Brace Digital at Umbraco UK Festival 2024

Last week some of the Brace Digital team had the pleasure of attending the Umbraco UK Festival in Shoreditch, London. As long-time members of the Umbraco community and proud sponsors of this year’s festival, it was an incredible opportunity to reconnect with old friends, meet new faces, and dive into the latest advancements in Umbraco and beyond.

Our experience began the night before the festival at a pre-party event hosted by Umbraco at Shuffle Club. The pre-party was a warm and vibrant gathering where we met up with familiar faces and welcomed new members into the community. It’s always inspiring to see how the community thrives, growing each year with passionate developers, designers, and digital specialists. You can't move for hugs, high fives and rekindling friendships.

The main event day was packed with insightful talks and sessions. From the opening keynote to the closing talk, the festival schedule was diverse, covering technical advancements, accessibility, sustainability and even the future of AI within the Umbraco ecosystem. Here are a few of the highlights that left a strong impression on me:

A New Sustainability Standard: SCI by Asim Hussain

Asim introduced a new standard for sustainability in tech, SCI (Software Carbon Intensity). It was fascinating to see how we, as developers and tech enthusiasts, can play a part in promoting sustainability in our field, reducing the environmental impact of digital services.

Handling Nullable Types in C# by Jason Elkin

Jason’s talk was a practical guide to navigating nullable types in C#, a topic many developers can relate to. His insights were on best practices and potential pitfalls for developers to consider when developing.

Multi-Dimensional Content by Laura Weatherhead

Laura's talk explained how, although Umbraco is highly flexible in creating multi variants of content pages including multi lingual and personalisation techniques, that it can become difficult to manage for content editors. This talk was extremely thought provoking and certainly outlined some of the risks and factors which should be considered with multi variant websites. 

Accessibility in Design for Color Blind Users by Matt Sutherland

Matt’s talk on how colour blindness can impact user experience was eye-opening. As well as explaining the different types of colour blind impairments that people can experience, Matt showed us some examples of the different impacts that should be considered and we even got a quick test for ourselves to see if we were colour blind! Understanding these visual challenges reminded us of the importance of inclusive design, ensuring that our work remains accessible and user-friendly for everyone.

Building Your Own AI with Umbraco by Callum Whyte

Callum’s session on creating AI within Umbraco opened up exciting possibilities for future projects. The talk demonstrated that, with the right tools, AI can be accessible from within Umbraco.

The Future of Umbraco Products by Bolette Kern

Bolette’s closing talk gave us a glimpse into the future direction of Umbraco’s product lineup. It’s thrilling to see how Umbraco continues to innovate and evolve, and it left us excited about what’s to come for this versatile platform.

The Umbraco UK Festival was a day of learning, inspiration, and community. Being part of an event that celebrates innovation, inclusivity, and open-source collaboration was both fulfilling and motivating. Here at Brace Digital we were extremely proud to sponsor this event to support the Umbraco Foundation and the community as a whole. As we look ahead, we’re excited to apply what we’ve learned to our clients' websites.