ClojuTRE 2019 — a (very) brief recap

Löyly Helsinki — Modern seaside Finnish sauna with a large deck for sweeping views, walking distance from the conference venue, Telakka.

This was my first time at ClojuTRE, a Clojure conference in Helsinki, Finland.

After going through the GR Clojure University — a program to take programmers from diverse language backgrounds and ramp them up to being productive Clojure developers at Guaranteed Rate, I’ve been searching for a beginner-friendly Clojure conference where I could absorb Clojure’s philosophies and motivation from conference talks while networking with the Clojure community.

ClojuTRE was listed on the official Clojure events page, and since it was both financially & geographically accessible (I was already in Europe), I decided to check it out.

There was an immediate positive vibe about it because the organizers are paving the way to be more inclusive and offer free student and “diversity tickets” to individuals from underrepresented groups.

Sister Mary Kenneth Keller — the face of ClojuTRE 2019

Each year, the ClojuTRE organizers highlight one of the pioneers of computer science at the ClojuTRE conference.

ClojuTRE 2019 gave kudos to Sister Mary Kenneth Keller, who had a part in implementing the BASIC programming language at Dartmouth College, and was the first woman to earn a Ph.D. degree in computer science. (Wikipedia)

Keller was a passionate advocate for the involvement of women in computing. She believed that everyone, not just computer scientists, should have access to computing. She also thought that computers could assist in learning and make us smarter.

The conference had a single track, a late start (12:30 pm), short talks (20 mins each), great food & snacks and “immutable” after-parties for networking.

• On Day1, there were talks on both Functional Programming and general Clojure topics.
• On Day 2, the focus was mostly on Clojure.

My original plan was to write a detailed recap of everything I saw, heard and did at ClojuTRE, but that would have been a rather long (and boring) read, so instead, I’ll be sharing my thoughts on the conference and key takeaways in an additional post…

And while I’m organizing my notes and reflecting on my experience, you can keep yourself busy by trying to bake these perfect Finnish Cinnamon Rolls and eat them while watching the ClojuTRE 2019 talks on YouTube.

Stay tuned, more conference info (and recipes) coming soon!

Edit: you can read more about the conference HERE.