2020 began with the promise of an excellent beginning for the decade ahead. But no one could have predicted that five months into the year, we would all be sitting in our homes, afraid of a deadly pandemic that is spreading across the globe.
While there were a lot of conferences scheduled for the year, the coronavirus episode means that most of them have been canceled. Thanks to the advancement in technology and better internet penetration, we have a lot of these conferences moving online.
Here is a list of ten virtual conferences you can attend in 2020.
1. DevSecCon24
DevSecCon 24 will combine DevOps and Security in a 24-hour virtual event that is hosted and also presided by practitioners. The USP of this event will be the talks around DevSecOps — the process of building security into the development process. Get the lowdown from the top industry experts and learn in a virtual environment how Security and Dev Ops go hand in hand in making continuously secure development a norm.
There is also a virtual expo where you get the chance to meet and interact with the sponsors, watch videos, and ask questions.
You will get the chance to understand how security can be implemented in the overall development process - ranging from customers to supply chain.
Website - https://www.devseccon.com/devseccon24-2020/
When: 15- 16 June 2020
Entry fee - Free
2. OpenDev -
This 3-day summit is an ideal place to meet and interact with the developers, users, and supporters of the open-source software. The virtual event this year is separated into three distinct categories - Large scale use of open infrastructure, Hardware Automation, and Containers in Production. Each day will deal with one of these topics.
Large Scale use of open infrastructure: This day will give a platform for users to share architecture and case studies, and work with developers to implement their open-source requirements directly. The event will deal with the challenges that you have to overcome when you have to deal with operating open infrastructure at scale.
The topics include centralized computing vs. distributed computing for NFV, scaling user stories, upgrades, etc.
Automation: During this event, viewers get a ringside view of operators as they discuss hardware limitations for cloud provisioning and challenges faced while networking, among other things.
Topics include networking, end-to-end hardware provisioning lifecycle for bare metal, and provide provision for cloud-based workloads by consuming bare metal infrastructure.
Containers in Production: Organizations today are developing architectures for a range of workloads, whether it is ranging from running containerized applications on bare metal or VMs. Users can use this event to discuss infrastructure requirements to support containers or collaborate directly with developers about their open source requirements.
Topics include security and isolation, bare metals, containers, using Openstack with containers, Telco, and network functions, among others.
Website - https://www.openstack.org/events/opendev-2020/
Dates - June 29 - July 1, July 20–22, August 10–12, 2020
Entry fee - Free
3. UX Writer conference
This virtual conference, brought to you by Welinske and Associates, aims to bring together UX writers from all across the world onto a single platform.
UX writers from different industries, and spread in different geographies, will all share what they know to the attendees in a series of Zoom conferences.
The speakers at this year's UX writer's conference include Torrey Podmajersky, who has written for the likes of Microsoft, and more recently, Google. Also speaking at this session will be Elly Searle, who founded the UX writing teams at CrowdStrike.
Website - https://uxwriterconference.com/
Dates - June 9–10, 2020
Entry Fee - $195
4. React Native Remote Conf 2020
This three-day remote conference is brought to you by the people behind React Native Radio podcast. React Native developers have the opportunity to network with some of the best minds in the business from across the world.
The participants have the luxury to stream any of the events, based on their convenience. On the first day, we have Christopher Chedeau, a Facebook Engineer, talking about the origins of React Native.
The speakers also include Tim Jung, who is an Engineer at Activision Blizzard. The regular speaker sessions will be interspersed with a networking hour, where developers have the chance to speak to other developers from around the world.
Website - https://reactnativeremoteconf.com/
Dates - July 29–31, 2020
Entry Fee - $75 per head
5. Ruby on Rails Railconf 2020
The online version of the popular Railsconf2020, a Ruby on Rails conference, canceled their in-person event scheduled earlier this year. But the organizers of Railsconf have managed to record all their interviews with the keynote speakers and put them online, which you can see on their website, railsconf.com.
Titled Railsconf 2020.2 Couch edition, the website gives access to all the speeches scheduled to happen this year, including the ones by David Heinemeier Hansson of Basecamp and Eileen M. Uchitelle of Github.
There are close to 33 speeches available on the website, enough to cover a couple of days on your calendar. The talks range from "Advanced ActionText" by Chris Oliver and "Wrangle your SQL with Arel" by Eric Hayes.
Website - https://railsconf.com/
Dates - Open
Entry Fee- Free
6. Apple WWDC 2020
Apple's World Wide Developer Conference 2020 is poised to be its most significant, looking to connect 23 million iOS developers in a week in June. The event will open doors for scores of developers from across the world to get early access to some of the new features in iOS, macOS, iPadOS, tvOS and watchOS.
The conference will also give developers an opportunity to interact with Apple engineers, prodding them about the new features they can expect with the next iPhone or iPad.
Apple has a strong and robust developer community, with roughly 23 million registered developers in more than 155 countries, and the WWDC aims to provide them with insights on how to turn their ideas into reality.
Website - https://developer.apple.com/wwdc20/?cid=CDM-DM-P0012725-448038&cp=em-P0012725-448038&sr=em
Dates - June 22, 2020
Entry Fee - Free
7. Stackconf online
Stackconf is a virtual tech conference about open source infrastructure, bridging the gap between development, operations, and testing and looking at it from multiple perspectives. The conference will give participants a look at how IT experts run their applications and how infrastructure in production has a massive influence on how they build their tech stack.
The team behind stackconf have been bringing together experts in the open-source field under one roof since 2009, and are expecting a large turnout this year.
Speakers include big names in the field, such as Aiko Klostermann of Thoughtworks and Ignat Korchagin from Cloudflare, along with 38 other experts over three days.
Website: https://stackconf.eu/
Dates - June 16,17,18 2020
Entry Fee - 99 Euros
8. DrupalCon Global 2020
Users of the popular Drupal Content management software have reason to cheer as Drupal has moved its conference that was scheduled to happen in Minneapolis into a fully virtual conference this year. DrupalCon aims to bring together developers and enthusiasts of Drupal, to share their thoughts and knowledge on open source software and enhanced digital experiences.
The conference also aims to provide networking opportunities to Drupal professionals. This year, DrupalCon will stick to its tradition of opening with Driesnote, where founder Dries Buytaert will chalk out Drupal's roadmap for the coming year.
Driesnote will be followed by presentations from industry experts, followed by a community connect the program to facilitate organic conversations between participants. Ticket holders will also get access to featured speaker content,on-demand event content, and attendee-only content in the content library.
Website - https://events.drupal.org/global2020
Dates - July 14–17, 2020
Entry Fee - $500
9. BrightonRuby 2020
This single-day conference, usually held in Brighton in July and organized by the vivacious Andy Croll, is moving online thanks to the coronavirus. Andy is putting together a group of Ruby experts in a series of video talks, a Podcast, and a book, all scheduled to arrive somewhere around mid-June this year.
The conference this year will be a mixture of Ruby, software engineering, and "me being an idiot," in Andy's own words.
In addition, 2 pounds out of every ticket sold will go to a Shelter, a charity for the homeless in the UK.
Website - https://brightonruby.com/
Dates - Mid June 2020
Entry Fee - 29 pounds
10. Hacking with Swift Live 2020
One of the world's largest Swift conferences will be held online this year in the third week of July 2020. This online iOS event will cover everything ranging from all the developments at WWDC 2020 to the current best practices while coding with Swift.
The conference aims to cover all the new frameworks of Apple, with tonnes of real-world examples and explanations. A hands-on coding challenge will help you sharpen your skills, and workshops will help you to learn the latest developments in Swift programming.
Networking is another key takeaway with this event since you have Swift programmers from all over the world discussing the latest trends in iOS development. To top things up, all the proceeds from the event this year will go to a charity, so you are learning and helping the world become a better place.
Website - https://www.hackingwithswift.com/live
Dates - 13,14, 15,16 July 2020
Entry Fee - 330 Euros for a regular ticket
500 Euros for an Individual sponsor
These are only some of the fantastic conferences happening this year. I might put out another list later this year. If you feel I missed out on something important - do let me know in the comments below!
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