MariaDB Server MiniFest 9 Dec 2020

New MariaDB releases come with regular intervals. Releasing a new version is a balance between new functionality and bugfixes on one side, and stability on the other. How do we get optimum quality for the releases? And what exactly is quality, from the point of view of DBAs and developers that use MariaDB Server?

The purpose of MariaDB Foundation, as defined in the Certificate of Incorporation

That’s the setting of our MariaDB Server MiniFest being held on Wednesday 9 December.

Through a novel format, MariaDB Server Fests strive to outshine physical conferences on interactivity and discussions. We create more interactions with the presenter, with other experts, and with participants, than at face-to-face conferences.


The special sauce

The special sauce for this MiniFest is

  1. Internal presenters explain the logic of release policies
  2. External presenters give the candid user perspective
  3. The desired outcome: improved processes and quality

Format and schedule

The MiniFest will take place during the afternoon from 14.00 CET (UTC +1) – that’s 8am in New York, and 21:00 in Beijing and Singapore – and will be live-streamed on the MariaDB Foundation YouTube channel as well as on BiliBili.

See the detailed schedule.

The internal (provider) presentations have a 10+10 minute format. The first ten minutes is a “slide deck” type overview presentation by an expert, such as Sergei Golubchik (board member of MariaDB Foundation, in charge of security and code quality of MariaDB Server) and Daniel Bartholomew (release manager). The second ten minutes is a Q&A session, a discussion between the original presenter and other subject matter experts.

The external (user) presentations, also 20 minutes in total, provide a similar overview-plus-Q&A format. How is DBS Bank looking at the release model? To which versions does the user upgrade production applications? How does Microsoft think we should strike the balance between getting new functionality, getting bug fixes, and avoiding regression bugs?

The conference is concluded by a moderated panel with all presenters, asking the difficult questions from a user perspective.

How to attend

It is free to attend, but you can optionally register here: https://mariadb.org/minifest2020-registration/