Name of City: Hamburg, Germany

(http://www.hamburg.de/)

Difficulty/Cost of Air Travel:

From/To Hamburg Airport

(http://www.airport.de/index_en.phtml)

go flights

- hourly to Frankfurt/Munich, Germany

- 5-8 times a day to major European Airports

- no intercontinental flights

For schedules see the Timetable

(http://www.airport.de/en/abflug_live.phtml?lang=en&anab=ab)

Local Support Organizations:

Staff and Students of University of Hamburg

Staff, Team Assistance of Sun Microsystems

(potentially OpenOffice.org DE project and

local User groups)

Attractiveness/Proximity to Contributors:

The majority of contributors seems to be located in Europe.

We have a very active DE.OpenOffice.org Project. Members have staffed several events in Germany. They have good relations to other projects and local or international partners.

Sun Development is (mostly) located in Hamburg, Germany

Attractiveness/Proximity to User-Volunteers:

Historically OpenOffice.org has a large user community in Germany.

English is understood.

Cost and Quality of Convention Facilities:

University of Hamburg (http://www.uni-hamburg.de/index_e.html) has the facilities to host a conference.

The OpenOffice.org Conference would be held in Philosophenturm

(http://www.uni-hamburg.de/Publikat/falt_e.html).

There are several lecture halls (up to 350 people) and small seminar room available.

The location is available without charge.

Cost and Availablitly of Local Accomodations:

Hotels of all price classes (50 EUR – 250 EUR) are in the area (Hamburg Außenalster West / Alsterlake West).

(http://www.hamburg-tourism.de/hotel/TISWeb.Dll?LieferInfoSeite(POL%7C%7CSTRUKTUR1?INDEX%7C%7CHTML_KAT_NAEHEVON_AUS_K1_S1)?&herkunft=)

From some of those you can walk to the conference location.

Other Considerations:

The root of OpenOffice.org is in Hamburg, Germany.

There is a large user base in Germany, which might be interested in joining the project.

Choosing Hamburg would allow many OpenOffice.org projects to be represented.

It gives the community esp. a chance to tighten the relation to contributors located in Hamburg.

The host (University of Hamburg) has a relation to the project and is not only interested in supporting the event, but also participates in the XML project and would like to actively join the group of speakers.

Choosing a date just after CeBIT 2003 (20.03.2003-21.03.2003) would allow attendees to arrive from Hanover (~150km, 1 train hour). There might be problems in availability of accommodations due to CeBIT.

Hamburg has all attractions/sights and possibilities for evening programs of a city with 1.5 mio citizens.