Bratislava, Slovakia
Proposal for OOoCon 2008
Key Question
In 400 words or less, answer this question: Why is your location and the date you propose the best for OOoCon 2008?
Bratislava is a great place for hosting international conferences, some of the international conferences which happen in Bratislava are the biggest one in central Europe. Slovakia have very good activities with open source software mostly in educational sector, there are several schools using such solutions for teaching purposes. The open source community in Slovakia, which also include some business like international ones such as Novell, Sun, IBM and smaller national small and medium sized enterprise focused on open source software. We have also strong support from a company 602Office, which is using OpenOffice with their own build and are selling support on such solution. 602Office is really popular among Czechs and Slovaks, since early 90s the only software you used for writing documents was from them, basically they are still really famous. OooCon 2008 can have a very intensive impact on the educational processes in Slovakia, which is good for youth people who will become pro open source adults in the future. Also it will boost the general wisdom of open source software, OpenOffice application for usage in government and can put a lot of light on the Open Standards issues which the world is facing right now. Promotion of Open Document Format is also very important mostly in the Eastern parts of Europe, where the government is missing experts regarding Open Standards and services of the government.
Mandatory Information
Location (country, city, conference center/university)
Slovakia, Bratislava, conference will be held in main park of culture center. Area of culture center buildings, can hold up to 2000 attendees in the main building, 500 attendees in the second building, is almost at the city center (10minutes by walk), is accessible by public transport (tram and bus) and is located on the old city center side of river danube. Main building offers various combination of smaller and bigger rooms which is ideal for workshops and bigger sessions. Bratislava is accessible by car via highways direction Prague – Berlin, Vienna, Budapest and Poland. Bratislava have three close international Airports, Airport Bratislava with mostly European flights (2km from Bratislava), Airport Vienna (20km from Bratislava / 20minutes by car) via highway Bratislava – Vienna and Airport Budapest reachable 1 hour driving by car.
Proposed Date(s)
Between 15 – 19 September / 22 – 26 September 2008, but we are flexible also for October, and we are counting using one weekend day for part of the conference if possible
Team Lead (main contact person)
Jan Husar (jan.husar (at) skosi.org) / SKOSI
Team Members
- Jan Husar (team lead, jan.husar (at) skosi.org) / SKOSI + whole skosi team (around 10 people)
- Michal Vavak and Tomas Vencelik / New Media Group
- Miroslav Macko / Novell Slovakia
- Martina Pisonova and Eva Stefanova / Sun Microsystems Slovakia
- Juraj Bednar / Digmia
- Jozef Sves, Tana Sramerkova, Milos Sramek, Ales Kreman, Martina Lickova, Ivan Nudzik + people from open source communities such as Linuxos, SKLUG, mozilla, ubuntu, etc...
Local events that are taking place in parallel (or right before/after)
One day conference, Open Source in education and government, focusing of usage of FLOSS in gov, edu and focus at open standards in the services of the government. One day event, Software Freedom Day 2008 in Bratislava. Evening events for OooCon, counting from: sight seeing (Bratislava, Vienna by boat, Budapest by boat), drinking and socializing event, electronic music events, parties in clubs, dinner events and one big welcome dinner party, technical and hack events for geeks. There will be also outdoor sports, like trekking/hiking, mountain bikes and such available.
Special visa or entry requirements, e.g. vaccinations
Visas are needed only from countries outside EU. Visa rules are those who apply for Schengen zone.
Optional Information
Large local OpenOffice.org deployments (for user keynotes and success stories)
Names of local OpenOffice.org developers (for developer sessions)
Names of local OpenOffice.org vendors/partners (potential sponsors)
- OpenOffice Slovak team, and close relationship with OpenOffice Czech and Poland
- few large scale openoffice.org deployments
- educational sector using openoffice.org
- number of SMEs using openoffice.org
Travel costs
Coming by car information will be available on the event website, including maps and assistance.
Flights are as follows:
Travel cost, airport Vienna, airport Bratislava, economy class and low
cost airlines London – Vienna, AirBerlin (100eur), Austrian Airlines
(150eur), Lufthansa (200eur), British Airways (200eur)
London – Bratislava, Czech Airlines (270eur), Lufthansa (300eur)
Paris – Vienna, AirBerlin (70eur), Austrian Airlines (90eur), SkyEurope
(120eur), AirFrance (150eur), Lufthansa (200eur)
Paris – Bratislava, Czech Airlines (220eur), Lufthansa (290eur)
Rome – Vienna, Alitalia (85eur), Austrian Airlines (90eur), AirOne
(120eur), Lufthansa (240eur)
Rome – Bratislava, Czech Airlines (230eur)
Beijing – Vienna, Aeroflot (800eur), Qatar Airlines (900eur), AirChina
(1000eur), Lufthansa (1100eur)
Sydney – Vienna, British Airways (1300eur), Austrian Airlines
(1500eur)
New York – Vienna, ** LOT Airlines (600eur), Alitalia (650eur), Iberia
(700eur), British Airways (740eur), KLM Dutch Airlines (770eur)
New York – Bratislava, ** AirFrance (700eur), Lufthansa (800eur),
Hamburg – Vienna, ** AirBerlin (85eur), Lufthansa (100eur), Austrian
Airlines (110eur),
Dublin – Vienna, ** AerLingus (190eur), Lufthansa (200eur),
Dublin – Bratislava, ** Czech Airlines (220eur), Lufthansa
(350eur),
San Francisco – Vienna, ** LOT Airlines (700eur), Air New Zealand
(730eur), Delta Airlines (780eur), San Francisco – Bratislava, **
AirFrance (900eur)
Cape Town – Vienna, ** KLM Dutch Airlines (1000eur), British Airways
(1050eur)
Tokyo – Vienna, ** Aeroflot (1000eur),
Tokyo - Bratislava ** Lufthansa (1050eur), Air France (1100eur)
Accomodation costs
Accomodation costs youth hostel
Hostel Blues (13.43eur shared / 19.40eur private)Downtown backpackers hostel (17.91eur shared / 23.88 private)
City Hostel (private 19.40eur)
Hostel possonium (14.92eur shared / 19.70eur private)
Patio Hostel (13.43eur shared / 17.91eur private)
Accommodation costs apartments
Apartments Blue Danube (private 26.86eur)Apartments Martin - Historical Centre (private 26.86eur)
Accomodation costs hotel
Hotel Matysak *** (double twin single person 80eur/104eur, double twin 88eur/115eur)Botel Marina **** (boat hotel) (single bed 59eur, twin bed 85eur, suite 101eur)
City Hotel Bratislava *** (single 60eur, twin bed 69eur, triple 77eur)
Hotel Kyjev ** ( single 52eur, twin bed 69eur)
Old city hotel (single 54eur, twin bed 60eur/80eur, triple bed 83eur/107eur)
Supplementary Information
The Call for Location states: user feedback from previous conferences suggest that the ideal location will:
- have a strong local OpenOffice.org community
- attract strong sponsor support
- have a low-cost/free conference centre with conference venues close together
- have facilities where people can pass the time, socialise, and mingle with other conference delegates close to the conference building(s)
- have a range of low-cost accomodation with easy/cheap transport to the conference location
- attract the largest number of community contributers
- facilitate the attendance of a large number of Sun's OpenOffice.org developers (who are in Hamburg, Germany)
- be accessible by cheap flight and train tickets
- be aligned with a large IT event (e.g. CeBIT, Systems, Comdex)
- provide low-cost broadband Internet access (e.g. wireless LAN in the rooms)
- allow for video and audio streaming (e.g. via the support of a company)
No Supplementary Information supplied
