Miniconfs are linux.conf.au’s special interest streams: they let us explore important topics in Open Source with greater depth than our selected presentations alone. This year our miniconfs cover fields ranging across technology, community, and openness in fields beyond technology.

linux.conf.au 2017 is being held in Hobart, Tasmania from Monday 16 January to Friday 20 January 2017. Our miniconfs will take place on Monday 16 and Tuesday 17 January.

Many of our miniconfs are accepting talk submissions, and want to hear from you. Miniconfs are a great opportunity to share your stories and experience, especially if you’re a new speaker, or if you missed out in linux.conf.au’s primary call for proposals. To submit a talk to a miniconf, create an account on our website (/dashboard), create a speaker profile, and then select “new proposal”.

Note that linux.conf.au does not offer complimentary tickets to presenters at miniconfs, however, a limited number of tickets for just the Monday and Tuesday of the conference may be available on request.

To find out more about our miniconfs, please visit /schedule/miniconfs/list

We’re excited to share our list of accepted miniconfs with you, and can’t wait to see what sort of talks you’ll propose!

Systems Administration

Organised by Ewen McNeill -- Talk submissions now open

The Systems Administration Miniconf focuses on professional management of real-world Linux and open source environments, both large and small. The miniconf aims to include talks directly useful to professional Linux administrators, covering a diverse range of tools and techniques that will help keep your entire environment functioning smoothly, and accomplish more with less effort.

Find out more, or submit a talk.

Open Hardware

Organised by Jonathan Oxer and Andy Gelme -- Talk submissions open soon

The concept of Free and Open Source Software, already well understood by LCA attendees, is complemented by a rapidly growing community focused around Open Hardware and "maker culture". Interest in Open Hardware is high among FOSS enthusiasts, but there is also a barrier to entry with the perceived difficulty and dangers of dealing with hot soldering irons, unknown components and unfamiliar naming schemes. The Open Hardware Miniconf will ease software developers into dealing with hardware, covering topics across both software and hardware.

Find out more.

Docs Down Under

Organised by Brian Moss and Lana Katherine Brindley -- Talk submissions now open

Docs Down Under is a technical communication-themed miniconf that will draw documentation professionals of all kinds from across Australia. Topics on every aspect of technical writing are welcome, ranging from languages and tools to building communities and the state of the industry. We are particularly interested in talks on the future of technical communication as an industry, new and interesting communication technologies, and the changing role of the writer in the IT world.

Find out more, or submit a talk.

Open Knowledge Australia

Organised by Matthew Cengia -- Talk submissions now open

The Open Knowledge miniconf, organised with the help of members of Open Knowledge Australia, will give people the opportunity to learn about many different aspects of openness, transparency, and information sharing, including in Open Data, Open Government, Open Source Software, Open Journals, Open Maps, Open Communities, Open Hardware, Open Science, and probably others too. This miniconf is a great introduction for people who are new to the open source world, or who want to learn about different types of openness to those with which they are familiar.

Find out more, or submit a talk.

Security and Privacy

Organised by Fraser Tweedale and Jason Cohen -- Talk submissions now open

The linux.conf.au 2017 Security and Privacy Miniconf will bring together users, researchers and practitioners involved in, or simply interested in, security topics in Open Source software and hardware. The program will feature a series of talks explaining and demonstrating important security and privacy concepts, techniques and initiatives. Whether you are a researcher, developer, sysadmin, UX designer or anthropologist, there will be something at the Security Miniconf to help you or your users live a more secure digital life.

Find out more, or submit a talk.

Kernel

Organised by Andrew Donnellan -- Talk submissions now open

The Linux kernel is at the heart of several billion computing devices, and is thus a rather important piece of open source infrastructure! The Kernel Miniconf will focus on a variety of kernel-related topics –- technical presentations on up-and-coming kernel developments, the future direction of the kernel, and kernel development community and process matters. Past Kernel Miniconfs have included talks on RCU, scheduling, filesystems, memory management, and others.

Find out more, or submit a talk.

WOOTCONF

Organised by Katie McLaughlin, Jacinta Catherine Richardson, Lana Katherine Brindley -- Talk submissions now open

WOOTCONF, Women Of Open Tech, is a miniconf dedicated to allowing women to share their knowledge in relation to the future of open source in Australia in beyond. Working on a foundation of previous linux.conf.au miniconferences: AussieChix, and Haecksen, WOOTCONF seeks to provide an environment allowing women to share their ideas and knowledge, with talks ranging from professional development, community and technical. WOOTCONF, and encourages new and upcoming speakers to propose and deliver talks. Mentoring by a number of recognised women in the open source community will be available for any speaker or attendee who wishes to use such help.

Find out more, or submit a talk.

Games and FOSS

Organised by Tim Nugent and Eloise Ducky -- Talk submissions now open

We all love games, right? We all love free and open source software, right? So why don't we love them together? Games are now a very big part of the software and entertainment industry but we don't often talk about how well they play with FOSS. Despite there being an overlap amongst users and developers, for the most part the game developers hide in their silo and FOSS hide in theirs, it is time to start getting the two together. This miniconf will be a single day exploring the interaction of games, free and open source software, and their communities and developers.

Find out more, or submit a talk.

Testing/Automation

Organised by R Tyler Croy -- Talk submissions now open

Testing and automation is not isolated to a single toolchain, language or platform, there is much to learn and share regardless of background. The goal of this miniconf is to foster discussion across various layers of testing and automation, using open source tools to improve all software.

Find out more, or submit a talk.

Community Leadership Summit X at LCA

Organised by VM (Vicky) Brasseur

The Community Leadership Summit X is an outreach event spun out of the annual Community Leadership Summit run by Jono Bacon and held prior to OSCON. It brings together community leaders, organizers and managers of projects and organisations that are interested in growing and empowering a strong community.

Find out more.

Free Software Law and Policy

Organised by Deb Nicholson and Donna Benjamin -- Talk submissions now open

Code is a great thing, but there are also rules. You can't get too far without at least a cursory understanding of copyright law, software patents and trademark issues. Plus, the disconnect between legislators and developers leads to policies that seem to lack a basic understanding of technology, let alone a proper respect for user autonomy and privacy. The state of international and local law presents constant challenges and occasional opportunities for free sofware advocates -- so let's talk about it!

Find out more, or submit a talk.

Open Radio

Organised by Scott Bragg and Ben Short -- Talk submissions now open

The Open Radio miniconf has been a popular staple of the linux.conf.au program for a number of years now, and with the explosion of embedded devices, open hardware and the Internet of Things, there are constant improvements and new ways of letting both users and devices communicate. Many Linux enthusiasts are also experienced amateur radio operators, while many more are interested in becoming a licensed ham. There are still plenty of experiments that can use unlicensed parts of the spectrum, and the Open Radio Miniconf will showcase talks and project demonstrations about many of them.

Find out more, or submit a talk.

About linux.conf.au 2017

linux.conf.au is a community-driven conference about the Linux operating system and the vibrant ecosystem of Free and Open Source Software that has grown up around it. Run in a different Australian or New Zealand city each year by local volunteers, LCA invites more than 500 people to learn from the people who shape the future of Open Source. 

In 2017, linux.conf.au is welcoming you to Hobart, Tasmania, on Monday 16 through to Friday 20 January. Ticket sales will open in October. We thank our Emperor Penguin Sponsors, IBM and Hewlett Packard Enterprise for their generous contribution to the conference. For more information, please visit