* "Open weekend" on 15/16 August; only very few spaces left
* Renowned speakers to talk on subjects including the Cloud, security
and privacy, streamed in real-time to the Internet
* Conference website: http://debconf15.debconf.org
* Hashtag for social media: #DebConf15
Heidelberg, August 2015 — The international Debian conference "DebConf"
will take place in Heidelberg, Germany from 15 to 22 August 2015.
Volunteer developers and contributors from all over the world will come
together to inform each other and the general public about progress and
ongoing work and to engage in discussions and planning for future
development. With more than 550 attendees from 53 countries, DebConf15
will be the largest DebConf so far.
At the start of the 8-day-conference, the organising team invites
members of the public to an "Open Weekend", to inform themselves about
the Debian Project, its operating systems and the people behind them.
More information about this weekend is available at
http://debconf15.debconf.org/openweekend.xhtml. Registration is free of
charge, but required via the website. Due to high demand, there are only
very few spaces left.
Visitors may expect presentations in English about the project, its
community and its products. Preparations for the next release and
technical topics will be supplemented with discussions around current
topics relating to the Cloud, security, privacy and Free Software in
general.
Featured speakers are:
* Bradley M. Kuhn, President of the Software Freedom Conservancy
* Werner Koch, Author of the GnuPG security software suite
* Bdale Garbee, Chief Technologist, Open Source and Linux at Hewlett
Packard, and former Debian Project Leader
* Jacob Appelbaum, security expert and journalist
* Allison Randal, President, Open Source Initiative, and Distinguished
Technologist, HP
* Peter Eckersly, Chief Computer Scientist at the Electronic Frontier
Foundation
* John Sullivan, Executive Director, Free Software Foundation
* Jon "maddog" Hall, Executive Director of Linux International
On Saturday evening (15 August), attendees will celebrate the 22nd
birthday of the Debian Project. The band "bellsparx" from Mannheim, who
specialise in Free music, will be playing live.
Another highlight is the screening of "Citizenfour" on Friday evening
(21 August). The film was awarded the Oscar for best documentary earlier
this year, and the Debian Project is explicitly thanked in the movie end
credits.
The rest of the week is packed with technical presentations, workshops
and discussions that will be influential to Debian and the plans for the
next version of the Debian family of operating systems.
The full conference programme is available from
https://summit.debconf.org/debconf15/
"DebConf is of incredible importance to our community," says Debian
Project Leader Neil McGovern. "We work as volunteers around the clock
from all parts of the world and personal interactions and friendships
forged at DebConf have a noticeable impact on the quality of our work,
and the motivation of all our contributors."
DebConf would not be possible without the support of numerous sponsors.
Platinum sponsor Hewlett-Packard and Debian have a long history of
cooperation.
"HP uses Debian to accelerate innovation for HP Helion and The Machine
and it is the natural choice with its strong commitment to being
universal operating system where HP and HP employees participate as part
of the community," says Steve Geary, R&D manager at Hewlett-Packard. "HP
continues its long tradition of sponsoring DebConf as a venue where HP
comes to share our ideas, hear others', and align technical paths for
Debian as part of HP Helion and The Machine."
Please direct any questions or requests for further information to our
press team at <press@debconf.org> or call +49 89 2155 0092 (during
Central European working hours).
About Debian and DebConf
------------------------
The Debian Project is an association of volunteer individuals who
have made common cause to create an operating system comprised entirely
of Free Software. Debian is used in numerous businesses, NGOs and the
public sector world-wide. It serves as the basis of other GNU/Linux
distributions, such as the popular Ubuntu, and Tails, the operating
system in use e.g. by the journalists responsible for the NSA
revelations.
DebConf has taken place every year since 2000 in a different country.
Like the Debian Project, it is organised entirely by volunteers and run
on a not-for-profit basis. Video streams of several presentations are
made available in real-time and archived for public consumption. Apart
from presentations and workshops, the conference goal includes providing
space and infrastructure to attendees to collaborate and discuss.
Next year, "DebConf16" is slated to take place in June/July in Cape
Town, South Africa, for the first time on the African continent.
Proposals for DebConf in 2017 are expected from Montreal/Canada,
Cambridge/United Kingdom, Paris/France, Prague/Czech Republic and
Karlskrona/Sweden.
Details and curiosa
-------------------
Named DebConf15, this year's DebConf is actually the 16th DebConf, which
curiously coincides with computer counting and indexing starting at 0.
The number actually references the year, and the first DebConf in 2000
was DebConf0.
More visitors are expected this year than ever before, a challenge the
organisers managed to rise to. "For the first time in DebConf history,
we have to consider closing down registrations due to the huge
interest," says Martin Krafft, a long time organiser, who's thankful to
the venue for their support: "The youth hostel has been extremely
accommodating and their facilities make it an ideal partner for us. The
cooperation with the staff has been pleasant and uncomplicated all
along."
The biggest challenge was that the youth hostel's Internet connection
was not suitable for the attendees' work and the video live-streaming.
Fortunately, "Project Elephant House" solved this. Within a few months,
the DebConf organisers, the youth hostel, the neighbouring zoo and the
local university teamed up to connect the youth hostel to the
university's network via the fibre connections installed throughout the
zoo. It is planned to keep this connection alive beyond the conference.
Walter Tiefenbach, the leading technician at the Zoo, comments: "Our zoo
invested in future-proof infrastructure a while ago, primarily for our
own digital content. We're very happy that the planned use of our link
by the youth hostel confirms these far-sighted decisions. We're looking
forward to cooperating with the hostel and the university."
The youth hostel operators, Martina and Andreas Rihm, are very pleased
with the development. "Thanks to the DebConf organisers, we managed to
approach this project in a short time. The collaboration with zoo and
university with the support by the DebConf team was very fruitful. In
the future, our guests are going to be able to buy zoo tickets at check-
in time. And we're now also one of the youth hostels in the state of
Baden-Württemberg with the fastest Internet connection."
More Information
----------------
More information about DebConf15 can be found on the conference website
at http://debconf15.debconf.org/ or by contacting the DebConf Global
Press Team at <press@debconf.org>.
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