The day the Swiss got together

By: François

Last Saturday we held the first national Swiss TYPO3 User Group day. It was a very nice meeting with a pleasant atmosphere and quality talks.

The meeting in full swing, with yours truly talking about services

The speakers received these beautiful, hand-made TYPO3 chocolates

As you may have noticed if you follow my writings (of which there was admittedly a severe scarcity recently) you will have probably noticed that I'm quite enthusiastic about the community aspect of Open Source software. As such I have attended all the Developer Days since they exist, plus most of the conferences. I also traveled twice to Zürich to attend meetings of the Swiss TYPO3 User Group.

Last year I finally started organising meetings in Lausanne to gather TYPO3 users from the French-speaking part of Switzerland. We had three meetings until now, with the same formula used in Zürich: a gathering in the evening with first a conference, then a lunch in a local restaurant. We meet in Lausanne which is quite central with regard to French-speaking Switzerland.

At the last Developer Days we had an informal meeting of German and French-speaking Swiss guys and started toying with the idea of having a national meeting, using English to bridge the language gap (also called Röstigraben). A first draft was prepared next time I met again with Mario Rimann, during the Open Expo/Hack Contest in September last year. After that Mario got full speed into the organisation with the help of Daniela Roth.

The result was a one-day meeting last Saturday (Jan 24) in Olten (quite a central place in the country). People came from all over Switzerland plus a few German (nice of you to come, guys!). We had six talks, a lunch and a surprise lottery draw. It was all very nice and remarkably organized. It was an opportunity to make a number of new contacts and it proved once more - if that was really needed - that sharing with the community always brought a lot back.

I enjoyed this day immensely. Heartfelt thanks to Mario and Daniela for the organisation. Getting involved in the community is one of the things that makes Open Source software so much more worth than commercial stuff. I don't know for you, but as far as I'm concerned, any such meeting recharges my batteries and keeps me going longer. So if you feel a bit down and the next official event seems too far away, go to your local TUG and get a shot of sharing!