Open Source Paradise - where everyone’s stories have started

The beginning of our journeys in Drupal

Starting to be active in a community is never an easy task, but worth all the effort. Let me introduce you to eight great contributors who shared their first steps with me in Palic, Serbia at DrupalCamp Pannonia this August and gave some hints for first-timers that they can take out!

Before we jump into their stories, as a first-timer, I also asked myself: If somebody had asked me a year ago, what will I do this year, honestly, I didn’t know what to answer. Maybe I will be at a French language-course and still work at the hotel in Brussels, Belgium. But I have never expected that I will be at the DrupalCamp Pannonia in 2019 and meet these awesome folks!

Photo: Me at the end of DrupalCamp Pannonia  - Photo by tatarbj

Not so long time ago, I started to contribute to the Drupal community. Because of my background (non-dev), I didn’t know where to start. But thanks to Balazs Janos Tatar, I found myself useful. I started to work with the Mentoring Team, took some administrative tasks and here I am, at my very first time, at a Drupal event. You can read my previous article about DrupalCamp Pannonia here.

This is my short story, how I just started to be with this huge and open-minded organization.  

So then, I started to think. Who knows the stories of others? How did others connect to Drupal? What was their very first time? How they felt then and now? So many questions and I didn't have any answers, yet. - But people of the Drupal community want to help you not to feel lost, want to know you as a person and want to tell their stories as well! So here we are with their stories and suggestions! Enjoy and let us know what you think by sharing your own stories!

Gábor Hojtsy

Drupal Initiative Coordinator Coordinator at Acquia

‘Create things, that people can use.’ - Gábor Hojtsy is a passionate developer. Before Drupal, he built one of the very first web development communities in Hungary, Weblabor, where folks were able to talk about PHP and more. In 2003, they needed a more modern backend and he discovered Drupal. He helped to translate it to Hungarian and also fixed various bugs on the way.

Currently, he is working on the Drupal 9 release among many others. This is a huge challenge, but he believes that with a lot of contributors, they will be able to provide a quality release on time.

When and where was your very first Drupal event?

In 2003 with István Palócz, we organized the first PHP conference in Hungary.

But my first international event, where I was attending was in 2005 the First DrupalCon Antwerp, in Belgium. There was a maximum of 40 people in the basement of a hotel. Quite a comparison to today's events! 

Do you have friends because of the Drupal community?

Of course, I have lots of great and supporting Drupal friends. They often invite me, some of them even visited our home. But, you know, most of them are just virtual, the distance is just too big.

Photo: The two Hungarian Drupal friends, PP and Gábor - Photo by varejulcsa

What do you suggest to first-timer contributors who attend that kind of event?

First, a first-timer needs to figure out what they are interested in Drupal. Then find a related interest group. Joining a micro-community works best.

Then find easy or possibly small projects where you can have success. This is important to have some motivation, especially in the beginning. Also, you will need time to catch up with the community. Don’t give up, it is definitely worth your time!

István Palócz

Hungarian Drupal contributor

István Palócz is a freelancer, advisor, Drupal instructor and organizer of Drupal Conferences. His main focus is to help small and mid-size agencies to grow by advising them with modern development methods. He organizes plenty of events, has a large number of techy friends and an easy-to-memories nickname: pp.

How did you connect to Drupal? When did you start to work with it?

Back in 2003, we started to organize the PHP conference for developers. Then we needed a better platform for our Weblabor forum, which Gábor also mentioned, so we decided to switch to Drupal.

My very first episode of this journey was in Hungary - it was a one-day event, and we called it simply Drupal Conference. Later on, we had a hard time, renaming our gathering to DrupalWeekend. But I remember Dries Buytaert was there for the first time, and he got his very first Drupal mug ever.

What do you suggest to first-timer contributors?

I have made a presentation where the new contributors can find much information about Drupal and the Hungarian Drupal community, even nowadays I suggest reading this first. Then also very important to join the community, talk to people, go to sessions, workshops and be ready for an amazing vibe by them!

Biljana Grbić

Event Director at DrupalCamp Pannonia

Back in 2015, she started to work for Studio Present. Since then she was Office Manager, Marketing Assistant and now she is the Event Director of DrupalCamp Pannonia in Serbia. She already does have an impressive carrier! She is always happy and smiling at everybody. Her spirit was all around us during the camp.

Photo: The two non-dev Drupal friends, me with Biljana - Photo by varejulcsa

She was my first interviewee, and I have to be honest here, we had a really fun time. At DC Pannonia we must thank a lot to her, without her passion and the team’s energy, we couldn’t have that positive and inspiring experience.

When and where was your very first time in a Drupal event?

There was a Drupal Meetup in Palić about 2 years ago, where I was participating in organizing it and I enjoyed the time spent there. We were about 60-70 attendees, very heart-warming and fun time, I remember.

My first experience at a Drupal event, I clearly remember, because I was so confused! I didn’t know what to expect - that was my first touch with Drupal. You know, how it goes with lots of IT and computer-lover members of our community, but it turned out that everybody was so welcoming, and it felt great to be part of them!

What do you suggest to first-timer contributors who attend that kind of event?

Go to sessions, of course, but if you are not one of the techies there, just walk out on the door. I mean, if you are a non-dev person, you might not understand the topic from the beginning, you don't neccessarily need to be there. Sometimes you can find others talking outside of the session room, and you'll have a different experience. So obviously, talk to as many guys and gals as you can!

Photo: With Drupalists at the pre-conference event - Photo by varejulcsa

Floris van Geel 

Information Technology and Services Professional, 040lab

Floris van Geel is a Drupal entrepreneur and web developer, but he is more than that: a passionate performer. He recruits and helps to find new talents for Drupal; performs and talks about its potential, showcases Drupal solutions for the ones who attend his sessions.

Since 1996 he builds websites, but his first Drupal website went to production in 2008. He felt more natural and smooth to work with Drupal.

In 2010 he went to his very first Drupal event, to DrupalJam Amsterdam with about 80 others, where everyone was so welcoming. He knew he was in the right place.

Photo: Floris starts his session at DrupalCamp Pannonia - Photo by Zoran "Zox Studio" Vukmanov

What was your best Drupal event so far? (if you can choose)

Oh, that is a tough question. I think, the one in Hungary, Drupalaton 2017, was one of the bests, apart from many other awesome ones! There were no sessions, only workshops and sprints. The whole event’s atmosphere was so chilled, and it was welcoming to families too. There were lots of activities, we could have gone swimming in the lake or get a drink in a bar. We had grill night on the beach, and the sprint room had a view of the lake. It was awesome, great to remember all the memories from there.

Nevena Stajić

Co-Founder/Developer at Codexsto

After finishing her studies, she started to work as a Front-End Drupal Developer. With her co-workers, they got some projects that later became one of the first ones of Codexsto, a Serbian agency that she co-founded back in 2017 with Miroslav Mitic.

Photo: Nevena and Miroslav, co-founders of Codexsto - Photo by Zoran "Zox Studio" Vukmanov

What was your very first time on a Drupal Event?

I was at Drupal IronCamp 2016, in Prague. It took place in the picturesque capital of Czechia, in Prague at the end of November 2016. As far as I remember, there were 200 attendees besides the cloudy weather. Since we first met, I immediately felt I am in a huge family. After the camp, 6 month later, we (as Codexto) organized the very first Drupal meetup in Nis, Serbia. It was successful, we had Drupal people from all over Serbia and from the community in North Macedonia. I can tell we had a great time together. Ever since we continued the meetups in Nis, then guys from Subotica took over and started to organise the meetups there. We are proud that we moved the whole Drupal Community in Serbia from dead point to a colorful place as it is now. 

What do you suggest to first-timer contributors? What they should do at a Drupal event?

Usually, at Drupal events, we have a very impressive list of speakers who are experts in their area. I would recommend to all developers regardless of their level of expertise, to get to sessions as we always can learn from each other. I, as a front-end developer got a lot of new techniques and tips by many of the speakers at Drupal events and that I would definitely suggest to first-timers is to be brave and honest, go to your speakers and ask them about anything that interest you! Even if they don’t know sometimes the perfect answer, they will follow it up, introducing you to other community members and helping you to grow in Drupal.

Photo: #DrupalGirlsPower - Photo by tatarbj

Hristo Chonov

Senior Software Developer at bio-logis and Maintainer of Entity API

Hristo is a friendly developer with an always-smiley face. I had an excellent time talking to him, especially because of his self-description, that says he has super-powers - I wanted to find out what are they, but he didn’t go into details, has let me discover them.

Photo: Hristo talks about Entity API and his contribution at DrupalCamp Pannonia - Photo by Zoran "Zox Studio" Vukmanov

In 2014 he was looking for a new job. He wanted to take a challenge to work for bio-logis and contacted them directly and as their reply, he had the chance to talk straight to one of their leaders, and the company invited him to the DrupalCamp Frankfurt 2014 to get to know each other and the team - at that time, he had quite limited knowledge of Drupal. He was so keen and took all of the wonderful opportunities and learned as fast as he could have. His journey has started 5 years ago, and now I’ve met a great senior technologist, who falls in love with Drupal. As he told me: “You know Reka, Drupal might change your life!”

How did you feel at your first Drupal event, DrupalCamp Frankfurt 2014?

I felt great and full of energy. I found myself in a very hospitable environment. My colleagues, there were friendly and they helped me a lot, to not be lost at the conference.

What do you suggest to a first-timer contributor?

Try to find a mentor as it’s essential to have somebody in the community that you know, he/she will be there for no matter what. Like for example, my very first mentor in the Drupal project was Tobias Zimmermann; he helped me extremely a lot.

Then talk to lots of people from the community. Go to sessions, try to pick up new tasks and go with the flow.

Maria Totova

Drupal Developer at Trio-Group Communication & Marketing GmbH & Plovdiv Community Leader, Education Manager and Instructor at Coding Girls

Photo: Maria talks about the Drupal Girls and its mission at DrupalCamp Pannonia - Photo by Zoran "Zox Studio" Vukmanov

In 2015 Maria heard about Drupal from a friend and her curiosity took over. At that time, she was a freelancer in the web development field but was looking for a change. She wanted to work on more complex projects for big brands. Maria found the beauty behind it and quickly fell in love with Drupal. She decided that the best way to learn the most out of it is to build a real project. So, she began experimenting and developed her portfolio website on Drupal 7. Soon she started working with Drupal and met her amazing mentors, Mladen Stankovic and Christian Kohl. They have helped her grow as a developer and have made her feel the power and the support of the Drupal community. That’s why Maria believes strongly in the power of mentorship and simply wants to pay it forward.

Now she represents Bulgaria, the Bulgarian Drupal community and furthermore the Coding Girls community from Plovdiv. She is committed to bringing new women to the fellowship. She proves her leadership skills as being a great mentor and speaker in the Drupal community.

What was your first Drupal event? What was your first impression there?

In 2017 I went to Drupal Bootcamp in Plovdiv. That was my very first time attending and already being on the stage as a speaker. I was so excited to start a new journey and found so many friends on the way since that time!

What do you suggest to a non-dev person who attends at a Drupal event?

Go and talk to literally everyone! I believe, all of us told you the same, but that is one of the reasons that we are here at similar events, right? :)

In addition, I highly suggest attending human-oriented sessions, they are amazingly valuable. There you will understand every single word and will feel the strength and the beauty of the Drupal community.

Yauhen Zenko

Technical Lead at We are you, speaker and event organizer

During the years at the university, Yauhen started his freelance career as a web developer. One of his clients from the Netherlands had the need to develop a website with Drupal. It turned his attention to learn more about this technology and ecosystem.

Photo: Yuahen talks about local communities at his session in DrupalCamp Pannonia  - Photo by Zoran "Zox Studio" Vukmanov

What was your first Drupal event where you attended?

In 2014 I went to DrupalCon Amsterdam. That was a bit too huge event, even though it had a nice atmosphere, I felt a little too corporate for my level. There were so many drupalists and I have to admit I felt lonely there. To be honest, I still prefer smaller events, like this one in Palic, DrupalCamp Pannonia. It’s more attractive for me, after a day you know basically everyone and it’s easier to navigate.

What do you suggest to first-timer contributors? What they should do at a Drupal event?

I believe in people-power. Go to contribution days, talk to peeps, find your way in and try not to start with a DrupalCon-size conference, because you might end up feeling lost. At a large, week-long conference you may be feeling like in an ocean, being a small drop – I suggest to get to social events where being yourself, you will definitely find new friends who could become your mentors, reducing your stress to be lonely. This is totally normal, no worries – still, in a smaller camp or at a meetup, it’s easier to recognize and be recognized.

Postscript

Photo: Postcards from DrupalCamp Pannonia 2019 - Photo by Zoran "Zox Studio" Vukmanov

At the beginning of every journey, as we’ve seen above, there are obstacles, but also moments when you feel, belonging to a community is one of the best things that you can get.

By the time you start contributing, going to events, spending evenings from your free time, you basically just end up being part of it. You become a contributor and your activities become called ‘contribution’. Dries mentioned in his Seattle keynote and also we can read it on his blog post “everyone deserves the opportunity to contribute”, for me it means all our time and effort are recognized and welcomed in a multicultural and diverse community such as the Drupal one is.

It was an amazing period, setting up our meetings, spending the time to shape this article, remembering all these awesome folks and their stories to contribute all these memories back to You, Drupal and Open Source friends.

I’m sure you have your own stories! You might share them with us in a comment below? We would love to see an even bigger picture, having all of you on stage!

Let’s start contributing, let’s start sharing ourselves!

Truly yours,
Réka