KDE Connect progress

The last few weeks KDE Connect Team has been working on different areas. To know a little more about KDE Connect please check the end of this post.

Tools

Thanks to our awesome sysadmin team, we have a management tool to help us coordinating every effort we do. KDE Connect in not an isolated project. We already have or will have relation with many other KDE projects so we want to make sure we are prepared for growing without heavily increasing the administrative and coordination efforts needed to offer a high quality service.

KDE Connect will have mailing lists, IRC channels, forums...everything you expect from a community project. We will be open them up by demand, little by little. So don't expect them as soon as the project is launched.

Artwork and marketing

Asun Sánchez is designing our logo and we are preparing a brochure for organizations that might want to join us. It will include a basic description of the Program and the basic terms and conditions.

KDE Connect will be presented during Akademy-es that will take place in Saragossa from May 18th to 20th.

Akademy 2012 Program Committee has just communicate me that the KDE Connect talk has been accepted so we will have a presentation this summer at Tallin, Estonia.

Procedures and activities

We are also defining the basic procedures that will be followed by KDE Connect team and organizations involved. The networking activities are also being described so KDE Connect Team members can have clear guidelines.

Roadmap

The roadmap is also under development. The initial plan is to launch KDE Connect in May. We will organize several activities during Akademy, so we need to do some previous work with organizations that will attend to our central event.

If everything goes as expected, I will be attending to LinuxTag 2012 helping in KDE booth and doing some KDE eV Board work .

Join KDE Connect Team

I would like to thank all the people that is helping me in this idea. If you are a KDE members and want to get involved, get in touch with me.

KDE Connect previous references

• Please check the previous post about KDE Connect
• Other references:
• KDE Connect early definition
• Some thoughts about dealing with private information in KDE Connect
• KDE Connect structure (check my blog for previous articles since Nov. 2011.

About KDE eV, its Board of Directors and the Treasurer position

What is KDE eV

In order to get to the point where we are right now in KDE, coding is obviously not enough. To be able to ship KDE Platform, Workspaces and Applications, there are non-technicals activities that must be done in different areas. Some of those can be better accomplished creating a legal entity.

To support KDE in some of those tasks, we created some time ago KDE eV, a legal organization based in Germany. It is formed by some KDE members that want to put some time and effort in helping developers to concentrate in what they like the most.... coding, bug fixing, translating, designing, etc.. KDE eV support the community in four major areas:

1. Legal
2. Administrative
3. Economic
4. Institutional

It is important to focus on the verb support, which have little to do with drive or decide. This concept is not easy to understand and, in practice, it brings some challenges. But that idea is part or our identity and differentiate us from many Free Software projects. Like any other legal entity, KDE eV has some duties that we cannot avoid, obviously, but we work everyday to make that compatible with what our community want and demand.

To achieve this goal, we need to be constantly open to what the community is demanding and the best way to do this is involving in KDE e.V. those people who significantly contribute to our project.

A German eV is different in some aspects from a Foundation (in US for example) or an Association (in Spain for instance). These differences explain some of the limitations and improvements we can achieve. Legal entities are just instruments and there is no single universal tool that works for everything everywhere, right?

KDE Board of Directors

Like every legal entity, somebody must be responsible for actions and decisions taken, leading and representing the group. KDE eV Assembly elects a five Board members (individually) for a three year period. Different countries also have different ideas of Board rights and duties.

Please check KDE eV Statutes to know more about our organization.

KDE eV elects a Chairman (we call it President) and two proxies. One of them must be the Treasurer. As you probably know, Cornelius Schumacher is our President. Sebastian Kügler Vicepresident, Celeste Lyn Paul and Lydia Pintscher are also Board members.

Treasurer

A few weeks ago, Frank Karlitschek, resigned as Treasurer to focus on OwnCloud Inc., his successful new project, so a we had a vacancy.

The plan is to open an election during KDE eV Assembly, that will take place during Akademy, to elect a long term Treasurer. Until then, I've been elected as new Board member and Treasurer.

One of the things I would like to do during this period is to write about the economic aspects of KDE. Some of the information I will manage is confidential, but there is room for explaining a lot about how a community driven Libre Software project, like KDE, work. We usually do not have time for things like this but I hope I can, at least, write two or three posts about this topic before Akademy.

I don't want to finish without thanking KDE eV members for supporting me. I'll work hard to live up to the circumstances.

KDE Connect: preparing the new program

KDE Connect preparations keep going. Right now we are taking some key decisions for the future and also preparing the tools and some of the basic procedures to coordinate this effort. Every goes slow but forward. We are in no hurry since we want to make sure we do it well.

Yes, we changed the name. The Program won't be called KDE ON anymore but KDE Connect. We think is closer to the project goal.

KDE Connect is our effort to create an ecosystem of companies, educational organizations and non-profit entities around our community. We pretend to structure the early stages of the involvement these organizations that approaches KDE. But also we want to give them the chance to meet each other, interact and create new opportunities.

Right now we are recruiting a group of people willing to help us with little things or concrete tasks we need to do in order to launch the project as soon as we can, having Akademy 2012 as major milestone. We are also working on the tools we will use to manage the project and defining some procedures for simple and basic tasks.

I'm happy about how things are going since it looks like most KDE members understand how important and the relevant impact KDE Connect can have in the future for KDE. This is the first but mandatory step in order to create a medium term project. We will reach a point where most tasks and procedures will be defined so we will need some people to help us executing them.

Obviously, going through this process will mean that many of them will change. That is the good thing about working with smart people, right? They help you to turn good ideas into great projects.

KDE ON Program: Dealing with private and public

When I began with Free Software I already was CEO of a little company back in the Canary Islands. To me it was a complete shock getting in contact with LTSP first and KDE later. In both cases I had business projects related with their technologies so, at the very beginning, that relation with them was a matter of pure business.

I remember thinking.... If they behave like crazy nuns, fine, I won't. I felt like the The Walking Dead lead actor. Not many months later, I realized I was one of the zombies. Still, both project made easy for me to get involved. No regrets, no blames, no pointing fingers.... just friendly hackers.

This common experience can be softened. Times have changed but business culture not so much. KDE ON Program must reduce this culture gap. One the main issues to do so is clearly defining how to deal with confidentiality, a key point for organizations.

When designing a Program like KDE ON, that deals with organizations, specially with companies, one of the possible conflicts we need to take in consideration is the different views/models/culture we have around confidentiality, about what is public and what should be kept private.

FLOSS communities, like KDE, that evolve in the Open, tend to reduce as much as possible the amount of private information, forums, decisions. Companies usually promote the opposite.

We have a tough challenge ahead of: to bring organizations into the open in a compatible way with their current business culture.

Someone might think that it is just a matter of building trust. But we know that is not enough. We have seen in the past how strong relations between companies and communities fell apart in seconds. We need to establish some procedures ensuring that common spaces can be built where private and open meets comfortably.

KDE-ON Program, our effort to create an ecosystem of organizations around KDE, must define those meeting points without changing our ground rules, which it won't be easy if we want to become attractive to organizations, so they join us. We should not underestimate their fears to the Open, specially when dealing with managers, born in the classic MBA business culture.

We have around KDE (other community projects too, obviously) many companies that, at different levels, understands and/or have experience dealing internally (and with us) with many of those fears, misconceptions, reactions, etc. Along with other experienced KDE members, I feel we can do a great job teaching organizations how powerful and profitable embracing the opening could be.

Don't you remember the first person that showed you how cool Free Software was? We always tend to have a special relation with our first mentor, that special teacher that opened our eyes, that first love that allowed us to discover a new world, right? That is the kind of hit we are able to create in many CxO that, hopefully, will get involved with us through KDE ON Program.

So KDE ON Program should be for participants a learning process that end up allowing them to build long term relations with Free Software community projects in open forums, in a FLOSS life style, accepting some Free Culture principles. At the same time, it should help us to understand them better, so along the road we can become a more business friendly.

Let's see if we do it right in KDE ON, or at least, we create learning spaces understanding we are in a, somehow, R&D environment. So we all judge our mistakes with scientific, or at least not pure business, eyes.

Building innovation nodes through Free Software Communities (VII): activities

This is the seventh post of the Building innovation nodes through Free Software Communities series. In order to fully understand this one, please consider reading the previous ones.



There are several kind of activities that can be very productive and aligned with the goals of the project. We can group them in several ways. Maybe the most general one is:

• Promotion activities.
• Training sessions.
• Discussion/reflexion.
• Networking activities.
• Demonstrations.
• Administrative/coordination meetings.

Some of the activities will be organized directly by communities. At the beginning of the project they would be the majority. But the project must be open to organize activities proposed by local agents and non members that are aligned with the project goals. Cross-community actions should be also promoted.

Opening a call for activities is a very good thing to do. There has to be also flexibility to allow activities that do not need a lot of effort to organize so they can be proposed with not much time in advance.

Some of the most common activities could be:

• Promotion events (talks, lightning talks, keynotes, etc).
• Demo events.
• Workshops and training sessions.
• Cross-community events.
• Announcements and press conferences.
• Sprints and hackfests.
• Communities Assemblies and board meetings.
• International events.
• Internal meetings:
• General Assembly and Board meetings.
• Other internal meetings.
• Interviews.
• Video and audio conferences. Streamming.

As explained in the Organization section, there should be a comitte that takes care of coordinating the activities so they make sure that there is a variety of them in terms of goals, participants and achievements. This Activities Coordination Group will make also sure that the activities schedule satisfy both, current project members and local agents.

It is desired that every member celebrates in the project facilities at least one activity every year. A good goal could be to celebrate every member annual event each three or four years, so they make sure a relevant one takes place at least once a year. 

It is a good practice not just to generate local critic mass but also to ensure that the project is attractive enough in terms of sponsorship.

Building innovation nodes through Free Software Communities (VI): organization

Please consider reading previous post of the Building innovation nodes through Free Software Communities  series:

• Introduction.
• Root article (you can access the rest of the posts from this one).

This project must have a legal entity that support the activity it will generate. That legal entity must be as flexible as possible. In Spain, for example, it would probably be an Association formed initially by legalized Local Free Software Communities (LFSC). When new ones get a minimum state of maturity, they will be invited to join the association as members.

Each Association would name a representative for this project. The Association's Assembly then will be formed by representatives of every legal LFSC involved. They would elect a Board, that initially, it would be formed by a President, a Vice-president, a Treasurer and a Secretary.

This Association will represent the project from a legal, economic and "political" point of view. Its basic role is to coordinate efforts and to make the project sustainable, keeping the independence of every member.

The Assembly would organize itself in groups taking care of different tasks. Several groups should be created:

1. Activities coordination group: All the activities, schedule and organization details will be coordinated y this group. The schedule is should be presented to the Board for approval and every year, a report should be made to the General Assembly.
2. Sustainability group: this group will take care of the sustainability of the project, specially the economic side.
3. I recommend to organize another two groups. One specialized in promo actions and another one that help the Board in dealing with administrative tasks, taxes, etc.

Sponsors and local entities should be invited to join these working groups so they become part of the project building relations with Local Free Software Communities.

Study of Spanish Internet users habits

The Association of Communication Media Research (AIMC) from Spain has published its annual study, based on questionnaires. This year (2011) almost 35 thousand people has participated.

This annual survey is the most relevant in Spain. This is its 14th edition. It tries to analyze Internet users habits, specially related to media. The first part of the survey deals with basic questions related with time spent in Internet, tools used, connectivity, SO, browser, frequently used services, etc.

As every year, many conclusions might be taken from this survey. I want to point here some interesting ones:

• The percentage of users that connect to Internet through a Linux based system has grown from 3.3% up to 3.6% last year due to the irruption in the survey of Android (0.7%).
• Microsoft market has gone from 86.1% to 86% during last year.
• Mozilla Firefox has drop from 36.6% to 31.6% but this year is the number one browser in Spain. IE is second with 30.1% and Chrome third with 29% Chrome is growing fast.
• Android is the leading mobile OS (40.5%) followed by iOS (22.4%), Symbian (11.5%) and Blackberry (11.3%). 6.3% admits that do not know what OS is shipped in his/her mobile phone.
• 93.4% of electronic newspaper readers use a PC/laptop/netbook, 12.9% tablets and 34.4% phones (obviously these are not exclusive).
• 45.5% of Internet users listen digital radio stations or on line music services like LastFM, Spotify, etc.
• 52.5% say unwanted/unauthorized advertisement is a big problem and 48.5% say Internet speed need improvement. 

The study is very interesting for many KDE related areas.

Please remember that this numbers are referred to Internet users only.

Links (in Spanish):

• Study presentation (.pdf)
• Full study 2011 (.pdf)
• 2011 questionnaire
• Previous studies

Moving to Madrid for a few weeks

As I posted a couple of weeks ago, I'm looking for a new job. I'm moving to Madrid to have some interviews and, hopefully, to attend to some Free Software/Free culture events. Let's see if I can also give a talk about KDE too.

I've been in Madrid many times before. I even have family there, but most of the times, I couldn't enjoy the city or visit some of my friends there since I went to work. It'll be different this time.

During these weeks in Madrid, I'll finish the Building innovation nodes through Free Software Communities series of posts and will try to help launching KDE ON Program.

You probably haven't heard anything about it. You can get some idea by reading the following previous posts from my blog:

• Some previous ideas about building new ecosystems around free software projects ( I, II, III, IV and V)
• KDE Program: Mission and Goals
• What is KDE Program
• KDE Organizational Network Program structure

Yes, I know, it is too much to read, but hey, I've been busy.

Building innovation nodes through Free Software Communities (V): services

Since this is the fifth post of the Building Innovation Nodes Through Free Software Communities, I strongly recommend you to read the previous four (I, II, III and IV)

This post will explain my ideas about what are the basic services that the initiative should provide so Local Free Software Communities (LFSC) and local player might organize activities that allow the project to be successful.

As enumerated in the second post of the series, the basic services that should be provided by the project to its members can be divided in six major areas:

1. Administrative.
2. Legal.
3. Financial and accounting.
4. Marketing and communication.
5. Business development.
6. Facilities maintenance and management.

The rest of the activities needed will be developed by participants, that is LFSC members, the catalyst organization or local players.

1.- Administrative

The administrative service can be divided in the following way:

1. Administrative services related with the project itself.
2. Administrative services targeting Local Free Software Communities.
3. All of the above.

1.1.- Administrative services related with the project itself

• Board support: as you can read in the Organization section, the project will be managed by a Board, elected from the Assembly. This Board will need administrative support.
• Contact/agenda management for project representatives.
• Accommodation management for activities organized within the project.

1.2.- Administrative services targeting Local Free Software Communities.
 

LFSC legalization: help LFSC that want to become part of the project in the near future with the basic administrative work in order for them to become a legal entity.

1.3.- Administrative services for both, the project and every LFSC participant

• Regular post management: notifications, legal papers and material shipment, this is, regular post service is one of those difficult area to manage when you are a distributed organization where board members chance quiet often.
• Membership management: the management of current and new members is a tedious task that every organization must put resources on. Having an administrative service can help them to become more efficient, specially to those where a each member has to make a yearly quota.

2.- Legal

The basic legal services needed are:

• Advice about basic legal aspects related with statutes and everyday decisions and operations for any LFSC and the project itself.
• Basic legal advice about licensing.
• Legalization of LFSC.
• Institutional agreements.
• Legal advice related with funding.

3.- Financial and accounting

This service should be given to the project itself and for every project member:

• Accounting support.
• Budget and economic reports. Costs control.
• Advice in financial decision and taxes.

4.- Marketing and communication

• LFSC and Project activities promotion in mainstream and social media.
• Project press releases and announcements.
• Local marketing actions support.

5.- Business development

Since the project will need to look for funds in order to grow, business development activities become a key part. The project will provide a service in this area that support participants the following areas:

• Relation with local agents/players.
• Sponsorship management support.

In another article I will talk about the resources needed to lauch the project and make it sustainable.

6.- Facilities maintenance and management
 

The facilities assigned to the project will be when the activities take place. The project will provide the following services:

• Facilities management.
• Security.
• Material manage, storage and control.
• Activities support.
• Connectivity.

and others needed to organize and support the activities defined by participants.

FOSDEM 2012 for Toscalix

This was my first FOSDEM without a predefined tight agenda, so I could enjoy more than ever the event. I had a lot of fun and could talk to many people with no stress.

I attended to several talks. I must say that I didn't like many of them. I'll mention the best ones, for different reasons:

• Wayland
• MER
• Qt5
• LibrePlan
• OpenAdvice
• OpenMoko Freerunner 
• Why the community should welcome Average Jane and Joe 

Obviously I didn't attend to most of the talks. There were more than 400 in one and a half day.

I spent most of the late Saturday and Sunday around KDE stand. Many KDE members where there and I could talk to most of them. I would like to mention Jonathan Riddell's work, specially in these hard times for him, Jonathan, you rock!

It was very cold in Brussels. We reached -14ºC the first night. Simply too much for a Canary Island guy. The beer was warmer than the weather. That was weird. Thanks to the Kolab guys, Paul and Georg, I could drink some very good beer and visit cool bars I've never been before.

As you know, we are having a hard time in Spain, specially if we talk about unemployment. Free Software sector is doing quiet good though. On our recent history, one of our structural problems have been exportation. Last two years, due to the internal the economic crisis, we have raised them by 30% and FLOSS companies are no exception. Many Spanish companies had presence in FOSDEM 2012.

On Sunday night I organized a networking dinner with some Spanish FLOSS companies and a representative of the Commercial Office of the Spanish Embassy in Brussels. KDE Spain, Zentyal, Gestiweb, Igalia, Carlos Sánchez and others (up to 24) were there.

The goal was that these representatives could know some entrepreneurs and how the FLOSS sector is doing in Spain. Next year, the day before FOSDEM 2013, we plan to organize in the Spanish Embassy in Brussels some networking activities between Spanish FLOSS companies and foreign corporations attending to the event.

FOSDEM has a great program, but networking is as relevant as talks. So don't don't miss it next year. See you there, hopefully, with better weather.