When I first read that FOSDEM would have over 8000 'hackers' funnily I didn't really think much of it - "Well, okay cool" and that was about it. But when I finally did reach the venue and looked around is when I realized that "eight thousand people" are a LOT!
I know that sounds stupid but to be honest, to see SO many people who, in some way or the other, use/contribute/maintain/lead open-source projects was nothing short of inspiring to see! A very pleasant surprise from my first FOSDEM!

At my first ever FOSDEM this year and I am absolutely blown away by the number of people here! HUGE!#FOSDEM2020

— Akhil (@akhlkg) February 1, 2020

Another very pleasant surprise was meeting David Edmundson - I was facing some issues with handling OpenGL contexts on different threads in Kdenlive (as part of the Titler rewrite, I was testing the QML producer) and David had kindly offered help in the comments section of my blog post. "It's how FOSDEM works" - I found him at the KDE Stall and we had a brief discussion near the end of the event about the issue I was facing.

I had a talk scheduled on Day 2 of FOSDEM in the Open Media devroom managed by Christophe Massiot. The talk went well, it was about the work I'm doing with Kdenlive right now which is creating clips out of QML files (which we would then use for title clips for the new Titler Tool in Kdenlive), titled "Rendering QML to make videos in Kdenlive". If that sounds interesting, you can find the video of the talk here

For the rest of the time, I was at the KDE Booth introducing passer-bys to KDE, Plasma and Plasma Mobile. We had some really cool hardware at the stall including the Pinebook Pro and (the new) Pinephones running Plasma to add to the crowd - it was real fun!

The KDE Stall in Building K - come meet us! #FOSDEM2020 pic.twitter.com/Fi6sJnl0XM

— Akhil (@akhlkg) February 1, 2020

FOSDEM gave me a much needed 'humane' touch to open-source, to meet the people in person that use and develop software that I see around me everyday - a very unique experience!

Compile your own badge! Loved the idea. @gentoo #FOSDEM #FOSDEM2020 pic.twitter.com/U1XxaG9zJV

— Akhil (@akhlkg) February 2, 2020

I also thank Christophe for selecting my talk for the Open Media developer room, I hope to continue bringing value to the open media field.

And finally, I thank the KDE e.V for being the sponsor. You can help the KDE Community to create and maintain free, privacy-friendly software by donating to the KDE e.V here.