Establishing the Joomla! User Group & the Joomla! Awareness and Outreach Seminar in Ahmedabad, India

CloudAccess.net India team members recently participated in forming the Joomla User Group in Ahmedabad, India. Personally, this was like a dream come true because I’ve been thinking about getting our local Joomla users under one roof for a long time now. We were proud to host the first Ahmedabad JUG meeting at our CloudAccess.net India office on July 27th where we planned the Joomla! Awareness and Outreach Seminar that was held on August 2nd at the School of Computer Studies at Ahmedabad University.

Forming the Ahmedabad JUG

I first met Gunjan Patel, a software developer at redweb.dk, and realized that we shared a lot of common goals and enthusiasm about growing the Joomla community in Ahmedabad. We shared our previous JoomlaDay experiences, and we set a date to discuss how we could inject some life into our local community. This led to our the first JUG Meeting at our office where my fellow CloudAccess.net teamsters Larisa Patel, Dhaval Desai and Miraj Ranpura attended along with Gunjan, Mrunal, Akash and Deval.

The JUG meeting was really exciting because everyone who attended had a variety of interests and ideas. After a brief introduction we delegated tasks and deadlines to develop the the Gujarati Translation Pack for Joomla! 3. The major topic of discussion, however, was the Joomla! Awareness and Outreach Seminar.

The Joomla! Awareness and Outreach Seminar

Just a few days after our initial JUG meeting we held the Joomla! Awareness and Outreach Seminar at The School of Computer Studies at Ahmedabad University. The event was overwhelmingly successful. Approximately 50 students, faculty members, and local members of the Joomla community attended the seminar. Very few of the students or faculty members had ever used Joomla, and many of them showed a strong interest in learning more. It was really exciting to introduce so many attendees to Joomla!

Other topics covered in the two hour seminar included the Joomla Community Magazine, the Google Summer of Code, Joomla documentation and translations, Pizza, Bugs & Fun and the certification program.

Looking Forward

The first JUG Meeting and the seminar went so well that we are planning on meeting again in October. And, because there was so much interest from students at the university, we scheduled a follow up 4 day Joomla Workshop to be held in a few weeks. As we move forward, we’ll also finish the Gujarati translation package and continue to discuss ways we can raise Joomla awareness and connect with our local community. We hope to start planning the first JoomlaDay Ahmedabad very soon! Personally, I’d like to thank Gunjan, my colleagues, and all the people who attended both the JUG Meeting and the seminar.