Ten years ago, on February 21st, there was the first “BonnXP” meetup in a pub in the old town of Bonn. I still remember the first meetups, in which we were just sitting around a table, presenting some slides and discussing agile topics. Since then, a lot has changed, especially in 2020.
In an agile way, we always tried out different things to see if those would help us to improve and keep the group fresh. For me this was and still is one of the core agile principles: always reflect back on what is working, what can be improved, and change something. Afterward, iterate and measure.
We had numerous meetings, which we did monthly or bi-monthly since then. We changed the name from “BonnXP” to “Bonn Agile” at some point to not only cover eXtreme Programming but all agile formats. We did bar meetups, regular meetups with talks and socialising moments, fishbowl, and so on. Always trying to keep the format fresh and improving in an agile way.
A few years ago, we combined the Bonn Agile meetup together with the Scrumtisch Bonn as both groups have a similar topic. As the core group has been there for a long time we then kind of switched a bit to a mixture between agile topics and anything on software development that doesn’t necessarily fit a special meetup or where a wide audience makes sense.
After starting on Xing groups (~400 members) we switched to Meetup a while ago and are now one of the proud local developer groups here in Bonn, with over 1000 members and a lot of companies supporting it.
In this first decade, I personally have gained many friends and experiences organising meetups. Viaboxx has always been part of Bonn Agile, with some current or past colleagues participating as well since the beginning. I fondly remember the annual “Summermeetup BBQ @ Viaboxx“, with nice barbecues and discussions having not only Bonn Agile members but the whole Viaboxx development team, where we could feel the passion for software.
In 2020 there haven’t been a lot of Bonn Agile meetups taking place. There was one remote meetup, but it doesn’t feel like the ones in the past.
I hope that the situation will change in the near future so that we can soon have back the Bonn Agile meetups, as I’m missing the friends and the discussions. Nevertheless, whatever the future brings, Viaboxx will always support local developer groups and is looking forward to many more Bonn Agile meetups.
