DrupalCon Barcelona 2024 - Team Recap

DrupalCon is one of our favorite events here at amazee.io. It’s an opportunity to unite and celebrate one another and the welcoming Drupal community. 

DrupalCon Barcelona 2024 was a celebration. We brought together many of our team members from across Europe, America, and Australia. We hosted LagoonCon, met new friends, caught up with old ones, and connected with our global community.

Here are highlights from our colleague’s conference experiences.

What an experience! This was my first time visiting Barcelona, my first time meeting my colleagues from across the globe in person, and my first DrupalCon and LagoonCon! The experience did not disappoint. The entire time, I couldn’t stop smiling and thinking how lucky I am to be surrounded by this “amazee”ng community. 

For LagoonCon, we had a great lineup of speakers. John Faber, Managing Partner at Chapter Three, presented, “Does a Next-Drupal Site Improve the ROI of Your Web Platform?”. John explored the reasons Drupal users should consider decoupling their Drupal sites. With a focus on open source, Next-Drupal offers a robust technical path to decouple your Drupal site without sacrificing the daily features editors require. His talk highlighted the ROI experienced for one of their newest site builds - Realtor. The ROI angle was interesting, as he outlined the difficulty in engaging engineers and developers with experience running Drupal sites at this scale versus experienced Front-End developers. The availability of technical resources, combined with the efficiency of scaling a Node-based front end, delivered an estimated 40% ROI improvement over the existing legacy solution.

Michael Schmid, Head of Technology at amazee.io, also presented. His session, “Open Source as part of a wider product strategy: Lagoon and its place in the Mirantis product suite,” led the audience through the five reasons for open sourcing everything! Michael’s passion for open source is infectious, and he encouraged the attendees to think beyond the more obvious reasons, such as security and strong go-to-market strategies. He used Lagoon as the ultimate example of embracing open source! 

One of my favorite moments was presenting at LagoonCon. I was lucky to present “Co-Designing Product Engineering Processes: Insights from the Lagoon Team.” I love talking about building a relationship between product and engineering. I highlighted my work with the Lagoon team and delved into use cases of how we improved processes and implemented structured processes and strategies.

After the speaker sessions at LagoonCon, we stayed to mingle and chat with attendees. It was heartwarming when a fellow product manager approached me and thanked me for my session. I cherish those moments the most! 

Other highlights of DrupalCon included meet-and-greets at our booth with curious people who wanted to learn more about amazee.io and grabbing food and drinks right on the beach with new and old friends! 

Barcelona had a fully packed schedule, kicking off with LagoonCon on the first day, followed by a busy week at DrupalCon. It was a fantastic experience to represent our team at our booth, sharing insights and showcasing what we’ve been working on. This marked my 11th DrupalCon Europe, and as always, it was a pleasure to reconnect with colleagues, partners, and the vibrant Drupal community.

Throughout the week, I had meaningful conversations with partners, potential clients, and even competitors, catching up with old friends along the way. There were many discussions on industry trends, new technologies, and shared challenges, and I was glad to catch up with colleagues in real life :). I also had the chance to give a couple of product demos, which was an excellent opportunity to showcase our strengths and engage directly with those interested in our services and solutions.

Outside of the event, I took the time to enjoy Barcelona’s incredible food and drink scene with colleagues and clients. Sharing tapas and local cuisine with fellow attendees after the conference was a fantastic way to wind down and reflect on the day’s experiences.

DrupalCon Barcelona 2024 was an incredible experience. I had the chance to participate in DrupalJam 2024 in Utrecht some months ago and already had a glimpse of how great Drupal events are, but DrupalCon was beyond expectations. There were many interesting companies and people to meet, existing clients to greet after calls and emails, and finally, my colleagues to see face to face!

On the first day, I attended LagoonCon, organized and hosted by amazee.io. It was great to listen to Toby Bellwood and Lauren Morris share their ideas and passion for Lagoon for the first time in person. It was an inspiring opportunity to feel part of something bigger and proud of our company goals and vision!

The next three days at DrupalCon were exciting. It was good to see how many people were interested in our services by coming to our booth and asking questions! I also had the chance to participate in our session as a sponsor, led by Toby Bellwood, regarding deploying multiple Drupal sites, multisite and polysites in particular. 

In other words, my experience at DrupalCon Barcelona was valuable and inspiring, and I look forward to attending the next Drupal event!

This is my third DrupalCon—and yet again, it delivered! 

LagoonCon was a great way to kick off this Drupal community meet-up. We got the opportunity to discuss all things Lagoon and open source, as well as celebrate the developer experience. I had the privilege of sharing what the Lagoon team has been delivering, what’s been exciting for the team, and what is coming next. It’s been a busy year at Lagoon! Discover more at dev.to/uselagoon and on our Discord channel.

During DrupalCon, I had a great time soaking in all the conversations with customers, visitors, and partners on almost every topic in the Drupalverse. There was a heavy focus on the new Drupal CMS, which is being built under the Starshot initiative. As a hosting company, we have much to consider regarding these projects. amazee.io’s core message of fully open source hosting was well received and continues to represent a strong differentiator for us.

I also had the honor of having a session where I talked about deploying all your sites, all the ways, all the time. I shared my thoughts about common patterns such as multisite, push/pull polysite, base image inheritance, and more. Diving into their pros, cons, and challenges, I shared some of our behind-the-scenes work with clients to optimize their scenarios. I also covered persuasive arguments used to sway everyone from dedicated CI enthusiasts to free-spirited YOLO developers.

Furthermore, I took the opportunity to volunteer, which is an essential way for us to give back to the community. As sponsors of DrupalCon Singapore in December, it was really interesting to promote the next big Drupal event and get a feel for how many people will benefit from a DrupalCon closer to the APAC side of the world!

Attending DrupalCon Barcelona was an unforgettable experience, and one of the highlights was the opportunity to spend time with my amazing teammates and clients. It’s not often that we all get to be in the same room, so being able to collaborate, share ideas, and even unwind together in person was something I truly appreciated. Whether we were brainstorming new approaches to projects or enjoying the vibrant Barcelona culture, the time spent together helped deepen our connections. It reminded me how fortunate I am to work with such a great team.

Another rewarding aspect of DrupalCon was the chance to meet our clients face-to-face. While we usually connect virtually, meeting in person to discuss their needs and share ideas was invaluable. We had productive conversations about ongoing projects and future goals, strengthening our professional relationships and ensuring we're on the same page moving forward. These face-to-face interactions highlighted the value of open communication and collaboration.

Of course, DrupalCon would only be complete with engaging with the broader Drupal community. It was fantastic to meet many talented developers, designers, and contributors who bring their expertise and enthusiasm to the table. Whether during insightful sessions or informal chats, it was a great chance to connect with others in the industry and exchange ideas.

Overall, DrupalCon Barcelona was a rewarding experience that left me feeling motivated and grateful for the connections I made and strengthened. I’m excited to apply what I’ve learned and look forward to the next opportunity to meet again.

I very much enjoyed my DrupalCon Barcelona 2024 experience. It offered an excellent opportunity to reconnect with the Drupal community while catching up with clients and diving deep into the latest CMS trends. And attending LagoonCon added to the conference adventure. LagoonCon, hosted by amazee.io, allowed our team to converse face-to-face with our clients and other Drupal enthusiasts. Topics discussed spanned a broad bandwidth, from infrastructure challenges to the future of web hosting, with insightful sessions led by my colleagues Lauren and Michael on the importance of Open Source and our company values of Trust, Transparency, and Collaboration.

I was also fortunate to have the time to attend sessions during DrupalCon Barcelona. One session I enjoyed and found very informative explored how AI can be integrated with Drupal workflows, offering users new ways to enhance and optimize their content management and personalization. 

The Drupal Starshot initiative, which focuses on building an effective Drupal CMS version that can be used immediately, was one of the dominating discussion topics. I learned a lot from the sessions and chats around this topic. This initiative is designed to simplify the user experience by packaging standard features and leveraging innovations like Project Browser, Recipes, and Automatic Updates. The Starshot approach will impact our client support efforts at amazee.io. As Drupal evolves, we will provide easy-to-use, scalable solutions for our clients in the enterprise Drupal-verse. Additionally, CMS architectures and specific frameworks that are growing in popularity, mostly Next.js, were much-discussed topics. Based on these insights, we discussed how Lagoon's capabilities can support composable architecture and AI advancements.

One thing about in-person conferences that is always true is that face-to-face conversations are irreplaceable. They allowed us to get together, brainstorm, and plan a strategic future with and for our clients. I’m excited to bring these insights, thoughts, and plans back to my team and my daily work.

For me, DrupalCon Barcelona was a great opportunity to learn, meet, and talk to the Drupal community in person and get a glimpse into the future of Drupal. I am already looking forward to the next opportunity to connect! In fact, we’ll be at DrupalCon Singapore this December, so we hope to see you there!

Until then, you can stay in touch and up to date on our social media accounts. If you ever want to chat, please get in touch with us.