Your guide to submitting a session proposal

Write and edit a couple of drafts of your session proposal using the offline form. Please note: You must enter your session information via the online submission form to formally apply to speak at GitHub Universe.

Think about your session title as the subject line of an email. Keep it short, punchy, and persuasive, and ask yourself how it would get an attendee to add it to their schedule.

The best Universe sessions surprise and delight. Think beyond slides and talking points. Have you considered a live demo, an interactive exercise, a storytelling approach, or something completely unexpected? Some of our most memorable sessions have used unconventional formats — from live action activities to collaborative problem-solving. If you have an idea that breaks the mold, tell us about it. Creativity is a feature, not a bug.

Have a friend outside of your industry review the proposal before you submit. They might not understand the technical language, but a fresh perspective is always helpful.

Sessions are intended to be educational, not salesy. When crafting your abstract, focus on sharing actionable insights, real-world examples, and best practices that deliver value to attendees. Avoid heavy product promotion, and instead engage your audience with ideas and lessons they can apply.

Do you need some inspiration for your bio? Here's a formula that might help: Your name + something descriptive about what you do (vs. just stating your title and company) + why you are credible + your role and/or any previous roles that are relevant + any extracurricular professional accolades or organizations you're part of + something personal that both humanizes you and that you'd feel comfortable sharing during an icebreaker session.

While it's optional for speakers to submit videos of previous talks, we strongly encourage you to do so, as it enhances our ability to assess your speaking style. If you don't have a video of a previous talk, you're welcome to provide a five-minute self-recorded video presenting on a topic of your choice. See this great example from Universe 2025 speaker Thomas Bissell (Sr. Associate, Digital Manufacturing Solution Engineering at Pfizer), who recorded a video on how the seven modes of the major scale work musically and how they create different emotional qualities ranging from bright to dark.

Share the cool thing you shipped. Whether you're maintaining an open source project, building an internal tool that scales a workflow, or creating something that solves a real developer problem, this is your stage. Tell us what you built, why it matters, and what you learned along the way. Inspire other developers to build and contribute. Plan for Q&A so attendees can engage with your work.

Whether you're a product leader announcing what's new, a customer sharing how you scaled developer tools across your business, or an industry voice discussing emerging trends, these sessions deliver insights grounded in real experience.

Share tips, tricks, and best practices that help users get more out of a specific product. Perfect for showing what's possible and inspiring people to try something new.

Interactive exercises where you guide attendees through practical learning. Participants actively apply concepts in a collaborative setting and walk away with skills they can implement immediately. The immersive format delivers the kind of depth that justifies the investment.

A session that combines demo and workshop. You'll demonstrate how you solved a specific challenge, then guide attendees through interactive exercises to apply what they learned.

A moderated conversation where a diverse group of experts discuss timely topics shaping the industry. Panels work best when they challenge conventional thinking and spark new ideas. Plan for significant Q&A and audience interaction.

A moderated one-on-one conversation. Think panel discussion, but with a single speaker instead of multiple experts.

Git's nine lives: Taming frontend chaos with Git's hidden features

Why it works

The title is creative and memorable, using a cat metaphor to make a technical topic approachable. It's specific enough that developers immediately understand the session is about practical Git skills, yet playful enough to spark curiosity.

Frontend development at scale can feel like herding cats — messy rebases, oversized monorepos, and disappearing commits at every turn. But Git has some hidden tricks that can help you land on your feet.

In this fast-paced, story-driven session, we'll use the metaphor of a cat's nine lives to explore Git's lesser-known features: sparse checkouts, partial clones, commit-graph optimizations, reflog, and more. Along the way, you'll pick up practical tips (and a few laughs) to help you tame Git chaos and keep your projects running smoothly.

Why it works

The abstract opens with a relatable problem that resonates with frontend developers, then immediately offers concrete solutions. It's specific about what attendees will learn while keeping a conversational tone that promises both practical value and genuine engagement.

Frontend development at scale is beautiful chaos — like trying to herd cats. You start with clean branches and good intentions, but then here come the rebases, the CI pipelines that never finish, and the monorepo that just keeps growing. This session is a story — told through the metaphor of a cat with nine lives — about surviving (and thriving) in complex Git workflows.

We begin with a moment of overwhelm: too many contributors, too many folders, and a rebase gone horribly wrong. That's when the Git Cat appears — a symbol of resilience, agility, and unapologetic independence — and shows us how to land on our feet.

• Life 1 – Rebase Like a Cat: Elegance in motion. Learn how git rebase -i and rerere can bring back control and confidence during conflict resolution.
• Life 2 – Clean Commits, Clear Minds: Like a cat grooming its fur — tidy up your history with squashing and thoughtful commits for better code review and collaboration.
• Life 3 – Sparse Checkouts, Focused Flow: Cats don't need the whole house to nap. Why should developers clone the whole repo? Focus only on what you need with sparse checkout.
• Life 4 – Partial Clones, Full Speed: Not every journey needs to carry the full load. We'll explore partial clones to accelerate onboarding and local performance.
• Life 5 – Pouncing with Performance: Tap into Git's hidden speed boosts — commit-graph, bitmap indices, and MIDX — to move with cat-like efficiency.
• Life 6 – Reflog to the Rescue: Falling off the branch? Git reflog can bring back that precious lost commit. Like a cat, there's always a way back up.
• Life 7 – Smarter Fetches, Less Meowing: Learn how Git's improved fetch negotiation protocol reduces noise and boosts sync speeds — no extra setup needed.
• Life 8 – Teaching with Curiosity: Git can be confusing. That's why we'll use visual metaphors, humor, and a little cat magic to explain complex internals simply.
• Life 9 – GitHub-Native Living: Tie it all together with GitHub-hosted repos, Codespaces, and frontend team habits that make collaboration feel smooth and natural.

We'll bring these lives to life with illustrated slides, cat metaphors, short terminal clips, and a playful audience poll: "What Git cat are you?" No live coding — just clear, focused moments of storytelling.

We'll wrap with a gentle nudge: Git doesn't have to be a source of fear. It can be a graceful, powerful part of your workflow — if you learn its rhythm. You'll leave with a cheat sheet, a smile, and maybe a little more curiosity about what Git can do for you.

Why it works

Rather than listing Git features, Pillippa structures the session around a metaphor that makes complex concepts memorable. The outline shows creativity through illustrated slides, cat metaphors, and audience interaction while ensuring attendees leave with techniques they can use right away.