List of free-software events

Bruce Perens is an American computer programmer and advocate in the free software movement. He created The Open Source Definition and published the first formal announcement and manifesto of open source. He co-founded the Open Source Initiative (OSI) with Eric S. Raymond.

KDE is an international free software community that develops free and open-source software. As a central development hub, it provides tools and resources that enable collaborative work on its projects. Its products include the Plasma Desktop, KDE Frameworks, and a range of applications such as Kate, digiKam, and Krita. Some KDE applications are cross-platform and can run on Unix and Unix-like operating systems, Microsoft Windows, and Android.

Bdale Garbee is an American computer specialist who works with Linux, particularly Debian. He is also an amateur radio hobbyist (KB0G), and a member of AMSAT, Tucson Amateur Packet Radio, and the American Radio Relay League. As of 2023 he is the President of Amateur Radio Digital Communications.

LinuxTag was an annual Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) conference and exposition with an emphasis on Linux but also BSD descendants located in Germany. The name is a compound with the German Tag meaning "Day", as it was initially a single day conference, but soon extended to multiple days, then always including a weekend. LinuxTag was the world's largest FLOSS conference and exhibition for years and aimed to provide a comprehensive overview of the Linux and Free Software market as well to promote contacts between users and developers. With this broad approach LinuxTag was one of the most important events of this kind.

GUADEC, formerly the GNOME Users And Developers European Conference, is an annual developer conference whose prime topic is the development of the GNOME desktop environment and its underlying base software such as GTK, GStreamer, etc.

Free and Open source Software Developers' European Meeting (FOSDEM) is a non-commercial, volunteer-organized European event centered on free and open-source software development. It is aimed at developers and anyone interested in the free and open-source software movement. It aims to enable developers to meet and to promote the awareness and use of free and open-source software.

Software Freedom Day (SFD) is an annual worldwide celebration of Free Software organized by the Digital Freedom Foundation (DFF). SFD is a public education effort with the aim of increasing awareness of Free Software and its virtues, and encouraging its use.

linux.conf.au is Australasia's regional Linux and open source conference. It is a roaming conference, held in a different Australian or New Zealand city every year, coordinated by Linux Australia and organised by local volunteers.

FOSS.IN, previously known as Linux Bangalore, was an annual free and open source software (FOSS) conference, held in Bangalore, India from 2001 to 2012. From 2001 to 2004, it was known as Linux Bangalore, before it took on a new name and wider focus. During its lifetime, it was one of the largest FOSS events in Asia, with participants from around the world. It focused on the technical and software side of FOSS, encouraging development and contribution to FOSS projects from India. The event was held every year in late November or early December.

Akademy is an annual contributors and users conference of the KDE community. Akademy is held at varying venues in Europe.

The history of free and open-source software begins at the advent of computer software in the early half of the 20th century. In the 1950s and 1960s, computer operating software and compilers were delivered as a part of hardware purchases without separate fees. At the time, source code—the human-readable form of software—was generally distributed with the software, providing the ability to fix bugs or add new functions. Universities were early adopters of computing technology. Many of the modifications developed by universities were openly shared, in keeping with the academic principles of sharing knowledge, and organizations sprung up to facilitate sharing.

Stormy Peters is an information technology industry analyst and prominent free and open source software (FOSS) advocate, promoting business use of FOSS. She advocates as a consultant and conference speaker. She co-founded, and was later appointed as executive director of the GNOME Foundation. She previously worked for Mozilla Corporation, Cloud Foundry, and Red Hat. In August 2019 she joined Microsoft.

The Libre Graphics Meeting (LGM) is an annual international convention for the discussion of free and open source software used with graphics; The first Libre Graphics Meeting was held in March 2006. Communities from Inkscape, GIMP, Krita, Scribus, sK1, Blender, Open Clip Art Library, Open Font Library, and more come together through the Create Project to assemble this annual conference. It was co-founded by Dave Neary and Dave Odin.