I just got the word, I'm going to Drupalcon.
So, now, time to start the discussion and organizing for Birds of a Feather times, dates and topics.
I've been playing around with a couple of different Government based types like:
1. All Government (including contractors and all employees of State, Local and Federal at any country at Drupalcon)
2. US Government (state, local, fed including legislative and judicial branches, NO Contractors, sometimes, there are things we have to discuss and can't with contractors present.)
3. US Government plus Contractors A big 'ole sharing frenzy, but without our counterparts from other countries.
This is by no means exhaustive, but since we have about 2 more weeks to do the planning around this, seemed like a good time to form some consensus. So, let's talk. Who's going and what kinds of BOFs do we want and when?
Comments
thoughts.....
Thanks Kirsten for leading this up. This is an important topic and I'd love to share my experiences at Education here as well. Since the time is limited, the crowds are large and we all stand to benefit from shared thoughtspace/experience, I'd enjoy interacting with largest group as possible, so option #1 looks best to me.
I'm in
I'm working on migrating a huge south american .gov site to drupal, and would like to share ideas, problems, etc. Option 1 seems better from a solution oriented perspective (we don't care who provides the solutions, as long as they belong in a gov organization). OTOH, many gov problems are not specific to that sector, but to all big organizations (staging, multisites, scalability, distributed authoring and permissions,...)
Your South American government site migtration to Drupal
We have done a number of Drupal sites in the health arena for US Governemtn Agencies and South Africa government, We would be happy to share our experience and give you any advice that might be helpful at DrupalCon.
However, if our advice is to help much, we should be informed of what the existing site looks like. Could you give us the existing url, we can check it out and see if our expeience might or might not apply to your situation. We have bilingual staff so a Spanish Site is no problem.
A vote for including contractors
My company (a contractor for the Department of Energy) will have several people there. As relative newcomers to Drupal we'll mostly be there in learning mode, but we're working on a couple of big projects already and we'd love to share experiences and brainstorm with employees or contractors at other agencies.
John Shortess
4Site Interactive Studios
All Gov but option for breakouts
I'm all for large gatherings. The more the better ... especially when it comes to generating new ideas and problem solving. I also like to be able to get to the root of the issue as well. Perhaps a couple of breakout groups wouldn't hurt. I manage several County websites in and I can tell you that the issues we have at the county level aren't necessarily the same at the federal or state. A time may come where the large group may need to split out either by government category (fed, state, county, city, contractor) or by functionality (theme, nodes, module, template, user). I think having the option to break into smaller, more focused/specialized groups, could be beneficial.
Good Idea
I work for a county and think this is a great idea. We will be converting our intranet to Drupal.
Hello! will
Hello!
will join!
Regards,
Ivo Radulovski
www.drupalgovdays.org
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Drupal Development by Trio Interactive
BoF started
Just to point out, here is a BoF I proposed about general Drupal and Government. I am pretty new to the Government sector, so I do not necessarily know what is best for everyone:
http://chicago2011.drupal.org/forum/drupal-and-government
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zzolo
BoF is scheduled at Drupalcon
I've scheduled two BoF sessions at Drupalcon
Government event with contractors, too! Today at 5:45 before the Field Museum event in the Ontario Room
http://chicago2011.drupal.org/conference/bof/government-and-drupal
and for Drupal4gov, government employees only at 9am on Wednesday in the Erie room
http://chicago2011.drupal.org/conference/bof/drupal4gov
And Allen is hosting a Drupal and Government session as well, this one is on Thursday
http://chicago2011.drupal.org/conference/bof/drupal-and-government
And if your interest is in Open Public and making it something useful for agencies, this BoF might be of interest:
http://chicago2011.drupal.org/conference/bof/contributing-openpublic-bui...
Just a minor kind of drupal geeky girl and for the US government no less!