BnB: Back and Busy

It’s been over a week now since we got back from Sydney, so why haven’t I posted? To put it simply – I haven’t had a chance to even check this place!

We arrived back on Wednesday 24th, which was followed by a fierce scramble to get things ready for EGN Lan 3.1 on that Saturday (27th Jan). In the middle of all of this, was Australia Day too (26th), so I lost a week day waiting for the fireworks with friends, and then watching them..

Then the work week started on Monday, and all the work that had piled up while I was away for the past 2 weeks, was now urgent and due the day before yesterday (at the time). So all of this week, I’ve been real busy trying to get on top of things – it’s actually been quite good though and I feel motivated.

Anyway, the Sydney trip was indeed one to remember. Since my partner had forced me to let her come, she conveniently went on the partners programme while the conference was on. Anyway, because of her I met a lot more people then I would have normally – as she met some of the partners of some of the speakers, which led to me meeting a few of the speakers, one of them (top bloke too), was a RedHat graphics guy and Inkscape ambassador: Andy Fitzsimon.

This was the first time I had attended an LCA, and I have to say I was very impressed with the number of speakers, the range of topics and free Wifi Access!. Everything from PHP Security/Performance sessions with Rasmus Lordoff (which was why I attended the conference, and well worth it), to building your own Segway, or using PHP to transmit/receive serial signals – so you can have letterbox (real mail) sensors! Luckily, for those that did not attend, and thanks to the cool LCA2007 team, just about every talk was digitally recorded. Check it all out from: LCA2007 Programme.

The real reason of an LCA though is to meet and network with people – something I probably only realised until about mid week through the conference. It was a bit unsual and unsettling to be around geeks that were mosty smarter then me. The cool thing is though, that everyone attending is obsessed with Open Source and Linux – so everyone is open minded and friendly. The next conference is due around the same time of year, 2008, in Melbourne. My partner and I are already planning to go.. hopefully by then I will be a bit more prepared and I won’t be attending not knowing anyone.