Cloud Native PDX September: Observability Night!
For September, we're taking advantage of a speaker in town for DevOpsDaysPDX, and making it an all-observability night, with FluentBit and OpenTelemetry.
Date: Wednesday, September 16, 2026
Time: 6:00 PM – 8:00 PM
Location: SteepleJack Brewing, Fireside Room, 2400 NE Broadway, Portland
A big thank you to SUSE for sponsoring catering at SteepleJack, as well as Eric's travel.
First Presentation: No C, No Opaque AI: Watch Your First Fluent Bit Contribution Happen Live
Speaker: Eric D. Schabell, SUSE
Contributing to a CNCF graduated project feels out of reach until someone shows you exactly how it happens. In this session, that someone is on stage doing it in real time — spotting a gap between what the Fluent Bit codebase actually does and what the docs say, opening a branch on a live fork, running the project's prose linter, writing a properly signed commit, and pushing a pull request that closes a real tracked issue. Every step, no shortcuts, no slides pretending to be a terminal.
You will leave knowing the two-repo mental model that makes Fluent Bit doc contributions work, the git habits that signal credibility to maintainers, and the AI guardrails that keep your name attached to work you actually stand behind. Your first PR does not require deep C knowledge. It requires knowing where to look, how to show your work, and when to keep your hands on the wheel.
Second Presentation: Devs, Transform (Your Data) and Roll Out!: Learning and Leveraging OTTL
Speaker: Reese Lee, New Relic
The OpenTelemetry Collector is OTel’s power tool for ingesting and processing your app and infrastructure data, but there’s even more you can do with your data before it reaches your backend! Learn how to start leveraging OTTL, or OpenTelemetry Transformation Language, to manage your data volume and quality. We’ll explore the syntax basics and its underlying architecture within the Collector, where its strength really comes into play, w
Join us for Hacktoberfest Hack Day Portland x Portland AI Devs — a one-day, in-person community hack day focused on learning, collaboration, and open-source contribution, part of Major League Hacking's Hacktoberfest. Whether you're new to open source or an experienced contributor, come connect with fellow developers, explore real-world projects, and build together. Participants will work on pull requests, issues, and open-source contributions, with hands-on hacking using open-weight models and open-source AI tools. Schedule: 9:00 AM – 9:30 AM: Check-in and welcome 9:30 AM – 1:30 PM: Collaborative hacking and open-source contributions 1:30 PM – 2:00 PM: Project demos, wrap-up, and networking Hosted by Portland AI Devs at the Portland State Business Accelerator. Light food will be provided. Just bring your laptop, curiosity, and a desire to build something together. MLH event page: https://events.mlh.com/events/15552-hacktoberfest-hack-day-portland-x-portland-ai-devs
## Details \#\# Mentorship Saturdays Partnership Because of the big overlap between our communities, we’ve partnered with Mentorship Saturdays. As a result, we’ll now be hosting two Code & Coffee events per month — at this location \#\# What to Expect: Roseline Coffee is an inclusive, informal co-working session. Drink some coffee, bring your laptop, and have engaging conversations. This is a great opportunity to learn from others, share your knowledge, and possibly collaborate on side projects, online courses, or even your day-to-day work tasks. Still uncertain? Let's chat on Discord! \#\# Venue: The Venue is at Roseline Coffee, who is graciously allowing us to host a space. WIFI, power outlets Recommended Parking: Smart Park, $7 all day https://www.portland.gov/transportation/parking/smartpark \#\# Agenda: 10 AM - Arrival: Head to the couches or the big table 10:15 AM - Introductions: Share your name Discuss your current projects or interests. If you don’t have a specific project, share what intrigues you! Mention your expertise and how you can assist others. Are you job hunting or hiring? Let us know! Community events you wanna plug. If none, that's cool too. 12:30 AM - Wrapping Up: You can stay longer, but we'll officially be done! We usually grab lunch as a group at near by food carts \#\# Online Link
Students are already using AI. This panel conversation will tackle what's actually happening: the different ways students are using it, what it might be doing to how they think and learn, and what it means when a chatbot becomes a student's go-to when they're stressed or stuck, not just a source of homework help. Three things we'll get into: The range of ways students are actually using AI, and why one story doesn't fit them all Whether AI is changing how students think, not just what they turn in What it means when students reach for AI instead of a teacher, tutor, or someone else, when they're overwhelmed or need support This is for anyone who teaches, parents, or works with students, or just cares about where education is headed. Panelists: Seth Fleischauer, Founder & President of Banyan Global Learning, host of Make It Mindful: Insights for Global Learning Mohan Nair, author of Unreachable: How Not to Lose Your Mind in an AI-Obsessed Era More panelists to come...