Thursday, September 8, 2011

Events

These months are quite hectic. I could just finish the draft for the Residential Specification hours before my flight left for the "Masterclass on OSGi" in Stockholm. Neil Bartlett and I had the masterclass in Stockholm because we had been asked to organize it there. We were told there were lots of eager OSGi afficionados that would love to come. In the end we had a single person from Sweden (and he came from the other coast) so from that perspective Stockholm was not good. However, the location, Djüronaset, was absolutely fantastic.
This must be one of the best locations in the world to learn OSGi! Beautiful spot, sauna, swimming pool, coffee and tea all day around, and a good conference room. Even the food was excellent. Combine this with a very good class and you have the recipe for  a thoroughly enjoyable week. This was a very international master class as we had people from Holland, England, Belgium, Sweden, Germany, US, Bulgaria, and Serbia. And one, ehh, guess Australia. Gerd Wütherich had brought Sheepie, a toy sheep secretly put in his backpack by his daughter. Sheepie had many adventures during the week, all photographed by Nils Hartmann for the book about Sheepie. I think we could actually provide Sheepie with the Masterclass certificate because she became an OSGi master along the way.

All participants were experienced so we could focus on the really interesting parts. With an experienced group like this it is possible to really discuss problems people have in day to day practice. Those 4 days were gone before we knew it and saying goodbye was actually hard. We are looking for a similar location on the East coast of the US so if you have suggestions, let us know. Believe, this is fun.

The rest of the week was largely catching up after having been glued to my Framemaker for almost three months. And of course doing the chores for the different events that are coming up. First the OSGi DevCon in Reston, VA next march. The Call for Papers will go out next week and we have started planning the details. Not much time for this as next week we have a meeting in Palo Alto, CA for a combined CPEG and EEG meeting. I had promised many people to provide feedback to their work so that is taking my time.

And then, last but absolutely not least, the OSGi Community Event! This year in Darmstadt, hosted by Deutsche Telekom. The Community Event Puzzle was solved but I will not give out the answer, really interested to see how many people found the word. You can tell me next week! Really looking forward to this event, hoping to meet the OSGi crowd and more. I am moderating a panel about "The Future of OSGi", a subject you can understand that is close to my heart. I've lined up some great people so this will be very interesting. I'll be flying to Darmstadt right after the weekend that I returned from California. I sure hope to see you there.

Then after returning from Darmstadt another week playing catchup so that the week after I can go to JavaOne where BJ Hargrave and I have 3 events going on. An OSGi BOF, a presentation about "Why OSGi?" (Isn't it obvious) and "Migrating to OSGi Services First." And then it is already October ...

Busy busy busy ...

Peter Kriens

1. Updated West coast to East coast