La Vie En KubeCon Paris

KubeCon EU 2024 concluded last week and this is a time for reflection.

This was the 20th KubeCon on the 10th anniversary of Kubernetes. With 12K+ developers, this was the largest KubeCon ever and the largest open source developer event around the world too. It only shows how cloud native computing is becoming more ubiquitous.

I had a few engagements at KubeCon this year.

This year was the first-ever hackathon in partnership with the United Nations. It was targeted to further the delivery of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. 22 participants from 8 countries hacked solutions that covered 10 out of 17 goals. You can read about the winners and their projects here. A video of winners announcement on Friday keynote can be watched here. The list of projects was very humbling and it was amazing how much 20+ hours of hacking could make a difference. We plan to expand this effort to future KubeCon, stay tuned.

A special thanks to Carlos Eduardo Arango Gutierrez Erin A Boyd Kelsey Hightower Rajas Kakodkar Omar Mohsine and Alena Prokharchyk for being the judges. The program committee defined the structure and content. Thanks to Amanda K Moran Ashley Willis Bear Douglas Cailyn Edwards Emily Fox Ezequiel Lanza Karen Bajza-Terlouw Lize Raes Malini Bhandaru Mel Cone Mithusha K Omar Mohsine Paul Albee Uma from Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Yuwen Wu. The Linux Foundation events staff was wonderful and very supportive. Thanks to Vanessa Heric Janelle Caudill Katie Greenley for ensuring a smooth execution of the event.

It was really great to hear from Amandeep Gill, the Secretary General's Technology Envoy, to congratulate on the inaugural hackathon and the winners.

Ezequiel Lanza and I gave a talk on Deploying LLMs in CloudNative using LangChain. This talk explained a five-step process to pick between local vs external model, how to package it as a container and deploy it on k8s, and how to create an LLM proxy/gateway that helps you pick different models based on your business needs. Several developers were asking questions about what it takes to create such a proxy. You can find the code for our demo here. Katanemo is one such company that is building a product on those lines (disclaimer: I'm an advisor for them). You can watch the recording of our talk here.

I moderated a panel on Achieving Technical Leadership at CNCF. This panel was very special, particularly during Women's History Month, with all women speakers. Thanks to Emily Fox Nancy Chauhan Lin Sun and Nikhita Raghunath . They shared their individual journey and talked about the characteristics and qualities of cloud native technologists that prime them to be technical leaders. We talked about the role of strategic and non-code work in gaining technical leadership. They provided tips on how to strike a balance between open source world and day job and educate management on the value of technical leadership particularly when it may not be directly contributing to the company's bottom line.

I was invited to participate in a panel on AI and Cloud Native with media and analysts. This panel was moderated by Constance Caramanolis. I was lucky to have participated with XUDONG REN Annie Talvasto Sudha Raghavan and Lachlan Evenson. There were some inciting questions as you'd expect from this audience. You can watch the recording here.

CNCF holds a high bar for transparency, diversity, and inclusion. The Governing Board Townhall is part of that effort to allow attendees to ask any question about how the GB thinks and operates. As the GB chair, I got to moderate the panel and had a great time with Christoph Blecker Jeremy Garcia Stephen Chin Alena Prokharchyk Anne B. Lachlan Evenson, and Emily Fox. The recording of the session is available here.

There was the usual Governing Board meeting and strategy session. We talk about the business, there are joint sessions with the Technical Oversight Committee and the newly-formed End User Technical Advisory Board. Congratulations to Alolita Sharma for being elected as chair of that board.

The venue for the meeting was quite stunning as you could see pretty views of Eiffel Tower once the curtains were raised for the evening reception. The next photo has Priyanka Sharma (General Manager of CNCF) and Melissa Smolensky (VP, Marketing, CNCF). They are my strong allies within CNCF and they get it on what it takes to make cloud computing ubiquitous. We'll continue to work to bridge the gap between AI and Cloud Native.

I also walked around the Exhibition Floor a bit. There was a flurry of developers everywhere. Customers were flocking to Intel Corporation booth to learn about our open source offerings. They were also stoked to learn about Intel Granulate cnvrg.io and Intel Developer Cloud.

The weekend after KubeCon was the Kids Day. This effort is to spark an interest in the kids about technology using fun workshops. There were ~40 kids and we delivered four workshops for them. This year we had a brand new workshop on Learning AI with Phippy by Cassandra Chin, Minecraft Modding by Aditya Gupta, Phippy and Friends Raspberry Pi by Melissa McKay, and Music Through Code by Mihir. I was particularly proud that both my sons delivered the workshops here and enjoyed it!

On a personal front, I enjoyed the "hallway track" and bumping into friends and developers. I was able to get a few runs to Eiffel Tower as well and managed to get a workout by the Eiffel Tower. You can catch that in action in a instagram reel.

Both of my kids joined to deliver the Kids Day workshops so it was a treat to spend some time with them walking around the city. A dinner at Madam Brasserie restaurant on the Eiffel Tower first floor was a highlight. Other than that, we enjoyed croissants, macaroons, ratatouille, onion soup, hot chocolate, creme brulee, bread, and much more.

Thank you to JFrog for including me in Frogs & Friends. A ride on a yacht by the Seine was certainly quite scenic and allowed to get quality time with some friends. You can experience that vicariously in this instagram reel.

KubeCon Paris is over but there is a healthy pipeline of events lined up. First, there is the 10th birthday bash of Kubernetes coming up. Then there is KubeCon + CloudNativeCon in Hongkong in Aug 2024, Salt Lake City in Nov 2024, India in Dec 2024, and London inApril 2025. Beyond that, there will be Atlanta in 2025 and back to Amsterdam in 2026.

Lets keep making cloud computing more ubiquitous.