Types of Events

Last updated on
15 April 2021

The Drupal community organizes many types of events for many reasons: community, learning, and contributing to Drupal. These events can be either online, in person, or a combination of both. Here are the major types.

To locate events, check out the Find an event page.

Local meetups

A meetup is an informal gathering of individuals interested in Drupal, aimed at building local knowledge and community. Depending on the size of the group, it could be a time for people to ask questions and get answers from others in the group, a social time, or there could be more formal presentations on a topic by one or more group members each meeting. "Lightning talk" days are also popular: each person can have 5-10 minutes to present a question, a new module they've learned to use, or some other topic of interest.

See Organizing meetups.

Online group meetings

Many groups within the Drupal community are global, so the only practical way for them to meet is online. Some groups hold meetings in text chat, and some hold audio/video meetings. You can find groups within the Drupal community at:

DrupalCamps

A DrupalCamp is a one- to two-day event that focuses on Drupal, and brings together people from a geographical region. The goal is knowledge sharing among the community -- essentially, you’re getting the community together to help each other learn. The term "Camp" comes from Barcamp, which is a self-organized informal non-conference, and gets across the idea that it doesn't need to be fancy. They take a bit of organizing, but in general it’s pretty easy to run a camp.

Generally a camp is an extension of a meetup. You'll have a hard time holding an effective camp unless you have a strong meetup already occurring in your town.

See Organizing a DrupalCamp.

DrupalCons

A DrupalCon is a global or continent-level gathering, which typically runs for several days and includes a contribution event, training, keynote addresses, and sessions. DrupalCons are organized by professional event planners, in conjunction with the Drupal Association.

Contribution Events

Contribution events are online and in-person events where people gather to contribute to the Drupal project software, documentation, training, and community. They can be held in conjunction with DrupalCons and DrupalCamps, or they can be stand-alone events.

See Organizing contribution events.

Google Summer of Code, Code-In, Etc.

Google periodically sponsors students to contribute to open source projects, and sometimes the Drupal project applies and is accepted to participate. Google Summer of Code is ongoing; Google Code-In had its last year in 2020.

See Google Summer of Code organizing guide.

Trainings

A training is an in-person or online event where a group of people is trained on a specific topic by one or more expert trainers. Examples:

  • Global Training Days are designed to introduce new and beginning users to Drupal. Trainers from companies and local groups around the world help newcomers to the Drupal community feel inspired and empowered to start great work. See the Global Training Days group on groups.drupal.org.
  • Some larger DrupalCamps have designated training days where experienced trainers in the community offer full-day or half-day trainings on beginning to advanced subjects like Drupal site building, web site accessibility, search engine optimization, Drupal module programming, or Drupal theming. A small fee is often charged.
  • DrupalCons usually offer one or more trainings, with larger fees.

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