Bits_from_the_DPL.webm

[Talk meister] Grab a seat please, there's
lots of seats around here, or there.

It's my pleasure to introduce our current
and new DPL,

Neil McGovern for his annual bits from
the DPL

[Applause]

[Neil] Thanks very much, hi everyone.

I'm aware that this talk is due to cut in
to lunch so I'll try and keep it slightly

... in to dinner, so I'll keep it slightly
more refined [laughter]

so people can get their food early.

Hopefully everyone's ok with that anyway.

I'm also kind of glad that it's in this
slot when it was originally proposed

and I got my initial time slot it was
going to be a 9am slot just after the

cheese and wine party so I [laughter]

probably wouldn't expect quite so many
people as we have here today.

So, welcome everyone, this final day of
the open weekend. Anyone who isn't a

regular person, hi and welcome to Debian!

Welcome to the huge Debian family which
is certainly growing all the time and

is something that's really good to see.

It's quite fantastic that there's just so
many people involved, especially this year

When I last checked the stats I think we
had 383 people who had so far checked in

slightly less than for DebConf 7, but I'm
certain... [laughter]

I'm certain over the next few days that'll
go up and definitely surpass us.

I just want to remind everyone what the
size of the project we are.

It's such a huge effort, one of the
biggest open source and free software

projects in the world.

Combining around 1000 developers, a few
thousand maintainers and contributors as

well, and also our users.

It's really a huge effort that we manage
to still be here after 22 years and still

be going strong.

Hopefully a DebConf in future will look
a little bit like that

I think the orga team might be slightly
more stressed if we end up with numbers

but what a fantastic thing.

Also over the last few years we've had 42
new project members have joined us.

This is over the last year, we've had all
these people.

Huge welcome to everyone there. [Applause]

Especially one or two on there which I
decided to get back into doing application

management, especially for our non-
uploading developers as well, which has

been a huge boost to really grow where
we're going.

Also welcome back. I've noticed a few
people this year who I haven't seen in a

few years, so stand up if you've been away
for a few years and you're returning

I know there's certainly some people,
excellent,

Tolimar? [laughter] There he is!
[Applause]

Kris Rose? Is he here? [points] Excellent.

Was active before I even joined Debian,
and essentially has come back again, so

it's great to see everyone back and thanks
very much for remembering us.

There's been a few new people as well.

Very, very new people who I haven't kinda
seen around before in previous DebConfs

Where did all these children come from?
I think there must have been something...

[laughter]

I think the Switzerland DebConf, there
might have been something in the water,

because it's suddenly been a huge... it's
absolutely fantastic to see not only

our usual developers around, but their
families as well, and new people being

introduced to Debian and to technology.

The TecKids workshops I think are
absolutely fantastic initiative I think

that really helps broaden Debian and what
we do.

So, when I first became DPL, I always knew
Debian was a big thing in free software,

in the communities and things we do.

I went along to my running club

and we went for a run,

went to the pub afterwards as you do in
the UK,

you can't have sport without excessive
alcohol consumption afterwards so it seems

and about 7 or 8 people all came up to me

and said "Hey, congratulations on being
DPL, I'm going to buy you a pint!", which

[laughter]

which is great

So if anyone wants to run for DPL you get
free beer, this is a good thing.

But it did really impress on me that

Debian's a big deal, it's a really huge
deal.

If you have a look at some of the latest
server stats for web servers,

Debian's number one.

It's about 32% of Linux distributions, and
and if you combine Ubuntu as well, and

all our derivatives, we're about 62% of
all linux servers out there

Basically Debian really does run the world

Not only that, but the amount of embedded
devices that Debian's involved with

from, as mentioned before, the HP talk,
running huge teleco systems

to assistive devices. I know Andy's around
somewhere.

That product is essentially being based on
Debian and it's a speak and spell type

device.

It's for people who can't talk.

You have a little keyboard, you type in
what you want to say, it has predictive

technology in there, and then it gives
people a voice.

Debian is literally being used to give
people voices who can't speak.

This is the sort of impact that Debian
have, and free software can have

on the world.

A few things happened, certainly over the
last year.

Apparently we released.

I was only DPL for about a week, but I'm
going to take credit for this

like any good politician, anyway.
[laughter]

I've already had a stable release.

This has hugely welcomed.

I don't know if anyone followed the DevOps
Reactions tumblr page, but they were

following along and huge cheers from
everyone when Debian releases.

It is a big deal.

Strangely I also saw a press release that
that said they're

having a party to celebrate the release
of Debian 8 at Linux Fest North West,

But this press release was from Microsoft
[laughter]

I thought it might be a spoof at first,
but I diligently checked the certificates

and domains and made sure it went back.

I think people, certainly large
organisations are realising now that this

open source, free software thing isn't
going away

This isn't something that they can just
ignore, or they can fight against.

This is something that they have to
embrace

Certainly for someone like Microsoft to
throw away a load of cake and do a press

release because Debian's released is
something I never thought I'd see when I

first joined the Debian Project.

We've had some new good things which have
started recently as well

Fantastic areas if anyone knows what this
might be for a current initiative that's

going on?

[Picture of four similar potted plants]

I was trying to do reproducible builds.

They all sort of look the same, so near
enough [laughter]

It's the nearest I could find on Flickr to
something being reproducible.

These are all CC by the way.

So this is perhaps a bit of a better slide
to explain just how impressive it is

where we've got.

I don't know if everyone here's aware of
reproducible builds and what this is

trying to do, and the importance of it.

[XXXX 8:49 XXXX]