Categories
Here’s one big reason to attend DemoCamp tonight:
Fresh camel meat with bearnaise sauce!
Actually, it’s our special guest, Damian Conway, who’ll be presenting his current project, a little scripting language you might have heard of called Perl 6.
DemoCamp 7 will take place tonight at 6:00 p.m. at No Regrets (42 Mowat Avenue). Since No Regrets is a restaurant, the after-DemoCamp social will also take place there. To find out more about the event, see the DemoCamp 7 wiki page.
Categories
Happy Independence Day!
To my American readers, friends and relatives: Happy Independence Day!
Bill Pullman played the president in Independence Day.
In honour of this day, here’s Bill Pullman’s speech to the troops before the final assault on the aliens in Independence Day [1.6 MB MP3 file]. Enjoy!
Categories
Happy Belated Canada Day!
I spent the holiday away from the computer, and Wendy and I had fun taking her parents around town. I hope your weekend was fun, and welcome to a short working week!
In honour of Canada Day, here’s Ren and Stimpy singing the Royal Canadian Kilted Yaksmen theme [1.9 MB MP3 file] (which I first posted in this entry).
Lucky number seven already? How time flies.
For those of you who haven’t heard of DemoCamp, here’s a quick summary. DemoCamp is basically “show and tell” for Toronto’s techies. Every month since December 2005, we’ve been getting together for Democamp, during which 5 or so people show a software or hardware project that they’re currently working on, constrained by two rules:
- You have 15 minutes in which to make your presentation. Typically, you’d split your presentation into 10 minutes for presentation, 5 minutes for questions or discussion.
- No slides! No PowerPoint, Keynote or any kind of slideshows. You’re supposed to show your project in action, not handwave!
This month’s presenters are:
- Portal Prophet Platform Demo from Domainer Inc. – Kristan Uccello
- FeelingBullish.com Financial Social Networks Demo – Josh Blinick
- Paruba.com Tagging the e-commerce web – Teehan+Lax
- The Glove: 3D info visualization – Cameron Browning
- Special Guest Appearance: Perl 6 – Damian Conway
DemoCamp 7 will take place on Tuesday, July 4th at 6:30 p.m. at No Regrets (42 Mowat Avenue). Since No Regrets is a restaurant, the after-DemoCamp social will also take place there. To find out more about the event, see the DemoCamp 7 wiki page.
Categories
Boston Bumper Stickers
When I was last in Boston — just a couple of weeks ago, to attend Wendy’s 10th college reunion — we were driving about and saw the car below, which sported a couple of amusing bumper stickers:
Yeah, I Photoshop-blurred the licence plate.
Here’s a close-up of the bumper sticker on the left. I need one of these:
And here’s the one on the right:
(This article also appears on Tucows Farm.)
The Ruby community are a bunch of lucky stiffs because why the lucky stiff is among their number. We’re lucky enough that why has given us his book-in-progress, why’s (poignant) guide to Ruby, the most whimsical programming book ever. Somehow, it manages to be both entertaining and still useful as a tutorial. We’re doubly lucky that why is also a gifted entertainer, who came to RailsConf not to deliver a keynote, but to give us a multimedia show.
Accompanied by his band, the Thirsty Cups, why treated us to a show that alternated between Ruby-themed musical numbers whose lyrics included unit tests and David Heinemeier Hansson dying at the hands of Robert Scoble, strange but amusing stories about koalas and “obidience lacquer” and sentient puddings coding viruses, and Flash animations, one of which was an amusing comparison of Java’s and Ruby’s exception handling (Java is wussy, in that it will try to catch you, while Ruby is more movie hero-like: it will begin a rescue mission).
Here’s a quick sample: a QuickTime movie of a number whose chorus is “Am I a Programmer Yet?” [11 MB]
A scene from why’s crazy multimedia show. Click the image to see the video (11MB, QuickTime)
“You know, you’d never see this kind ofthing at JavaOne,” I said to someone beside me during one of why’s songs, which are a sort of Ween-meets-Danielson-sounding.
I got to chat with why for a little bit after his performance. The moment was captured by Sebastian Delmont, probably around the time when why saw the accordion slung around my right arm and asked “Wait a minute…aren’t you the Accordion Guy?”
I meet why. Photo by Sebastian Delmont. Click the image to see it on its Flickr page.
If you ever get the chance to see one of why’s performances, do it! And why, if you’re reading this: if you ever need an accordion player to sit in, you know whom to call.