July 2021: Article updated to fix some of the rules and details.
I'm happy to announce the Vaadin Community Award (VCA) program, which recognizes the valuable efforts of top contributors in the Vaadin Community.
Let's build a stronger community
It's no secret that having a strong and enthusiastic community around open-source technologies is one of the main driving factors in the success of not only open-source projects but, most importantly, of their users. Look at projects such as Linux, Java and, yes, Vaadin! They always have passionate developers constantly sharing knowledge and contributions in the form of books, tutorials, bug reports, code… you name it!
A stronger community means that you, as a user, get more answers to questions, better learning resources, more bug fixes, more add-ons, better functionality and, in general, a higher level of confidence and success when using the technology. The VCA program aims to recognize and foster this type of contribution around Vaadin technologies.
How does the Vaadin Community Award work?
The Vaadin Community Award is a program that recognizes community members with an exceptional track record of community participation. The VCA is given to members that actively lead online and local Vaadin communities, speak at conferences or Java User Groups, create and maintain popular Vaadin Directory add-ons, publish articles and videos centered on Vaadin features and integrations with other technologies, engage in social media, Discord, and Stack Overflow discussions, and, in general, constantly and passionately help other members of the Vaadin Community.
VCA winners:
- Are selected by the Vaadin DevRel team every year
- Get the "Vaadin Community Award winner" title
- Are not Vaadin employees
What are the perks of winning the Vaadin Community Award?
As a VCA winner you:
- Receive a physical recognition token
- Get listed on the official VCA page on vaadin.com
- Are interviewed for the Community Spotlight blog post series (optional)
- Get the moderator role on Discord
- Get a free one-year Pro subscription valued at US$1428
How to join the community
Everybody is welcome to join the community, regardless of their experience with Vaadin. Join the growing group of fellow developers on Discord, Twitter, YouTube, and Stack Overflow. Don't hesitate to use hashtags (#vaadin) and tag the official Vaadin accounts when you share cool stuff such as tips and tricks, screenshots of your apps, talks you gave, add-ons you published, or anything else that could interest other developers.