The 2019 edition of AtlasCamp, the annual conference for developers organized by Atlassian, took place in Vienna September 11 and 12, and Clément Garin and Dusan Spaic, part of the Elements developer team, were able to attend. This was the first time Clément and Dusan have attended AtlasCamp, and they came back with lots of news to share. So what were their top take-aways from the conference? Diversity, bug bounty, and cloud cloud cloud.
A diverse and open conference
Clément: The focus of the conference is obviously software development, but it’s not just for developers. There are a lot of diverse topics beyond just programming, like how to balance a team, how to leverage multi-culturalism, and how to think about the user experience. I was really impressed by the presentation by the Atlassian intern Huw Evans on using Sketch to create screen mock-ups and designs, especially with the use of a neural network AI to generate realistic users.
Dusan: The AtlasCamp attendees were diverse, with consultants, scrum masters, product owners, and other people in the ecosystem beyond just programmers, which was really enriching. Plus it’s so important to talk with people from different companies and countries and hear about their processes and their problems. You feel less alone with your difficulties when you realize you’re not the only one facing them.
Bug bounty program
Dusan: Atlassian has started a Bug Bounty program where you can submit bugs you find in Atlassian products. The beta program was run with 4-5 vendors, but they’re opening it up to everyone.
Clément: K15t was one of the first companies to find a bug and receive a bounty of $5,000, which they gave to charity.
Cloud
Dusan: Cloud is clearly the future for the Atlassian environment, and I think the tools that are coming to help companies prepare for a migration to cloud will be really useful. For example, the page they shared during Opening Keynote session showed how companies will be able to evaluate how their apps are currently used (so whether or not they are fundamental to their instance), but also to see if the app is currently or will soon be Cloud compatible. We are working on a cloud version of our app Elements Connect, and the opportunity to provide users information “We’re working on it” is more helpful than just “Yes” or “No”.
Clément: I was at the session “Supercharge Your Pages – New Ways to Extend the Confluence Editor” given by Klaus Ihlberg, Senior Development Team Lead at Atlassian, and the new features released in Confluence Cloud were mentioned. Since I work on a Confluence app offered on both Server and Cloud, I asked if those features will be offered on Server in the future too, but the answer was no. They gave some statistics that cloud apps have grown 60% in 2019. We still have a lot of users on server and data center, but if the new features are all on Cloud, that’s probably going to change. There also were some announcements on how developers will be able to work on Cloud apps in the future, which should be really interesting.
Dusan: The framework will much more scalable, and means we will be able to focus on the customer experience. It will be easier and faster to develop apps that work on Cloud. Programming for the cloud is a big priority for us right now, so we’re eager see what Atlassian will announce in the coming months.
Vienna
Dusan: Vienna was a really good location for a lot of people in Europe since they could drive their (although not a choice for us coming from France). The conference app Atlassian developed for their events was really useful too for all the practical information like scheduling, but also to exchange contact information. I was chatting with someone from Atlassian and he couldn’t answer all my questions on the spot, but he was able to reply through the app a few minutes later when he had the answer.
Clément: The convention center was really nice and modern, and right by the Danube. With the happy hour networking events at the end of the day, it was a great time to chat with people, and it seemed like the waiters had a magic never-ending supply of beer!
Key take-aways from AtlasCamp
Clément: Cloud, cloud, cloud! Everything was really focused on how to help clients migrate to cloud, how to help developers build for the cloud.
Dusan: Connecting with people, whether they be Marketplace vendors or Atlassian staff, is important for the community, and I look forward to meeting them again at a future event. The Forge framework should be really helpful for our team too.
If you’d like to meet the Elements team, we’ll be at two upcoming Valiantys Enterprise Days: meet us in Paris or in Bern.