New events calendar for open source conferences, meetups, and more

Opensource.com has added a new feature for listing open source events, and because we like to think big, our goal is to be the premier listing.

Are you planning, hosting, speaking at, or going to an open source conference in 2013? Submit it to the calendar. Are you part of a user group (i.e. a Linux User Group)? Submit your meetup. Other types of meetings and seminars, including webinars, are encouraged too.

In 2011, we tested the waters by listing events on a static page that was updated with each new event submission and curated it on a monthly basis. Progressively, we saw an uptick in the number of user-submitted events and decided to make an investment in a more robust calendar system.

Several user stories and design mockups later, paired with lots of quality assurance tests, have brought us to this announcement today. Of course, we're using a "crawl, walk, then run" approach. The static page was a prototype and got us crawling. Now we're in the walk phase, leveraging Drupal content-types, rules, workflow, and views. And if the open source community proves there to be value in having this calendar, we'll consider implementing further changes. For now, the default calendar listing shows up to five events per day.

Tip: before you submit an event, view the calender to see if it is already listed.

When you submit an event, expect the following results:

• a preview of the event, with a notice that it's been submitted for review
• an email notifying you that the event was submitted and is waiting for approval
• an admin will be notified and review the event
• upon approval, the event will be listed by both calendar view and alphabetical listing (or Rolodex)
• an email letting you know that the event has been approved
• award of 10 points to user account (must be logged in)

I'd like to thank the opensource.com user community who helped us test the beta version of the calendar. They offered some great feedback and suggestions—not to mention a lot of events. We were able to get some of those suggestions into this version of the calendar. But there were also a lot of good ideas will take more time to consider and we've added them to the wish list:

• importing an .ics feed
• recurring events
• adding start/stop times with an event

Keep in mind that each event listing is intended to be a summary of the event with a link to the event landing page for more details. We encourage you to use the calendar and promote open source events. Your feedback is welcome in the comments.