Yocto Conference Production

Producing a Yocto Project Conference

This page is intended to be a guide on how Yocto Project conferences (e.g. ELC and ELCE), Developer Days, and Summits are designed and executed.

High Level Calendar

• Three months out
  • Set the tentative dates
  • Make arrangements with the conference for booth and DevDay/Summit registration
  • Set up a preliminary budget, get tentative approval
  • Setup flights and hotels
• Two months out
  • Advertise event
  • Announce the Call for Papers (CFP)
  • Gather/order booth swag and collateral
  • Setup conference page at Yocto home page
• One month out
  • Announce presenters for DevDay/Summit
  • Insure that conference registration is fully up
• One week out
  • Confirm that presenter papers are coming together
  • Confirm booth host schedule

Conference

• Conferences are ideal ways to:
  • Have an anchor for the booth, DevDay/Summit
  • Advertise the project
  • Connect with our community
  • Connect between each other
  • Advertise the DevDay/Summit
  • Manage the DevDay/Summit registration and money

We have been working primarily with the Embedded Linux Conference, sponsored by the project's parent organization The Linux Foundation. We have typically sponsored both a booth and a Yocto Project DevDay/Summit in conjunction, given its high synergy.

Physical Conference

• Yocto Project must sign up for a booth
  • Typically we join at the Bronze level, which provides a basic booth at a reasonable cost
  • The contract must be negotiated several months ahead
  • There is typically no penalty for later registration, but it could result in a late posting of the DevDay/Summit advertising and registration page, which can potentially affect attendance
• The Yocto Project booth pop-up
  • Local the booth pop-up (currently with David)
  • The booth travels as normal luggage, about 30-40 pounds
  • The booth takes about 20 minutes to assemble and disassemble
• Booth posters
  • If possible it is good to bring a collapsible stand, so that posters of the daily schedule of Yocto Project related talks can be advertised, in addition to the DevDay/Summit
  • If no stand is present, then posters hanging in front the the booth pop-up and stand-up displays on the booth itself can be used
  • There is a requirement to display the primary Yocto Project members (e.g. Platinum) at the booth
• Booth Content
  • There should be handouts on the booth, for example:
    • Cards
    • Yocti
    • Swag (USB battery packs, spinners, pens, T-shirts
  • T-Shirts are great giveaways and great live conference advertisements, but do require cost, transportation, and size distribution considerations
  • Hand outs
    • It is good to have brochures that provide technical content about the project
    • We currently have a short form (~ 4 pages, and an older long form ~ pages with testimonials)
  • Display computer
    • We often have a display running from a laptop of NUC. This can provide live browsing of the Yocto Project home page, documentation, Layer Index, DevDay/Summit home page. Visitors sometimes suggest web pages of their own as part of their questions.
  • Demos
    • We try to have live demos at the booth, to attract visitors and stimulate conversations
    • Examples include Software Defined Radio, routers, robots, and once a race car
  • Booth Hours
    • We usually get about 4 hours the day before the conference floor opens to prepare our booth
    • We typically need the booth attended 8 hours a day, in particular in between sessions and during lunch
    • ELC/ELCE typically have a special booth walk evening, where the entire conference is at the booths for 2 to 3 hours
  • Booth Attendance
    • It is important to arrange a schedule of booth watchers, so that we look organized and can be available to catch visitors
    • The booth schedule is typically 2 people in 2 hour slots across the open hours
    • One of the best part of the conference is that Yocto Project people generally hang around the booth even if they are not actually in the booth, so it is often easy to find an expert if a visitor asks a hard question
    • When the booth is closed each evening, the loose content must be locked up in the booth, and the key must go to someone whom is guaranteed to open the booth the next morning
  • Booth Interaction
    • Each booth is given a badge scanner so that we can catch the visitors, This information is very important to the Yocto Project Advocacy Committee
    • Generally people are pleased to allow you to scan their badges, so no worries
    • We often offer the swag in exchange for the badge scan, to make this more efficient
    • There will generally be 20% of the people who come just for the swag, and that is ok

Virtual Conference

Virtual conferences share many of the same aspects of physical conferences. Here are the differences.