Why it’s beneficial to attend MySQL conferences

Peter Zaitsev speaks at the Percona Live MySQL Conference and Expo in Santa Clara, Calif. in April 2013.

In the MySQL ecosystem, there is some sort of conference or another all year long. But why are they important?

To answer this, we can split the audience into 3 groups:

– MySQL Professionnals
– MySQL Community Members
– MySQL (Future?) Users

Depending on which category you are in, you can have different expectations about conferences.

For MySQL Professionals, it’s the best opportunity to meet partners, customers and also other business players in real life – and this is a very important point. As most of our contact with customers is virtual, meeting people and discussing things with them in person is very beneficial for future collaboration. This is also the best moment to share ideas, and most of the time it’s after a conference that the implementation of new functionalities are started. Here at Percona, we work all around the globe, so conferences are also the best places to meet colleagues again!

For MySQL Community members, it’s also a way to recharge the “enthusiasm batteries.” After a conference I personally feel so boosted and happy to have chosen to be part of this Community. It’s also a potential way to be discovered by professionals and maybe land a new career opportunity. You can also share the tools and technologies you are using and see what your peers think about them, and perhaps learn new things that way.

For MySQL Users or future users, conferences are the best places to meet the people you work with or even those whose blog posts or articles you read regularly. It’s also the ideal moment to ask as many questions as you want to professionals and compare their ideas. Outside of conferences you will never find it as easy to have so many MySQL companies ready to help you. In addition, you will also listen to people sharing their issues and see how they resolved them – perhaps you’ve also encountered the same difficulties and could offer advice, or get advice.

And finally, conferences offer a chance to discover the latest innovations in MySQL’s world.

Oh, and one more thing: Conferences are also the best time to get out of the office and drink some beers with other DBAs.

In Europe, the current 2 biggest MySQL-related events I personally take part in are Percona Live London and FOSDEM.

Percona Live London 2013 is November 11-12 and you can already register now (until August 4th) and benefit of the Super-Saver Registration!

See you in London, UK!