My first in-person talk

#Traveling is scary

I don't really travel outside Greece. Not for any specific reasons, it's just that there's no reason to. So last year, when Linux App Summit 2025 announced that it'd take place in Albania, I signed up instantly!

I had an awesome & interesting talk about Tuba and was getting ready to present it. Unfortunately, due to unforeseen events, I wasn't able to participate in-person. That was my first talk experience.

This time around, Linux App Summit 2026 announced that it'd take place in Berlin. Germany is a bit far, but some events that took place earlier this year, made me want to do a talk on some stuff (no spoilers yet!).

#Plane time!

The first and last time I boarded a plane was when I was in high school and we went on a school trip to Scotland. Airports are confusing!

I spent like an hour waiting at the check-in area because I didn't really know where I was supposed to be, until I realized that I can just go through the (hidden behind a wall) security since I had already checked-in online. 🙃

Security had to pat me down, but my electronics & I managed to go through. Welp... more waiting now... ... ... BOARDING TIME!

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What's the deal with airplane food?

I don't know, I quite enjoyed the free omelet and dessert snack!

I'm too tall for the airplane seat spacing however, ouch...

#Berlin is scary

Okay so, I'm not going to sugarcoat it, I felt very lost when I arrived. Google Maps showed me that I had to take something called FEX to get to my hotel and I could get tickets from something called VBB. Cool!

I found a VBB self-service machine right outside the terminal. I selected English and... lo and behold... everything but the tickets are translated 🙃🙃🙃 With the help of some OCR translation, I managed to print a one-way one-time ticket to my destination. Now what?

What exactly is FEX? Google maps didn't provide enough info, is it a bus? is it a train? is it metro? I asked a bus driver and they told me "not here". Okay. Not enough info still. I asked another bus driver and they didn't speak English. Thankfully, some young people around there heard us and told me it's underground.

There was a stationed wagon when I arrived and I asked the staff if it would take me to my destination, twice, and both times they told me to validate my ticket instead... Anyway, everything went well from now on, I reached my destination and checked-in my hotel, hooray!

#Berlin is beautiful too

Beautiful buildings, streets, sidewalks. A lot of greenery, bikes, people, wish I had more time to explore it... Maybe next time?

#Public speaking is scary

The event was PACKED! So many people, especially for the keynote. Lot's of familiar faces too. Sadly, I was extremely nervous the whole day and I avoided socializing almost entirely. (Sorry if you tried to talk to me but couldn't get ahold of me, I wasn't trying to avoid anyone!)

During lunch, I ran to my hotel room to do a last minute mock presentation, which took a bit longer than expected and I ended up missing some after-lunch talks, but I watched them afterwards.

I also had to prepare my laptop by creating a user account for the presentation and transferring the files over. I do my presentations in slidev, so the export requires a web server. I really didn't want to bother with setting up node just for this, so I ran it through php. 😰

Oh, I also dropped a bunch of Tuba stickers at the table (I asked for permission!). If anyone grabbed any, send me a pic of it, it'd make me happy to see them used, as they were all gone by the time I got back and I really wish nobody took all of them or they were thrown out!

The talk before mine was a bit controversial, the QnA part at least, which made me a bit more nervous, but it was now my time. I got up there, connected my laptop and started talking.

Well... it didn't exactly go as well as I'd had hopped for. The audience was great, they laughed at my jokes and seemed engaged, my issues were with how I presented it. It came out a bit preachy ("this is what you must do" etc.) and a bit like I was just reading the slides. I had prepared a lot more material and examples on every point, my nervousness just wouldn't even allow me to look at the audience 😭😭 I think I'll do better next time, now that the initial fears are gone! (I'll also upload the slides soon).

If I would add something, it'd be to that first question. Continuing a project without forking is absolutely the preferred route, but it can only happen if 1. you were already an active contributor and trusted by the users and previous maintainer or 2. the previous maintainer trusts you and you align with their and their users' goals already. When I was a lot less experienced in FOSS, I did that, I asked someone that maintained a project I really liked and used, but hadn't had the chance to contribute to, if they would allow me to take over and the answer was "no, just fork it".

#Why LAS?

I got asked a few times, "Why LAS instead of GUADEC?" and my answer is that I want to reach more people from other communities. Sure I could talk about this and Tuba in GUADEC, but I don't think it's the right audience for it as they know these already. I think more communities should know about the EOL situation on Flathub and how to properly continue projects, avoid burnout and the dangers on leaving maintainership to LLMs.

#Goodbye Berlin

On day 2, I was more chill. I got to speak a bit with Liaizon Wakest on fedi clients and a bit with Tobias. I was going to join Boiling the ocean's trip to the museum for design, however with the whole 'Berlin is scary' situation I decided to just go to the airport early than stress out over missing my flight. Next time for sure!

And of course, huge thanks to the GNOME Foundation for sponsoring my travel expenses. I wouldn't have been able to participate without them! Consider donating to GNOME.