On October 14, 2026, Ceph Day Zurich opened its doors at the University of Zurich. Looking back, it was a day that clearly demonstrated how active, collaborative, and engaged the Ceph community truly is.
When organizing an event of this scale, good attendance is always the goal. Seeing the hall in the RAA building completely filled - with virtually all registered attendees showing up, many having flown in from abroad - exceeded our expectations. A special thank you goes out to all attendees and speakers for arriving on time: thanks to everyone getting there early, check-in from 8:00 AM ran without friction, setting a relaxed and welcoming tone over the first cup of coffee.
16 Sessions: Deep Technical Dive All Day Long
Running 16 talks in a single day is an ambitious schedule. What stood out most was the sustained focus in the room: all the way through to the final presentation late in the afternoon, questions were sharp, participation stayed high, and conversations remained lively.
Credit for that belongs directly to our speakers. The agenda covered a broad, practical range of topics: from internal architectures, Cephadm, and Rook to large-scale infrastructure deployments, automation, and real-world migration paths from legacy systems into the Ceph ecosystem. Each speaker shared concrete experiences and practical takeaways from their day-to-day operations.
A big thank you also goes to our moderator: he tied the sessions together seamlessly throughout the day, bridging each topic with thoughtful context. His personalized, well-researched introductions for every speaker gave the packed schedule a structured, approachable feel.
Strong Backing: Thank You to Partners, Sponsors & Supporters
A community gathering like this depends on reliable partners who actively invest in open-source infrastructure:
Warm thanks to the team at the University of Zurich for hosting us in the RAA building and ensuring the on-site audio/video setup ran smoothly throughout.
Special thanks to our lanyard sponsor HST Greenfield: Rolf Hunzinger and his team not only backed the event financially, but also spent the entire day on site, joining the discussions and connecting directly with attendees.
A sincere thank you to all our Supporters: by opting for a supporter ticket, you directly contributed to making this event possible at this standard. As a token of our appreciation, supporters received the exclusive event hoodie alongside the official Ceph Day Zurich T-shirt—and had their place on our on-site Wall of Fame. Thank you for stepping up.
Practical Discussions at the Topic Tables
The interactions between sessions were every bit as valuable as the presentations on stage. Over coffee breaks, lunch, and around our dedicated "Topic Tables", conversations between sysadmins, storage architects, and developers stayed pragmatic, candid, and direct.
People shared notes on day-to-day production workloads, unexpected hurdles during major migrations, and patterns for resilience. That willingness to share genuine operational knowledge is what defines the Ceph community.
Slide Decks Now Live
For those who want to revisit specific sessions or couldn't attend in person, the speaker slide decks are now available on the official Ceph event page:
View the presentation slides on the Ceph Event Page
Looking Ahead: Ceph Day Karlsruhe 2027
Our day in Zurich confirmed once again how valuable face-to-face exchanges are for the open-source community. The next date is already set: we look forward to seeing everyone again at Ceph Day Karlsruhe on April 14–15, 2027!
Thank you to everyone who joined us in Zurich and made the day what it was.