Hackfest2023 Bensberg

This page details the planning of Inkscape's 2023 hackfest in Bensberg, Germany. The hackfest will take place on March 13-17, 2023. We are looking to bring together a group of 11 attendees. but do not let that number discourage you from throwing your hat in the ring in case we reach/go over it. We are fully booked and the number of participants is final now.

This hackfest is a standalone event and not organized around any other event or FOSS conference.

Previous events: Hackfest2019 Saarbrücken, Hackfest2019 SCALE, Hackfest2018 Kiel, Hackfest2018 LGM, Hackfest2018, Hackfest2017, Hackfest2016, Hackfest2015.

Description

It's a hackfest! We will work on Inkscape bugs, new features, packaging, website issues, ... in fact anything that can benefit from us being physically in the same space. And let's not forget about the social component - all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy! We get to hang and talk and laugh in person since we usually only meet virtually :).

Bensberg

Bensberg is part of Bergisch Gladbach, a city in the western part of Germany, about 15 km east of Cologne. It is beautifully located in the countryside, surrounded by lush forests slightly elevated to give a great view depending on weather conditions. The nearest airport is Cologne Bonn (CGN) which is an international airport.

• Bergisch Gladbach on Wikipedia

Bensberg (range indicated to Cologne's Cathedral). Screenshot from Google Maps.

Venue

Our host is the Generali Akademie, the dedicated education and conference center of the Generali Group in Germany (it's an insurance company). The location's special appeal is its all-inclusive package: conference rooms, hotel rooms and full catering service are conveniently provided on-site.

(full disclosure: as an employee, RdH has been there multiple times)

Location, Location, Location!

official address	for navigation systems
Generali Akademie Am Schloss 1-3 51429 Bergisch-Gladbach Germany	Generali Akademie Jan-Wellem-Straße 51429 Bergisch-Gladbach Germany

Catering

We have full catering on-site, i.e. breakfast, lunch and dinner including non-alcoholic drinks. Our meeting room also comes with coffee and beverages throughout the day.

Don't starve together

	time	comment
breakfast	7:00 - 9:00	buffet
lunch	12:00	buffet; vegetarian only
dinner	18:30	buffet; meat or fish

Facilities

• office hours reception: 8:00 - 16:00

• meeting room available 9:00 - 22:00.

• Wireless networking (fast broadband), powered by m3connect
• No wired network available
• Europlug type F
  • we should bring some power strips
• LCD projector, DVD player, VHS VCR (lol!)
• swimming pool, whirlpool, sauna

Vicinity

Nature. A castle. A small city.

Arrival and Departure

All times UTC+1.

• earliest arrival on Monday: 9:00, RdH is supposed to be the first on site
  • hotel rooms available: 15:00
• window of departure on Friday: 17:00-18:00 (we need to be gone by 18:00)

Travel information

Your main destination is Cologne.

from Cologne/Bonn airport (CGN) to central station

Take the tram S19 to Cologne central station. Travel time is about 15 minutes. The tram is scheduled every 20 minutes for most of the day.

from Cologne central station to Bensberg (public transportation)

Take the bus Schnellbus SB 40 that directly connects Cologne central station to Bensberg (final stop). Travel time is about 30 minutes. This bus is scheduled every half hour between 6am and 8pm.

Once you arrive at the bus stop in Bensberg, you can either take a taxi or walk about 900m to our location.

from Cologne central station to Bensberg (cab)

Our hosts have special conditions with a local cab service (https://www.transfer-nurdogan.de/). I can't tell if that's cheaper compared to the others or just for a classy look:

• 45 € (standard)
• 50 € (large cab, suitable for sharing)

Hotels

Hotel rooms are provided on-site and are part of our conference package, no dedicated booking necessary.

Cost calculation

per attendee

The fee for housing and catering per attendee is 837 € and is due on the last day of the event, payable via debit or credit card (VISA, Mastercard) by each individual themself. A billing address needs to be provided in advance.

hotel room incl. breakfast  127 € x 4 days =    508 €
catering service (days 1-4)  70 € x 4 days =    280 €
catering service (day 5)     49 € x 1 day  =     49 €
--------------------------------------------    837 €

joint event

The meeting room fee is 900 €. Additionally, we have allocated a budget for alcoholic drinks as those are not included in our otherwise "all inclusive package".

meeting room (days 1-5)     180 € x 5 days =    900 €
alcoholic drinks            500 € x 1      =    500 €
--------------------------------------------  1,400 €

Total

Using the interim results from above, this brings us to a total cost (excl. travel) of up to 9,770 €. The fixed part of the total cost (i.e. everything without alcoholic drinks) is 9,270 € and has been payed in full by the SFC by international wire transfer. The total amount for alcoholic drinks - if any - will have to be payed on-site on the last day of our event (RdH will take care of this and do the reimbursement process later).

participants                    837 € x 10 =  8,370 €
joint event                    1400 € x  1 =  1,400 €
--------------------------------------------  9,770 €

Attendance

• Hackfest Bensberg 2023 takes place on March 13-17, 2023
• deadline to apply for attendance is February 01, 2023

preface

In an initial poll, 8 people expressed their interest/availability for this hackfest. Based on this number we are planning for 10 attendees. Should more people be interested, we'll try our best to expand - the earlier we know, the better! If we don't reach 10, we will try to scale down our booking. If you are interested, don't hold yourself back!

I want to attend!

That's great! Be aware of the following:

• You are making a commitment here which will produce expenses for the project. Please make sure that you will be able to honor this commitment! (Are you table to take the week off from your day job? Are you able to travel? etc.)
• Every attendee will have to pay their fee of 837 € on the last day of the hackfest. There is something special about payment methods that we will have to talk about privately, I'll contact everyone. (After the hackfest you can follow the reimbursement procedure.)
• You are eligible to apply no matter if you participated in the initial poll/"call for interest". (Only in case we end up being seriously overbooked and cannot accommodate for everybody we will take the initial poll into account.)

Now go ahead and add yourself to this table (or ask in this issue and it will be done for you):

Join the Signal phone group to keep in touch with everyone during the event.

Name	GitLab handle	Inbound	Outbound
Martin Owens	@doctormo	LH423 13T05:15 FRA	UA8853 21T10:50 FRA
Jonathan Neuhauser	@joneuhauser	13.03. 9:55 (Bensberg)	17.03. 16:08 (Bensberg)
Tavmjong Bah	@Tavmjong	13.03 13:15 Cologne	17.03 18:43 Cologne
Marc Jeanmougin	@marcjeanmougin	12.03 13h15 Cologne Hbf	19.03 13h42 Cologne Hbf
Chris Rogers	@CRogers	13.03. 12:00 (Bensberg)	booked - ok!
René de Hesselle	@dehesselle	13.03. 9:00 (Bensberg)	17.03. 17:00 (Bensberg)
Jabier Arraiza	@jabiertxof	14.03. between 9 and 11 (13.03 22:30 DUS)	19.03 15:45 DUS
Thomas Holder	@speleo3	13.03. 12:05 Cologne Hbf	17.03. 17:55 Cologne Hbf
Ted Gould	@ted.gould	booked - ok!	booked - ok!
Nicco Kunzmann	@niccokunzmann	13.03. between 10 and 12	Booked
Pono Takamori	@pono1	14.03. ~12:00 (Bensberg)	tba

I want SFC to pay for my flight/train

• @doctormo
• @jabiertxof
• @niccokunzmann
• @speleo3

Hackfest Agenda

Add your ideas here! We'll make a tentative agenda at the start

• Organization
  • Community: Vectors, Testers, Translators, etc.
    • Social video call with Vectors.
    • Is there interest in merging communities? E.g. our user channel and Discord?
  • Board election
  • Financial status
  • Paid development (GTK4 proposal, Release Video proposal)
  • Funding paid development
  • Retiring the Wiki (sorry for the clickbait title)
• Infrastructure
  • Website, social media
  • Resources for developers
• GSoC and Outreachy
  • rework Google Summer of Code page to give more guidance for first-timers so that Vectors and others don't have to answer the same questions across dozens of channels every year https://chat.inkscape.org/channel/team_vectors?msg=9TPcKXybuSWZNSndw
  • "raising the bar": beginner friendly vs minimum required experience; improving documentation and/or additional offerings
• Development discussions
  • Releases
  • Dependencies
  • Bug fixing
  • GTK4
  • Refactoring
  • etc.
• Hacking
  • Code reviews
  • Critical bugs for 1.3