Have you ever been to KubeCon?

If you haven't and you are reading this, get in touch! Let's work out something together, the next one is in Paris, France!

I am heading to KubeCon NA Chicago, USA for a full 7 days of Cloud Native, Kubernetes, Platform Engineering, and Open Source including Cloud-Native Rejekts, KubeCon Co-located events (AppDeveloperCon) and the main conference starting on Tuesday.

KubeCon, for me, is a big thing because I've seen how massive communities, projects, and companies decide the industry's future. My first KubeCon was in Barcelona in 2019, and since then, I've tried to be in every one of them. The main reason I attend is to meet people, discuss ideas, and stay up to date with what is happening in the cloud native industry.

At KubeCon, you will find tons and tons of project maintainers who are eager to share where their projects are going and what they are planning for next year. If you want to start contributing to projects, meeting them would speed up your journey.

Suppose you are looking for a job at a tech company. In that case, most of the influential companies are sponsoring the event, and you can find engineers, product managers, and marketing folks to have a chat and figure out which company might be right for you. You will see from small startups to tech giants all sharing the same sponsors' floor, which gives you opportunities for all kinds of conversations.

If you don't know where to start and you see me around, I will be more than happy to help you. Let's have a chat!

I am a CNCF Ambassador now!

Last week, I was notified that I'd been accepted as a CNCF Ambassador, so now more than ever, I want to focus on helping new people not only to speak at the event but also join projects from these fantastic communities.

I've found most of my mentors at KubeCon, and I am hoping to be able to mentor folks who are starting their journeys both on open-source and cloud-native technologies.

The best way to get in touch with me is to drop me a message on Twitter/X @Salaboy

If you are attending KubeCon, come and say hello!

My week starting today will be crazy, but as I mentioned, this week's primary focus is meeting people and having amazing conversations.

I will be doing some book give aways and signing! So come and say hello!

Here is a brief list of times and places where I am supposed to be:

• Sunday 5th Nov - Cloud Native Rejekts: shout out to my friends at Solo.io, specifically Marino, for sharing a ticket with me. I love Cloud Native Rejekts, the conference designed to host people whose proposals were rejected for the main conference. This small conference happening the weekend before the main events offers you great (and cheaper) insights into what's coming during the week. Most presenters are staying for the main conference, which makes it the perfect opportunity to make friends before ten thousand people arrive.
• Monday 6th Nov - AppDeveloperCon: I am hyped to see how this event turns out. I am presenting with my friend Oleg from AtomicJar at 9:15am.
  After my presentation, I will be hanging out at the Diagrid sponsor booth (table F6) and doing some book signings! Come and say hello!
  Remember that if you have tickets for any co-located event, you can move around to any other session in any other event happening simultaneously. And as you can see, there are tons of things happening at the same time!
  

• Monday 6th Nov - Dapr Project Update: Dapr Project update contributors/maintainers gathering happening at 1 p.m., 🕐 1:00-3:00pm at 📍 Hilton Garden Inn Chicago McCormick Place, level 3, Peerless room.
  To finish the day, I will go and watch some lighting talks starting at 5:30 p.m. starting with this one .
  
• Tuesday 7th Nov - KubeCon: During the main conference, many things are happening. I will definitely start with the CNCF Ambassadors breakfast, this is not open for everyone to go, but from there, I will be attending the opening keynotes. Then I head to the sponsors' floor to hang around in the Diagrid's sponsor booth (B27) until 12:30 where I will head to Codefresh's booth to sign some copies of the report I've authored titled Software Deployment with Kubernetes.
• Wednesday 8th Nov - KubeCon: more book signings at Diagrid's booth (B27) between 12:30-2:00pm. We will be giving away copies of my freshly printed book title Platform Engineering on Kubernetes. The rest of the time, I will be trying to attend as many sessions as I can, while I also stay helping in the booth.
• Thursday 9th Nov - KubeCon: From 10 am to 11 am, you can find me at the Codefresh booth signing more reports and having good conversations about the Argo project. After that, I will be at Diagrid's booth or at sessions learning from maintainers.

I haven't had the chance to look at sched yet (the schedule/agenda) app to organize your conference. I strongly recommend you do so before the conference starts so you know where to go and you don't miss out on sessions that you want to attend.

See you all at the conference!