The WordCamp Kampala was so energetic during the two day event bringing together the most self taught wordpress enthusiasts, tech lovers, influencers, bloggers and wordpress users in kampala all in one place at outbox.
This was the first WordCamp of its kind in Kampala and we were enlightened on the various opportunities online. WordCamps are locally-organised conference kind of setting covering most if not everything related to WordPress which is a free and open source personal publishing software that powers over 29% sites on the web.
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Kampala itself has over 5000 active blogs according to @WordCampKampala organizers and we were happy to have the opportunity of life-changing training sessions from the various speakers that attended the camp.
WordCamps come in all different flavors, based on the local communities that produce them, but in general, WordCamps include sessions on how to use WordPress more effectively, beginning plugin and theme development, advanced techniques, security, among others.
Actually, an awarding winning travel blogger @CharlieBeau mentioned in a tweet that she was looking forward to getting knowledge on how to transform her blog, Diary of a Muzungu.
Not only that, WordCamp Kampala brought together students from various university ie, IUIU, MUK and Kyambogo to mention just a few with a motive of getting to know on how best they can utilize wordpress. See mini gallery bellow.
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The big news is that, in some way, WordCamp Kampala got on the top. We trended on twitter in first position for 3 hours on the last day beating #KamapalaTraffic which had trended for a couple of days. It was excitement and fan with memes spreading on social media about the take over.
One of the most interesting session was the foodie moment. The organizers led by Frank (@pearlmediaweb3) brought together the best dishes for the delegates. Here is the moment I was caught on camera by @WordCamp kampala.
Nonetheless, we got so many thoughtful and inspiring stories from many WordPress users mostly the speakers that offered themselves to share their knowledge and tips.
Special Volunteer Speakers
Ayebare Mucunguzi Brooks
With over 6yrs experience working with WordPress and has contributed several plugins to the WP repository.
Nekesa Patience
Founder of Design for Women foundation Africa which focuses on the use of STEAM to train and develop solutions that help women in Africa and across the world to deal with social, political, health, economical and other problems that affect women.
Christo Innocent
6 years WordPress User and has worked on over 150 Projects. He founded DoxaLight Inc. an I.T. firm
Peter Kakoma
Has been building with WordPress for over a decade and has contributed themes to the WordPress repo. Worked MTN Uganda, Lead at Kanzu Code and senior consultant at Andela Uganda
Mwesigye Moses
He is web developer with intent of introducing a variety of people to the world wide web
Julius Masaba
He has worked with Inachee, a research & business advisory firm, as Associate-Research and Business Associate for a period spanning 4 years. He is also well versed with business & investment research
Laurence Bahiirwa
He is a WordPress Theme and Plugin developer and Seasonal blogger
David M. Wampamba
Developer at gagawala, volunteer trainer at You Inspire You and web tutor at Hostalite Cyber Academy.
Franklin Nsubuga
WordPress enthusiast and CEO Agrimartt Uganda which is fully powered by WordPress
Arthur Kasirye
He a passionate web developer, Search Engine expert and online marketer at Kasiryelabs with over 5 years of hands-on experience efficiently coding websites and applications using modern HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, and WordPress.
Mukalele Rogers
He is an information technologies specialist with great experience and skills in ICT training, programming, systems administration, networking, web systems development and web hosting. He is a trainer/mentor at ITPlus Solutions Limited.
The most interesting session for the delegates was during the presentation from Mukalele Rogers (@mrogers4christ ) on the topic turning to https where he show cased some of the tips to secure your sites. He shared these tips doing it live step by step with provision of some online tools.
Apart from @CharlieBeau sharing her long term experience while blogging at Diary of a Muzungu, @IpNekesa a self-employed website and user interface developer also shared her knowledge on the topic why website consultancy is important whereas David Wampamba a self taught web developer shared on the topic developing WordPress plugins where he showcased a live demo on how to code and publish a wordpress plugin. David Works with Gagawala graphics and blogs @idesignwebs
In conclusion, the event was a success with closing remarks from Prof. Dr. Wolfgang H Thome (@whthome) of ATC News sharing with the delegates about his blogging experience thoughout his tour, travel, aviation and publishing career in the last 42years.
A speaker’s panel attended to questions from the delegates with reaction to what was discussed.
NOTE: Kampala is now among the 69 cities to have hosted the WordCamp in after being hosted by our neighbor city Nairobi. Thanks to the WordCamp Kampala, sponsors and contributors, WPML.org, Jetpack, woo commerce, Godadday Pro, Blue host and Outbox hub. Feel free to let me know incase you don’t want your photo to apear to in this blog. I will be happy to put it down.
Please don’t forget that is blog is sitted on the @WordPress free open cms.
Share with me your thoughts in the comment box below. See you there.
