On which Drupal Camp to go?
As mentioned in our interview with Janez Urevc there are too many Drupal events, which are internationally oriented. DrupalCons grow each year and so does Drupal Camps. It's hard for organizers to attract visitors, because Drupalistas can't travel every weekend. Knowledge of where to expand your Drupal skills is, therefore, a key thing. In the past few weeks, we have written many blog posts about Drupal Camps for you. Now, we give you an overview of the findings in our Drupal Camp world tour, so that your decisions which Drupal Camps to visit will be easier.
After reading about and listening to many sessions, workshops, sprint days ... worldwide, we've got the idea to present Drupal Camps according to the continent, where they take place. Some Drupal Camps were left out on purpose, some were cancelled, some were not on the map for a long time and some were accidentally forgotten. With the help of some Drupalistas – again thank you very much – we were able to cruise from one continent to the other and conclude our list with all the reliable information.
Early beginnings
Our world tour started in Africa, where the situation about Drupal is strongly connected with a general situation in Africa. Not many Drupal camps took place this year. Still, the most were in the most developed country South Africa. Interesting fact was that Drupal Camp Johannesburg changed its name to Drupal Camp Gauteng to better represent the geographic area that it represented. Besides Drupal, visitors were able to learn more about PHP on DrupalCamp Nigeria.
We continued with Drupal Camps in Asia, where the situation is much more improved than in Africa. At the beginning of the year the whole attention was on DrupalCon Asia in Mumbai, so it wasn't until March this year that Drupal Camps came to life. The biggest Drupal Camp is Drupal Camp Delhi, which is also one of the most known Drupal Camps worldwide. It attracts Drupalistas from all over the world, despite major problems about pollution in the city.
At the peak of Drupal Camps
Our third choice was North America. More than 20 Drupal Camps took place there this year. They were lasting one day, two days and even more than two or three days. To be fair, every camp is worth mentioning, but due to the fact that there were too many to be analysed, we will point out Drupal Camp LA, which took place for the tenth consecutive year and Twin Drupal Camp, which exclusively focused on bringing together Drupal users from Universities and colleges worldwide.
Direct competitor to North America was Europe, where we also discovered more than 20 Drupal Camps. In fact, we counted the most Drupal Camps and there were spread across the continent in the most useful way, covering practically every part of the continent. Since some Camps fail to take place every year on every continent, we concluded that the first spot for Europe is not always the case. Nevertheless, our CEO Iztok Smolic had a session on Drupal Camp Munich under the name of Drupal Commerce in Drupal 8. Other European Drupal Camps worth mentioning are of course Drupalaton, DrupalCamp Baltics, Drupal Mountain Camp and DrupalIron Camp.
From disappointment to surprise
The biggest shock was that we found only one Drupal Camp, which was organized on South American soil, although past years were not so black. Brazil even organized Olympic Games this year, which in theory should have turned world's attention in South America and sponsors for organizing Drupal Camps should have been more easily obtained. Since we did not know the whole context of that bad year, we concluded that Drupal Camps Campinas was enough to secure the last place for South America on our world tour ranking table.
After such disappointment, our tour needed a lift. It got it first with Middle America, which organized two Drupal Camps this year. One in Guadalajara and another in San Jose. Latter is one of the biggest Drupal Camps with 36 sessions lasting two days and one whole day reserved for workshops. There, Drupal is also part of the bigger projects. Namely, it will next year take part in promoting software knowledge on DevConf.
The biggest surprise was, however, Oceania. It’s true that this year Drupal Camps were all organized in Australia, but there were three and very well organized. By looking into the past we also found out that they offer a stability, because from 2008 on there was at least one Drupal Camp each year and from 2014 there were at least three of them each year. Oceania was also the last continent in our world tour, so it was time for the final results, which you can see beyond.
Final Drupal Camp world tour ranking table
Measuring the quantity of Drupal Camps, we formatted a table for the end, ranging from the one with the most to the one with the least Drupal Camps:
1) Europe
2) North America
3) Asia
4) Africa
5) Oceania
6) Middle America
7) South America
We hope that with all our blogs about Drupal Camps and that overview, your decisions about where to expand your Drupal knowledge will be easier. It’s true that Europeans and Americans will easily satisfy their needs, but other continents also don't neglect the purpose of expanding Drupal knowledge among web developers, students etc. We have one blog post left for you this year. The rest are coming in 2017.
