2025 Koha Hackfest in Marseille Wrap-Up

by Elise Aiello on Apr 17, 2025

Several developers from the ByWater Solutions team were able to attend the 2025 Koha Hackfest in Marseille! Koha Hackfest is THE unmissable event for all those who wish to get involved in the development of Koha, the open source library management solution. Developers, librarians, contributors and enthusiasts come together to collaborate, code, share and develop this unique software together. Read on to learn about their experiences and takeaways.

Jesse Maseto

The Hackfest is one of my favorite weeks of the year, and I feel very fortunate to have attended this year. As the Release Maintainer for Koha 22.11, it was especially rewarding to collaborate with other community members and learn more about their workflows. I picked up valuable insights into Release Maintenance that will definitely help with future releases. There’s something truly special about Hackfest—being face to face with other Koha Community members in the same room makes it easier to connect, share ideas, and get things done. It’s hard to put into words, but the energy and productivity are unmatched.

While we had plenty of work to do, including talks and presentations, my favorite part of Hackfest was hanging out with my coworkers. We did a lot of sightseeing together in Paris. Since we didn’t have much time before catching our train to Marseille, we hopped on the ‘Hop On, Hop Off’ bus tour to make the most of it. We saw the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, several museums, and so much more on our adventures. I’m incredibly grateful for the time we got to spend together—and I already can’t wait for next year"

Lisette Scheer

This was my first Hackfest and it was such a great experience. Getting to see my coworkers and community members in person was definitely the highlight. It's definitely nice to have a lot of folks in the same time zone and getting to discuss some of the big features we've been working on and ways to improve Koha going forward. We had a little time in Paris before going to Marseilles and did a "hop on, hop off" tour that let us see a lot of the sights in a short period. In Marseilles we also did some sightseeing, including on their "Petite tourist train" which was a blast. In the evenings we spent time with community members discussing everything from Koha to history to games. One evening we played pool for a few hours. It was great building those connections and putting together faces with names I see frequently on Bugzilla and Mattermost.In addition to the social times, during Hackfests there were working groups, talks, and presentations. During a working group, Andrew from Open Fifth wrote his first patch and we were able to get it signed-off and QA'd all during hackfest!

A few of my highlights from the talks during hackfest include upcoming improvements to the core Interlibary loan system, setting up Koha to handle lending interlibrary loans in core, a theme builder for the staff interface, and changes to the record display system to make customization easier and more maintainable. A lot of the discussion centered around making Koha more user friendly and stable. For all of these topics, we have the steps laid out to get started and folks assigned to work on the first steps. It was an energizing experience and I can't wait to see what we can accomplish for the future of Koha."

Laura Escamilla

This year, I had the amazing opportunity to attend Hackfest for the very first time—and honestly, I’m still processing how incredible it all was. Being part of the Koha community has always been exciting, but getting to finally meet the people behind the usernames and IRC handles I’ve talked to online was something else entirely. It was so valuable to put faces to names, learn everyone’s personalities, and build deeper connections with folks I’ve only known through the screen. Even as a new developer, I felt welcomed and included. Throughout the week, we tackled bugs, pushed tests, and had some fantastic conversations about the future of Koha. The energy in the room was contagious, and it was clear just how passionate and collaborative this community is.

Seeing Koha users and developers from all over the world come together with one shared goal was incredibly inspiring. One of the highlights for me was getting to meet the lead developer of Koha’s first release in person—it was surreal to chat face-to-face with someone whose work I’ve admired from afar, and hearing their insights up close made me even more excited to be part of this open-source project.Outside of the code, Hackfest was just plain fun. Whether it was sharing meals, late-night chats, or joining the Pokémon Go group and exploring Paris and Marseille, I felt like I was part of something special. Getting to sightsee and spend time with my coworkers outside of work was incredible and lots of fun! All in all, my first Hackfest was everything I could’ve hoped for and more. I’m so grateful for every moment and every person I met—here’s to more adventures, more coding, and hopefully many more Hackfests in the future!"

Tomas Cohen Arazi

I don't remember exactly how many Hackfests I attended. But every time I'm part of it, I remember why I joined this open source community in the first place. Maybe because I spend most of my day hours -virtually- with this group of people, meeting in person always feels familiar. There are always new faces too! My first Hackfests were magical days in which I was able to do my tiny things side by side with prominent core team members. Learning and also being heard. It made me grow a lot. I also always found it rewarding to find people from distant latitudes, that benefit from something you've made (small, big, doesn't matter) and even found new creative ways to use or enhance it! This time wasn't different at all. I spent most of my time talking to people, discussing big ideas and making long-term decisions. I learned to love this new experience.From a more concrete POV, this time we were able to learn the different use cases for ILL that prevented us and Open Fifth to collaborate a bit more, and we unlocked several new thing that are coming to the project, including lending side handling. Sharing this experience with my coworkers and being a real team for all matters (coding, looking at a map, deciding together how to have fun, etc) has also been important. I felt more than ever how great ByWater and the people being part of it are.