The History of LinuxTag

The idea of LinuxTag dates back to 1995. In the early 1990s, an independent student initiative at the University of Kaiserslautern, the Unix study group, worked to gather expertise in modern and innovative networked systems. Linux was in use there as early as 1992. Michael Kleinhenz and Nils Magnus, members of the study group, felt that Linux needed to be introduced to a broader public. To that end, they began planning an informational event on the university campus.

On January 20, 1996, the day had dawned: with the energetic help of many volunteers, the first LinuxTag opened in the foyer of the Auditorium Maximum, Building 42 at the University of Kaiserslautern. The event, with a program of six lectures, welcomed seventy visitors.

Encouraged by the success of the premiere event, the Unix study group held the second LinuxTag one year later, on January 15, 1997. The number of visitors doubled, in spite of a severe freezing rain that brought public transport in Kaiserslautern to a near standstill. The event was dampened, but not the team's spirits: they decided to hold another LinuxTag in the same year. Since then, LinuxTag has been held in summer.

The second 1997 LinuxTag was held once again in the foyer of the Audi Max, and drew several hundred visitors. In addition to the lectures, which by then were organized in two tracks, the summer event added tutorials to get to the meat of the subject matter. Another important new feature in 1997 has changed the character of LinuxTag ever since: up to then, the presentations had taken the form of lectures, but in the summer of '97, several projects demonstrated the results of their work live.

In 1998, the organizers' exhibits were joined by the first external projects to present their solutions at LinuxTag. One of the first such free software projects to support the event was the KDE project. LinuxTag's growth in 1998 was also marked by a four-digit visitor count: about 3,000 people made their way to Kaiserslautern for the event.

By the fifth LinuxTag, held in June, 1999, the event was booming: the auditorium foyer was no longer big enough to house all 55 exhibitors, and the university's cafeteria was cleared for the convention. That year at LinuxTag, Hewlett Packard demonstrated a simulator for the first 64-bit versions of Linux. The number of exhibitors had grown again significantly, and the number of visitors—over 7,000—doubled the university's population.

This began to make the administration of the University of Kaiserslautern uncomfortable, and LinuxTag had to look around for a more suitable venue. At this time the non-profit LinuxTag association was founded, and held its first extramural fair in the Stuttgart Convention Center. 2000 was a boom year, and LinuxTag was stormed. What with the crowds of visitors and the early July weather, LinuxTag 2000 is remembered by many as the "open source sauna." By this time LinuxTag had become a four-day event. LinuxTag was now a regular date for international visitors. Presentations by Slashdot founder Cmdr. Taco and by Illiad, the creator of User Friendly, were warmly received. The keynote address by free-software visionary Richard M. Stallman was attended by nearly 2,000 visitors.

Early tremors of the impending crash were not noticeable at LinuxTag 2001. The fair once again set new records for exhibit area, and admissions easily cleared the 10,000 mark. The keynote talk in 2001 was given by Eric S. Raymond, who championed the term "open source software" and the "Open Source Initiative" that rallied behind it.

LinuxTag moved house once again in 2002: the Karlsruhe Convention Center offered an ideal combination of auditoriums, exhibition halls and conference rooms at a reasonable price. For the next four years, Karlsruhe was home to LinuxTag. The event's conference program had grown to over 60 lectures, seminars and tutorials. The 2002 keynote address was given by Matthias "Kalle" Dalheimer.

2003 19,500 visitors, 130 exhibitors. Keynote speaker: Jon "Maddog" Hall.

2004 June 23 -26, 2004; 16,175 visitors, 150 exhibitors. Keynote speaker: Ian Murdock, founder of the Debian Project.

2005 June 22 -25, 2005; 12,000 visitors, over 160 exhibitors. Keynote speaker: Jimmy Wales, Wikimedia Foundation.

2006 May 3 - 6, 2006: LinuxTag was held earlier this year to avoid any conflicts with the football World Cup, which was held in Germany in the summer. 9,000 visitors came to the Rhein-Main-Hallen in Wiesbaden to see 150 exhibits and hear keynote talks by kernel maintainer Andrew Morton and Ubuntu founder Mark Shuttleworth.

 

Previous LinuxTag Events

Date City Number of presentations Number of exhibitors Number of visitors Keynote speaker
1/20/1996 Kaiserslautern 5 (no exhibition) 70 "What the heck is a 'keynote speaker'?"
1/18/1997 Kaiserslautern 8 (no exhibition) 150  
6/14-6/15/1997 Kaiserslautern 12 incl. tutorials First free-software projects (such as KDE) 470 Tom Schwaller, Editor-in-Chief, Linux-Magazin
6/27-6/28/1998 Kaiserslautern 22 15 stands, including the first outside exhibitors 3,000  
6/26-27/1999 Kaiserslautern over 50 about 55 7,000 Prof. Müller, University of Kaiserslautern
6/29-7/2/2000 Stuttgart     15,000 Richard M. Stallman, Free Software Foundation
7/5-7/8/2001 Stuttgart     15,000 Eric S. Raymond, Open Source Initiative
6/6-6/9/2002 Karlsruhe over 80 over 100 13,000 Matthias "Kalle" Dalheimer, KDE Team
6/10-6/13/2003 Karlsruhe over 100 over 130 19,500 Jon "Maddog" Hall, Linux International
6/23-6/26/2004 Karlsruhe over 100 over 150 16,175 Ian Murdock, Debian Project founder
6/22-6/25/2005 Karlsruhe over 120 over 180 12,000 Jimmy Wales, Wikimedia Foundation
5/3-5/6/2006 Wiesbaden over 120 ca. 150 9,000 Andrew Morton, kernel maintainer, and Mark Shuttleworth, Ubuntu
5/30-6/2/2007 Berlin over 120 about 150 expected 10,000 expected  

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