openSUSE + LibreOffice Conference Will Take Place Online

Organizers of the openSUSE + LibreOffice Conference along with the project’s boards have made the decision to change the conference to an online conference.

The uncertainty surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic and its effect on travel, conference planning, logistics and possibility for attendees to come to the event were reasons for shifting the event from a physical event to an online event.

Shifting the conference online is good news and the organizers intend to provide a great conference that is filled with insightful talks, technical presentations and sessions dedicated for those who want to socialize during the event. Using video a conferencing tool, attendees learn about new technologies in openSUSE and LibreOffice and have the chance to chat to developers and ask questions. Communities involved in marketing, design, QA and other topics will be able to meet online, catch up and exchange ideas.

The Call for Papers (CfP) will remain open and people can continue to submit their talks until July 21. The submissions for the CfP will continue to take place on the Open Source Event Manager (OSEM) instance at https://events.opensuse.org. The collection of submissions will be organized in the OSEM tool, but the online event will take place on a different website site like the one recently used for the openSUSE Virtual Summit – https://opensuse.reqmagic.com. The platform works with Firefox, Chromium and other open-source browsers. The software leverages various APIs (YouTube, Dolby, etc) to enable web based service, which is entirely HTML5 based with no plugins required.

More information about the time frame and schedule of the conference will be made available soon.

The following tracks can be selected when submitting talks related to openSUSE:

a) openSUSE

b) Open Source

c) Cloud and Containers

d) Embedded.

The following tracks can be selected when submitting talks related to LibreOffice:

a) Development, APIs, Extensions, Future Technology

b) Quality Assurance

c) Localization, Documentation and Native Language Projects

d) Appealing Libreoffice: Ease of Use, Design and Accessibility

e) Open Document Format, Document Liberation and Interoperability

f) Advocating, Promoting, Marketing LibreOffice

Talks can range from easy to difficult and there are 15 minute, 30 minute and 45 minute slots available.

The openSUSE + LibreOffice Conference organizers would like to hear immediately from community members who would be interested in organizing mini-online summits to go along with the conference in their local language. The idea would be that the mini-online summits could reach greater audiences for communities that are willing to help with organizing it, as it happens for the monthly events organized by the LibreOffice Spanish speaking community. While the openSUSE + LibreOffice Conference will be done in English, the mini-online summits can be done in a local language. For languages spoken in several countries with active communities (for instance, French, German and Spanish), the efforts will have to be coordinated in order to involve all volunteers. For those who are interested, email ddemaio@opensuse.org with the subject “openSUSE + LibreOffice Conference Mini-Summit”.

How to submit a proposal

Please submit your proposal to the following website: https://events.opensuse.org/conferences/oSLO 

• Create an account if you don’t already have one.

• Your proposal must be written in English and be no longer than 500 words.

• Please run spell and grammar checkers for your proposal before submission.

    ◦ https://extensions.libreoffice.org/extensions/languagetool
    
    ◦ https://www.grammarly.com/
    
• Your biography on your profile page is also a reviewed document. Please do not forget to write your background.

• You must obey openSUSE Conference code of conduct:

https://en.opensuse.org/openSUSE:Conference_code_of_conduct

It is recommended that you use the slide deck of what ever organization you choose to represent. The openSUSE slide decks are located at https://github.com/openSUSE/artwork/tree/master/slides and the LibreOffice slide deck is located at https://extensions.libreoffice.org/templates/libreoffice-presentation-templates 

Guide to write your proposal

Please write your proposal so that it is related to one or more topics

For example, if your talk is on security or desktop, it is better that it contains how to install that applications or demo on openSUSE.

Please clarify what the participants will learn from your talk.

• The introduction of main technology or software in your talk

• The main topic of your talk