report from GHM 2011

Debian and GNU have a lot in common: starting from the fact that strstr() applied to the respective project (full) names does not return NULL, up to the the common objective of building a UNIX-like operating system that grants fundamental software freedoms to its users. That is why I've been very pleased when the organizers of GNU Hackers Meeting 2011 (GHM) invited me to attend and speak about Debian and its relationships with GNU at the event. Slides of my talk are already available, while a video is being encoded (it will probably show up on both GHM homepage and IRILL website).

Acknowledging the commonalities of goals on both Debian and GNU sides, we took the chance of this encounter to review how each project feel about relationships with the other (my original inquiries for the Debian community can be found on debian-project) and to talk it over during a discussion session scheduled to happen just after my talk.

Yesterday, I've summarized all my notes from GHM 2011 in a report posted to debian-project. Quoting from there:

After this experience, it is striking for me how much we have in common with GNU (ideally, culturally, socially, etc.) and at the same time how harsh can our "family battles" become at a times. Let's avoid that the remaining [few] differences get too much in the way [of collaboration], especially when that can be easily avoided.

Enjoy!