GNOME Asia 2022 - My first international conference

Hey everyone!

Hope everyone is doing well and enjoying this holiday season. In this blog, I am excited to share my experience about attending my first GNOME Asia 2022 Summit in Malaysia. The conference, which focuses on the GNOME Open Source desktop environment, was held in Kuala Lumpur, the vibrant and bustling capital city of Malaysia.

Let's begin!

Back in May of 2022, GUADEC 2022 took place in Mexico and Google Summer of Code interns had a chance to present their projects in that event, but due to some visa issues, none of the interns were able to attend that conference in-person.

Fast forward to October 2022, where we heard about GNOME Asia 2022 Summit which was going to be held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. I was pretty excited as we were invited again by the GNOME Foundation! Thank you Felipe Borges!

Getting Malaysian visa was pretty easy as it lies in Asia. Special thanks to Umang Jain and Melissa Wu for approving the travel request and booking the accommodations for us.

Two days before the event

Everything was ready, and I had reached Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport. As this was my first international flight, this was an adventure for me. Aman and Pooja joined me in my flight, so travelling was more fun! All the processes were smooth and finally boarded the flight.

A day before the event

Finally landed in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia at around 7 A.M in the morning. The organizing committee had organized a cab for us to travel from the airport to the hotel. It was a really great gesture. Thank you Kristi Progri and Syazwan for this!

Then I got to meet my other fellow GSoCers - Anupam and Aryan. All of us made this trip fun for each other!

The day of the conference

As I walked into the conference center, I was immediately struck by the sense of community and collaboration in the air. The conference was attended by developers, designers, and users of GNOME from all over the world, and it was clear that everyone was eager to share their experiences and learn from one another. The schedule for GNOME Asia had some amazing workshops and talks.

The D.E.I Workshop by Jonna was fun and interactive. It was a community bonding period where I got interact with a few developers from Singapore and France.

After this workshop we had lunch and attended the Newcomer's workshop by Felipe. He was missed at the conference, but his talk was really nice who wanted to know more about GNOME Apps.

After the summit, we went out to explore Malaysia. And Malaysia is a really beautiful city with lots of awesome people around. First we visited the Aquaria, which is a super big aquarium! We got to see the Musical fountain and Petronas Towers at night! The view was astonishing.

Second day of the conference

Second day of the conference started with Aryan sharing his open source journey and GSoC experience. After that got to learn more about Open Source and Cybersecurity. After lunch break, I attended a few talks by Anisa Kuci, Mantoh Kuma and Matthias Clasen which were great! Kristi Progri mentioned in her lightning talk that the GNOME Foundation is open to anyone who wants to host GNOME Asia in their country. Do reach out to them!

After the conference, we again went to sight seeing and shopping. The Central Market and Chinatown are the best and cheap places to shop in Kuala Lumpur. Got some chocolates and show pieces from there, pretty amazing! Lastly, ended the day by visiting KL Tower. The view from there is gorgeous! You can almost see entire Kuala Lumpur from there!

Last day of the conference

I had my lightning talk on the last day. It was about my GSoC project "Faces of GNOME" which is built by developers for the developers to showcase their profile and projects they are working on. It was an awesome experience speaking in front of everyone and later and received valuable feedback from other attendees and GNOMEies in the conference. Open source community is just the best!

Let’s put it all together

Overall, attending my first GNOME Asia conference in Malaysia was a fantastic experience. I learned a lot, made some great connections, and had an amazing time exploring the beautiful city of Kuala Lumpur. I can't wait to attend another GNOME conference in the future, and I would highly recommend this experience to anyone interested in open source software and the GNOME community.

Here's a small trailer of the event with all the amazing speakers (and yes they included the interns in the thumbnail!).

I would like to thank the GNOME Foundation for sponsoring my trip. I am grateful for the opportunity to attend and it wouldn't have been possible without them.

Kuala Lumpur was great, lots of awesome people, food and culture! I hope to meet everyone again soon in future GNOME events.

Open Source FTW 🚀

Merry Christmas 🎄 and a Happy New Year ✨!