justwheel commented

(Migrated from gitlab.com)

Summary

Provide feedback, input, and/or approval of Flock 2026 Call for Proposals (CFP) themes by Tuesday, 11 November 2025

Background

The Flock Organizer Team is getting the party back together for 2026. One of the many things we are working on is the CFP to open before the end of this year. (Crazy, right??) As part of this process, we invite input from the various Fedora leadership bodies (Council, FESCo, Mindshare Committee, and EPEL Steering Committee) on the themes we have come up with so far.

Since we are planning to open the CFP before the end of the year, we do have a deadline for providing input, feedback, and comments. I am formally requesting any feedback on the 2026 CFP themes no later than Tuesday, 11 November 2025. This will leave enough time for the Flock Organizer Team to address feedback and open the CFP before the end of the year.

This is not a guarantee we will implement every single piece of feedback. We are asking four diverse committees for feedback, after all! However, the Flock Organizer Team respects the perspective and input of all our leadership bodies to help influence the content we want to have at Flock 2026. So, we ask for your collaborative input to help us build a community conference that we are all proud of.

Details

At the time of opening this ticket, we have come up with four themes. These themes do not necessarily correspond to tracks or how the actual schedule will be organized. However, it will be more like "tags" that a submitter can apply to their content. In an ideal world, every accepted session at Flock will clearly fit into at least one theme.

Here they are:

Freedom: The Open Frontier — This theme explores how Fedora pushes the boundaries of technological freedom. We invite proposals on FOSS approaches to Artificial Intelligence, the advancement of open hardware like RISC-V, the development of open standards, and the protection of data privacy. Sessions should focus on how our work in the Fedora Project creates a more free and collaborative technological world for everyone.
Friends: Our Fedora Story — This theme celebrates the people and practices that make our community unique. We seek proposals that share stories of mentorship, successful team collaboration, and effective onboarding within Fedora. Collaboration is key to our success, so sessions about our partnerships with other FOSS communities should center on the mutual benefits and the positive impact these relationships have on the Fedora Project.
Features: Engineering Fedora's Core — As a contributor conference, this theme dives deep into the craft of building our distribution. We welcome sessions on improvements to our infrastructure, release engineering processes, and community tooling. This is the place for technical talks that showcase our engineering excellence and the collaborative work that makes a Fedora release possible, from code to final artifact.
First: Blueprint for the Future: Fedora 45 & 46 — This theme focuses on the near-term innovations that will define the next generation of Linux. With the next few Fedora Linux releases serving as the foundation for RHEL 11, this is a critical time. We are looking for forward-looking technical talks on the changes, features, and architectural decisions in F45 and F46 that will shape the future of the operating system, from the community desktop to the core of the enterprise.

Outcome

Mindshare Committee discusses and reviews the themes, provides input as comments to this GitLab ticket no later than Tuesday, 11 November 2025, and the Flock Organizer Team incorporates as much thoughtful feedback as we can before opening the CFP later this year.

# Summary Provide feedback, input, and/or approval of Flock 2026 Call for Proposals (CFP) themes **by Tuesday, 11 November 2025** # Background The Flock Organizer Team is getting the party back together for 2026. One of the many things we are working on is the CFP to open before the end of this year. (_Crazy, right??_) As part of this process, we invite input from the various Fedora leadership bodies (Council, FESCo, Mindshare Committee, and EPEL Steering Committee) on the themes we have come up with so far. Since we are planning to open the CFP before the end of the year, we do have a deadline for providing input, feedback, and comments. I am formally requesting any feedback on the 2026 CFP themes **no later than Tuesday, 11 November 2025**. This will leave enough time for the Flock Organizer Team to address feedback and open the CFP before the end of the year. This is not a _guarantee_ we will implement every single piece of feedback. We are asking four diverse committees for feedback, after all! However, the Flock Organizer Team respects the perspective and input of all our leadership bodies to help influence the content we want to have at Flock 2026. So, we ask for your collaborative input to help us build a community conference that we are all proud of. # Details At the time of opening this ticket, we have come up with four themes. These themes do **not** necessarily correspond to tracks or how the actual schedule will be organized. However, it will be more like "tags" that a submitter can apply to their content. In an ideal world, every accepted session at Flock will clearly fit into _at least_ one theme. Here they are: 1. **Freedom: The Open Frontier** — This theme explores how Fedora pushes the boundaries of technological freedom. We invite proposals on FOSS approaches to Artificial Intelligence, the advancement of open hardware like RISC-V, the development of open standards, and the protection of data privacy. Sessions should focus on how our work in the Fedora Project creates a more free and collaborative technological world for everyone. 2. **Friends: Our Fedora Story** — This theme celebrates the people and practices that make our community unique. We seek proposals that share stories of mentorship, successful team collaboration, and effective onboarding within Fedora. Collaboration is key to our success, so sessions about our partnerships with other FOSS communities should center on the mutual benefits and the positive impact these relationships have on the Fedora Project. 3. **Features: Engineering Fedora's Core** — As a contributor conference, this theme dives deep into the craft of building our distribution. We welcome sessions on improvements to our infrastructure, release engineering processes, and community tooling. This is the place for technical talks that showcase our engineering excellence and the collaborative work that makes a Fedora release possible, from code to final artifact. 4. **First: Blueprint for the Future: Fedora 45 & 46** — This theme focuses on the near-term innovations that will define the next generation of Linux. With the next few Fedora Linux releases serving as the foundation for RHEL 11, this is a critical time. We are looking for forward-looking technical talks on the changes, features, and architectural decisions in F45 and F46 that will shape the future of the operating system, from the community desktop to the core of the enterprise. # Outcome Mindshare Committee discusses and reviews the themes, provides input as comments to this GitLab ticket **no later than Tuesday, 11 November 2025**, and the Flock Organizer Team incorporates as much thoughtful feedback as we can before opening the CFP later this year.

justwheel commented

2025-10-23 18:32:12 +00:00

(Migrated from gitlab.com)

set status to To do

set status to **To do**

justwheel commented

2025-10-23 18:32:12 +00:00

(Migrated from gitlab.com)

changed start date to October 23, 2025 and changed due date to November 11, 2025

justwheel commented

2025-10-23 18:32:12 +00:00

(Migrated from gitlab.com)

assigned to @jwwheeler

gridhead commented

2025-10-24 04:26:20 +00:00

(Migrated from gitlab.com)

Some verbiage improvements first.

3,6c3,6
< 1. **Freedom: The Open Frontier** — This theme explores how Fedora pushes the boundaries of technological freedom. We invite proposals on FOSS approaches to Artificial Intelligence, the advancement of open hardware like RISC-V, the development of open standards, and the protection of data privacy. Sessions should focus on how our work in the Fedora Project creates a more free and collaborative technological world for everyone.
< 2. **Friends: Our Fedora Story** — This theme celebrates the people and practices that make our community unique. We seek proposals that share stories of mentorship, successful team collaboration, and effective onboarding within Fedora. Collaboration is key to our success, so sessions about our partnerships with other FOSS communities should center on the mutual benefits and the positive impact these relationships have on the Fedora Project.
< 3. **Features: Engineering Fedora's Core** — As a contributor conference, this theme dives deep into the craft of building our distribution. We welcome sessions on improvements to our infrastructure, release engineering processes, and community tooling. This is the place for technical talks that showcase our engineering excellence and the collaborative work that makes a Fedora release possible, from code to final artifact.
< 4. **First: Blueprint for the Future: Fedora 45 & 46** — This theme focuses on the near-term innovations that will define the next generation of Linux. With the next few Fedora Linux releases serving as the foundation for RHEL 11, this is a critical time. We are looking for forward-looking technical talks on the changes, features, and architectural decisions in F45 and F46 that will shape the future of the operating system, from the community desktop to the core of the enterprise.
---
> 1. **Freedom: Expanding Fedora's Frontier** — This theme explores how Fedora Project pushes the boundaries of technological freedom. We invite proposals on FOSS approaches to Artificial Intelligence, the advancement of open hardware like RISC-V, the development of open standards, and the protection of data privacy. Sessions should focus on how our work in the Fedora Project creates a more free and collaborative technological world for everyone.
> 2. **Friends: Sharing Fedora's Story** — This theme celebrates the people and practices that make our community unique. We seek proposals that share stories of visionary mentorship, successful collaboration, and effective onboarding within Fedora Project. Sessions about our partnerships with other FOSS communities should center on the mutually availed benefits and the positive impact these relationships continue to have with the Fedora Project.
> 3. **Features: Engineering Fedora's Experience** — This theme dives deep into the craft of building and maintenance of our distribution. We welcome sessions on improvements to our infrastructure, release engineering, quality assurance, packaging and community tooling. This is the place for technical talks that showcase our engineering excellence that empowers the community to shape the Fedora Linux releases, from source code to final artifact.
> 4. **First: Crafting Fedora's Future** — This theme focuses on the near-term innovations that will define the next generation of Linux. With the next few Fedora Linux releases destined to shape the foundation for RHEL 11's future, we are looking for forward-thinking talks on the changes, features, and architectural decisions in F45 and F46 releases that will shape the future of the operating system, from the community desktop to the enterprise core.

The improvements should more or less cover the narrative that I am suggesting here but here's a brief rundown anyway.

I am attempting to improve the submitter's experience by making the titles more concise and impactful. Nothing wrong with yours, to be honest but if these show up as either radio buttons or dropdown elements, I would much rather if the text cuts to the chase.
I also expanded upon to the description for the "Features" section, based on the parts of the engineering fraternity in Fedora Project that I have found to be more impactful. This also ends up giving visibility to our lesser appreciated group of contributors.
"Expanding" in place of "Open" - We are not only keeping an apple on the top of @jwwheeler's head (metaphorically speaking) but we are also providing the contributors with the means to... well, you know. I wanted for our phrasing to represent that fact.
I removed the occurrence of "as a contributor conference", because that equally applies on other parts too, doesn't it? Instead, I tried filling that part with more information pertaining to that specific theme while making it contributor-focused all the same.
If we are being aspirational with collaboration and onboarding, we should be the same with mentorship too - both, in spirit and in words. Also, I have added the "maintenance" part in the Fedora Linux release process because it is equally important.
I made the phrasing a little more community-first with the words like "empowerment", "advancement" etc. I know it for a fact that it is not just me who feels little more positive with the use of these words, no matter how managerial they might end up looking.

That being said, +1 to the proposed theme (with the minor aforementioned changes).

Some verbiage improvements first. ```diff 3,6c3,6 < 1. **Freedom: The Open Frontier** — This theme explores how Fedora pushes the boundaries of technological freedom. We invite proposals on FOSS approaches to Artificial Intelligence, the advancement of open hardware like RISC-V, the development of open standards, and the protection of data privacy. Sessions should focus on how our work in the Fedora Project creates a more free and collaborative technological world for everyone. < 2. **Friends: Our Fedora Story** — This theme celebrates the people and practices that make our community unique. We seek proposals that share stories of mentorship, successful team collaboration, and effective onboarding within Fedora. Collaboration is key to our success, so sessions about our partnerships with other FOSS communities should center on the mutual benefits and the positive impact these relationships have on the Fedora Project. < 3. **Features: Engineering Fedora's Core** — As a contributor conference, this theme dives deep into the craft of building our distribution. We welcome sessions on improvements to our infrastructure, release engineering processes, and community tooling. This is the place for technical talks that showcase our engineering excellence and the collaborative work that makes a Fedora release possible, from code to final artifact. < 4. **First: Blueprint for the Future: Fedora 45 & 46** — This theme focuses on the near-term innovations that will define the next generation of Linux. With the next few Fedora Linux releases serving as the foundation for RHEL 11, this is a critical time. We are looking for forward-looking technical talks on the changes, features, and architectural decisions in F45 and F46 that will shape the future of the operating system, from the community desktop to the core of the enterprise. --- > 1. **Freedom: Expanding Fedora's Frontier** — This theme explores how Fedora Project pushes the boundaries of technological freedom. We invite proposals on FOSS approaches to Artificial Intelligence, the advancement of open hardware like RISC-V, the development of open standards, and the protection of data privacy. Sessions should focus on how our work in the Fedora Project creates a more free and collaborative technological world for everyone. > 2. **Friends: Sharing Fedora's Story** — This theme celebrates the people and practices that make our community unique. We seek proposals that share stories of visionary mentorship, successful collaboration, and effective onboarding within Fedora Project. Sessions about our partnerships with other FOSS communities should center on the mutually availed benefits and the positive impact these relationships continue to have with the Fedora Project. > 3. **Features: Engineering Fedora's Experience** — This theme dives deep into the craft of building and maintenance of our distribution. We welcome sessions on improvements to our infrastructure, release engineering, quality assurance, packaging and community tooling. This is the place for technical talks that showcase our engineering excellence that empowers the community to shape the Fedora Linux releases, from source code to final artifact. > 4. **First: Crafting Fedora's Future** — This theme focuses on the near-term innovations that will define the next generation of Linux. With the next few Fedora Linux releases destined to shape the foundation for RHEL 11's future, we are looking for forward-thinking talks on the changes, features, and architectural decisions in F45 and F46 releases that will shape the future of the operating system, from the community desktop to the enterprise core. ``` The improvements should more or less cover the narrative that I am suggesting here but here's a brief rundown anyway. - I am attempting to improve the submitter's experience by making the titles more concise and impactful. Nothing wrong with yours, to be honest but if these show up as either radio buttons or dropdown elements, I would much rather if the text cuts to the chase. - I also expanded upon to the description for the "Features" section, based on the parts of the engineering fraternity in Fedora Project that I have found to be more impactful. This also ends up giving visibility to our lesser appreciated group of contributors. - "Expanding" in place of "Open" - We are not only keeping an apple on the top of @jwwheeler's head (metaphorically speaking) but we are also providing the contributors with the means to... well, you know. I wanted for our phrasing to represent that fact. - I removed the occurrence of "as a contributor conference", because that equally applies on other parts too, doesn't it? Instead, I tried filling that part with more information pertaining to that specific theme while making it contributor-focused all the same. - If we are being aspirational with collaboration and onboarding, we should be the same with mentorship too - both, in spirit and in words. Also, I have added the "maintenance" part in the Fedora Linux release process because it is equally important. - I made the phrasing a little more community-first with the words like "empowerment", "advancement" etc. I know it for a fact that it is not just me who feels little more positive with the use of these words, no matter how managerial they might end up looking. That being said, +1 to the proposed theme (with the minor aforementioned changes).

ekidney commented

2025-11-11 10:09:38 +00:00

(Migrated from gitlab.com)

Time escaped me on this one 😅

I like the proposed themes - it’s a nice way to make sure all talks are related. I’m happy to give a +1 to this!

Time escaped me on this one 😅 I like the proposed themes - it’s a nice way to make sure all talks are related. I’m happy to give a +1 to this!

justwheel commented

2025-11-13 10:52:48 +00:00

(Migrated from gitlab.com)

Thanks for the feedback, y'all! As the deadline has passed, I am going to close this issue. Over the next few weeks, the Flock CFP team will work on integrating the feedback collected from Mindshare and the other Fedora governance bodies back into the themes before we launch the CFP in December.

Closing this issue as complete. 🌊

Thanks for the feedback, y'all! As the deadline has passed, I am going to close this issue. Over the next few weeks, the Flock CFP team will work on integrating the feedback collected from Mindshare and the other Fedora governance bodies back into the themes before we launch the CFP in December. Closing this issue as complete. :ocean:

justwheel commented

2025-11-13 10:53:43 +00:00

(Migrated from gitlab.com)

set status to Done

set status to **Done**

justwheel (Migrated from gitlab.com) closed this issue

2025-11-13 10:53:43 +00:00

justwheel commented

2025-12-03 13:54:43 +00:00

(Migrated from gitlab.com)

Thank you to everyone who reviewed and provided feedback on the Flock to Fedora 2026 Call for Proposals (CfP) themes. The review process is now concluded, having collated input from the Fedora Council, FESCo, the Mindshare Committee, and the EPEL Steering Committee. Our goal for the revisions was to balance technical precision with community inclusivity, ensuring that every contributor sees a "home" for their work in these tracks.

Summary of Changes

Inclusivity in Engineering: Based on feedback regarding the "Features" track, we explicitly added Quality Assurance (QA) and Packaging to the description. It is important that these contributors know their work belongs in our core engineering track.
EPEL & Deliverables: We updated the "Features" and "First" tracks to broaden the scope from just "the distribution" to "Fedora deliverables." We also explicitly added EPEL 11 alongside RHEL 11 as a future foundational topic.
Theming Strategy: We received several creative suggestions regarding the titles and narrative voice. Ultimately, we decided to retain the standard "Four Foundations" (Freedom, Friends, Features, First) naming convention to maintain a consistent structural narrative for the conference. We focused our revisions on the descriptions to ensure the scope was accurate and welcoming.

Here is the final list of themes that will go live with the CfP:

Freedom: The Open Frontier — This theme explores how Fedora pushes the boundaries of technological freedom. We invite proposals on FOSS approaches to Artificial Intelligence, the advancement of open hardware like RISC-V, the development of open standards, and the protection of data privacy. Sessions should focus on how our work in the Fedora Project creates a more free and collaborative technological world for everyone.
Friends: Our Fedora Story — This theme celebrates the people and practices that make our community unique. We seek proposals that share stories of mentorship, successful team collaboration, and effective onboarding within Fedora. Collaboration is key to our success, so sessions about our partnerships with other FOSS communities should center on the mutual benefits and the positive impact these relationships have on the Fedora Project.
Features: Engineering Fedora's Core — As a contributor conference, this theme dives deep into the craft of building our distribution and other Fedora outputs. We welcome sessions on improvements to our infrastructure, release engineering processes, quality assurance, packaging, and community tooling. This is the place for technical talks that showcase our engineering excellence and the collaborative work that makes Fedora's deliverables possible, from code to final artifact.
First: Blueprint for the Future: Fedora Linux 45 & 46 — This theme focuses on the near-term innovations that will define the next generation of Linux. With the next few Fedora Linux releases serving as the foundation for RHEL 11 and EPEL 11, this is a critical time. We are looking for forward-looking technical talks on the changes, features, and architectural decisions in F45 and F46 that will shape the future of the operating system, from the community desktop to the core of the enterprise platforms.

Thank you again for helping us refine the direction of the conference!

Thank you to everyone who reviewed and provided feedback on the **Flock to Fedora 2026** Call for Proposals (CfP) themes. The review process is now concluded, having collated input from the **Fedora Council, FESCo, the Mindshare Committee, and the EPEL Steering Committee**. Our goal for the revisions was to balance technical precision with community inclusivity, ensuring that every contributor sees a "home" for their work in these tracks. ## Summary of Changes * **Inclusivity in Engineering**: Based on feedback regarding the "Features" track, we explicitly added **Quality Assurance (QA)** and **Packaging** to the description. It is important that these contributors know their work belongs in our core engineering track. * **EPEL & Deliverables**: We updated the "Features" and "First" tracks to broaden the scope from just "the distribution" to "Fedora deliverables." We also explicitly added **EPEL 11** alongside RHEL 11 as a future foundational topic. * **Theming Strategy**: We received several creative suggestions regarding the titles and narrative voice. Ultimately, we decided to retain the standard "**Four Foundations**" (Freedom, Friends, Features, First) naming convention to maintain a consistent structural narrative for the conference. We focused our revisions on the descriptions to ensure the scope was accurate and welcoming. Here is the final list of themes that will go live with the CfP: * **Freedom: The Open Frontier** — This theme explores how Fedora pushes the boundaries of technological freedom. We invite proposals on FOSS approaches to Artificial Intelligence, the advancement of open hardware like RISC-V, the development of open standards, and the protection of data privacy. Sessions should focus on how our work in the Fedora Project creates a more free and collaborative technological world for everyone. * **Friends: Our Fedora Story** — This theme celebrates the people and practices that make our community unique. We seek proposals that share stories of mentorship, successful team collaboration, and effective onboarding within Fedora. Collaboration is key to our success, so sessions about our partnerships with other FOSS communities should center on the mutual benefits and the positive impact these relationships have on the Fedora Project. * **Features: Engineering Fedora's Core** — As a contributor conference, this theme dives deep into the craft of building our distribution and other Fedora outputs. We welcome sessions on improvements to our infrastructure, release engineering processes, quality assurance, packaging, and community tooling. This is the place for technical talks that showcase our engineering excellence and the collaborative work that makes Fedora's deliverables possible, from code to final artifact. * **First: Blueprint for the Future: Fedora Linux 45 & 46** — This theme focuses on the near-term innovations that will define the next generation of Linux. With the next few Fedora Linux releases serving as the foundation for RHEL 11 and EPEL 11, this is a critical time. We are looking for forward-looking technical talks on the changes, features, and architectural decisions in F45 and F46 that will shape the future of the operating system, from the community desktop to the core of the enterprise platforms. Thank you again for helping us refine the direction of the conference!

jflory7 added the

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2026-07-09 00:22:56 +00:00

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Request for Review of Flock 2026 CFP themes by 2025-11-11 #86

Summary

Background

Details

Outcome

Summary of Changes