Stuttgart: Day 2

Another day in Stuttgart and lots to talk about.

The city is just a blast. There was a car show (pictures to follow) down on the Schlossplatz … man do the Germans love their cars. Everything from Mercedes to Ford to Citreon was there. I even got to see some Lambourghini’s first hand … wow … nice cars …

I spent a couple of hours down watching people go by while sitting in the shade. Totally fun to just people watch in the lovely weather and look across the fantastic city-scape.

The evening brought the GUADEC speaker reception that Nokia sponsored. This was a good event. Booze and food for everybody! They even had dessert. This was one of the better events I’ve been to at a conference like this. It was low-key and didn’t have too many people at it so it was a chance to really connect with people. I got a chance to meet David Neary, Luis Villa and Ryan Gammon … great conversations to be had by all.

Nokia was giving away their new 770’s for the GNOME developers which was really cool. This is a device that is running Linux and a completely open source software stack. Really neat to see and hopefully they can sell some. I was this close to winning one … haha …

The walk back from the reception was amazing. It was just after midnight and the city was totally electric. From talking with some of the folks from Stuttgart they said that this was the first big break in the weather and that people were just itching to get out. The downtown area was totally hoppin’ with all of the beer gardens packed … kids still out running around … just craziness … it’s a beautiful place at night.

GUADEC starts tomorrow … looking forward to it!